little changed.[191] Trinity College remains a Protestant institution well endowed, almost a monopoly of the Protestant upper class in Ireland, practically little resorted to by Irish Catholics; the Queen's Colleges are avoided by the Irish Catholics, as being 'irreligious' if called 'non-religious,' though the College of Belfast suits Presbyterian views; they, too, receive a large bounty from the State; but the Catholic University, the true seminary for the upper middle Catholic classes, and now divided into different colleges, is still, as such, left out in the cold. Its students, no doubt, can obtain Royal University degrees, and some of its professors have been placed as examiners on that foundation; but it is the veriest mockery to call this justice when we look at Trinity College and the Queen's Colleges. 'The words of scripture are reversed,' in Macaulay's language; 'the rich are filled with good things and the hungry are sent empty away.' I do not envy those who, whatever their reasons, refuse to acknowledge the wrong done by these arrangements. It will hardly be denied, in the twentieth century, that Protestant ascendency ought not to exist in any sphere of Irish affairs, and that in University life, as in all matters, Irish Catholics ought to have civil equality, and that without a violation of the rights of conscience. It has been triumphantly maintained that, in high education, these conditions are actually fulfilled in Ireland; Trinity College and the Queen's Colleges are accessible to all students, without regard to their religion or no religion; these have a perfectly equal right to share in the government and the honours of institutions thrown completely open. But those who argue in this way either shut their eyes to facts, or will not perceive that this fine 'liberalism' in Ireland works sheer injustice. Catholics are but a handful of students in Trinity College and the Queen's Colleges compared to what their natural proportion ought to be; Trinity College, if nominally open, is in all essential respects Protestant; the Queen's Colleges as being 'non-religious,' that is, in the view of their Church 'irreligious,' are practically avoided by Irish Catholics; yet the State endows Trinity College and the Queen's Colleges; it starves the Catholic University and other Catholic colleges, which are thus unfairly handicapped by their rivals. If this is not furthering Protestant ascendency in Irish high education, and denying civil equality to Irish Catholics who, in this matter, will not forego the rights of conscience, I do not know what else it can be; it seems to me to be iniquity in no doubtful sense. And are the objections of the Irish Catholics, in this province, as 'irrational' and 'superstitious' as has been scoffingly said? Reverse the case of Trinity College: suppose that England was a Catholic Power, and that she kept up a great Catholic University in the Irish capital, discountenancing Protestant institutions