however, equal numbers of the council were to be chosen, by the Crown, by co-optation, by the professors, and by the graduates. The Bill, according to the Bishop of Peterborough--by far the ablest Protestant ecclesiastic Ireland has produced in the Victorian period--“was as good as could be under the circumstances,” and “ought to have pleased all parties.”[49] Unfortunately it pleased nobody, and its weak point was obvious. It attempted to provide for separate denominational education in the affiliated colleges, and for mixed secular education in Trinity College and the University of Dublin, to which they were affiliated--the one system being as incompatible with the other as an acid with an alkali. As Mr. Gathorne-Hardy said, the exclusion of History and Philosophy rendered the new University a monster _cui lumen ademptum_. The proposal to make the Irish Viceroy its Chancellor recalled, he declared, the lines of Milton, “Its shape, If shape it can be called, which shape had none Distinguishable in feature, joint, or limb--” all the more that “What seemed its head, The likeness of a kingly crown had on.” At first the Bill was very well received, and there was a general disposition to admit that, in view of the limiting conditions of the problem, it was impossible to find a solution less offensive to the Protestants, and more generous to the Catholics of Ireland. But in a few days it became apparent that the measure was doomed. Ministers had been led to believe by their colleague, Mr. Monsell, who was the spokesman of the Catholic clergy, that the compromise would be accepted by them. But the Catholic Bishops met in secret, and decided to oppose the Bill.[50] As the Catholics opposed it for giving them too little, the Protestants opposed it because it gave the Catholics too much. The apostles of culture opposed it because it cut History and Philosophy out of the University curriculum, and in doing so they furnished all discontented Liberals with a good non-political excuse for voting against the Government. The Bill was defeated on the 12th of March by a vote of 287 to 284, the votes of 36 Catholic Members and 9 Liberals[51] having turned the scale. To the very last moment the issue was uncertain, because it was known that if Mr. Gladstone had offered to abandon the teaching clauses of the Bill, he would have won over a sufficient number of Catholic votes to carry it.[52]