3. Again, how are vacations consumed? The student who does not read at least two hours a day is letting a golden opportunity pass and wasting a precious gift of God--time. It may be said that this after all is a rather slow process; it will only mean about a volume a month. Yes, but that means twelve in a year, or at least eighty-four in your course, not a bad stock to start life with. 4. In the training of the future priest the recreation hour can be converted into the most important item on the day's programme. He plunges from the silence of the study hall into the vortex of the world, for it is the world in miniature; its passions, its pride, its meanness, as well as its gentleness of heart and heroism of spirit are all flowing around him. If properly utilised, the recreations can be minted into veritable gold. In the term "recreation" I include all those occasions of free intercourse where students meet to interchange thought--the hall, the club, &c.--and the more numerous these are the better. Here the student is his natural self, unrestrained by a master's presence. The young minds are free to wrestle, and opposing thoughts to clash. The fire of contradiction will test the genuine ore: the same fire will consume all that is worthless in his opinions and principles: the clay and alloy of his character too will go. He learns to cast away many a cherished notion now dinged and broken in the war of minds; he is taught to distrust himself and tolerate the opinions of others. If the recreation, however, is to be a mental gymnasium it must be guided by fixed rules, and this is most important. The tone must be of a high level. No vulgarity; no scurrility. _In the hottest debate we must not forget that we are gentlemen_. We should argue, not to overcome an opponent, but to make truth evident. Minds in debate should resemble flails on the threshing floor, that labour not to overcome each other, but to separate the solid grains from the chaff and straw. No man should be ashamed to say "I don't know" or "Perhaps I am wrong." Without these safeguards the recreation or debate might easily become a cock-pit of unbridled passions. "Our fortunes lie not in our stars, good Brutus, but in ourselves." The making of the priests depends not merely on the college, but also on the students' own endeavours. This latter fact is but imperfectly understood, or acted on only in a very limited extent. It is from intercourse between minds of various bents, the debating clubs, the social unions, and not the lecture halls or study desks, that the Oxford student draws strength and elegance of character. It is the want or misuse of these opportunities that leaves the young Irish priest so raw and unfinished. _Knowledge_ only comes from the professor and the book, but the _character_ is shaped, rounded, and polished by a variety of agencies lying outside both these. The creation of these agencies is almost entirely in the student's own hands.