d with the conformity between the
proposed measure and the accepted principles of university
organisation in England; but that the Roman catholics would think
themselves hardly or at least not generously used. All that Mr.
Gladstone has heard this morning through private channels, as well
as the general tone of the press, tends to corroborate the
favourable parts of what he gathered last night, and to give hope
that reasonable and moderate Roman catholics may see that their
real grievances will be removed; generally also to support the
expectation that the bill is not likely to pass.

Delane of the _Times_ said to Manning when they were leaving the House of
Commons, "This is a bill made to pass." Manning himself heartily
acquiesced. Even the bitterest of Mr. Gladstone's critics below the
gangway on his own side agreed, that if a division could have been taken
while the House was still under the influence of the three hours' speech,
the bill would have been almost unanimously carried.(284) "It threw the
House into a mesmeric trance," said the seconder of a hostile motion.
Effects like these, not purple passages, not epigrams nor aphorisms, are
the test of oratory. Mr. Bruce wrote home (Feb. 15): "Alas! I fear all
prospect of ministerial defeat is over. The University bill is so well
received that people say there will not be even a division on the second
reading. I see no other rock ahead, but sometimes they project their
snouts unexpectedly, and cause shipwreck."

Soon did the projecting rocks appear out of the smooth water. Lord Spencer
had an interview with Cardinal Cullen at Dublin Castle (Feb. 25), and
found him though in very good humour and full of gratitude for fair
intentions, yet extremely hostile to the bill. It was in flat opposition,
he said, to what the Roman catholics had been working for in Ireland for
years; it continued the Queen's Colleges, and set up another Queen's
College in the shape of Trinity College with a large endowment; it
perpetuated the mixed system of education, to which he had always been
opposed, and no endowment nor assistance was given to the catholic
university; the council might appoint professors to teach English
literature, geology, or zoology who would be dangerous men in catholic
eyes. Lord Spencer gathered that the cardinal would be satisfied with a
sum down to redress inequality or a grant for buildings.

Archbishop Manning wrote to Cardi