s, in how many ways, by which it
would be preceded and followed! how many wounds, open and secret, would it
inflict upon the body politic! And, if it fails, which is to be expected,
then a double mischief will ensue from its recognition of evils which it
has been unable to remedy. These are your deep misgivings; and, in
proportion to the force with which they come to you, is the concern and
anxiety which you feel, that there should be those whom you love, whom you
revere, who from one cause or other refuse to enter into them.

5.

This, I repeat, is what some good Catholics will say to me, and more than
this. They will express themselves better than I can speak for them in
their behalf,--with more earnestness and point, with more force of argument
and fulness of detail; and I will frankly and at once acknowledge, that I
shall insist on the high theological view of a University without
attempting to give a direct answer to their arguments against its present
practicability. I do not say an answer cannot be given; on the contrary, I
have a confident expectation that, in proportion as those objections are
looked in the face, they will fade away. But, however this may be, it
would not become me to argue the matter with those who understand the
circumstances of the problem so much better than myself. What do I know of
the state of things in Ireland, that I should presume to put ideas of
mine, which could not be right except by accident, by the side of theirs,
who speak in the country of their birth and their home? No, Gentlemen, you
are natural judges of the difficulties which beset us, and they are
doubtless greater than I can even fancy or forbode. Let me, for the sake
of argument, admit all you say against our enterprise, and a great deal
more. Your proof of its intrinsic impossibility shall be to me as cogent
as my own of its theological advisableness. Why, then, should I be so rash
and perverse as to involve myself in trouble not properly mine? Why go out
of my own place? Why so headstrong and reckless as to lay up for myself
miscarriage and disappointment, as though I were not sure to have enough
of personal trial anyhow without going about to seek for it?

Reflections such as these would be decisive even with the boldest and most
capable minds, but for one consideration. In the midst of our difficulties
I have one ground of hope, just one stay, but, as I think, a sufficient
one, which serves me in the stead of