THE ST. PATRICK'S COLLEGE COL LECTION.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 4006, 24 May 1884, Page 3

THE ST. PATRICK'S COLLEGE COL LECTION.

[To the Editor op the Daily Telegraph.] Sic, —Your two correspondents, '' A Catholic Layman" and "Diarmid," havo condescended to notice my short letter to you, .published on Tuesday, but neither has touched the real question at issue. What I implied, in a series of queries, "Catholic Layman " denies and "Diarmid" admits. The former tries to draw a red-herring across the scent, the latter, enacts the part

of a special pleader. But, apart from thendenials aud special pleadings, the fact remains that a sum of money, amounting to somewhere about £400, was collected, or promised to be subscribed, last Sunday, and the object of the collection was neither more nor less than to build a school for young people whose parents can afford to pay for their education. I insinuated that, to get such a large sum, the congregation had to be bounced into dipping deeply into their pockets. This is denied. So be it. But when the names of people who give largely are to be written in gold and publicly paraded; when the poor are told that poorer than they have contributed liberally; when servant girls are told that they can afford to give £1, and that £1 is expected from them, I am disposed to think that the language is bounce. I consider Diarmid s letter a piece of bounce with a very strong dash of bosh ; probably he does not think so. Wo will agree to differ, for the reason that a Catholic congregation cannot be judged on the same lines as members of other religious denominations. I rather think that it would take a very strong parson-power indeed in any other church but St. Mary's to draw a £10 note to build a school outside Napier. " Diarmicl's " opinion is that St. Patrick's College is to regenerate this colony, that it is to do what no other college has ever succeeded in doing; it is to give as the most pious of priests, the most learned of statesmen, the most philanthropic of lawyers, the most brilliant of literateurs, the most clever of medical men. And with such inflated eulogy the Catholics are supposed to be so impressed that, out of the abundance of their philanthropy, they are expected to give voluntarily and liberally. The same language might be used with regard to any school, but it is all bosh nevertheless. But because it was swallowed holus-bolus the bosh becomes bounce, and the poor are induced out of their poverty to give for the benefit of tho rich. There is not a rich man amongst the whole Catholic population of Napier, yet I have heard that very many subscribed from £5 up to £10, and even £25, to build this school at Wellington. As I said before, "every man to his taste," but I am inclined to think it very bad taste indeed to send so much money away, when it has been found necessary for Father Chesnais to deliver a lecture for the benefit of our local Convent schools, which are of infinitely more value to the poor people here than all the St. Patrick's Colleges outside Napier.—l am, &c, Napier, May 2'i, 1884.