The project of a Catholic University for Ireland was launched at the Synod of Thurles in 1850. To revive true learning was essential for the well-being of Irish Catholics; the suggestion of Pius IX and the example of Louvain
The project of a Catholic University for Ireland was launched at the Synod of Thurles in 1850. To revive true learning was essential for the well-being of Irish Catholics; the suggestion of Pius IX and the example of Louvain were inspiring; and, above all, it was necessary to provide a seat of higher education on Catholic lines for lay students who kept away from the condemned Queen's Colleges, where religion had no official or collegiate recognition and the governing and academic bodies, as regards Cork and Galway, were foreign to the religious convictions of the people they were intended to educate. The Holy See gave approval in 1852; liberal contributions poured in, and property was acquired in Dublin for university purposes. The bishops had secured John Henry Newman as rector for a short term of years. At their meeting in May, 1854, the hierarchy gave solemn effect to the papal letters regarding the erection of the university. On the Feast of Pentecost following Dr. Newman took the oath of office at a function in the metropolitan church, where Archbishop Cullen delivered an address. Statutes, framed for the government of the university, were sanctioned by the Holy See; papal authority was granted to confer degrees; and in November of the same year the work of the university began. The Irish hierarchy, acting through a committee, constituted the supreme governing body. Among its authorities the senate was the body representative of the university; and the rectorial council was the rector's ordinary adviser. The university had five faculties, viz.-theology, law, medicine, philosophy and letters, science. Newman was careful to secure the services of various distinguished men as professors and lecturers. The first appointments to professorial chairs comprised the names of Edmund O'Reilly, S.J., Dr. P. Leahy, Eugene O'Curry, T.W. Allies, and D.F. McCarthy; and gradually a considerable number of students, including some in high rank, from different European countries, began to frequent the halls of the new university. But the institution itself and its students laboured under the greatest disadvantages. The university had no charter from the State to confer degrees, nor were its lectures recognized elsewhere in Ireland as leading to a degree. It had to de