lived in the first half of the eighteenth century, when the whole
machinery of government was ruthlessly used to crush the Catholics.
But Berkeley had little sympathy with the penal laws; he had words of
kindness for the Catholics, and undoubtedly wished them well. Nor
must Swift be forgotten, for though he took little pride in being an
Irishman, he hated and despised those who oppressed Ireland, and is
rightly regarded as one of the greatest of her sons.

The short period during which Grattan's parliament existed was one of
great prosperity. It was then that Maynooth College was established
for the education of the Irish priesthood. But Catholics, though free
to set up schools, were still shut out from the honors and emoluments
of Trinity College, the one university at that time in Ireland.
Still, Charles O'Connor, MacGeoghegan, and O'Flaherty were great
Catholic scholars in the latter part of the eighteenth century.

In the following century, while Protestant ascendancy was still
maintained, the Catholics had greater scope. Away back in the days of
Queen Elizabeth, Campion found Latin widely spoken among the
peasantry, and Father Mooney met country lads familiar with Virgil
and Homer. In 1670, Petty had a similar story to tell, in spite of
all the savageries of Cromwell and the ruin which necessarily
followed. And in the eighteenth century the schoolmaster, though a
price was set on his head, was still active. With an inherited love
of learning, the Irish in the nineteenth century would have made
rapid progress had they been rich. But their impoverishment by the
penal laws made it impossible for them to set up an effective system
of primary education, and until the national school system came into
existence in 1831, they had to rely on the hedge-schools. Secondary
education fared better, for the bishops, relying with confidence on