“I DENY”
I postulate that there is no education in Ireland apart from the
voluntary efforts of a few people, mostly mad. Let us therefore not talk
of reform, or of reconstruction. You cannot reform that which is not;
you cannot by any process of reconstruction give organic life to a
negation. In a literal sense the work of the first Minister of Education
in a free Ireland will be a work of creation; for out of chaos he will
have to evolve order and into a dead mass he will have to breathe the
breath of life.
The English thing that is called education in Ireland is founded on a
denial of the Irish nation. No education can start with a Nego, any more
than a religion can. Everything that even pretends to be true begins
with its Credo. It is obvious that the savage who says “I believe in
Mumbo Jumbo” is nearer to true religion than the philosopher who says “I
deny God and the spiritual in man.” Now, to teach a child to deny is the
greatest crime a man or a State can commit. Certain schools in Ireland
teach children to deny their religion; nearly all the schools in Ireland
teach children to deny their nation. “I deny the spirituality of my
nation; I deny the lineage of my blood; I deny my rights and
responsibilities.” This Nego is their Credo, this evil their good.
To invent such a system of teaching and to persuade us that it is an
education system, an Irish education system to be defended by Irishmen
against attack, is the most wonderful thing the English have
accomplished in Ireland; and the most wicked.