Ireland

Ireland occupies a central place in the book’s account of providence because the author presents it as a test of Great Britain’s religious responsibility. The country’s political future is linked to the treatment of its people’s religious education: in the author’s view, Great Britain’s failure to evangelize Ireland has put its hold on the country in danger. Ireland is therefore not merely a setting for debate about schooling. It is where the book’s claims about Scripture, government, religious freedom, and national responsibility meet.

Ireland in the Providential Argument

The author places Ireland within a wider claim about Great Britain’s rise and obligations. Great Britain’s influence, the book argues, is not simply the natural result of its island position or commercial advantages; its standing carries a religious responsibility. The argument invokes the history of Cyrus and the captive Jews as a precedent for power granted for a purpose, then turns that precedent toward Great Britain: its place among nations is presented as a trust that should be used to make the Bible available in Ireland and India.

This interpretation gives Ireland a consequential place in the book’s account of national conduct. The author argues that Great Britain has allowed Ireland to remain in ignorance for many ages and has hoped to retain it by accommodating superstition. In this view, such accommodation does not resolve the conflict; it leaves the underlying religious and educational question unanswered. The warning that Great Britain may lose Ireland is thus framed not as a prediction based on military or administrative events, but as a consequence of failing to fulfill what the author regards as a providential duty.

The Dispute over Education

The chief practical focus is the national system of education and its exclusion of the Bible. The author distinguishes between its effects on Protestants, who are said to have Scripture in their homes, and its effects on Roman Catholics, whom the system is said to keep from the Bible. This distinction makes the criticism more specific than a general complaint about state schooling: the central charge is that public provision enables education to proceed without Scripture, restricting the latter’s reach among those the author considers most in need of it.

The book also addresses the political defense of non-interference in religious belief. It portrays politicians as arguing that attempts to enlighten people about religion risk disturbing existing practices. The author rejects that caution as theoretical rather than grounded in knowledge of human nature, and points to Ireland and India as cases where, in the book’s account, experience has discredited such political speculation. Ireland thus appears in a dispute over who should determine the terms of education: government policy, religious authorities, or access to the Bible.

The Alternative of Scriptural Schooling

Against the national system, the author describes the prospect of a different educational course. Scriptural education was advancing, and the London Hibernian Society, supported by Christian efforts in England, Scotland, and Ireland, might have extended Bible education throughout the country if government had not intervened. The passage presents this as a contingent opportunity rather than an accomplished nationwide outcome. It further argues that clerical opposition could not have kept people away from schools where the Bible was read and memorized, had government funding not made Bible-free schooling possible.

That account assigns institutional support a decisive role: the concern is not simply that the Bible was absent from particular lessons, but that public funds helped sustain an alternative educational arrangement. The author nevertheless does not describe the door as permanently closed. Jesus Christ, in the book’s theological interpretation, has allowed it to shut for a time but can open it again. Meanwhile, the existing system may prepare people to read Scripture when the opportunity comes. The comparison with a rebel who learns military drill before returning to allegiance expresses this paradox: an education initially directed toward a purpose the author opposes may still supply capacities later put to a different use.

Political Stakes and Unresolved Tension

The argument’s desired outcome is freedom of conscience combined with access to biblical instruction. The author says conscience should be free, but objects to paying people to maintain what the passage calls an empire of ignorance. Ireland’s predicament is therefore presented through a tension between liberty and provision: the state should not compel belief, yet its education policy is criticized for making schooling possible without the Bible and thereby, in the author’s view, restricting its access.

The book’s conclusion is both warning and hope. Great Britain is urged to recognize that its position depends on faithfulness to the God of the Bible; Ireland’s alienation is treated as the possible consequence of neglect, while later access to Scripture remains possible. These are the author’s providential judgments, not a neutral account of Irish public opinion or the full workings of the education system. Within that argument, however, Ireland becomes a measure of whether political power will be used to support the religious mission the book believes it has been given.