He reminded me that the prosperous and progressive municipality of Belfast, with a population eminently industrious, and predominantly Protestant, has to be policed by an Imperial force in order to restrain two sections of Irish Christians from assaulting each other in the name of religion.
[17] '_Pro salute animae meae_' was, I am reminded, the consideration usually expressed in the old charters of manumission.
[18] One of the unfortunate effects of this passion for building costly churches is the importation of quantities of foreign art-work in the shape of woodcarvings, stained glass, mosaics, and metal work.

To good foreign art, indeed, one could not, within certain limits, object.

It might prove a valuable example and stimulus.

But the articles which have actually been imported, in the impulse to get everything finished as soon as possible, generally consist of the stock pieces produced in a spirit of mere commercialism in the workshops of Continental firms which make it their business to cater for a public who do not know the difference between good art and bad.

Much of the decoration of ecclesiastical buildings, whether Roman Catholic or Protestant, might fittingly be postponed until religion in Ireland has got into closer relation with the native artistic sense and industrial spirit now beginning to seek creative expression.
[19] The following extract from a statement of the Most Rev.Dr.O'Dea, the newly elected Bishop of Clonfert, is pertinent:--'There is another cause also--i.e.in addition to the absence of university education for Roman Catholic laymen--which has hindered the employment of the laity in the past.