The Idea of a University

In his first discourse, Newman prepares the ground for the intellectual explorations in subsequent discourses. While he comes to the topic as a Catholic scholar speaking to a Catholic audience, he asserts that his case can be held true by all, whether religious or not: “The principles on which I would conduct the inquiry are attainable […] by the mere experience of life. They do not come simply of theology” (4). Newman defends this adoption of an experiential (rather than theological) foundation to his inquiry by noting that the Catholic Church has deferred to external authorities on issues of those authorities’ expertise, and so his adoption of nontheological principles for an inquiry into educational theory fits with the larger Catholic intellectual tradition. Thus, he proposes to make use of some of the educational theory underlying the Protestant university tradition in Great Britain, from which his own training derives.

Newman also answers objections against the idea of founding a Catholic university in Ireland. He appeals to specifically Catholic arguments, noting that the request for such a university in Ireland, coming from the Pope himself, overrides all practical concerns against it. In the