Mannix Quotes

“It was said that his decision to have his papers burnt was a defence against biographers. He had read a life of one of the archbishops of Dublin, Dr William Walsh, and thought it a travesty of the man he had known. No one would do that to him; no one would analyse the mind and heart of Daniel Mannix. It would be bad enough if they got it wrong. And for him, it might have been almost as bad if they got it right.”
― Brenda Niall, Mannix

“One curious postscript to the Mannix farewell to Maynooth has never been explained. Just two days before being consecrated as archbishop, near the end of his nine-day retreat of prayer and silence, he wrote a short note inviting an underqualified, obscure young teacher, whom he had never met, to apply for a part-time job lecturing in mathematics at Maynooth.45 Mannix could have left it to his successor to find a candidate for this minor post. Why did he want to help Eamon de Valera? In 1912, de Valera, a father of three, was struggling to get by with bits and pieces of teaching in secondary schools. The Maynooth connection would be an immense asset to a future political leader, but in 1912 de Valera hadn’t entered politics. All he had done was to get a disappointing pass degree in mathematics, learn Irish, and become secretary of a branch of the Gaelic League. Was Mannix trying to atone for the O’Hickey case? Whatever his reasons, he brought the future Sinn Féin leader, like a Trojan horse, into the clerical fortress of Maynooth.”
― Brenda Niall, Mannix

“He speaks with the clear enunciation and ready eloquence of his race, and uses his clear, pleasant-toned voice with practised effect.”
― Brenda Niall, Mannix

“As a young man Mannix was disgusted to see his cousin John Cagney take off his cap to Robert Sanders. ‘I always do that to my superiors,’ Cagney explained. ‘Well, my advice to you is to go about bald-headed,’ Daniel retorted.8”
― Brenda Niall, Mannix

“We know almost nothing about Daniel’s feeling for his parents. To read that he wept uncontrollably at his father’s funeral in May 1910 is startling, not just because it is the only testimony to their attachment, but because Daniel was then well on in his forties and his usual style was so restrained.1”
― Brenda Niall, Mannix

“The Australian National Secretariat of Catholic Action, then little more than an idea in the making, needed a deputy for the director, Frank Maher. Santamaria’s words—‘so I said…“Yes”, because I would have said yes to anything he asked’—echo down the years.7”
― Brenda Niall, Mannix

“IT TOOK THREE days to burn his private papers, so the legend has it.”
― Brenda Niall, Mannix