CHAPTER XVII.

The Moral Scope.

The object of education is the harmonious development of the _whole_

man. So far we have spoken of the development of the intellect. Yet

the _will_ needs training even more than the intellect, and the higher

schools ought not to neglect this most important part of the work of

education. It cannot be gainsaid that the emphasis laid upon moral

training forms the most marked distinction between the true educator

and the mere instructor, of whatever creed he may be. At the same time

it is one of the most disquieting features of our age that so many

teachers in the higher schools have lost sight of this fundamental

principle of education. “I hold,” writes Dr. McCosh, “that in every

college the faculty should look after, not only the intellectual

improvement, but also the morals of those committed to their care by

parents and guardians. I am afraid that both in Europe and America all

idea of looking after the character of the students has been given up

by many of our younger professors.”[898]

The inevitable consequence of this method must be a decline of

morality among the rising generation, or to put it more mildly, and

to use the expression of some writers, a lamentable disproportion

between the intellectual and moral progress. The existence of this

disproportion is attested to by men who have hitherto been rather

optimistic about the educational conditions of this country. Thus

President Eliot has quite recently expressed himself very frankly

on the “failure of our popular education.” In spite of the greatest

efforts of various agencies towards checking vice in every shape, he

sees small results. His practical conclusion is that “we ought to

spend more money on schools, because the present expenditures do not

produce all the good results which were expected and may be reasonably

aimed at.”[899] Still, it is more than doubtful whether an increased

expenditure is the needed remedy; it is not lack of money, but lack

of the true method of education, which is at the root of the failure

of education. This has been correctly observed in several comments

on President Eliot’s indictment. The defects of our people, says the

Chicago _Chronicle_, lie “in morals rather than in intelligence.”

And the Columbia _State_ remarks: “It will at least be difficult to

point at any fatal exaggeration in this arraignment. But is it fair to

charge all of it up to education? Would it not be better for Harvard’s

President to revise his views as to the power of education? Learning

of itself, the mere accumulation of knowledge, can not make morally

better an individual or a society. It is unfair to expect so much.

Education of the mind may be a help, since it does fit the individual

to understand, to distinguish right from wrong and to apprehend the

consequences of evil. But education ought never to have been regarded

as an insurance against immorality, a preventive of crime, a cure

for cupidity, or a guaranty that the Golden Rule will be observed.

The education that brings this about must be more than a mere mental

training; it must be moral and spiritual.”

These comments touch the sore spot in modern education. The capital

error of most school reformers lies in this that they expect too much

from intellectual accomplishments for the moral and social improvement

of mankind. Every second word of theirs is: culture, knowledge,

science, information; and yet, what is far more needed is a reform

of character by training the will.[900] The plausible assertion:

“Instruction is moral improvement,” a principle which is repeated in

many variations, is false. The neglect of the religious and moral

training is the result of a false philosophy; for, there exists the

closest connection between philosophy and pedagogy, so much so that

a false philosophy necessarily leads to a false pedagogy, and that

a false pedagogy is always the outcome of a false philosophy.[901]

Pedagogy, according to the very derivation of the word, means “the

guiding of children;” in order to guide them properly it is necessary

to know clearly the end and goal which is to be reached. The end of man

can be known only from his true nature, and this knowledge is supplied

by philosophy. Philosophy, then, which is to be the foundation of

sound pedagogy must correctly answer the important questions: _Whence_

and _Whither_? If as the foundation of education a philosophy is

chosen which gives a wrong answer to these momentous questions, the

children will be led in a wrong direction. Now, that philosophy which

considers man merely a highly developed animal, which sees in the

human mind nothing but another “aspect” or “phase” of the body (Bain,

Spencer, and others), and consequently denies the spirituality and

immortality of the soul--such a philosophy (if it deserves this name)

cannot assign any other end and object of man’s life than some form of

hedonism or utilitarianism. Unfortunately this philosophy has exerted

a disastrous influence on many modern educational theories. It has led

to the separation, more or less complete, of education from religion,

and as we shall show hereafter, a solid moral training is impossible

without religion. There is only one system of philosophy which can form

the sound basis of true pedagogy, and that is Christian philosophy,

that philosophy which is in harmony with the revealed truths of

Christianity. This philosophy alone gives the correct answer to the

all-important _Whence_ and _Whither?_ It tells us that the soul of

the child is a spirit, created by a personal God to His own image and

likeness, and destined for an eternal happiness in heaven; it tells us

that this life is not the final stage of man, but a journey to another,

higher life; that “we have not here a lasting city, but seek one

that is to come.”[902] A system of education based on this Christian

philosophy will widely differ from those systems which are built up

on “modern” philosophy, be it German pantheism, French positivism, or

English and American agnosticism. The most essential difference will be

this that in a Christian system the intellectual training is considered

secondary and subordinate to the moral and religious training, whereas

all other systems aim at a purely secular education, and in this again

lay special stress on the intellectual, to the neglect of the moral

training.

It has frequently been observed that the spirit of our age manifests

many pagan tendencies. The utilitarian trend of modern education is

undoubtedly a sort of neo-paganism. To the artistic mind of the Greek

the “Beautiful” (καλόν) and the “Good” (ἀγαθόν) were terms almost

synonymous. Greek education, accordingly, aimed at the harmonious

development of body and intellect for this life. In the eyes of the

Roman, the Eternal City was destined to conquer and rule the whole

world. To make useful and devoted members of that mighty political

fabric was the sole aim of the education imparted to Roman youths. But

the aim of Christian education must be far different. Christ’s life

and teaching cannot be ignored and disregarded. His “seek ye first

the Kingdom of God and His justice,”[903] must be the foundation of

all educational principles, “for what doth it profit a man if he gain

the whole world and suffer the loss of his own soul?”[904] Therefore,

if “the fear of God is the beginning of all wisdom,”[905] the moral

and religious training of the young must claim the special attention

and care of the teacher. Whereas Greek education affected only the

intellect (νοῦς, _mens_), Christian education affects the soul,

(πνεῦμα, _spiritus_) as contrasted with the body, the “flesh” (σάρξ,

_caro_). Pagan education aimed at mere _formation_ (_Ausbildung_), at

the evolution and development of the natural man; Christian education

aims at _transformation_ (_Umbildung_), at change, at elevation.[906]

Every one, free or slave, rich or poor, white or black, is a child of

God and destined to be an heir of heaven. Therefore, he is to seek

first heavenly things: “_Quae sursum sunt quaerite, quae sursum sunt

sapite, non quae super terram._”[907] He must “put off the old man

who is corrupted, and put on the new man who, according to God, is

created in justice and holiness of truth.”[908] He must listen to

Christ’s commendation of humility, meekness and purity, and follow

His stern command: “_Abnega temetipsum, tolle crucem et sequere

me_: Deny thyself, take up thy cross and follow me.”[909] But this

is not in accord with the natural inclinations of man; therefore,

_transformation_ is needed. The work of transformation must begin

from the awakening of reason and must be the principal object in all

education. For, as the _Following of Christ_ has it, “when Christ our

Master, comes for the final examination, he will not ask how well we

spoke and disputed, but how well we lived, _non quid legimus, sed quid

fecimus, non quam bene diximus, sed quam religiose viximus_.”[910]

In the “school of the heart” at Manresa, Ignatius had thoroughly

grasped these sublime lessons. He had carried them out in his own

life and made them the guiding principles of his Society. In his

_Spiritual Exercises_, Ignatius has laid down a brief, but most

comprehensive epitome of Christian philosophy. There he has expressed

the whole purpose of man’s life in these few lines: “Man is created to

praise, reverence and serve God, and thus to save his own soul. All

other things are created for the sake of man, and to aid him in the

attainment of his end; therefore he should use them only with this

object, and withdraw himself from them, when they would lead him from

it.” Apply this principle to learning, to knowledge, and you must admit

that these are not man’s ultimate end, they are only means to that

end. Throughout the educational system of the Society, we find the

application of these truths. Thus the Fourth Part of the Constitutions

says: “Since the object at which the Society directly aims, is to aid

its members and their fellow-men to attain the ultimate end for which

they were created, learning, a knowledge of the methods of instruction,

and living example are necessary.” In the Ratio Studiorum the first

rule of the Provincial reads: “It is one of the most important

duties of the Society to teach all the sciences, which according to

our Institute may be taught, in such a manner as to lead men to the

knowledge and love of our Creator and Redeemer Jesus Christ.” Of like

import are the first rules of the Rector, the Prefect of Studies and

the professors of the various grades. This great care which the Society

has always bestowed on the moral and religious training of its pupils,

is probably the reason that accounts for the popularity of its schools.

Christian parents felt assured that the spiritual welfare of their

sons would be most diligently attended to, and so sent them with the

greatest confidence to Jesuit colleges. More than once have parents

give expression to their sentiments on this point. The testimony of one

American father, the distinguished convert from Protestantism, Orestes

Brownson, may be given as an instance among many. “We ourselves have

four sons in the colleges of the Jesuits, and in placing them there we

feel that we are discharging our duty as a father to them, and as a

citizen to this country. We rest easy, for we feel they are where they

will be trained up in the way they should go; where their faith and

morals will be cared for, which with us is a great thing. It is more

especially for the moral and religious training which our children will

receive from the good fathers that we esteem these colleges. Science,

literature, the most varied and profound scholastic attainments,

are worse than useless, where coupled with heresy, infidelity or

impurity.”[911]

However, the Society has been blamed by some for insisting too

strongly upon moral and religious training, and for subordinating to

it everything else. But how can any one who believes in the existence

of God and an eternal life, find fault with this principle? If there

is a God, if man has an immortal soul, if there is an eternity of

happiness awaiting the good, and an eternity of punishment the wicked,

then the “one thing necessary” on earth, and to be aimed at above

everything else, is the salvation of the soul. Hence it is that men,

who in their religious tenets widely differ from the Jesuits, could not

help praising the latter for the attention they paid to the moral and

religious education of their pupils. From numerous testimonies we may

be allowed to quote a few. “As might be expected,” writes Quick, “the

Jesuits were to be very careful of the moral and religious training of

their pupils.... Sacchini writes in a very high tone on this subject.

Perhaps he had read of Trotzendorf’s address to a school.”[912] In

1879 an anti-clerical paper wrote about the Belgian higher schools:

“Could not our teachers do a little more for discipline? Could

they not watch more diligently over the manners and morals of the

students? How often do we hear people say: ‘What, I send my son to the

_Athenées_?[913] God forbid! Fine manners he would learn there!’ Now

there is no reason why the young should acquire worse manners in the

_Athenées_ than in the Jesuit schools--on the contrary. However, in

point of fact, only the Jesuits look after _education_, whereas our

_Athenées_ busy themselves only about _instruction_. I know full well

that the education imparted by the clergy is bad, even dangerous. Our

lay teachers should pay more attention to _education_, as it is exactly

this training, however detestable, which brings to the men in the

soutane the patronage of so many parents.” M. Cottu, a bitter enemy of

the Jesuits, had to acknowledge the same.[914] Professor Kern of the

University of Göttingen, a Protestant, wrote years ago: “The Jesuits

attack the evil at its root: they educate boys in the fear of God and

in obedience. Has it ever been heard that from Jesuit schools doctrines

come forth similar to those of our modern schools? History has proved

that irreligious and anarchistic doctrines spread rapidly after the

suppression of the Society. Faith and science were no longer united.

Reason with all its errors,--and what error is so absurd that has not

had its defenders--was given the preference, faith was abandoned,

ridiculed, and spoken of only under the name of superstition.”[915]

By what means do the Jesuits endeavor to effect the moral training

of their pupils? We may classify the means they employ under four

heads: the example of a virtuous life, reasonable supervision, ethical

instruction, and certain means provided by the Church, especially the

sacraments. As to the first we all know that example is much more

powerful than words, particularly so with the young. There is a great

truth in the old Latin adage: _Verba movent, exempla trahunt._ Every

teacher, therefore, should lead such a life as to be able to say with

the great teacher of the Gentiles: “Be ye followers of me as I also

am of Christ.”[916] Above all ought this to be the case with teachers

who make a profession of religion. The life of a religious is one of

continual self-denial. St. Ignatius seems to have thought that daily

contact with men of this stamp would be good for boys. He seems to

have thought that in course of time they would assimilate some of that

spirit of conscientious devotion to duty, of generous readiness to go

far beyond the limits of mere duty, of the manful and noble spirit of

self-control and self-sacrifice, of that spirit which seeks not self

but the good of its neighbor, that spirit which the pupils cannot help

seeing exemplified in their masters, if those masters are such men

as St. Ignatius intended them to be.[917] Now, St. Ignatius was very

explicit on the necessity of setting a good example, and the Ratio

inculcates the same in exhorting the teacher to edify the pupils by the

example of a virtuous life.[918] Have the sons of Ignatius come up to

the expectation of their father? Even the enemies of the Order could

not help expressing their admiration for the moral purity of the lives

of the Jesuits.[919] Nor can we wonder at this. The solid training in

religious life, which we described in a previous chapter, and the daily

practice of mental and vocal prayer, must give the religious teacher

a self-control that preserves him from the more serious outbreaks of

passion, which may prove detrimental to his authority and ruin all

salutary influence over his pupils.[920] Professor Paulsen observes

in regard to the Jesuit teacher: “According to an old saying, he is

strongest who overcomes himself. This may mean not only that the

greatest effort is needed to rule one’s self, but that he who is able

to do so possesses the greatest strength. Now it is my conviction that

there was never a body of men who succeeded better in controlling

natural inclinations, and in checking individual desires, than the

Jesuits. True, such qualities do not make one amiable; no one is

amiable who is without human weaknesses. Perfect absence of passion in

a man makes him awe-inspiring and causes others to feel uncomfortable

in his presence.” Then he adds: “That the Jesuits up to this day are

masters in the great art of checking anger, and thus masters in the

great art of ruling over men’s souls, the reader may learn from a

book written by a pupil of the Jesuit college of Freiburg and of the

_Collegium Germanicum_ in Rome, who afterwards became a Protestant

minister, and who vividly and truthfully describes the impression made

upon him in these Jesuit institutions.”[921]

In addition to these testimonies, it will not be superfluous to cite

the testimony of prominent men who as pupils in Jesuit colleges had

an opportunity of watching the Jesuits closely. The first witness is

Voltaire: “During the seven years,” he writes, “that I lived in the

house of the Jesuits, what did I see among them? The most laborious,

frugal, and regular life, all their hours divided between the care they

spent on us and the exercises of their austere profession. I attest the

same as thousands of others brought up by them, like myself; not one

will be found to contradict me. Hence I never cease wondering how any

one can accuse them of teaching corrupt morality.”[922]--From Germany

three men may be quoted who are considered, by friend and enemy, as

equally distinguished for gifts, for noble character, and for genuine

patriotism: von Ketteler, von Mallinckrodt, and Count Ballestrem. It

was in the early days of the _Kulturkampf_, when the laws for expelling

the Jesuits from Germany were being discussed, that among others, these

three stood up to defend the persecuted Order. Freiherr von Ketteler,

the celebrated Bishop of Mentz, testifies: “As a youth I was sent by

my parents to an educational institution of the Jesuits, where I spent

four years. From home I brought with me such independence of character

and such purity of morals, that had I noticed a shadow of what the

world styles Jesuitical principles, I would have turned away from

them with loathing and disgust. My parents, who enjoyed an entirely

independent position in life, and who were filled with the purest and

strongest love for their children and their true welfare, would not

for a moment have left me in that institution, had they apprehended

anything of the kind. There I witnessed nothing that ever shocked my

youthful spirit trained in the purest principles of Christianity. I

took leave of all my teachers with deepest reverence and with the

firmest conviction that they were men who daily made on themselves the

demands of severest morality.”--Similar testimonies were rendered by

Herr von Mallinckrodt, that chivalrous spirit who, with perhaps the

exception of Windthorst, was the greatest man in that grand Catholic

organization, the German Centre Party. And Count Ballestrem, now for

several years President of the German _Reichstag_, commenced one of his

speeches before that assembly with the following words: “The last time

I had the honor to address you here, I defended an institution which

has become dear to me, and in which I have spent a great part of my

life, the Prussian Army. To-day I come to defend an institution which I

have known from the days of my childhood, and with whose excellences I

am acquainted in every detail. I come to bear witness for my venerable

teachers, for my highly esteemed friends: for the religious of the

Society of Jesus.”[923]

Undoubtedly the testimony of these men, who with the keen eyes of boys

that so readily find fault with their teachers watched the Jesuits

and scrutinized their every word and action, outweighs a thousand

calumnies of prejudiced pamphleteers, who, in many cases, have never

seen a Jesuit or any other religious. Moreover, these witnesses

refute the oft-repeated charge of “the corrupt moral teaching of the

Jesuits.” Fair-minded Protestants have long since branded this charge

as a slander. Thus the German Protestant Körner says in his “_History

of Pedagogy_”[924]: “It is the fashion to represent the Jesuits as

heartless beings, malicious, cunning, and deceitful, although it

must be known perfectly well that the crimes imputed to them are

historically groundless, and the suppression of the Order in the last

century was due entirely to the tyrannical violence of Ministers of

State. _It is only our duty to justice to silence the folly of such

as declare the Jesuit system of education to be nothing but fanatical

malice and a corruption of the young._ The Jesuits were the first

educators of their time. Protestants must with envy acknowledge the

fruitfulness of their labors; they made the study of the ancient

classics a practical study, and training was with them as important as

education. They were the first schoolmasters to apply psychological

principles to education; they did not teach according to abstract

principles, but they trained the individual, developed his mental

resources for the affairs of practical life, and so imparted to the

educational system an important influence in social and political life.

From that period and from that system, scientific education takes its

rise. _The Jesuits succeeded in effecting a moral purity among their

pupils which was unknown in other schools during the sixteenth and

seventeenth centuries._”

Indeed, the Society has ever been most anxious to preserve her pupils

from the taint of impurity, the vice to which youth most easily falls

a prey. She takes most effective means to preserve what Chaucer calls

the “sweet holiness of youth.” She will inexorably expel a boy whose

presence is dangerous to others, especially in the matter of purity.

“There are some faults,” says Shea,[925] “for which the Jesuit system

of discipline has no mercy, and in the first place is found the vice

of impurity. For this crime the only punishment is expulsion, since

contamination is looked upon as the greatest evil that can be spread

among the young. Hence the virtue of purity is fostered with all

possible care and solicitude, and even Protestants have borne witness

to the high moral purity of Jesuit students.” (See, v. g., Mr. Körner’s

words quoted above.) So also another writer, the German Protestant

Ruhkopf: “In Jesuit colleges a moral purity prevailed which we look for

in vain in Protestant schools and universities. Such as were totally

corrupt, the Jesuits did not tolerate among their pupils, but sent them

away. In their colleges, impurity and demoralization could not easily

arise, as with the utmost care they kept away everything that could

taint the imagination of the youth committed to their charge.”[926]

Boarding schools, in particular, may easily, and, if precautions are

not taken, will almost invariably become hot-beds of immorality.[927]

Hence the anxiety of the Jesuits in guarding their pupils. Yet they

have been attacked more than once for these very precautions. Great

educators, however, have been one with the Jesuits on this important

question. Thus we read in the life of President McCosh: “The notion

that a professor’s duty began and ended with the instruction and

order in the class room, was abhorrent to him. He thought it the most

serious problem of the higher education to secure the oversight and

unremitting care of students, without espionage or any ‘injudicious

interference with the liberty of the young man.’ With the fine language

about treating students as capable of self-government, and responsible

for their own conduct, Dr. McCosh never felt the slightest sympathy,

believing that the formation of good habits was more than the half of

education, and that the morals of the young, like their intellect and

judgment, required constant attention from the instructors.”[928]

Now let us listen to what the head of an important department in one

of the large institutions in this country thinks on this subject: “One

way to deal with these strange, excited, inexperienced, and intensely

human things called Freshmen is to let them flounder till they drown

or swim; and this way has been advocated by men who have no boys of

their own. It is delightfully simple, if we can only shut eye and ear

and heart and conscience; and it has a kind of plausibility in the

examples of men who through rough usage have achieved strong character.

‘The objection,’ as the master of a great school said the other day,

‘is the waste;’ and he added, ‘it is such an awful thing to waste human

life!’ This method is a cruel method, ignoring all the sensibilities

of that delicate, high-strung instrument which we call the soul. If

none but the fittest survived, the cruelty might be defended; but

some, who unhappily cannot drown, become cramped swimmers for all

their days. Busy and worn as a college teacher usually is, thirsty for

the advancement of learning as he is assumed always to be, he cannot

let hundreds of young men pass before him, unheeded and unfriended.

At Harvard College, the Faculty, through its system of advisers for

Freshmen, has made a beginning; and though there are hardly enough

advisers to go round, the system has proved its usefulness. At Harvard

College, also, a large committee of Seniors and Juniors has assumed

some responsibility for all the Freshmen. Each undertakes to see

at the beginning of the year the Freshmen assigned to him, and to

give every one of them, besides kindly greeting and good advice, the

feeling that an experienced undergraduate may be counted on as a friend

in need.”--This is excellent, but all the more surprised will the

reader be to find that this author continues in the following strain:

“Whether colleges should guard their students more closely than they

do--whether, for example, they should with gates and bars protect their

dormitories against the inroads of bad women--is an open question. For

the deliberately vicious such safeguards would amount to nothing; but

for the weak they might lessen the danger of sudden temptation.”[929]

As to the “open question” we hold rather that it is a shocking

principle. Must not fathers and mothers, who have sons in such schools,

shudder at the thought that their children will scarcely be protected

against the worst and most disgraceful of moral dangers, since the

school authorities think it an “open question” whether such protection

is advisable? In too many cases are youths “left to flounder till they

drown or swim.” And the majority will drown, or become cramped swimmers

for all their days; that is, become moral, and perhaps physical wrecks.

This is the end of all that specious but senseless talk about “the

sanctity of the individual,” “advantage of rough usage,” “dangers

of guarding sternly or tenderly,” “free spirit of our country,” and

the like. The Divine Teacher of mankind, the friend of children, has

clearly and sternly expressed His “views” upon these points: “He that

shall scandalize”--and we may add, he that allows others to scandalize,

or does not prevent from being scandalized--“one of these little ones

that believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were

hanged about his neck, and that he should be drowned in the depth of

the sea.” Neglect of watchfulness in this regard is nothing less than

treason; treason towards the souls of the pupils who should be guarded

against their worst foes, their own corrupt inclinations; treason

against parents who demand that their children be not exposed to such

experiments.

The Jesuits do not let their pupils “flounder till they drown or

swim.” They consider it their most sacred obligation to prevent, as

far as possible, their charges from coming into contact with moral

contamination. “But,” it is objected, “what good comes from all your

protection? It usually happens that your pupil on leaving the place

where he was protected against all dangers, falls the more quickly and

the more shamefully. And why? For the very reason that he was shielded

on all sides and never struggled with dangers and temptations. He

is not prepared, he is caught unawares, and yields unconditionally

and hopelessly, whereas had he been trained by daily encounter with

temptation his character would have been hardened.”[930] If the case

were frequent, if the deeper fall inevitably followed the purer

boyhood, then we may as well despair of all education and all virtue.

Happily, we have here one of those sweeping generalizations and

exaggerations, so common with certain writers. We answer: _First_, not

all fall away after leaving the sheltering precincts of the college.

Many remain good among the greatest dangers and temptations. And this

perseverance they owe to the precautions taken in the college and to

the virtuous habits acquired through the daily practice of observing

the regulations of these institutions. The continued moral efforts

required for doing this are as effective for producing strength of

character as the “rough usage” and, at the same time, less dangerous.

_Secondly_, many of those who afterwards disgrace themselves, would

have done so even had they never been inside college walls, in many

cases much earlier, and perhaps more irreparably. It was college

discipline that prevented them from earlier ruin. St. Ignatius used

to say: “To have prevented one sin is worth all the troubles and

labors of this life.” _Thirdly_, many come to Catholic academies and

colleges from public and private schools, where they have acquired such

a knowledge of life and of the “ways of the world,” that educators

are sometimes horrified at discovering what boys of fourteen and

sixteen years have heard and experienced. For such boys the quiet and

seclusion of a Catholic college and its strict discipline are of the

greatest benefit, and the spirit of piety and modesty pervading the

whole atmosphere acts upon those poor boys as the healthy, pure air of

Colorado and New Mexico upon consumptives. If the spiritual consumption

has not progressed too far, two or three years spent in thoroughly

Christian surroundings, often restore such youths to complete health

of soul and body. There is scarcely a Jesuit teacher who could not

recount many instances of boys whose reformation was so thorough, that

they became most excellent men. Without this salutary influence their

souls would have sunk into the abyss of vice and crime, and their

bodies very likely into an early grave. _Fourthly_, boys who were thus

protected in college, and afterwards go astray will in most cases

return. Their hearts will not be happy in their pleasures and excesses;

for the religious and moral principles implanted in them can never be

totally destroyed. After a brief experience they become disgusted with

their lives and begin to loath their vices. A young man without any

previous religious training sees no way out of the quagmire of vice; he

easily abandons himself the more to his evil passions. But it is very

different with the young man who grew up under religious influences. In

moments of disgust and remorse, at a sudden calamity that befalls him

or those near him, he remembers not only the happiness of his childhood

but also the salutary advice of his teacher, to whom he used to look up

as a fatherly friend. Such recollections have saved more than one young

man who had gone astray. _Finally_, are those young men who from early

years and during college life were left to their “own experience and

rough usage” of temptations, later on, in the battles of life, better

and of purer morals, then those “sheltered” against dangers? An honest

inquiry will assuredly be met with a decided answer in the negative.

The idea of supervision and restriction seems to be especially

repugnant to people in England and America. Undoubtedly, the character

of the American and English youth differs in several points from that

of the youth of other countries. For this reason we may admit, with a

writer in the _Dublin Review_,[931] that in dealing with English--and

we add: with American--youths, it will be found beneficial to exercise

a somewhat less minute supervision than that practised in some other

countries. This seems to be demanded by the peculiar character and

the spirit of the public and private life of the English and American

people. On the other hand, these differences have frequently been

exaggerated, and conclusions have been drawn from these discrepancies

of character which are altogether unjustified. Opinions have been

uttered which seem to imply an intrinsic superiority of the American

youth over those of the rest of the world, a superiority which renders

laws that are necessary for good education everywhere else, superfluous

in this country. Some seem to think that restrictions are little

compatible with republican institutions. Professor Edward J. Goodwin,

of New York, said recently: “German children are taught to submit to

authority, but our boys must be taught to govern themselves.”[932]

We readily admit that the principle of submitting to authority can

be carried to extremes, in education as well as in political life.

But we think that boys will learn to govern themselves only by

submitting first to authority, as in early years they possess neither

the sufficient knowledge nor the necessary strength of will to govern

themselves reasonably. We fasten the young tender tree to a pole,

lest it grow crooked or be bent and broken by the storm; the same is

necessary, and to a much higher degree, in the case of the frail human

sapling in which so many perverse inclinations are hidden which tend to

foster a growth in the wrong direction. Above all, educators should not

forget that there is one authority to which the youths of every country

must submit unconditionally, and that is the authority of the Divine

Lawgiver as expressed in the precepts of morality--and obedience is one

of these precepts. The same Divine authority imposes the sacred duty on

educators to watch over their charges, and to remove, as far as lies in

their power, all that endangers their morality. The Christian educator

fears lest any neglect in this matter may draw upon him the dreadful

words addressed to the “watchman to the house of Israel”: “If thou

declare it not to him [the wicked man], nor speak to him, that he may

be converted from his wicked way and live: the same wicked man shall

die in his iniquity, but I will require his blood at thy hand.”[933]

Indeed, it is the fatherly love and care for the welfare of their

pupils which leads the Christian educator to exercise supervision over

his pupils. He has received from the parents that treasure which is to

them more precious than anything on earth; their own dearly beloved

children, for whom they toil and labor, over whom they anxiously watch

and pray lest they should suffer shipwreck in regard to their faith

and virtue, especially the virtue of purity which is so beautiful, so

priceless, and yet so difficult of securing in youth. The teacher would

be guilty of the basest breach of confidence, did he not strain every

nerve to avert a calamity from those so sacredly entrusted to him.

We can well understand that at times this or that particular method

may justly be censured, as, in reality, not being conducive to the

end which is sought; but that the whole system, the very principle,

should be ridiculed and condemned, spoken of in terms of invective and

indignation, and stigmatized by such opprobrious names as “espionage”

and the like--this, we say, is startling.[934] It can be explained only

from the false philosophical notions of such critics; particularly from

their wrong conception and very low valuation of the human soul.

Many, especially such as have never stepped inside the doors of a

Jesuit college, are filled with an absurd dread of the supervision

exercised, as they fancy, by the Jesuits. From time to time, however,

when some appalling scandals are discovered within the walls of a

college where the students enjoy pretty nearly full liberty, or when

scores, if not hundreds of students, exhibit most disgraceful scenes

of disorder on the public streets, then the eyes of many are opened

and they see that, after all, some supervision, and a pretty strict

one, is necessary in a place where hundreds of hot-blooded youths

live together. In 1891, an English non-Catholic paper, speaking about

scandalous disclosures on board the school-ship _Britannia_, said

there were two kinds of public schools, Jesuit and Gaol-bird school.

“The Jesuit idea of school life is that a boy at school should, as

far as possible, be in the same position as he will afterwards be in

as a man in the world, that is to say, the position not of a wild

beast in an African jungle, free to do what he pleases, but of a human

being in a civilized country, living under the eye of the law. The

Jesuits in fact police their schools, that is, what it comes to. This

policing is called by people who don’t like it (i. e. don’t like the

trouble of enforcing it) espionage and other ugly names. As a matter of

fact, it amounts to no more than that ordinary care which a commonly

decent and commonly sensible father exercises in his own house: It

means simply reasonable supervision, aided of course by rationally

constructed school buildings--massing of boys for school as well as

for play--living in the light of day, in fact. Now, neither a boy nor

a man does much harm or has much harm done to him, so long as he lives

in the light of day, and the consequence is that although, of course,

many boys who leave Jesuit schools become bad men afterwards, yet they

get no harm while they stay at school. They leave as good as they

come and, moreover, if they do not come pretty reasonably good, they

do not stay long. The father gets a letter to say ‘the boy is doing

no good at school and had better be removed.’ The Goal-bird system is

simplicity itself. The head master draws his salary, attends to the

teaching of Greek and Latin and shuts his eyes firmly, deliberately,

conscientiously, like an English gentleman, as he would say himself,

to everything else going on around him.”[935] This is very severe

language. May it not partly apply to a number of “educators” in this

country, who denounce so strongly any “paternalism” exercised over the

pupils?

As regards the charges against the precautions taken in Jesuit

colleges, they are usually founded upon wrong suppositions. It is

believed that the Jesuit pupil is watched every moment. This is not

so; he has liberty enough within a certain reasonable limit. Of

course, it is a most delicate and difficult question how this limit

is to be determined. It is not possible to lay down any particulars

on this subject, because, in this as in other matters, there exists

considerable variety in different Jesuit colleges, and Superiors assign

that measure of liberty which, considering the difference of places and

circumstances, especially the age and character of the pupils, seems

not to expose them to great dangers.--It is also falsely supposed that

no word of necessary explanation is given concerning the dangers that

await the pupil outside the college walls; that educators imperatively

forbid any inquiry about matters which the students may be anxious to

ask; that they never give advice and instruction on matters which at a

certain age a young man may, and considering the circumstances, should

know, in order not to be caught unawares by dangers and temptations,

which are sure to come.[936] Necessary instruction and advice,

according to age and other circumstances, will be given, above all,

by the confessor; the teacher also, with moderation and discretion,

will do the same. Many occasions will offer in the explanation of the

catechism, of the authors, and in private conversations.

A few words must be said about the private talks with boys so much

recommended in the Jesuit system. Father Jouvancy says the teacher

should speak in private more frequently with those who seem to be

exposed to worse and more dangerous faults.[937] Father Sacchini

remarks that he should study the character and disposition of each

pupil, to discover the bad outcroppings on the tender plant and nip

them in the bud.[938] Father Kropf advises the teacher to go carefully

over the names of his pupils every Sunday and to recommend them in

prayer to our Lord and His Blessed Mother. While doing this he should

reflect especially whether it is advisable to see this boy or that in

private, to correct him, to warn him against a danger, or whether it is

well to communicate with his parents.[939] What should be treated of in

these private conversations is plain from Jouvancy and Sacchini. And

the 47th rule of the teachers says briefly, they should treat only of

serious matters.[940] Speaking of conversation with the students, the

Father General Vitelleschi, in 1639, gave characteristic directions:

“It will be very useful if from time to time the professors treat with

their auditors, and converse with them, not about vain rumors and other

affairs that are not to the purpose, but about those that appertain to

their well-being and education; going into the particulars that seem

most to meet their wants; and showing them how they ought to conduct

themselves in studies and piety. Let the professors be persuaded that a

single talk in private, animated with true zeal and prudence on their

part, will penetrate the heart deeper and work more powerfully, than

many lectures and sermons given to all in common.”[941] This keeping in

touch with the individual pupil has always been considered as one of

the sources of the success of the Jesuits in their educational labor.

Protestant educators have not failed to recognize this and to speak

of it with approval. Thus Sir Joshua Fitch writes of Arnold: “Much of

the influence he gained over his scholars--influence which enabled

him to dispense in an increasing degree with corporal punishment--was

attributed to his knowledge of the individual characteristics of

boys.... This is a kind of knowledge which has long been known to be

characteristic of the disciplinary system of the Jesuits, but has not

been common among the head masters of English public schools.”[942] It

is almost altogether absent in most modern systems, consistently with

their principle of separating training from teaching, education from

instruction, a principle which, as M. Brunetière said, “our forefathers

would not have been able to understand.”[943]

Supervision and exhortation are powerful means for preserving the good

morals of youths, but much more powerful are the divinely appointed

means, Confession and Communion. Although they are practised in all

Catholic colleges, the Jesuits, following the example and advice

of their founder, worked most zealously for the spread of frequent

confession and communion. By doing so they incurred the special hatred

of the Jansenists, whose rigorous views they vigorously opposed. We

need not here refute the Protestant views of auricular confession.

Every Catholic knows that it is not a “torture chamber of conscience,”

not an “unwarrantable invasion of the privacy of the individual,”

not an “intrusion into the sacred domain of domestic life,” not a

“source of weakness to the will,” not a “dangerous and demoralizing

practice.” To men who use such language and hold such opinions may be

applied the words of the Epistle of St. Jude the Apostle: “_Blasphemant

quod ignorant_, they blaspheme things which they know not.” Apart

from the divine institution, the Catholic knows that confession, the

“ministry of reconciliation,” the “sacrament of peace,” is a source of

unspeakable blessings, of consolation in distress, of encouragement

in despair, of advice in perplexities. With reference to our object,

the English Jesuit Father Clarke (Oxford), in an article entitled “The

Practice of Confession in the Catholic Church,”[944] points out the

special advantages of confession for the moral training of the young.

The passage is so beautiful and so much to our purpose that it is well

to quote it in its entirety.

“It has probably occurred to the mind of most Catholics, as it has

often occurred to my own, that if there were no other proof of the

paramount claims of the Catholic Church, we should find a sufficient

one in the elaborate care with which she watches over the innocence

of the young. To guard from evil and corruption the lambs of the

fold is one of her chief duties and privileges. This loving care

she inherits from her Divine Founder, Who was the friend and lover

of little children. Now, I do not think that it is possible for any

unprejudiced and well-informed person, who compares the practical

working of the Catholic system with that of any other religious system

in the world, to deny her unrivalled and unapproachable superiority

in this respect. She shields her little ones in their early childhood

with all the jealous care of the most tender mother, and when the time

comes for the safe seclusion of the parental roof to be exchanged for

a freer intercourse with their fellows, she provides safeguards for

their purity that are unknown, or almost unknown, outside her fold. For

the due education of boys, large schools, and for those of the upper

class, large boarding schools are a practical necessity. Then comes

the dangerous time, and how great the dangers of that time are is well

known to every one who has had an experience of the inner working of

English public schools. To keep boys safe from a most perilous, if not

fatal, contact with vice and sin, is a problem which has exercised

the mind and troubled the conscience of every one who has taken part

in the management of any of our large schools and colleges; and those

among Protestant educators who have studied the subject most deeply,

and who have had long experience to guide them, have had to admit, with

sorrow and grief, that the task was a hopeless one.[945] They have had

to submit to what they considered an inevitable evil, and their best

hope has been by personal influence to mitigate to some extent that

which they knew they were powerless to prevent. But is the evil one

for which no remedy can be provided? God forbid! The Catholic Church

provides an effective remedy for this as for every other evil incident

to human life. Here I can speak from a large experience, and with a

full knowledge of the subject. Again and again I have been assured

by boys who have passed through Catholic colleges, from the lowest

to the highest form, that during the whole of their time there they

never heard one immodest word, or came into contact with any sort of

temptation to evil from those with whom they associated. I have known

some who at the end of their school course were as innocent of moral

evil as on the day they entered, and were utterly shocked and disgusted

when they were thrown into the vortex of the world outside, and had to

listen to the kind of talk that too often forms the common staple of

conversation among those who have had a Protestant education.... I do

not say that the Church is always successful in her endeavors. It is

quite possible that, even in a Catholic school, evil may for a time

run riot. One sinner may destroy much good. But the evil never lasts

long, and the Catholic system brings about a speedy recovery. What I

do assert is that the moral perils, to which a boy is exposed in a

Catholic school, are infinitesimal as compared with those which will

surround him in any of the Protestant public schools and colleges.

“In all this the chief engine for the good work is the confessional.

There are, of course, many others. There is the personal influence and

the keen sense of responsibility of those who are in authority; there

is the close and intimate friendship existing between the teacher and

the taught, which is something utterly different from the comparatively

cold relations and official reserve which make the Protestant master

far more of a stranger to his boys. But it is the weekly or fortnightly

confession that is the real safeguard. It is in the confessor that he

has his trusted friend, to whom he freely talks of all his dangers and

temptations; it is confession that keeps the moral atmosphere healthy

and pure; it is confession that maintains the high standard of life and

conversation prevailing, through God’s mercy, in our Catholic schools

and colleges; it is confession that enables the Catholic parent to

entrust his boy to the good priests, whether secular or regular, who

devote themselves to the work of education, without any of those qualms

or fears, that anxiety and foreboding about the future, that fill the

heart of the Protestant parent when he bids farewell to his innocent

child on his first plunge into the vortex of a Protestant public school.

“But there is one charge, one false and cruel charge, which some

Protestant writers bring against confession. They say that it

introduces the young and innocent to a knowledge of subjects which are

_sacro digna silentio_, and even suggests to them evil of which they

would otherwise be ignorant. I can only assure my readers (in answer to

this gratuitous calumny), on the word of an honest man, that during the

twenty years and more that I have been constantly hearing confessions

of men and women, boys and girls, of every class and in various

countries, I have never known of a single instance of any knowledge of

evil having been imparted in the confessional. I am sure that I may

speak for all my fellow priests all over the world, when I say that I

would, with God’s help, far rather be torn in a thousand pieces than

say one word in the confessional that could endanger the purity of the

young, or impart a knowledge of evil to one previously ignorant of it.

“But if there should be any of my readers who are not willing to

accept my own personal assurance, there is another consideration which

ought to convince them. If there were in this accusation the smallest

element of truth, every good mother would, in her tender care for her

children’s innocence, have the greatest horror of seeing her little

ones kneeling before the priest, and every careful father would forbid

his boys and girls from incurring the risk of such contamination. Is

this the case? Do we find good Catholic parents dreading the influence

of the confessional for their children? On the contrary, there is

nothing that gives them more hearty satisfaction than to know that

their sons and daughters are, from their earliest years, regular in

making their confession month by month, or week by week. They regard

it as the best possible safeguard for their innocence and virtue. They

are alarmed and anxious if, when boyhood emerges into youth, their sons

grow irregular in frequenting the tribunal of penance. They fear there

must be something wrong. They urge and entreat them not to fall away

from the practice of confession. Joy fills the mother’s heart when she

sees her son once more returning, it may be after long absence, to that

fount of mercy and of grace, where she knows that he will obtain pardon

for the past, and strength and help for the struggles of the future.”

It would be presumption on our part to make further comment on these

beautiful words. Every Catholic will testify to the truth of Father

Clarke’s description of the salutary influence confession exercises

over the young during the most dangerous period of life. Now let us

contrast with this description a picture drawn from the life of a

Protestant. Newman, in the introduction of _Loss and Gain_, describes

a clergyman of the Church of England, who has just decided to send his

son Charles to one of the large public schools. “Seclusion”, he says

to himself, “is no security for virtue. There is no telling what is in

a boy’s heart; he may look as open and happy as usual, and be as kind

and as attentive, when there is a great deal wrong going on within. The

heart is a secret with its Maker. No one on earth can hope to get at

it, or to touch it. I have a cure of souls; what do I really know of my

parishioners? Nothing; their hearts are sealed books to me. And this

dear boy, he comes close to me; he throws his arms around me, but his

soul is as much out of my sight as if he were at the antipodes. I am

not accusing him of reserve, dear fellow; his very love and reverence

for me keep him in a sort of charmed solitude. I cannot expect to get

at the bottom of him.

“‘Each in his hidden sphere of bliss or woe,

Our hermit spirits dwell.’

“It is our lot here below. No one on earth can know Charles’s secret

thoughts. Did I guard him here at home ever so well, yet, in due

time, it might be found that a serpent had crept into the Eden of his

innocence. Boys do not fully know what is good and what is evil; they

do wrong things at first almost innocently. Novelty hides vice from

them; there is no one to warn them or give them rules; and they become

slaves of sin while they are learning what sin is.”

Is not this a most pathetic confession of a great shortcoming of the

Protestant system which renounces all inward government and direction

of the soul? It leaves all to the private judgment of the individual.

And yet, what a blessing for young people to have one to whom they can

securely disclose “their secret thoughts.” Then this friend of their

souls can “warn them and give them rules.” The evil will be discovered

and counteracted before the young are slaves of sin. The Catholic

youth has all this advantage in the confession. What could an Arnold,

a Thring, a McCosh do here? Indeed, does not this reserve of the

Protestant system frustrate in many educators talent, zeal, kindliness,

and keen-eyed affection, of their best fruits?

On the educational influence of the reception of the Holy Eucharist, a

beautiful passage is found in the diary of the first American Cardinal,

Archbishop McCloskey of New York, written when sojourning in Rome as

a young priest. “_Feast of St. Aloysius, Rome_, June 21, 1835. This

is the peculiar festivity of the students of Rome. It is observed

with the greatest solemnity at the Church of the Roman College, S.

Ignazio [under the care of the Jesuits]. Nearly all the students of

the college, amounting to the number of 1500, receive Holy Communion

together on this day. Being anxious to witness so interesting and

edifying a spectacle, I took care to be at the Church of S. Ignazio at

a seasonable hour. When I arrived, the students had just entered and

had taken their places in ranks forming an aisle in the middle, and

extending from the altar along the nave of the church to the very door.

The Community Mass, a low one, was celebrated by a Cardinal, and the

choir was composed of some of the choice singers among the pupils. It

may have been owing to the numberless youthful associations that were

connected with the scene before me, but I must confess it was to me

the most edifying and most affecting ceremony I have yet witnessed in

Rome. It was one which I shall never forget. To behold that spacious

and beautiful edifice almost exclusively occupied by such a number of

students of every rank and almost every age, arranged in such beautiful

order, their countenances bespeaking a deep sense of the act they were

about to perform in receiving into their bosoms their Divine Lord and

Saviour, and to hear, at the same time, the solemn strains of music

which filled the place with pious harmony, was certainly enough to

fill a far less sensitive breast with holy enthusiasm. The moment of

Communion arrived. It was a moment in which I felt the holiness and

sublimity of my religion with a peculiar force. Fifteen hundred young

men and boys approached the table of their Divine Master with a modesty

and a fervor most marked and sincere, and, it is to be supposed, with

a corresponding purity of mind and heart, all of them in the heyday

of life, and most of that age, and in those exterior circumstances,

which lead the youth, particularly of Protestant colleges, to the most

dangerous vices. This, assuredly, I thought was a triumphant evidence

of the superior moral influence of the Catholic religion. Call it

Jesuitism, call it priestcraft, call it what you please, no candid mind

contemplating such a spectacle can deny that as edifying a one has

never been, and never will be, presented by the same number, nor one

tenth of the number, of Protestant youth in any part of the world.”[946]

Besides these two principal means employed for the religious and

moral training of youth, there are others which are used with the

most salutary results. Among them are certain _devotions_ recommended

to, and encouraged among, the students. Non-Catholics do not view

the Catholic devotions very favorably, but their antipathy springs,

for the most part, from a misunderstanding of the true nature of

these devotions. Protestants think that Catholics consider these

practices as the essence of religion; further, they have the opinion

that these devotions are merely mechanical recitations of certain set

prayers. In this they are seriously mistaken.[947] To the Catholic

the religious devotions are not the essence of religion, but they are

practical manifestations of religion and, at the same time, valuable

helps to obtain and strengthen what is essential in religion, namely,

the perfect subjection of the intellect and will to the will of God.

Nor are they merely mechanical recitations of prayers; they are, if

performed according to the mind of the Church, powerful means of

lifting up the understanding, the imagination, the feelings and the

will to the contemplation and active love of God. They all contain most

potent motives for the moral elevation and betterment of man. Let us

take that devotion which Jesuit educators recommend so much to their

pupils: the devotion to St. Aloysius, the “Lily of Gonzaga.” In this

devotion the picture of the highest Christian perfection attainable

in youth is placed before the eyes of the students. They see in this

Saint a noble youth who, in the midst of wealth and luxury and the

allurements of a courtly life, preserved unsullied the white robe of

innocence; a youth who from early childhood measured all things, as

he himself expressed it, _secundum rationes aeternas, non secundum

rationes temporales_, i. e. according to the value which they possess

for his final destination; a youth who always followed the dictates

of conscience with a chivalrous energy and steadfastness, and who

heroically spurned the pleasures that prove so fatal to many young men;

a youth who renounced the inheritance of a principality in order to

follow the evangelical counsels, and to devote himself to the glory of

God and the service of his fellow-men. Surely, a devotion which places

before the admiring gaze of students such a type of youthful holiness

for imitation, is a practical devotion, one that cannot fail to elevate

the character of the students and make their lives purer and holier.

Here we may also mention another most salutary exercise, namely, the

annual retreat in which, following the directions of St. Ignatius,

the end of man, the means of attaining this end, and the motives for

striving after Christian sanctity are set before the mind of the pupil.

What untold blessings result from these exercises, only he is able to

realize who has made them.

Then there exist in every Jesuit college the _Sodalities of the

Blessed Mother of God_, pious associations originated by the Jesuit

Scholastic Leon, and solemnly recognized and highly eulogized by many

Popes, beginning from Gregory XIII. (1584) down to Leo XIII. It is

worth while to read the high commendation bestowed on them by the

learned Pope Benedict XIV., who, as a former Jesuit pupil and member of

the sodality, could well form a competent judgment upon their value.

The influence of these sodalities on the moral life of the pupils

cannot be valued too highly. Their members are usually the leaders

in setting good example to others. The decline of sodalities was

frequently followed by a decline of morality in Catholic colleges. In

1871 the sodalities in the thirty higher schools in Rhenish Prussia

were hampered by government interference; it was said that the good

they might do to individuals, should be accomplished by the schools

without them. A year after, in 1872, Dr. Falk, Minister of Instruction

in Prussia, ordered the dissolution of the sodalities in all higher

schools in the kingdom. Not eight years had elapsed when Dr. Falk’s

successor, von Puttkamer, on the 20th day of May 1880, had to warn

the heads of the same institutions against associations formed by the

students with the avowed purpose of practising drink, dishonesty and

immorality.[948]

These sodalities, instituted to advance the students in true and solid

piety as well as learning, effected inestimable good. The members were

exhorted to cherish above all that virtue which is the most beautiful

ornament of youth, purity. They created a lofty moral tone in the

colleges and sustained a healthy, manly public opinion. Thus these

pious associations exerted a most powerful formative influence on

the character of the students.[949] Their piety, too, was active in

works of charity. The socialists of early colleges united in bands to

purchase articles of food and clothing for distribution among the poor;

they visited prisoners, and consoled and instructed them; they went to

the hospitals and to the squalid quarters of the city to look after the

sick.[950] What the students thus began to practise in college, was by

many continued throughout their lives.

Nor have the sodalities ceased to achieve the same excellent results

in our days. As a modern model sodality we mention that of Barcelona,

consisting of seven hundred members, mostly students of the University,

or members of the professions. Its _Academia_ encourages excellent

literary and scientific work.[951]

Another point concerning the moral training that deserves particular

mention is the care of the Society with regard to reading. The press

is a mighty instrument for good and evil. With it heaven and hell are

contesting for a priceless treasure--the soul of man. St. Ignatius

and the framers of the Ratio Studiorum knew this full well. They tell

the teacher to encourage good and wholesome reading, but even more

earnestly to warn the students against dangerous books, which St.

Augustine calls “the hellish stream into which the children of men are

daily cast.”[952] Ignatius feared lest the reading of classic authors

should introduce into young minds pagan tastes and morals. Nor was his

fear groundless in view of the disastrous results that had followed the

one-sided study and admiration of the classics during the latter period

of the Renaissance, when people not only imitated the beautiful style

of the writers of antiquity but also their shocking principles.[953]

About the year 1550 Ignatius, who had thought long and deeply upon

this subject, wrote to a prelate: “Seeing that young people are so

disposed to receive and retain first impressions, whether good or bad

... and considering that books, especially classics as they are taught

to boys, as Terence, Virgil, and others, contain amongst many things

to be learnt, and not useless but profitable rather for life, some

other things very profane and injurious even if only heard ... and so

much the more, if these are placed before them in books in which they

study habitually, having them in their hands--this considered, it has

seemed to me, as it does still seem, that it would be very expedient

if we were to remove from these classic works all the parts that are

unedifying or noxious, and replace them by others of a better sort, or,

without adding anything leave only what is profitable. And this appears

to me up to these last years most desirable for the good Christian life

and good training of our youth.”[954]

The principles of St. Ignatius found a practical expression in the

Constitutions of the Society,[955] and later in various parts of the

Ratio Studiorum.[956] There it is laid down that in the authors given

into the hands of the pupils all dangerous passages should be omitted,

or if certain authors, as Terence, could hardly be expurgated they

ought rather not to be read at all. Many modern educators or writers

on education consider this anxiety of the Jesuits mere prudery. Others

who have studied the question more thoroughly and conscientiously,

admit that many reasons can be given for the practice of the Jesuits.

Others again declare themselves unable to speak decisively on this

“perplexing” question. Thus a writer in the _St. James’s Gazette_,

after having mentioned the “castrated editions of the classics” used

in the Jesuit college at Stonyhurst, England, says: “Our public

schools go upon another principle; the argument being that the shock

of introduction on entering the world, to what has been so zealously

excluded would only lead to a sudden and fatal downfall. For my part I

find the question a perplexing one.”[957]

To those who see in the caution of the Society nothing but prudery,

we may reply that even pagan writers, and those of the very highest

standing, as Plato, Aristotle, Cicero and Quintilian, denounced

emphatically the reading of certain authors of their own language

and race. Quintilian well said: “As regards reading, great care is

to be taken, above all things, that tender minds, which will imbibe

deeply whatever has entered them when they are ignorant of everything

and, as it were, resemble empty vessels, may learn not only what is

well written, but, still more, what is morally good. The reading of

tragedies is beneficial, the lyric poets nourish the mind, provided

that you select from them, not merely authors, but portions of their

works; for the Greeks are licentious in many of their writings, and

I should be loath to interpret Horace in certain passages.”[958] And

even Ovid, that licentious writer, warns his readers if they want to be

free from the consequences of disorderly passion, not to read, nay, not

to touch frivolous poetry: _Teneros ne tange poetas_, and he includes

in this class some of his own works. The language of the Fathers of

the Church is unmistakable on this subject. In fact, the terms of

condemnation used by some Fathers against pagan writings, are actually

directed against the idolatry and immorality contained therein. It

would be useless to multiply quotations.

There are modern educators, also Protestants, who on this point are

at one with the Society. Thus writes Quick: “It is much to the credit

of the Jesuit Fathers that, though Plautus and Terence were considered

very valuable for giving a knowledge of colloquial Latin and were

studied and learned by heart in the Protestant schools, the Jesuits

rejected them on account of their impurity.”[959] Later on expurgated

editions of Plautus, Terence, Horace, Juvenal, Persius and others

were published by Jesuits, especially by Father Jouvancy. The words

of Professor Paul Barth of Leipsic, written a year ago, are also well

worth being summarized here.[960] “One of the truest sayings of Goethe

is: ‘Let no one imagine that the first impressions of youth can be

effaced.’ There are striking examples recorded in history how perverse

reading in early years caused the greatest harm. Of course there will

be wise people, even educators, who say: ‘It is true, there are some

offensive passages in this work, but their effect is counteracted by

other instruction. Don’t let us be pedantic. Don’t let us make so much

noise about such trifles.’ These gentlemen must be answered that in

education there are no trifles; that nothing is so little that it may

be overlooked. For every trifle has an influence on many, very many

souls of children, and in every one of these souls it can work its

effect for a long time, perhaps for a whole life. Others, advocates of

a ‘sound realism,’ as they style themselves, will say: ‘Evil is after

all a component part of this world, and so it is beneficial to free

the young of the illusion that there is no evil in the world.’ To this

we reply: Belief in the moral order in this world is an energizing

factor in the life of the young, and the man who robs the child of this

belief, weakens its moral energy, consequently does an immoral act.

Others again, granting all this, will say: ‘Although there is some

danger in such reading, still it gives an insight into the life and

the history of the nations.’ Such historians we answer: The history

of civilization can be learned in other ways; at any rate, it is too

dearly bought if it ruins the character of children.”

That no prudishness is advocated by our remarks on reading the

classics, is sufficiently proved from what has been said on Homer.[961]

Nor do we deny that some editors of school-texts, as well as teachers,

may not have gone too far in expurgating. Here, as in other matters,

the golden rule is: _Medio tutissimus ibis._ It will always remain a

delicate and difficult question to decide what is to be omitted or

what may be read without danger. The tact of the teacher and skill

in handling such passages will often give the proper solution. But

about the correctness of the general principle laid down in the Ratio

Studiorum there can be no doubt.

The same principle holds good not only of the classical authors

of Greece and Rome, but of the moderns as well, if not in a higher

degree.[962] The ancients are direct, outspoken and straightforward,

even in their obscenity; the moderns are more indirect and insinuating.

The latter method is not the more harmless as might appear to the

superficial, but is by far the more dangerous, since it stimulates

curiosity, sets the mind thinking and leaves the reader to reflect

and dwell on an unsavory and prurient subject. The Jesuit teachers

are exhorted not only “not to read in class any obscene author or

any book which contains matter dangerous to good morals, but also to

deter most energetically their pupils from reading such books outside

of class.”[963] This advice about deterring pupils from bad reading,

is far more necessary now-a-days than at the time when the Ratio was

drawn up. How many popular books and magazines, openly, or secretly

under the name of “modern science,” are advocating principles which

in reality are agnostic and irreligious? How many of the novels that

flood the literary market, are filled with ill-disguised nastiness?

How many books are borrowed by the young people from libraries, which

should never be permitted to fall into their hands? God alone knows all

the harm done to faith and purity by these books. For many a talented

youth, the pride and joy of a happy home, the indulging in filthy

novels has been the beginning of a career of sin and crime.

As a rule it is not advisable to say _this_ or _that_ book is bad or

indecent; for some boys, either through viciousness or curiosity, will

for that very reason read the book. But should an evil publication

circulate among the boys, then it should be denounced in the strongest

terms.

Boys should be likewise cautioned against over-indulgence in the

reading of newspapers, especially of the sensational kind. There is

no worse school for the mind than such papers. They not unfrequently

swarm with infamous advertisements; scandalous happenings, whose very

possibility ought to be unknown to young people, are there discussed

in a frivolous manner and with the omission of not a single disgusting

detail. If these newspapers form the daily mental food of a boy, they

will dull and blunt all sense of delicacy and modesty, and disable

his mind for serious application to hard study. In his “Book of the

Spiritual Exercises,” St. Ignatius pictures the inveterate enemy of

mankind seated on a throne on the plains of Babylon, despatching

innumerable demons all over the world, to every city and every person

in order to ensnare and deceive men. This wily fiend has undergone a

marvellous metamorphosis. He makes use of the doctrine of evolution,

adapting himself to new circumstances. He is no longer the horned and

hoofed monster of olden legends, but a polished, well-read gentleman,

who manages thousands of printing establishments. And every mail

carries countless demons, in the shape of bad novels, magazines and

papers, to every city, every town, every village, every dwelling,

no matter how secluded or remote. Shall we expect these envoys of

Satan, “transformed into angels of light,” to overlook our schools and

colleges? Alas, how often do they sneak in, unnoticed by porter or

janitor, to work their deeds of darkness among the young. Naught but

the utmost vigilance on the part of school authorities will be able to

counteract these evils. Certainly the principle of St. Ignatius and the

Ratio Studiorum need not be further vindicated.[964]

We must make some remarks about _sports_, which take so important

a part in our modern schools. We do this in connection with moral

education for various reasons. First, because a moderate use of

athletics helps to develop certain moral qualities. Secondly, because

some moderns see in it a remedy for nearly all vicious habits

of youth. They rejoice that “muscular Christianity,” “a sound,

practical, sensible, worldly basis of life has taken the place of the

morbid asceticism and unreal superstitions and transcendentalism of

former generations, which considered the flesh a burden, a clog, a

snare.”[965]--Thirdly, because excess in athletics leads to serious

damage, moral as well as intellectual.

The physical culture of the pupils forms a most important feature in

a good system of education: _sit mens sana in corpore sano_. Athletics,

out-door sports and gymnastics do much for the physical health of the

students. Besides, they demand, and consequently help to develop,

quickness of apprehension, steadiness and coolness, self-reliance,

self-control, readiness to subordinate individual impulses to a

command. This is all valuable for education. Still, “in the reaction

from the asceticism of our early college life there is little doubt

our athletics have gone too far; so far as to direct in a noticeable

degree the student’s attention from his studies.”[966] Indeed, it has

come to pass that among students base-ball, foot-ball, boat-races

and other sports form almost the exclusive topic of conversation.

The favorite reading is the sporting sheet of the newspaper. Some

college periodicals give almost more space to athletics than to

literature. “Pray,” said an Oxford Don to President McCosh, after

reading several numbers of the Princetonian, “are you the president

of a gymnastic institution?”[967] The dangers arise not so much

from athletic exercises themselves, as from their publicity and the

universal admiration in which they are held. There is in our days a

morbid craving for notoriety; people wish to be interviewed, to be

talked about, to be kept before the eyes of the public. Many a young

man thinks he cannot realize this ambition better than by athletic

triumphs. Thus by competitive games much time and talent is wasted,

much enthusiasm for higher aspirations is stifled. Unfortunately, some

colleges, instead of checking this spirit have catered to it. No wonder

that boys have changed their views of the ideal student. Their ideals

are on the campus, no longer in the domain of literature and science.

The hero to whom they look up with admiration is not the leading boy

in the class, not the one who at the end of the year carries off the

honors, but the one “who breaks the world’s record” in some athletic

contest. Many prefer the approving shout of thousands of spectators

on the football field to the earning of class honor. Indeed brain is

no longer the highest human gift in the eyes of a great number of

students, but muscles and muscular achievements. And a writer in a

periodical for September 1901, boasted that “we are fast becoming a

nation of athletes.” The best educators are unanimous in condemning

this excessive spirit of athleticism. They foresee the serious dangers

that spring from it, to intellectual and moral culture.[968]

The Jesuits have never neglected the care of the health of their

pupils.[969] Long ago they had introduced various games into their

colleges and did much to interest all the pupils in them. This is

mentioned as a laudable feature of their educational system even

by men who wrote in a hostile spirit against the Society.[970] The

Jesuits recognized the importance of games at a period when they

were little esteemed by others. “The schools of the sixteenth and

seventeenth centuries are in general noted for their gloomy neglect of

this cheerful element in the education of youth. The schools of the

Jesuits were, in this respect, conducted on more reasonable principles

than most of the rest.”[971] It is a well-known fact that in Germany

sport in the higher schools, is, or was, until recently, neglected

more than is expedient for the general development of the pupils.

And yet, wherever German Jesuits opened a college, be it in Freiburg

(Switzerland), Feldkirch (Vorarlberg), or Sao Leopoldo (Brazil),

everywhere they introduced and encouraged plenty of healthful games, an

evident sign that it is the spirit of the Society to give the pupils

sufficient recreation. Of the French Jesuits, the _Figaro_ wrote years

ago (June 2, 1879): “Games and amusements occupy an important place in

the schools of the Jesuits. They are as much interested about the place

of recreation as about the study hall. The prefects induce the pupils

to join in the games with the same ardor they display in stimulating

them to work at their books. Two prefects, Fathers de Nodaillac and

Rousseau, have written the history of games.... Fencing is honored

and encouraged in the Jesuit schools. In the three institutions at

Paris (_rue de Madrid_, _de Vaugirard_ and _des Postes_) more than

four hundred pupils take lessons in fencing under the direction of the

best instructors.”[972] It is not necessary to prove that in English

speaking countries the Jesuit colleges do not neglect this part of

training.

FOOTNOTES:

[898] _Life of James McCosh_, p. 224.

[899] _The Literary Digest_, November 22, 1902, p. 669.

[900] See the splendid lecture of Bishop Keppler: “Reform, True and

False,” (translated by the Rev. B. Guldner, S. J., in _The Catholic

Mind_, No. 1, January 1903, pp. 13-14).

[901] On the “Relation of Philosophy to Pedagogy” see five articles

by Father Christian Pesch, S. J., in the _Stimmen aus Maria-Laach_,

volumes XIV and XV.

[902] _Hebr._ 13, 14.

[903] _Matthew_ 6, 33.

[904] _Matth._ 16, 26.

[905] _Ecclesiasticus_ 1, 16.

[906] Willmann, _Didaktik_, vol. I, ch. V.

[907] _Col._ 3, I, 2.

[908] _Ephes._ 4, 22, 24.

[909] _Matth._ 16, 24.

[910] Book I, ch. III, 5.

[911] _Brownson’s Review_, Jan. 1846, p. 87.

[912] _Educational Reformers_ (1890), page 47.--It is worth noting

that Sacchini is supposed to have learned from Trotzendorf to esteem

highly moral and religious training--by the way, Quick’s edition of

1868 ascribes that address to Melanchthon!--Everything good in the

Jesuit system must be traced to Protestant sources! As though Sacchini,

in the teaching of the Bible and the most explicit principles of the

Constitutions of his Order, had not better sources than in a school

address of Melanchthon or Trotzendorf, of which he probably knew

nothing!

[913] The public higher schools of Belgium.

[914] _Journal de Gand and La Chronique_, quoted by De Badts de Cugnac,

_Les Jésuites et l’éducation_, p. 54.

[915] Quoted by Ebner, _Jesuiten-Gymnasien_.

[916] 1. Cor. 11, 1.

[917] See Father Lucas, S. J., in _The Spiritual Exercises and the

Education of Youth_ (London, 1902).

[918] _Reg. com. mag. cl. inf._ 10.

[919] Thus the Protestant Sir Henry Howorth, who attacked the Jesuits

so bitterly in recent years, must confess: “The Jesuits have been a

very powerful agency in framing history. They have some things to be

proud of. So far as I know, the austerity and purity of their lives was

one of the greatest, probably the greatest of all, reforming agencies

in the purifying of the clergy of the sixteenth century, and they

strenuously leavened religious life with the stricter rules of life,

which the Council of Trent tried hard to introduce into the religious

world.” (The London _Tablet_, Nov. 23, 1901, p. 817.)

[920] On this whole subject it is worth while to read De Badts de

Cugnac, _La morale des Jésuites_ (Lille, 1879).

[921] _Geschichte des gelehrten Unterrichts_, pp. 282-283 (I,

408-409). The work referred to is: _Erinnerungen eines ehemaligen

Jesuitenzöglings_ (_Recollections of a former Jesuit pupil_). Leipzig,

1862.

[922] _Lettre_, 7 février 1746.--Hughes, _Loyola_, p. 105.

[923] Duhr, _Jesuitenfabeln_, ch. 5 (2nd ed.), pp. 102-103.

[924] _Geschichte der Pädagogik_ (Leipzig, 1857), page 12.--Quoted by

Shea; _History of Georgetown College_, page 86. Italics are ours.--See

also the splendid testimony rendered to the Jesuits by M. Albert Duruy

in the _Revue des Deux Mondes_, January 1, 1880.

[925] _History of Georgetown_, p. 85.

[926] Janssen, _Geschichte des deutschen Volkes_, vol. VII, page 82.

[927] See, for instance, what Arnold said on this subject, in Fitch,

_Thomas and Matthew Arnold_, page 77; further, the _Dublin Review_,

October 1878, p. 294 foll., in the highly instructive article:

“Catholic Colleges and Protestant Schools.” Also “Tom Brown’s School

Days at Rugby,” especially the Preface to the Sixth Edition, will

furnish interesting material.

[928] _Life of James McCosh_, pp. 33 and 35.

[929] _Atlantic Monthly_, March 1900.--A somewhat similar principle

is stated in an article on Eton, in the _Edinburgh Review_, April

1861: “It was the fashion in Sydney Smith’s days--it is so still--to

maintain that the neglect to which boys are necessarily exposed at

our public schools, in consequence of the insufficient number of

assistant masters, renders them self-reliant and manly; and that the

premature initiation into vice, which too often results from that

cause, imparts to them an early knowledge of what are apologetically

called ‘the ways of the world'; and prevents their running riot when

subsequently exposed at the universities to still greater temptations

than those offered them in their boyhood by the public-houses and

slums of Eton and Windsor.” Quoted in the _Dublin Review_, October

1878, p. 308.--This “premature initiation into vice” was, accordingly,

a frequent result of the system of the great English public schools;

moreover, it was considered a positive benefit. A sad prerogative of

these schools, indeed!

[930] Such objections have sometimes been made even by short-sighted

Catholics who, dazzled by the outward brilliant successes of the great

Protestant schools, wished some of their features to be introduced

into Catholic colleges. These views have been ably refuted in various

articles of the _Dublin Review_. See e. g. July and October 1878.--On

the other hand, not long ago President Jones of Hobart plainly

advocated _greatly increased supervision_ in student life. He does

not think that more stringent regulations would keep the students

“milksops.” _The Forum_, Jan. 1901, 592-593.

[931] _Dublin Review_, October 1878, p. 285, note.

[932] _Report of the Commissioner of Education_, 1901, vol. I, p. 249.

[933] _Ezech._ 3, 18.

[934] _Dublin Review_, April 1878, p. 330.

[935] _Truth_, November 1891; quoted in the _Tablet_, November 14, 1891.

[936] On this important point see Père Rochemonteix, vol. II, p. 66

foll.

[937] _Ratio Docendi_, ch. 1, art. 2.

[938] _Paraenesis_, art. 18.

[939] _Ratio et Via_, ch. IV, art. 1, § 6.

[940] See also _Woodstock Letters_, 1896, p. 251.

[941] _Monumenta Germaniae Paedag._, Pachtler, vol. III, p.

59.--Hughes, _Loyola_, p. 108.

[942] _Thomas and Matthew Arnold_, p. 102.

[943] _Revue des Deux-Mondes_, 15 février 1895.

[944] _North American Review_, December 1899.

[945] Compare with this the passage quoted by Arnold: “Public schools

are the very seats and nurseries of vice. It may be unavoidable, or

it may not, but the fact is indisputable. None can pass through a

large school without being pretty intimately acquainted with vice,

and few, alas! very few, without tasting too largely of that poisoned

bowl.”--Fitch, _l. c._, p. 77.

[946] _Historical Records and Studies_, vol. II, part I: “Cardinal

McCloskey,” by Archbishop Farley.

[947] Far worse misrepresentations of Catholic devotions are due to

gross ignorance of Catholic teaching. Thus we find in so learned a

work as Schmid’s _Geschichte der Erziehung_ (vol. III, part I, page

91) the assertion that “the Society of Jesus, according to the idea

of its founder, sees the end and object of all religious exercises in

the adoration of Mary.” Every Catholic child of seven years could have

told the Leipsic Professor who wrote this calumny, that Catholics do

not _adore_, but _venerate_ Mary and the Saints; nor do Catholics see

in the veneration of Mary and the Saints the end and object of all

religious exercises.

[948] _Centralblatt für die Unterrichtsverwaltung_, 1880, p. 572.

[949] See Coleman, “Old Stonyhurst” in _Messenger_, New York, 1894, p.

797 foll.

[950] Details may be read in the _History of the Sodalities_, Boston,

Noonan & Co., 1885.--See also Rochemonteix, vol. II, p. 121 foll.,

where the charitable work of the Sodalities at La Flèche is related.

[951] See _The Pilgrim of our Lady of Martyrs_, New York, Sept. 1893

and Jan. 1894.

[952] _Confess._ I, c. 16.

[953] See above chapter II, § 2: pp. 50-52 and ch. V on the

theatrical performances, pp. 165-167.--Vittorino da Feltre and other

representatives of the Christian Renaissance differed radically on this

point from the Pagan Humanists. Thus Vittorino read certain authors to

his pupils only with many excisions. Woodward, _Vittorino da Feltre_,

pp. 47 and 57.

[954] In Stewart Rose, _St. Ignatius Loyola_, p. 515.--Obscene passages

are meant. But _substitutions_ cannot be recommended.

[955] _Constit._ P. IV, c. 5. _Decl._ E.

[956] _Reg. Prov._ 34.--_Reg. com._ 8.

[957] Littell’s _Living Age_, vol. CLXX (1886), p. 248.

[958] _Inst._ I, c. 8.

[959] _Educational Reformers_, p. 507.--See also von Raumer’s

statements above p. 166.

[960] _Neue Jahrbücher_, 1901, vol. VIII, pp. 57-59.--See also

Schiller, _Handbuch der praktischen Pädagogik_, 1894, p. 172, where it

is said that some satires of Horace and some passages in Homer should

be left out in the school editions. The same author’s opinion about the

use of unabridged Bibles in schools will be quoted in the next chapter.

[961] See above pp. 399-400.

[962] The Rules of the Provincial 34, § 2, say: “Still greater caution

is needed in regard to the vernacular authors.”

[963] _Reg. com._ 8.

[964] On reading see also Sacchini: _On Dangerous Reading_ (In Latin);

a new translation in Herder’s _Bibliothek der katholischen Pädagogik_,

vol. X, pp. 186-205.--Jungmann, S. J.: _Gefahren der belletristischen

Lektüre_.

[965] See General Walker’s address in _Report of Commissioner of

Education_, 1896-97, I, p. 705 foll.

[966] Prof. West of Princeton University, in _Education in the United

States_, vol. I, p. 222.

[967] _Life of James McCosh_, p. 208. See also p. 223 foll.

[968] On this keenly discussed question see: Findlay, _Arnold of

Rugby_, with an _Introduction_ by the Right Reverend Lord Bishop of

Hereford. (1897), pp. 23 and 24.--Fitch, _Thomas and Matthew Arnold_,

pp. 103-108. There it is stated that exaltation of physical powers to

the same level as intellectual distinction has in late years seriously

debased the ideal and hindered the usefulness of the great public

schools in England. “For the moment the type of school-boy and of

manhood most in favor with the British public is Spartan rather than

Athenian.” Mr. Fitch states also that the famous romance of Thomas

Hughes, _Tom Brown’s School-days_, gives only one side and that not the

best side of Rugby school life.--Some excellent remarks on athletics in

college are made by Mr. Canfield in his book _The College Student and

his Problems_, pp. 103-105. A very severe criticism of the excessive

admiration of sport among the English public is contained in the

_Contemporary Review_, Jan. 1902.--See also _Nineteenth Century_, Jan.

1903, p. 46.

[969] A document in Spanish, drawn up in the first years of the

Society, contains a most interesting chapter entitled “The Preservation

of Bodily Health and Strength.” In seventeen paragraphs it lays down

rules about moderation in studies, about food, clothing, sleep, proper

bodily exercises, and sufficient recreation. Although this document

was primarily written for the younger members of the Order, its

principles were applied, as appears from other passages, to the pupils

of the colleges, of course with necessary changes. See _Monumenta

Paedagogica_, p. 68 sq. “_Para Conservar la Salud y Fuerzas del

Cuerpo_.”

[970] For instance in the _Recollections of a Jesuit Pupil_ (written

by an apostate priest who had studied in Jesuit colleges), p. 104

foll. Bode: _Aus dem Kloster_, vol. II, p. 174 foll. quoted by Huber,

_Jesuiten-Orden_, p. 370 foll.

[971] Kiddle and Schem, _The Cyclopaedia of Education_, article

“Games,” p. 330.

[972] De Badts de Cugnac, _Les Jésuites et l’éducation_, pp. 25-31.