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THE EDUCATION OF CATHOLIC GIRLS
* * * *
PUBLIC SCHOOLS FOR GIRLS. A Series of Papers by Nineteen
Headmistresses dealing with the History, Curricula, and
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LIFE'S IDEALS. By WILLIAM JAMES, formerly Professor of
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EDUCATION AND THE NEW UTILITARIANISM, and other Educational
Addresses. By ALEXANDER DARROCH, M.A., Professor of
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Longmans, Green and Co.,
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* * * *
THE EDUCATION OF CATHOLIC GIRLS
by
JANET ERSKINE STUART
With a Preface by Cardinal Bourne
Archbishop of Westminster
Longmans, Green and Co.
39 Paternoster Row, London
Fourth Avenue & 30th Street, New York
Bombay, Calcutta, and Madras
Fourth Impression
1914
Nihil Obstat:
F. THOS. BERGH, O.S.B.
Imprimatur:
FRANOISOUS CARD. BOURNE
ABCHIEPOS WESIMONAST,
die 1 Januarii, 1912.
PREFACE
We have had many treatises on education in recent years; many
regulations have been issued by Government Departments; enormous sums
of money are contributed annually from private and public sources for
the improvement and development of education. Are the results in any
degree proportioned to all these repeated and accumulated efforts? It
would not be easy to find one, with practical experience of education,
ready to give an unhesitatingly affirmative answer. And the
explanation of the disappointing result obtained is very largely to be
found in the neglect of the training of the will and character, which
is the foundation of all true education. The programmes of Government,
the grants made if certain conditions are fulfilled, the recognition
accorded to a school if it conforms to a certain type, these things
may have raised the standard of teaching, and forced attention to
subjects of learning which were neglected; they have done little to
promote education in the real sense of the term. Nay, more than this,
the insistence on certain types of instruction which they have
compelled has in too many cases paralysed the efforts of teachers who
in their hearts were striving after a better way.
The effect on some of our Catholic schools of the newer methods has
not been free from harm. Compelled by force of circumstances, parental
or financial, to throw themselves into the current of modern
educational effort, they have at the same time been obliged to abandon
the quieter traditional ways which, while making less display, left a
deeper impress on the character of their pupils. Others have had the
courage to cling closely to hallowed methods built up on the wisdom
and experience of the past, and have united with them all that was not
contradictory in recent educational requirements. They may, thereby,
have seemed to some waiting in sympathy with the present, and
attaching too great value to the past. The test of time will probably
show that they have given to both past and present an equal share in
their consideration.
It will certainly be of singular advantage to those who are engaged in
the education of Catholic girls to have before them a treatise written
by one who has had a long and intimate experience of the work of which
she writes. Loyal in every word to the soundest traditions of Catholic
education, the writer recognizes to the full that the world into which
Catholic girls pass nowadays on leaving school is not the world of a
hundred, or of fifty, or of even thirty years ago. But this
recognition brings out, more clearly than anything else could do, the
great and unchanging fact that the formation of heart and will and
character is, and must be always, the very root of the education of a
child; and it also shows forth the new fact that at no time has that
formation been more needed than at the present day.
The pages of this book are well worthy of careful pondering and
consideration, and they will be of special value both to parents and
to teachers, for it is in their hands and in their united, and not
opposing action, that the educational fate of the children lies.
But I trust that the thoughts set forth upon these pages will not
escape either the eyes or the thoughts of those who are the public
custodians and arbiters of education in this country. The State is
daily becoming more jealous in its control of educational effort in
England. Would that its wisdom were equal to its jealousy. We might
then be delivered from the repeated attempts to hamper definite
religious teaching in secondary schools, by the refusal of public aid
where the intention to impart it is publicly announced; and from the
discouragement continually arising from regulations evidently inspired
by those who have no personal experience of the work to be
accomplished, and who decline to seek information from those to whom
such work is their very life. It cannot, surely, be for the good of
our country that the stored-up experience of educational effort of
every type should be disregarded in favour of rigid rules and
programmes; or that zeal and devotion in the work of education are to
be regarded as valueless unless they be associated with so-called
undenominational religion. The Catholic Church in this and in every
country has centuries of educational tradition in her keeping. She has
no more ardent wish than to place it all most generously at the
service of the commonwealth, and to take her place in every movement
that will be to the real advantage of the children upon whom the
future of the world depends. And we have just ground for complaint
when the conditions on which alone our co-operation will be allowed
are of such a character as to make it evident that we are not intended
to have any real place in the education of our country.
May this treatise so ably written be a source of guidance and
encouragement to those who are giving their lives to the education of
Catholic children, and at the same time do something to dispel the
distrust and to overcome the hostility shown in high quarters towards
every Catholic educational endeavour.
FRANCIS CARDINAL BOURNE,
ARCHBISHOP OF WESTMINSTER.
CONTENTS
PREFACE
INTRODUCTION
CHAPTER
I. RELIGION
II. CHARACTER. I.
III. CHARACTER. II.
IV. THE ELEMENTS OF CATHOLIC PHILOSOPHY
V. THE REALITIES OF LIFE
VI. LESSONS AND PLAY
VII. MATHEMATICS, NATURAL SCIENCE, AND NATURE STUDY
VIII. ENGLISH
IX. MODERN LANGUAGES
X. HISTORY
XI. ART
XII. MANNERS
XIII. HIGHER EDUCATION OF WOMEN
XIV. CONCLUSION
APPENDIX I
APPENDIX II
INDEX
Pair though it be, to watch unclose
The nestling glories of a rose,
Depth on rich depth, soft fold on fold;
Though fairer he it, to behold
Stately and sceptral lilies break
To beauty, and to sweetness wake:
Yet fairer still, to see and sing,
One fair thing is, one matchless thing:
Youth, in its perfect blossoming.
LIONEL JOHNSON.
INTRODUCTION
A book was published in the United States in 1910 with the title,
EDUCATION: HOW OLD THE NEW. A companion volume might be written with a
similar title, EDUCATION: HOW NEW THE OLD, and it would only exhibit
another aspect of the same truth.
This does not pretend to be that possible companion volume, but to
present a point of view which owes something both to old and new, and
to make an appeal for the education of Catholic girls to have its
distinguishing features recognized and freely developed in view of
ultimate rather than immediate results.
CHAPTER I.
RELIGION.
"Oh! say not, dream not, heavenly notes
To childish ears are vain,
That the young mind at random floats,
And cannot reach the strain.
"Dim or unheard, the words may fall.
And yet the Heaven-taught mind
May learn the sacred air, and all
The harmony unwind."
KEBLE.
The principal educational controversies of the present day rage round
the teaching of religion to children, but they are more concerned with
the right to teach it than with what is taught, in fact none of the
combatants except the Catholic body seem to have a clear notion of
what they actually want to teach, when the right has been secured. It
is not the controversy but the fruits of it that are here in question,
the echoes of battle and rumours of wars serve to enhance the
importance of the matter, the duty of making it all worth while, and
using to the best advantage the opportunities which are secured at the
price of so many conflicts.
The duty is twofold, to God and to His children. God, who entrusts to
us their religious education, has a right to be set before them as
truly, as nobly, as worthily as our capacity allows, as beautifully as
human language can convey the mysteries of faith, with the quietness
and confidence of those who know and are not afraid, and filial pride
in the Christian inheritance which is ours. The child has a right to
learn the best that it can know of God, since the happiness of its
life, not only in eternity but even in time, is bound up in that
knowledge. Most grievous wrong has been done, and is still done,
to children by well-meaning but misguided efforts to "make them
good" by dwelling on the vengeance taken by God upon the wicked, on
the possibilities of wickedness in the youngest child. Their
impressionable minds are quite ready to take alarm, they are so small,
and every experience is so new; there are so many great forces at work
which can be dimly guessed at, and to their vivid imaginations who can
say what may happen next? If the first impressions of God conveyed to
them are gloomy and terrible, a shadow may be cast over the mind so
far-reaching that perhaps a whole lifetime may not carry them beyond
it. They hear of a sleepless Bye that ever watches, to see them doing
wrong, an Bye from which they cannot escape. There is the Judge of
awful severity who admits no excuse, who pursues with relentless
perseverance to the very end and whose resources for punishment are
inexhaustible. What wonder if a daring and defiant spirit turns at
last and stands at bay against the resistless Avenger, and if in later
years the practical result is--"if we may not escape, let us try to
forget," or the drifting of a whole life into indifference, languor of
will, and pessimism that border on despair.
Parents could not bear to be so misrepresented to their children, and
what condemnation would be sufficient for teachers who would turn the
hearts of children against their father, poisoning the very springs of
life. Yet this wrong is done to God. In general, children taught by
their own parents do not suffer so much from these misrepresentations
of God, as those who have been left with servants and ignorant
teachers, themselves warped by a wrong early training. Fathers and
mothers must have within themselves too much intuition of the
Fatherhood of God not to give another tone to their teaching, and
probably it is from fathers and mothers, as they are in themselves
symbols of God's almighty power and unmeasured love, that the first
ideas of Him can best reach the minds of little children.
But it is rare that circumstances admit the continuance of this best
instruction. For one reason or another children pass on to other
teachers and, except for what can be given directly by the clergy,
must depend on them for further religious instruction. This further
teaching, covering, say, eight years of school life, ten to eighteen,
falls more or less into two periods, one in which the essentials of
Christian life and doctrine have to be learned, the other in which
more direct preparation may be made for the warfare of faith which
must be encountered when the years of school life are over. It is a
great stewardship to be entrusted with the training of God's royal
family of children, during these years on which their after life
almost entirely depends, and "it is required among stewards that a man
may be found faithful." For other branches of teaching it is more easy
to ascertain that the necessary qualifications are not wanting, but in
this the qualifications lie so deeply hidden between God and the
conscience that they must often be taken for granted, and the
responsibility lies all the more directly with the teacher who has to
live the life, as well as to know the truth, and love both truth and
life in order to make them loved. These are qualifications that are
never attained, because they must always be in process of attainment,
only one who is constantly growing in grace and love and knowledge can
give the true appreciation of what that grace and love and knowledge
are in their bearing on human life: to _be_ rather than to _know_ is
therefore a primary qualification. Inseparably bound up with it is the
thinking right thoughts concerning what is to be taught.
1. To have right thoughts of God. It would seem to be too obvious to
need statement, yet experience shows that this fundamental necessity
is not always secure, far from it. It is not often put into words, but
traces may be found only too easily of foundations of religion laid in
thoughts of God that are unworthy of our faith. Whence can they have
come? Doubtless in great measure from the subtle spirit of Jansenism
which spread so widely in its day and is so hard to outlive--from
remains of the still darker spirit of Calvinism which hangs about
convert teachers of a rigid school--from vehement and fervid spiritual
writers, addressing themselves to the needs of other times--perhaps
most of all from the old lie which was from the beginning, the deep
mistrust of God which is the greatest triumph of His enemy. God is set
forth as if He were encompassed with human limitations--the fiery
imagery of the Old Testament pressed into the service of modern and
western minds, until He is made to seem pitiless, revengeful,
exacting, lying in wait to catch His creatures in fault, and awaiting
them at death with terrible surprises.
But this is not what the Church and the Gospels have to say about Him
to the children of the kingdom. If we could put into words our highest
ideals of all that is most lovely and lovable, beautiful, tender,
gracious, liberal, strong, constant, patient, unwearying, add what we
can, multiply it a million times, tire out our imagination beyond it,
and then say that it is nothing to what He is, that it is the weakest
expression of His goodness and beauty, we shall give a poor idea of
God indeed, but at least, as far as it goes, it will be true, and it
will lead to trustfulness and friendship, to a right attitude of mind,
as child to father, and creature to Creator. We speak as we believe,
there is an accent of sincerity that carries conviction if we speak of
God as we believe, and if we believe truly, we shall speak of Him
largely, trustfully, and happily, whether in the dogmas of our faith,
or as we find His traces and glorious attributes in the world around
us, as we consider the lilies of the field and the birds of the air,
or as we track with reverent and unprecipitate following the line of
His providential government in the history of the world.
The need of right thoughts of God is also deeply felt on the side of
our relations to Him, and that especially in our democratic times when
sovereignty is losing its meaning. There are free and easy ideas of
God, as if man might criticize and question and call Him to account,
and have his say on the doings of the Creator. It is not explanation
or apology that answer these, but a right thought of God makes them
impossible, and this right thought can only be given if we have it
ourselves. The Fatherhood of God and the Sovereignty of God are
foundations of belief which complete one another, and bear up all the
superstructure of a child's understanding of Christian life.
2. Eight ideas of ourselves and of our destiny. It is a pity that evil
instead of good is made a prominent feature of religious teaching. To
be haunted by the thought of evil and the dread of losing our soul,
as if it were a danger threatening us at every step, is not the
most inspiring ideal of life; quiet, steady, unimaginative fear and
watchfulness is harder to teach, but gives a stronger defence against
sin than an ever present terror; while all that belongs to hope
awakens a far more effective response to good. Some realization of our
high destiny as heirs of heaven is the strongest hold that the average
character can have to give steadiness in prosperity and courage in
adversity. Chosen souls will rise higher than this, but if the average
can reach so far as this they will do well.
3. Eight ideas of sin and evil. It is possible on the one hand to give
such imperfect ideas of right and wrong that all is measured by the
mere selfish standard of personal security. The frightened question
about some childish wrong-doing--"is it a mortal sin?" often indicates
that fear of punishment is the only aspect under which sin appears to
the mind; while a satisfied tone in saying "it is only a venial sin"
looks like a desire to see what liberties may be taken with God
without involving too serious consequences to self. "It is wrong"
ought to be enough, and the less children talk of mortal sin the
better--to talk of it, to discuss with them whether this or that is a
mortal sin, accustoms them to the idea. When they know well the
conditions which make a sin grave without illustrations by example
which are likely to obscure the subject rather than clear it up, when
their ideas of right and duty and obligation are clear, when "I ought"
has a real meaning for them, we shall have a stronger type of
character than that which is formed on detailed considerations of
different degrees of guilt.
On the other hand it is possible to confuse and torment children by
stories of the exquisite delicacy of the consciences of the saints, as
St. Aloysius, setting before them a standard that is beyond their
comprehension or their degree of grace, and making them miserable
because they cannot conform to it.
It is a great safeguard against sin to realize that duty must be done,
at any cost, and that Christianity means self-denial and taking up the
cross.
4. Eight thoughts of the four last things. True thoughts of death are
not hard for children to grasp, to their unspoiled faith it is a
simple and joyful thing to go to God. Later on the dreary pageantry
and the averted face of the world from that which is indeed its doom
obscure the Christian idea, and the mind slips back to pagan grief, as
if there were no life to come.
Eight thoughts of judgment are not so hard to give if the teaching is
sincere and simple, free from exaggerations and phantoms of dread, and
on the other hand clear from an incredulous protest against God's
holding man responsible for his acts.
But to give right thoughts of hell and heaven taxes the best
resources of those who wish to lay foundations well, for they are
to be foundations for life, and the two lessons belong together,
corner-stones of the building, to stand in view as long as it shall
stand and never to be forgotten.
The two lessons belong together as the final destiny of man, fixed by
his own act, _this_ or _that_. And they have to be taught with all the
force and gravity and dignity which befits the subject, and in such a
way that after years will find nothing to smile at and nothing to
unlearn. They have to be taught as the mind of the present time can
best apprehend them, not according to the portraiture of mediaeval
pictures, but in a language perhaps not more true and adequate
in itself but less boisterous and more comprehensible to our
self-conscious and introspective moods. Father Faber's treatment
of these last things, hell and heaven, would furnish matter for
instruction not beyond the understanding of those in their last years
at school, and of a kind which if understood must leave a mark upon
the mind for life. [1 See Appendix I.]
5. Eight views of Jesus Christ and His mother. For Catholic children
this relationship is not a thing far off, but the faith which teaches
them of God Incarnate bids them also understand that He is their own
"God who gives joy to their youth"--and that His mother is also
theirs. There are many incomprehensible things in which children are
taught to affirm their belief, and the acts of faith in which they
recite these truths are far beyond their understanding. But they can
and do understand if we take pains to teach them that they are loved
by Our Lord each one alone, intimately and personally, and asked to
love in return. "Suffer the little children to come unto Me, and
forbid them not," is not for them a distant echo of what was heard
long ago in the Holy Land, it is no story, but a living reality of to
day. They are themselves the children who are invited to come to Him,
better off indeed than those first called, since they are not now
rebuked or kept off by the Apostles but brought to the front and given
the first places, invited by order of His Vicar from their earliest
years to receive the Bread of Heaven, and giving delight to His
representatives on earth by accepting the invitation.
It is the reality as contrasted with the story that is the prerogative
of the Catholic child. Jesus and Mary are real, and are its own
closest kin, all but visible, at moments intensely felt as present.
They are there in joy and in trouble, when every one else fails in
understanding or looks displeased there is this refuge, there is this
love which always forgives, and sets things right, and to whom nothing
is unimportant or without interest. Companionship in loneliness,
comfort in trouble, relief in distress, endurance in pain are all to
be found in them. With Jesus and Mary what is there in the whole world
of which a Catholic child should be afraid. And this glorious strength
of theirs made perfect in child-martyrs in many ages will make them
again child-martyrs now if need be, or confessors of the holy faith as
they are not seldom called upon, even now, to show themselves.
There is a strange indomitable courage in children which has its deep
springs in these Divine things; the strength which they find in Holy
Communion and in their love for Jesus and Mary is enough to overcome
in them all weakness and fear.
6. Eight thoughts of the faith and practice of Christian life. And
here it is necessary to guard against what is childish, visionary, and
exuberant, against things that only feed the fancy or excite the
imagination, against practices which are adapted to other races than
ours, but with us are liable to become unreal and irreverent, against
too vivid sense impressions and especially against attaching too much
importance to them, against grotesque and puerile forms of piety,
which drag down the beautiful devotions to the saints until they are
treated as inhabitants of a superior kind of doll's house, rewarded
and punished, scolded and praised, endowed with pet names, and treated
so as to become objects of ridicule to those who do not realize that
these extravagances may be in other countries natural forms of peasant
piety when the grace of intimacy with the saints has run wild. In
northern countries a greater sobriety of devotion is required if it is
to have any permanent influence on life.
But again, on the other hand, the more restrained devotion must not
lose its spontaneity; so long as it is the true expression of faith it
can hardly be too simple, it can never be too intimate a part of
common life. Noble friendships with the saints in glory are one of the
most effectual means of learning heavenly-mindedness, and friendships
formed in childhood will last through a lifetime. To find a character
like one's own which has fought the same fight and been crowned, is an
encouragement which obtains great victories, and to enter into the
thoughts of the saints is to qualify oneself here below for
intercourse with the citizens of heaven.
To be well grounded in the elements of faith, and to have been so
taught that the practice of religion has become the atmosphere of a
happy life, to have the habit of sanctifying daily duties, joys, and
trials by the thought of God, and a firm resolve that nothing shall be
allowed to draw the soul away from Him, such is, broadly speaking, the
aim we may set before ourselves for the end of the years of childhood,
after which must follow the more difficult years of the training of
youth.
The time has gone by when the faith of childhood might be carried
through life and be assailed by no questionings from without. A faith
that is not armed and ready for conflict stands a poor chance of
passing victoriously through its trials, it cannot hope to escape from
being tried. "We have laboured successfully," wrote a leading Jewish
Freemason in Rome addressing his Brotherhood, "in the great cities and
among the young men; it remains for us to carry out the work in the
country districts and amongst the women." Words could not be plainer
to show what awaits the faith of children when they come out into the
world; and even in countries where the aim is not so clearly set forth
the current of opinion mostly sets against the faith, the current of
the world invariably does so. For faith to hold on its course against
all that tends to carry it away, it is needful that it should not be
found unprepared. The minds of the young cannot expect to be carried
along by a Catholic public opinion, there will be few to help them,
and they must learn to stand by themselves, to answer for themselves,
to be challenged and not afraid to speak out for their faith, to be
able to give "first aid" to unsettled minds and not allow their own
to be unsettled by what they hear. They must learn that, as Father
Dalgairns points out, their position in the world is far more akin to
that of Christians in the first centuries of the Church than to the
life that was lived in the middle ages when the Church visibly ruled
over public opinion. Now, as in the earliest ages, the faithful
stand in small assemblies or as individuals amid cold or hostile
surroundings, and individual faith and sanctity are the chief means of
extending the kingdom of God on earth.
But this apostleship needs preparation and training. The early
teaching requires to be seasoned and hardened to withstand the
influences which tend to dissolve faith and piety; by this seasoning
faith must be enlightened, and piety become serene and grave,
"sedate," as St. Francis of Sales would say with beautiful commentary.
In the last years of school or school-room life the mind has to be
gradually inured to the harder life, to the duty of defending as well
as adorning the faith, and to gain at least some idea of the enemies
against which defence must be made. It is something even to know what
is in the air and what may be expected that the first surprise may not
disturb the balance of the mind. To know that in the Church there have
been sorrows and scandals, without the promises of Christ having
failed, and even that it had to be so, fulfilling His word, "it must
needs be that scandals come" (St. Matthew XVIII. 7), that they are
therefore rather a confirmation than a stumbling-block to our faith,
this is a necessary safeguard. To have some unpretentious knowledge of
what is said and thought concerning Holy Scripture, to know at least
something about Modernism and other phases of current opinion is
necessary, without making a study of their subtilties, for the most
insecure attitude of mind for girls is to _think they know_, in these
difficult questions, and the best safeguard both of their faith and
good sense is intellectual modesty. Without making acquaintance in
detail with the phenomena of spiritualism and kindred arts or
sciences, it is needful to know in a plain and general way why they
are forbidden by the Church, and also to know how those who have lost
their balance and peace of mind in these pursuits would willingly draw
back, but find it next to impossible to free themselves from the
servitude in which they are entangled. It is hard for some minds to
resist the restless temptation to feel, to see, to test and handle all
that life can offer of strange and mysterious experiences, and next to
the curb of duty comes the safeguard of greatly valuing freedom of
mind.
Curiosity concerning evil or dangerous knowledge is more impetuous
when a sudden emancipation of mind sweeps the old landmarks and
restraints out of sight, and nothing has been foreseen which can
serve as a guide. Then is the time when weak places in education show
themselves, when the least insincerity in the presentment of truth
brings its own punishment, and a faith not pillared and grounded in
all honesty is in danger of failing. The best security is to have
nothing to unlearn, to know that what one knows is a very small part
of what can be known, but that as far as it goes it is true and
genuine, and cannot be outgrown, that it will stand both the wear of
time and the test of growing power of thought, and that those who have
taught these beliefs will never have to retract or be ashamed of them,
or own that they were passed off, though inadequate, upon the minds of
children.
It is not unusual to meet girls who are troubled with "doubts" as to
faith and difficulties which alarm both them and their friends.
Sometimes when these "doubts" are put into words they turn out to be
mere difficulties, and it has not been understood that "ten thousand
difficulties do not make a doubt." Sometimes the difficulties are
scarcely real, and come simply from catching up objections which they
do not know how to answer, and think unanswerable. Sometimes a spirit
of contradiction has been aroused, and a captious tendency, or a love
of excitement and sensationalism, with a wish to see the other side.
Sometimes imperfect teaching has led them to expect the realization of
things as seen, which are only to be assented to as believed, so that
there is a hopeless effort to _imagine_, to _feel_, and to _feel
sure_, to lean in some way upon what the senses can verify, and the
acquiescence, assent, and assurance of faith seems all insufficient to
give security. Sometimes there is genuine ignorance of what is to be
believed, and of what it is to believe. Sometimes it is merely a
question of nerves, a want of tone in the mind, insufficient
occupation and training which has thrown the mind back upon itself to
its own confusion. Sometimes they come from want of understanding that
there must be mysteries in faith, and a multitude of questions that do
not admit of complete answers, that God would not be God if the
measure of our minds could compass His, that the course of His
Providence must transcend our experience and judgment, and that if the
truths of faith forced the assent of our minds all the value of that
assent would be taken away. If these causes and a few others were
removed one may ask oneself how many "doubts" and difficulties would
remain in the ordinary walks of Catholic life.
It seems to be according to the mind of the Church in our days to turn
the minds of her children to the devotional study of Scripture, and if
this is begun, as it may be, in the early years of education it gains
an influence which is astonishing. The charm of the narrative in the
very words of Scripture, and the jewels of prayer and devotion which
may be gathered in the Sacred Books, are within the reach of children,
and they prepare a treasure of knowledge and love which will grow in
value during a lifetime. Arms are there, too, against many
difficulties and temptations; and a better understanding of the
Church's teaching and of the liturgy which is the best standard of
devotion for the faithful.
The blight of Scriptural knowledge is to make it a "subject" for
examinations, running in a parallel track with Algebra and Geography,
earning its measure of marks and submitted to the tests of
non-Catholic examining bodies, to whom it speaks in another tongue
than ours. It must be a very robust devotion to the word of God that
is not chilled by such treatment, and can keep an early Christian glow
in its readings of the Gospels and Epistles whether they have proved a
failure or a success in the examination. In general, Catholic
candidates acquit themselves well in this subject, and perhaps it may
give some edification to non-Catholic examiners when they see these
results. But it is questionable whether the risk of drying up the
affection of children for what must become to them a text-book is
worth this measure of success. Let experience speak for those who know
if it is not so; it would seem in the nature of things that so it must
be. When it is given over to voluntary study (beyond the diocesan
requirements which are a stimulus and not a blight) it catches, not
like wild fire, but like blessed fire, even among young children, and
is woven imperceptibly into the texture of life.
Lastly, what may be asked of Catholic children when they grow up and
have to take upon themselves the responsibility of keeping their own
faith alive, and the practice of their religion in an atmosphere which
may often be one of cold faith and slack observance? Neither their
spiritual guides, nor those who have educated them, nor their own
parents, can take this responsibility out of their hands. St. Francis
of Sales calls science the 8th Sacrament for a priest, urging the
clergy to give themselves earnestly to study, and he says that great
troubles have come upon us because the sacred ark of knowledge was
found in other hands than those of the Levites. Leo XIII wrote in one
of his great encyclicals that "Every minister of holy religion must
bring to the struggle the full energy of his mind and all his power of
endurance." What about the laity? We cannot leave all the battle to
the clergy; they cannot defend and instruct and carry us into the
kingdom of heaven in spite of ourselves; their labours call for
response and correspondence. What about those who are now leaving
childhood behind and will be in the front ranks of the coming
generation? Their influence will make or unmake the religion of their
homes, and what they will be for the whole of their life will depend
very much upon how they take their first independent stand.
It is much that they should be well grounded in those elements of
doctrine which they can learn in their school-days. It is much more if
they carry out with them a living interest in the subject and care to
watch the current of the Church's thought in the encyclicals that are
addressed to the faithful, the pastorals of Bishops, the works of
Catholic writers which, are more and more within the reach of all, in
the great events of the Church's life, and in the talk of those who
are able to speak from first-hand knowledge and experience. It is most
of all fundamental that they should have an attitude of mind that is
worthy of their faith; one that is not nervous or apologetic for the
Church, not anxious about the Pope lest he should "interfere too
much," nor frightened of what the world may say. They should have an
unperturbed conviction that the Church will have the last word in any
controversy, and that she has nothing to be alarmed at, though all the
battalions of newest thought should be set in array against her; they
should be lovingly proud of the Church, and keep their belief in her
at all times joyous, assured, and unafraid.
Theology is not for them, neither required nor obtainable, though some
have been found enterprising enough to undertake to read the _Summa_,
and naive enough to suppose that they would be theologians at the end
of it, and even at the outset ready to exchange ideas with Doctors of
Divinity on efficacious grace, and to have "views" on the authorship
of the Sacred Writings. Such aspirations either come to an untimely
end by an awakening sense of proportion, or remain as monuments to the
efforts of those "less wise," or in some unfortunate cases the mind
loses its balance and is led into error.
"Thirsting to be more than mortal,
I was even less than clay."
Let us, if we can, keep the bolder spirits on the level of what is
congruous, where the wealth that is within their reach will not be
exhausted in their lifetime, and where they may excel without offence
and without inviting either condemnation or ridicule. The sense of
fitness is a saving instinct in this as in 1 every other department of
life. When it is present, first principles come home like intuitions
to the mind, where it is absent they seem to take no hold at all, and
the understanding that should supply for the right instinct makes slow
and laborious way if it ever enters at all.
To know the relation in which one stands to any department of
knowledge is, in that department, "the beginning of wisdom". The great
Christian Basilicas furnish a parallel in the material order. They are
the house of God and the home and possession of every member of the
Church militant without distinction of age or rank or learning. But
they are not the same to each. Every one brings his own understanding
and faith and insight, and the great Church is to him what he has
capacity to understand and to receive. The great majority of
worshippers could not draw a fine of the plans or expound a law of the
construction, or set a stone in its place, yet the whole of it is
theirs and for them, and their reverent awe, even if they have no
further understanding, adds a spiritual grace and a fuller dignity to
the whole. The child, the beggar, the pilgrim, the penitent, the lowly
servants and custodians of the temple, the clergy, the venerable
choir, the highest authorities from whom come the order and regulation
of the ceremonies, all have their parts, all stand in their special
relations harmoniously sharing in different degrees in what is for
all. Even those long since departed, architects and builders and
donors, are not cut off from it, their works follow them, and their
memory lives in the beauty which stands as a memorial to their great
ideals. It is all theirs, it is all ours, it is all God's. And so of
the great basilica of theology, built up and ever in course of
building; it is for all--but for each according to his needs---for
their use, for their instruction, to surround and direct their
worship, to be a security and defence to their souls, a great Church
in which the spirit is raised heavenwards in proportion to the faith
and submission with which it bows down in adoration before the throne
of God.