Ver.04.29.93*END*
FOR GREATER THINGS
The story of Saint Stanislaus Kostka
by William T. Kane, S.J.
with a preface by James J. Daly, S.J.
PREFACE
Among Christian evidences the heroic virtue and holiness of Catholic
youth must not be overlooked. Juvenile and adolescent victories of a
conspicuous kind, over the flesh, the world, and the devil, can be
found in no land and in no age, except a Christian land and age, and
in no Church except the Catholic Church. It is of all excellences
the very rarest and most difficult, this triumphant mastery over
human weakness and human pride. It has defied the life-long
strivings of men whom the world recognizes as beings of superior
wisdom and power of will. The philosophers who have described it
most beautifully and encouraged its pursuit in the most glowing and
impressive terms remain themselves sad examples of human futility in
the struggle to disengage the spirit from the claws of dragging and
unclean influences. For the forces of evil are infinite in their
variety, insidious beyond the ability of natural sharpness to detect
and guard against, and unsleeping in the pressure of their siege
upon the heart of man. Who will explain how it comes to pass that
youth, whose callowness and inexperience are the mockery of the
world, has laid prostrate in single combat this giant of evil and
won fields where the reputations of the world's wisest and noblest
and most tried lie buried?
It is a matter of idle curiosity with us how an unbelieving
generation, ingenious in devising natural explanations (which are
most unnatural) of supernatural phenomena, would explain away the
wonder of the young Saint's life which is the subject of the
following pages. It presents to us a picture of Divine Condescension
guiding and inspiring and aiding human effort, so convincingly clear
and transparent in its smallest details and in its general effect as
to seem outside the pale of all possible mutilation and
misinterpretation by malice or skeptical analysis. Natural reaction
against sinful excess, thwarted ambitions, disappointed hopes, meek
conformity with environment, ecclesiastical manipulation of pliant
material, tame acquiescence in family traditions and arrangements,
these and all the other stock "explanations," with which a groveling
world seeks to pull down the Saints to its own dreary level, cannot
be invoked to dissipate the mystery and the glory surrounding
Stanislaus. How did he come so early in life, and in a nobleman's
family, to set such store upon spiritual values? How did his tender
and immature mind grasp with such swift sureness the one lesson of
all philosophies, that life on its material side is an incident
rather than the sum of human existence and can never satisfy
the soul's desires ? How could this mere boy have developed, so
young, an iron will which wrought that hardest of all laborious
tasks, namely, the conformation of conduct with lofty ideals? There
are supernatural answers to these and similar questions which might
be raised concerning the brief career of St. Stanislaus. We know of
no merely natural answers.
The lively and energetic style adopted in the present biography may
create a trace of mild surprise in older readers. Sanctity, it is
true, some one may say, is a very beautiful achievement in a world
of poor and, at best, mediocre performance; but, after all, the
business of sanctity is a serious business. It calls for grit and
endurance, and, as a picture, is only saved from the sordid by
spiritual motives which are unseen. If all moral life is a
monotonous warfare, the life of a Saint is warfare in the very first
ranks where the trenches are filled with water and the shells fall
thickest and the general discomfort and pettiness are at their
maximum. It is misleading and not in strict accord with known
realities, to paint the portrait of a Saint in rose color and
sunlight, diffusing an iridescent atmosphere of cheerful gayety and
buoyancy.
The criticism is not without some foundation; but youthful readers
will not adopt it. For youth is generous, and age is crabbed. And
because Saints never become crabbed we are right in concluding that
they always remain youthful. And, to draw out our conclusion, the
lives of Saints, contrary to the popular belief, are much more
interesting to the child than they are to the man. It is a pity that
Catholic parents do not recognize this outstanding truth. No
Saint's life is dull to the average intelligent child. Grown-ups
are dull: they never yield to sublime impulses: they measure,
calculate, practice a hard-and-fast moderation, reduce the splendid
possibilities of life to a drab level of safe actuality, and pursue
ideals at a canny and cautious pace. Not so the Saints. They always
retained the freshness and confidence and generous impulses of
childhood. If God spoke to their inner ear and bade them leap
boldly forth into His Infinite Arms, spurning irretrievably the
solid footing of our spinning globe, without hesitation or question
they took the leap. And every child can see the wisdom of it. To
the child it is common sense: to his elders it is inspired heroism
or unintelligible hardihood. We have always entertained a deep-
seated suspicion that there is no child who does not think it easy
to be a Saint, so native is sanctity to Catholic childhood. Cardinal
Newman, we believe, exhorted us all to make our sacrifices for God
while we are young before the calculating selfishness of old age
gets hold of us.
Still it may not be quite clear to the inquiring mind why the
desperate difficulties of sainthood can be truthfully viewed in the
light of a breathless adventure. Learn, then, the great secret. The
love of God in the heart is the magical light which touches the
dreariness and hardship of self-thwarting with a splendor of sublime
Romance. You cannot have holiness without love. Holiness can be
either greater nor less than the love of God. Let this love faint
or grow cold, there is at once a loss of holiness, even though it
retain all its external gear. This is a cardinal truth; it is a key
which will solve many a puzzle. It will explain why fanatics and
similar oddities are not Saints, though secular history sometimes
honors them with the title.
Merely concede that the Saint possesses love for God in an
extraordinary measure and degree, and it is the most comprehensible
thing in the world that he will not only accept all tests of his
love readily, but will go forth in search of them with eager
alacrity. First and last and always the only keen satisfaction of
great love, whether human or divine, is to welcome opportunities of
proving itself in some heroic form of courage and endurance. Danger,
suffering, battling against odds, discouragement, overwork, pain of
mind and body, failure, want of recognition, rebuffs, contempt and
persecution, are no longer the subject matter of a strong-jawed
stoicism or a submissive patience but rather the quickening bread
and wine of an intense and high-keyed life. This is why the Saints,
be the provocation ever so great, never develop nerves, or
experience those melancholy and humiliating reactions which are the
natural ebb-tide of spiritual energies. This is why Saints can fast
and keep their temper sweet, can wear hair-shirts without
cultivating wry faces, can be passed by in the distribution of
honors without being soured, can pray all night without robbing the
day of its due meed of cheerfulness, can rise superior to frailties
and weaknesses without despising those who cannot, can be serious
without being testy and morose, can live for years in a cell or a
desert or a convent-close without perishing of ennui or being
devoured by restlessness, and can mingle with life, where all its
currents meet, without losing their heads or swerving a hairbreadth
from the straight line of a most uncommon and most impressive kind
of common sense.
Unless we keep before our eyes this mainspring of a Saint's life,
that life will be as enigmatical to us as it is to the world. Jesus
balked at no test of the love which He bore towards us: nay, He
devised tests passing all human imagining. Let Him make trial of our
love for Him! We are unhappy till He does! And with this daring
spirit in his heart every Saint enters upon a career of Romance in
its sweetest and highest form. And, we submit, to recur to the
literary style of the following biography, Romance is light-hearted,
light-stepping, cheerful, with the starlight on its face and in its
eyes.
James J. Daly, S.J.
CONTENTS
Chapter I ON THE ROAD
Chapter II THE PURSUIT
Chapter III EARLY DAYS
Chapter IV OFF TO VIENNA
Chapter V SCHOOL DAYS
Chapter VI IN THE HOUSE OF KIMBERKER
Chapter VII THE TEST OF COURAGE
Chapter VIII IN DANGER OF DEATH
Chapter IX VOCATION
Chapter X THE RUNAWAY
Chapter XI AT DILLIGEN
Chapter XII THE ROAD TO ROME
Chapter XIII THE NOVICESHIP
Chapter XIV GOING HOME
Chapter XV AFTERMATH
FOR GREATER THINGS
CHAPTER I
ON THE ROAD
Mid-August in Vienna, the year 1567: when Shakespeare was still a
little boy; twenty years before Philip II fitted out the Spanish
Armada; forty years before the first English colony settled in
America. The sun had just well risen, the gates of Vienna had been
opened but a few hours. Through the great western gate, which cast
its long shadow on the road to Augsburg, came a strange-looking boy.
He lacked but a month or two of seventeen years, was some five feet
two or three inches in height, had an oval face of remarkable beauty
and liveliness, jet black hair, and eyes in which merriment dwelt as
in its home. He was dressed as became a noble of the time, and in
apparel of unusual splendor and costliness; plumed bonnet, slashed
velvet doublet, tight silken hose, jeweled dagger at his girdle.
But it was odd to see so brilliant a figure on foot in the dusty
highway; still more odd that be carried a rough bundle slung on a
staff over his and that, peasant fashion, he munched at a loaf of
bread as he trudged the road.
By no means stalwart-looking, still he swung along with an easy
stride and a confident strength that many a stouter man might envy.
He was bound for Augsburg, 400 miles to the west, and he set himself
thirty miles a day as his rate of travel.
He wore splendid clothes, because he was Stanislaus, the son of John
Kostka, Lord of Kostkov, Senator, and Castellan of Zakroczym in the
Duchy of Mazovia, Poland. He ate his rough breakfast, like a
peasant, on the road, because he had just been to Mass and received
Holy Communion at the Jesuit church in Vienna. He carried a bundle
on his staff, because he laughed merrily at fine clothes and had in
the bundle a coarse tunic and a stout pair of brogans, which he
meant to put on as soon as he got well out of the city. And his face
and his eyes shone with joy, because he loved God most wonderfully
and was as happy a boy as ever moved through this dull world.
Every age has its adventurers: men who for fame, or for place, or
for money, cross wide seas, fight brave battles, endure great
hardships. The age in which Stanislaus lived was filled with them.
All the world reads with delight the story of such men. And every
decent boy who reads feels himself, if only for the moment, their
fellow in spirit, eager to do what they did and as bravely as they
did.
But was there ever adventure finer than this, ever spirit more gayly
daring? Stanislaus Kostka, son of a noble house, a boy in years,
starting without a copper in his pocket to cross half of Europe
afoot! And for what? Not to have men say what a brave chap he was;
not to win a name, or rank, or money: but because God would be
pleased by his doing it, because God called him to do something
which he could not do in Vienna.
He felt he had a vocation to be a Jesuit. He knew his father would
not consent. He took six months to think it over, to pray for light,
to make sure it was no mere whim or fancy of his own, but the very
voice of God. And when he felt sure, he left a letter for his
brother Paul and his tutor, Bilinski, with whom he had been studying
in Vienna; he gave his money to a couple of beggars; he said, "If
God wants me to do this, He'll furnish the means"; he put on his
best attire, tied up a rough suit in a cloth, took a stout staff in
his hand, and with God's blessing upon him and His Eucharistic
Presence in his heart, stepped out cheerfully on a journey that
would stagger most men.
That is the stuff of which heroes are made. If Stanislaus had done
this for the glory of the world, we should have his praises in our
histories, we should have stories woven about him, the whole world
would cry "Bravo!" But he did it for God, and the world cannot
understand him at all: the world is silent.
An hour or so of that steady, tireless stride carried him well away
from Vienna. He slipped off his velvet and silk, put on his coarse
tunic - a shirt-like garment that came below his knees - girded
himself with a bit of rope, tied his stout shoes on his feet, and
took the road again. There were folk aplenty journeying from the
countryside to Vienna in the early morning. Stanislaus picked out
one of the poorest-looking peasants and handed him the gala dress he
had just taken off.
"I can't carry these with me, friend," he said. "Won't you please
take them? I have no use for them, and perhaps you can sell them in
the city."
And he was gone before the peasant, gaping in wonder at the rich
garments and dagger in his hands, could much more than catch a
glimpse of that bright face and those laughing eyes.
He tramped all day, and made his thirty miles. When he was hungry,
he asked some one he met for food. It is not likely that any one
would refuse the smiling, handsome boy, from whose face innocence
simply shone. But if any one had refused him, it would not have
annoyed Stanislaus. His good humor came from heaven, as well as
from his own cheery soul - and you cannot rebuff that kind of good
humor.
Night came down at last, and he was tired out. He came to an inn
and asked for shelter.
"I have no money," he told the landlord, smiling, "and I have no
claim upon you. Will you take me in?"
The landlord looked at him shrewdly a little, then said with respect:
"But what is your grace doing in such a garb?"
Stanislaus thought for a moment that he was recognized; but he put
on a bold front, and laughed as he said:
"I am not 'your grace. I am what you see me, and I have a long
journey to make."
In those days it was not unusual for even nobles to go, roughly
clad, upon pilgrimages of devotion. That Stanislaus was a noble,
the landlord was quite certain. That he might be engaged on some
such pious business, was possible. But who ever heard of a mere boy
going upon pilgrimage?
The whole affair puzzled the landlord more than a little. However,
the face of the boy reassured him. At least there could be no evil
behind that frank, brave countenance. So he shook his head, saying:
"I do not understand. But come in. You are welcome."
He gave Stanislaus his supper and a bed to sleep in.
"You shall not be the poorer for this," said Stanislaus, as he
thanked him. "You know God makes it up to us for even a cup of cold
water given in His name."
And as the boy spoke, the landlord saw his face glow when he spoke
of God and he was very glad at heart that he had given shelter and
food, to this strange boy.
Stanislaus slept soundly. But he was up with the sun, washed and
dressed quickly, and went to thank his host again before setting
out.
"But you will have something to eat before you go?" cried the man,
as Stanislaus stood before him, staff in hand, ready for the road.
"It is good of you to offer it," the boy answered. "But perhaps I
shall find a church before long, and I must go fasting to Holy
Communion."
Then the landlord marvelled again, for at that period even good
people did not go very often to Holy Communion, especially when they
were traveling hard, as Stanislaus evidently was. And his
admiration and liking grew for this boy with the merry face and the
heart so near heaven.
"At least," he said, "you must take something with you for the way."
And that Stanislaus did not refuse, but accepted gratefully, and so
parted from the kind landlord, leaving him gazing in the doorway
with wonder in his eyes.
His legs were a bit stiff and sore this second day. But the first
few miles wore that off, and he swung on his way as bravely and
gayly as before.