[29] As the Public Schools Commission pointed out, the Head Master often thinks of nothing but the attainment of University honours, even when the great majority of his pupils are not going to the University.
[30] The advantages of learning by heart are twofold, says Sacchini: “Primum memoriam ipsam perficiunt, quod est in totam ætatem ad universa negotia inæstimabile commodum. Deinde suppellectilem inde pulcherrimam congregant verborum ac rerum: quæ item, quamdiu vivant, usui futura sit: cum quæ ætate illa insederint indelebilia soleant permanere. Magnam itaque, ubi adoleverint, gratiam Praeceptori habebunt, cui memoriæ debebunt profectum, magnamque lætitiam capient invenientes quodammodo domi thesaurum quem, in ætate cæteroqui parum fructuosa, prope non sentientes parârint. Enim vero quam sæpe viros graves atque præstantes magnoque jam natu videre et audire est, dum in docta ac nobili corona jucundissime quædam promunt ex iis quæ pueri condiderunt?—First, they strengthen the memory itself and so gain an inestimable advantage in affairs of every kind throughout life. Then they get together by this means the fairest furniture for the mind, both of thoughts and words, a stock that will be of use to them as long as they live, since that which settles in the mind in youth mostly stays there. And when the lads have grown up they will feel gratitude to the master to whom they are indebted for their good memory; and they will take delight in finding within them a treasure which at a time of life otherwise unfruitful they have been preparing almost without knowing it. How often we see and hear eminent men far advanced in life, when in learned and noble company, take a special delight in quoting what they stored up as boys!” The master, he says, must point out to his pupils the advantages we derive from memory; that we only know and possess that which we retain, that this cannot be taken from us, but is with us always and is always ready for use, a living library, which may be studied even in the dark. Boys should therefore be encouraged to run over in their minds, or to say aloud, what they have learnt, as often as opportunity offers, as when they are walking or are by themselves: “Ita numquam in otio futuros otiosos; ita minus fore solos cum soli erunt, consuetudine fruentes sapientum.... Denique curandum erit ut selecta quædam ediscant quæ deinde in quovis studiorum genere ac vita fere omni usui sint futura.—So they will never be without employment when unemployed, never less alone than when alone, for then they profit by intercourse with the wise.... To sum up, take care that they thoroughly commit to memory choice selections which will for ever after be of use to them in every kind of study, and nearly every pursuit in life.”—(Cap. viij.) This is interesting and well put, but we see one or two points in which we have now made an advance. Learning by heart will give none of the advantages mentioned unless the boys understand the pieces and delight in them. Learning by heart strengthens, no doubt, a faculty, but nothing large enough to be called “the memory.” And the Renascence must indeed have blinded the eyes of the man to whom childhood and youth seemed an “ætas parum fructuosa”! Similarly, Sturm speaks of the small fry “qui in extremis latent classibus.” (Quoted by Parker.) But when Pestalozzi and Froebel came these lay hid no longer.
[31] Ranke, speaking of the success of the Jesuit schools, says: “It was found that young persons learned more under them in half a year than with others in two years. Even Protestants called back their children from distant schools, and put them under the care of the Jesuits.”—Hist. of Popes, book v, p. 138. Kelly’s Trans.
In France, the University in vain procured an arrêt forbidding the Parisians to send away their sons to the Jesuit colleges: “Jesuit schools enjoyed the confidence of the public in a degree which placed them beyond competition.” (Pattison’s Casaubon, p. 182.)
Pattison remarks elsewhere that such was the common notion of the Jesuits’ course of instruction that their controversialists could treat anyone, even a Casaubon, who had not gone through it, as an uneducated person.
[32] “Sapientum hoc omnium seu veterum seu recentum constans judicium est, institutionem puerilem tum fore optimam cum jucundissima fuerit, inde enim et ludum vocari. Meretur ætatis teneritas ut ne oneretur: meretur innocentia ut ei parcatur ... Quæ libentibus auribus instillantur, ad ea velut occurrit animus, avide suscipit, studiose recondit, fideliter servat.”
[33] “Conciliabit facilè studiis quos primùm sibi conciliârit. Det itaque omnem operam illorum erga se observantionem ut sapienter colligat et continenter enutriat. Ostendat, sibi res eorum curæ esse non solum quæ ad animum sed etiam quæ ad alia pertinent. Gaudeat cum gaudentibus, nec dedignetur flere cum flentibus. Instar Apostoli inter parvulos parvulus fiat quo magnos in Christo et magnum in eis Christum efficiat ... Seriam comitatem et paternam gravitatem cum materna benignitate permisceat.” Unfortunately, the Jesuits’ kind manner loses its value from being due not so much to kind feeling as to some ulterior object, or to a rule of the Order. I think it is Jouvency who recommends that when a boy is absent from sickness or other sufficient reason, the master should send daily to inquire after him, because the parents will be pleased by such attention. When the motive of the inquiry is suspected, the parents will be pleased no longer.
[34] “Errorem existimo statim initio spinosiores quasdam grammaticæ difficultates inculcare ... cum enim planioribus insueverint difficiliora paulatim usus explanabit. Quin et capacior subinde mens ac firmius cum ætate judicium, quod alio monstrante perægre unquam percepisset per sese non raro intelliget. Exempla quoque talium rerum dum praelegitur autor facilius in orationis contextu agnoscentur et penetrabunt in animos quam si solitaria et abscissa proponantur. Quamobrem faciendum erit ut quoties occurrunt diligenter enucleentur.”
[35] See, e.g., marvellous instances of their self-devotion in that most interesting book, Francis Parkman’s Jesuits in N. America (Boston, Little & Co., 10th edition, 1876).
[36] I have referred to Francis Parkman, who has chronicled the marvellous self-devotion and heroism of the Jesuit missionaries in Canada. Such a witness may be trusted when he says: “The Jesuit was as often a fanatic for his Order as for his faith; and oftener yet, the two fanaticisms mingled in him inextricably. Ardently as he burned for the saving of souls, he would have none saved on the Upper Lakes except by his brethren and himself. He claimed a monopoly of conversion with its attendant monopoly of toil, hardships, and martyrdom. Often disinterested for himself, he was inordinately ambitious for the great corporate power in which he had merged his own personality; and here lies one of the causes among many, of the seeming contradictions which abound in the annals of the Order.”—The Discovery of the Great West, by F. Parkman, London, 1869, p. 28.