Loyola and the Educational System of the Jesuits

by Thomas Hughes

The grades of Grammar have respectively their own forms of prelection, given in detail by the final Ratio. It will be enough for us to sketch the general form of the earlier critics.[294]

According as it is a grammar or an author that is being explained, a very different method of prelection is to be followed. In the grammar, we acquire a fund of precepts; in an author, a store of words and phrases. Wherefore, in the books of grammar, the boys must understand perfectly the things explained; they need not attend scrupulously to the words there, with a view to forming style. But, in the letters of Cicero, and other texts of the kind, it is not so much the substance of the sentences, as the words and phrases that are of chief consequence; the significance and force of his thoughts are to be reserved for the higher classes, when the students are no longer mere boys.

In the classes of Grammar then, let the Master follow this method of explaining Cicero, or any other author. First, he will sketch, in the briefest way, the meaning of the author, and the connection between what has gone before and what is now to be explained. Then he will give a version of the period literally, preserving to the utmost the collocation of words, as they stand in the author; and also the figures employed. As to the collocation or arrangement of the words, this is of such consequence that sometimes, if a single word is put out of its place, the whole thought seems to lose its force and fall flat. Herein, too, is perceived that rhythmic flow of the style, which of itself, even if other ornaments are wanting, pleases the ear wonderfully and gratifies the mind. Thirdly, the whole period is to be resolved analytically into its structural elements, so that the boys understand distinctly what every word governs; and their attention should be directed to some useful points of good Latinity. As to this structural analysis, I may be allowed the passing remark, which is familiar to every judge of a classical education, that the disciplinary value of literary studies reaches here its highest degree of mental exercise; and that the two classical tongues, Latin and Greek, are altogether eminent as supplying materials for this exercise, in their own native structure; which, in the Latin, is an architectural build, characteristic of the reasoning Roman mind; and, in the Greek, is a subtle delicacy of conception and tracery, reflecting the art, the grace and versatility of Athens and the Ionian Isles.

After this, each word is to be examined, as to what it signifies, and to what uses it may be applied; the boy is to understand, as far as may be, the original and proper idea and force of every word, not merely its general significance, as in a shadowy outline; he should know, too, the phrases in his native tongue, which correspond with precision and propriety to the Latin. The metaphors and the figurative use of words, especially as found in Cicero, are to be explained to the boys in an extremely plain manner,[295] and by examples drawn from the plainest objects. Unless this use of words is understood, the true and genuine knowledge of the tongue is seriously obstructed. Then, picking out the more elegant turns of style, the Master will dictate them to the scholars, and afterwards require the use and imitation of these phrases in their themes. Lastly, he will go back and translate the words of the author over again, as he did at the beginning; and, if need be, do so a third and a fourth time.

As to writing, during all this, let him forbid them absolutely to take down a single letter, except when told. What he does dictate to them, he is to finish within the time of the prelection, and not prolong this time for the sake of the writing. It happens now and then that, with much labor, waste of time, and to no good purpose whatever, the boys take down, and preserve with diligence, a set of notes which have not been thought out very judiciously nor been arranged very carefully,—notes simply trivial, common, badly patched together, sometimes worse than worthless; and these notes they commit to paper, in wretched handwriting, full of mistakes and errors. Therefore, let the dictation be only of a few points, and those extremely select.

The Masters are to be on their guard, lest private tutors at the boys' homes explain new lessons to them. These tutors have merely to repeat with the boys what has been heard in class. Otherwise, the fruit of the good explanation which is received at school is lost at home.

Repetition is now in order. Two principles govern this exercise. First, "what has often been repeated sinks deeper into the mind."[296] Secondly, "the industry of youths flags under nothing so much as satiety."[297] As soon, therefore, as the prelection is over, the Professor is to require at once an account of all that he has said, and he is to see that the whole line of his explanation is followed in the repetition. As if this seemed to imply that only the best scholars were to be called upon, the critics go on to note that not all of what has been explained should be repeated by one only, but that as many as possible should be practised every day. The Master should not follow the order in which the boys are seated, but take them here and there. However, the first to be called on are those more advanced; then, the duller, or perhaps lazier ones, and these should rather be asked oftener, to be kept up to the mark.[298]

The final Ratio notes that the daily lesson should not exceed four lines in the lowest class of Grammar; seven in Middle Grammar. There is, as I have already observed, a prelection proper to grammatical rules; also to Greek, whether it be in the grammar or in an author. Proportion in width and depth of matter is adjusted to each grade. A careful dictation in the vernacular is to be given, which, when rendered into Latin or Greek, will exemplify the precepts explained, or the use of the phrases already dictated. And one part of the school exercises, from the lowest class up to Rhetoric, is a concertatio between rivals, which is a lively discussion either upon matters explained in the prelections, or upon one another's compositions. In this field of debate, as is natural, the activity of the students grows, both in the extent of the field to be covered, and in the depth of erudition required, according as the grades are mounted. And it is carried out of the class-room into select societies, called "academies," the members whereof, whether grammarians or littérateurs, conduct their debates, give their own prelections or repeat a choice one of their Professor's, award a place in the archives to some specially meritorious production; and they conduct all these exercises in exact keeping with their actual prelections and studies. Nor do they yield an inch in gravity or dignity to the great academy of theologians and philosophers.[299]

As to the native tongue, one of the earliest systems of studies in the Society, prior to the general Ratio by about forty years, lays down for the middle class of Grammar, that "on Mondays and Wednesdays the boys will receive the themes in Bohemian and German for their epistolary exercises."[300] This document is probably from the pen of Peter Canisius, soon after the colleges were founded at Prague, Ingolstadt and Cologne. In a directive memorial of 1602, drawn up for Mayence by Father Ferdinand Alber, a postscript is added to the effect, "Let exercise in the German tongue be furthered."[301] Jouvancy lays down the practice in this manner: "After the correction and dictation of the written exercises, the Latin author is rendered into the mother tongue, or a concertatio is held. These two exercises can be held on alternate days, if there is not enough of time every day for both. In rendering the author into the vernacular, you will observe three things: first, the idiom of the vernacular, and its agreement in construction with the Latin, or else its disagreement, so that the scholars learn each tongue by the other; secondly, the proper turns and elegance of the Latin style; finally, the thoughts of the author, as having a moral bearing, and as calculated to form and mould the judgment of the boys; also the ways of men, the punishments of the wicked, the maxims of sages. Some part of an historical author should be given sometimes for their written exercise, to translate into the mother tongue; or it may be added, as an appendix, to a shorter theme. Let the boys hold a discussion among themselves upon the merits of the translation; they can write in that narrative style, to win the best places in class; as also, at the close of the year, for the premiums. However, the whole time of class is not to be taken up by such translations, as happens sometimes with negligent Masters, who shirk the labor of the prelection, and of the correction of themes. While the boys dispute among themselves on the precepts of grammar, poetry, or eloquence, one stands against many, or several against several. The subject, time, and manner of the concertatio is to be defined beforehand; umpires and judges are to be appointed, prizes for the victors, penalties for the vanquished. The others, who are merely listening during the contest, will show in writing what fruit they have derived from it, or will be asked questions thereupon."[302]

In the following article,[303] the same writer gives several specimens of a prelection in Cicero, Virgil, Phædrus, as adapted to the different classes. They are only passages. The whole of this system goes by passages, taken consecutively, until a whole piece has been mastered by the students. For it is in the prior perfection of detail that perfection in a larger compass is attained. And we may also note that it is only in the original productions of perfect Masters in style, that detail can ever be adequately studied. The understanding and enjoyment of an entire masterpiece, taken as a whole, is by every law of nature and of art an easy resultant of understanding the parts. If any writers on pedagogy have thought that no student could "understand and take pleasure" in an original classic, and therefore have advocated the reading of translations as a means of receiving the "literary impressions," I fear that we need only point to the style of literary writing which seems to have resulted from doing things in this second-hand fashion—if indeed it is even second-hand. For, after all, style itself never appears in a translation; only the thoughts are translated. Thoughts are the soul of style; its expression was the body; each fitted the other in the classic original; and, in an eminent mutual fitness, an eminent style was being studied. The best translation of a classic piece has never done more than produce a bare equivalent. Wherefore, if with the striking original no thorough work has been done, it is more than probable that, in the results, nothing original and striking will ever be done.