Loyola and the Educational System of the Jesuits

by Thomas Hughes

2. In the philosophical and theological courses, both of which terminate in the conferring of degrees, the system of examinations for all students, who are not members of the Society, refers only to those degrees, at the time when application is made for them. For the philosophical degree, the first preliminary is an hour's disputation with three examiners, on the matter of the whole course, and that in presence of the other students. The result being satisfactory, permission will then be granted to prepare for a public defence of all Philosophy. This is the method for the solemn form of graduation, which, in the old style, confers upon the successful student, after three years of Natural Sciences, or Philosophy, the title of Master of Arts.

At this point start the three professional lines of Medicine, Jurisprudence, Theology. The last-named faculty ends in much the same manner as that of Philosophy, but with a much greater amplitude of public acts or defence, and then finally with a defence of all Philosophy and Theology together. This entitles the defendant to the degree of Doctor of Divinity, which is conferred in the most solemn manner.

There is a pedagogical history connected with the present subject, which it may be well to sketch in two stages, first, that of the sixteenth century, and secondly, that of the nineteenth.

Ignatius of Loyola had legislated in his Constitution to this effect: "In the study of Arts, courses shall be arranged in which the Natural Sciences shall be taught; and, for these, less than three years will not suffice; besides which, another half-year shall be assigned the students, for repeating the matters they have heard, for holding public acts of defence, and for receiving the degree of Master. The whole course, therefore, shall be three years and a half, up to the reception of the degree."[330] Again, Ignatius had legislated for Divinity: "The course of Theology shall be six years in length; all the matters that have to be read will be treated in the first four; in the other two, besides making a repetition, those who are to be promoted to the degree of Doctor will make the usual acts of defence."[331]

Having this legislation before them, with the experience of forty years to illustrate its working, the critics of 1586 are confronted, at the same time, with a set of historical facts, which seem not to be in harmony with the legislation. While Loyola's system was obviously the organization of education, the facts, which they notice, show a concomitant process going on, in an inverse sense, towards the dissolution of system. This, no doubt, was owing to the disturbed condition of the sixteenth century. Making an effort to bring the Ratio and the facts more into harmony, the critics reason in this manner:—

"It is hard to expect everywhere that external students will be content to hold their acts of public defence, only after their course of Philosophy or Theology; and that, during the half-year, or the two years specified beyond. For, in Italy, scarcely any are promoted to the degrees by our faculties, except our own alumni, or convictores, who cannot wait so long as that in expectancy, and who will readily slip away to Medicine or Jurisprudence; nay, they are alienated from us, and are offended at this severity, seeing that, in the other universities of Italy, they can most easily obtain the degree if they want it. In Germany, too, such intervals of protracted waiting are scarcely tolerated; and they rather think they have done something, if they have gone through a four-year course in Theology. And it would seem proper to grant them a relaxation there; otherwise, the men are deterred from seeking the Doctorate; so that Germany will have but few Catholic Doctors in the future; whereas, it abounds in non-catholic Doctors, whose promotion is to be had any day. In France, too, the philosophers do not wait beyond the close of the triennium to be made Masters of Arts; they could not put up with delay, for they are hurrying on to Law. The same is the condition of things with the German philosophers, for other reasons. Therefore the Reverend Father General might consider whether he will dispense with the observance of the Constitution in the Italian and Transalpine Provinces; the more so, as the Constitution itself says that it is to be observed, as far as may be."[332]

In accordance with this, the Ratio Studiorum is not absolute in its general legislation, and leaves room for the special conditions of different countries. A most distinct conception of the meaning and process of conferring degrees may be had, by consulting the typical constitution of an exclusively Jesuit university, as exhibited in the Monumenta Germaniæ Pædagogica.[333] The third part of this document treats exclusively of the "Variety of Academic Degrees and the Conditions for Each." And it begins by saying: "As it is expedient to confer Academic degrees on those who are found worthy of the same, so the utmost caution is to be practised, lest, at any time, they be conferred on such as would only bring the name of the Academy into discredit, and the degrees themselves into contempt. Wherefore no degree is ever to be conferred upon any one, who has not undergone all the tests which the customs of universities require."

Passing on from the sixteenth century to our time, an important gap has to be crossed in the educational history of the Order. It is that of the Suppression, during about forty years at the end of the last century and the beginning of the present. These blank pages signify the total loss of property and position, with a severance in many places of the educational traditions for almost sixty years, and the entire destruction of them in many other parts. Besides, like "goods derelict," the whole system of education which, by means of the Society, had passed out of a limited number of mediæval universities, and had been accommodated with a home gratuitously in over seven hundred cities and towns of a dozen nationalities, was found by the Order, at its resurrection, to be largely in the hands of State authorities, or, at least, not independent of State control. Restored, but having had to struggle into existence, under altered and unfavorable circumstances, this pedagogical system may be viewed with interest, as it stands towards the close of the nineteenth century. For this purpose I may be allowed to glance at it, in several parts of the world, under the precise aspect which I have just been regarding, that of endeavoring to complete its work of education with Academic degrees.

In the United States, it has the same freedom of action as any other system of higher education, with none of the special support which is given to organizations endowed by the State.

In many parts of the continent of Europe, the property of the Order is in an habitual or chronic state of confiscation, and the members, as educators, are legally outlawed. Education can scarcely thrive when on the wing.