Loyola and the Educational System of the Jesuits. Hughes Thomas
thereby they have prepared the endowment, on which education will chiefly rest, – that is to say, the endowment consisting of the men to teach, and their services tendered gratis. Position and dignity are alike rendered inaccessible by an express vow of the members professed. Obedience keeps the organization mobile as a company of trained soldiers. And, if any observant mind, well acquainted with the course of human affairs, detects in these principles some reasons for success, normal, habitual, and regular, in the face of unnumbered obstacles, and of unremitting hostility, his view will be singularly corroborated when he rises to a plane higher, and regards the same principles as "religious," carrying with them the sanction of divine worship; which I should be loath to call "enthusiasm," much less "fanaticism." These sentiments are never very prudent, nor enlightened, nor cool; they are either very natural or are short-lived. A mild fever of fanaticism can scarcely produce high results; and a high fever of the same can scarcely last three hundred and fifty years, with perpetuity still threatening. But I would call this phenomenon, in its origin, religious devotion; in its consequences, a supernatural efficiency; and, taking it all in all, that which is called a grace of vocation.
On the 27th day of September, 1540, the Society of Jesus received from the See of Rome its bull of confirmation, by which it became a chartered body of the Church. While these pages were being penned, the 27th day of September came by, 1890. It was the anniversary of that foundation, three hundred and fifty years ago.
CHAPTER IV
COLLEGES AS PROPOSED IN THE JESUIT CONSTITUTION
The written rule about the system of education is found in a double stage of development. The first is that in which Loyola left it: it gives us the outline. The second is that in which Aquaviva completed it: this presents us with the finished picture. Likewise in the historical course of administration out in the world, the development is twofold. It runs its first course from Loyola to Aquaviva, while experience was still tentative. Its second course was subsequent to Aquaviva, when experience, having gathered in its results, had only to apply the approved form. This was subject thenceforth to none but incidental changes, as times and places change. And, for these contingencies, the application remained expressly and always pliable.
Hence, whatever was embodied in the Ratio Studiorum, as completed, had been the result of the most varied experience before legislating, an experience in the life of the Order extending over fifty-nine years. Whatever this universal experience had not yielded as a positive result, or as applicable to all places, was not embodied. Teachers are different; national customs vary; vernacular tongues are not the same. With regard to these mutable elements, the maxim of the Order in studies, in teaching, in conducting colleges, was the same as that which it proposed to itself in the various other functions of practical life. An exponent of the Institute states the maxim thus: "One should have a most exact knowledge of the country, nation, city, manner of government, manners of the people, states of life, inclinations, etc.; and this from histories, from intercourse, etc."27 General indications alone are given with regard to these variable factors. The same is done with respect to new sciences, which from the time of the Renaissance were felt to be approaching and developing. Subsequent legislation arises to meet them as they come.
While the Fathers were carrying on the same deliberations to which I referred in the preceding chapter, a resolution was taken to leave the drafting of a Constitution in the hands of those who should remain in Italy. Circumscribing the task still more, they decided to appoint a committee of two, who should address themselves to this work, and report to the rest. The general assembly when convened would issue the final decree. Whatever that should be, such of those present as might then be absent hereby endorsed it beforehand.
Their small number of ten was already reduced to six members present, the other four being scattered in divers countries. They designated as a commission Fathers Ignatius and John Coduri. Soon afterwards Coduri died, and the rest were distributed through the countries of Europe, Africa, and the far East. During the following years, Laynez, who was for some time Provincial of Italy, remained more regularly than the rest within the reach of Ignatius. For this reason, therefore, besides several others, we may understand why Ignatius paid such a high tribute to this eminent man, when he said, as Ribadeneira tells us, that "to no one of the first Fathers did the Society owe more than to Laynez." Whereupon the historian Sacchini observes: "This, I believe, he said of Laynez, not only on account of the other eminent merits of so great a man, and, in particular, for devising or arranging the system of Colleges; but most especially because the foundations, on which this Order largely rests, were new, and therefore likely to excite astonishment; and Laynez, having at command the resources of a vast erudition, was the person to confirm and commend them to public opinion. And that this praise was deserved by Laynez will appear less dubious to any one who considers that other period also, during which he was himself General; if one reckons how many points, as yet unshaped and inceptive, in the management of the Society, were reduced to form and perfected by Laynez; how widely it was propagated and defended by him."28
But to return to Ignatius. After ten years of government, he gathered together in Rome such of the first Fathers as could be had, besides representatives from all the Provinces. Forty-seven members were present. He submitted to them, in general assembly, the Constitution as now drawn up, and as acted upon in practical life, during those ten years. The Jesuits present did not exhaust the number of those whose express opinions were desired. That not a single one of the principal Fathers might be omitted in the deliberation, he sent copies of the proposed code of laws to such as were absent. With the suggestions and approbations received from all these representative men he was not yet content. Two more years had elapsed when, having embodied the practical results of an ever-widening experience, he undertook to promulgate the Constitution, by virtue of the authority vested in him for that purpose. But he only promulgated the rule; he did not yet exercise his authority to the full, and impose it as binding. He desired that daily use might bring out still farther, how it felt under the test of being tried, amid so many races and nations. Thus 1553 came and went; and he waited, until the whole matter should be revised and approved once more by the entire Society in conclave. His death intervened in 1556.
Two years later, representatives from the twelve provinces of the Order met together, and elected James Laynez as successor to Father Ignatius. Examining once more this Constitution in all its parts, receiving the whole of it just as it stood with absolute unanimity, and with a degree of veneration, they exercised the supreme authority of the Order, and confirmed this as the written Constitution of the Society of Jesus. By this act nothing was wanting to it, even from the side of Papal authority. Yet, that every plenitude of solemnity might be added to it, they presented it to the Sovereign Pontiff, Paul IV, who committed the code to four Cardinals for accurate revision. The commission returned it, without having altered a word, From that time, whatever general legislation has been added, has entered into the corpus juris, or "Institute" at large, as supplementing or explaining the "Constitution," which remains the fundamental instrument of the Institute.
In the Constitution there are ten parts. The fourth is on studies. In length, this fourth part alone fills up some twenty-eight out of one hundred and eleven quarto pages in all, as it stands printed in the latest Roman edition. The legislation about studies is thus seen to be one-fourth of the whole. It has seventeen chapters. In one of them, on the Method and Order to be observed in treating the Sciences, the founder observes that a number of points "will be treated of separately, in some document approved by the General Superior." This is the express warrant, contained in the Constitution, for the future Ratio Studiorum, or System of Studies in the Society of Jesus. In the meantime, he legislates in a more general way. And he begins with a subject pre-eminently dear to him, the duty of gratitude. Since corporations are notoriously forgetful, and therefore ungrateful, he lays down in the first place the permanent duty of the Order towards benefactors: then he continues with other topics. They stand thus: —
The Founders of Colleges; and Benefactors. The Temporalities of Colleges. The Students or Scholastics, belonging to the Society. The Care to be taken of them, during the time of their Studies. The Learning they are to acquire. The Assistance to be rendered them in various ways, to ensure their success in studies. The Schools attached to the Colleges of the Society, i.e. for external Students not belonging
Gagliardi.
Hist. S. J., 2da pars, Lainius; ad annum 1564, n. 220, p. 340.