The Intermountain Catholic. (Salt Lake City [Utah] ;) 1899-1920, 1903-08-29
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CHAPTER X.-Continued.

low. II can agree with him in his VieW
of collegiate education. But he ough
in Justice to say that things are alread.
taking the turn he wishes, and thu
plan he suggests mas already been be
gun to be acted upon. We can safely
leave the whole question to the proper
authorities, and to the force of circum-
stances"
Il am aware" said Father John
that the changes and notifications
| contend for have commenced. and are
approved very generally by the intelli.
gent Catholics, whether clergymen oi
iaymen, who have much studied the
subject. In several of the colleges I'M
der the control of the Society of Jesus
the preparatory school is partially sep
arated from the college proper, and in
them all the college is separated from
the seminary. The heads of colleges
! and professors in general, even when
! they see not clearly what Improvements
can be made, feel that our colleges, a.
/ they have hitherto been, do not pro-
/ duce the desired results. For my part
/ I think we have to many colleges, and
| not enough of schools of an intermedi-
ate grade between the primary school
and the college. The college is the
/ worst possible school for those who are
| not intended to go through the entire
course. The boys are sent to college
quite too young-in some instances, be-
fore they have been sent to school
and they are little more than boys
when they graduate The effects of
this are bad. Our colleges as now
managed, take the boy at a tender age,
watch over him with a maternal solic-
itude, provide him with all the helps
religion can give him. use all the means
and appliances that can be devised to
make him love and preserve his faith,
cram him with religious instruction,
refresh his religious sensibilities by re-
treats and reiterated eXhortatiOns, place
the confessional always before him, and
a director at his elbow, till he reaches
the age when the passions begin to I'm
fold, and he commences the dangerous
period of transition from the boy to
the man. And then, when he needs
more than ever the spiritual aids anG
counsels he has been accustomed to-,
they send him out into society, weak,
ignorant, without any habits of self
reliance, self government, or self-help,
exposed to all its seductions and temp
tations, so much the more to be dread
ed, as they all haye for him the charm
of novelty and leave him, wholly un
flesh and the devil, as best he may. The
majority, l believe, succumb, as we
might expect, in the struggle. Some
thing would be done to remedy this
evil, by separating more decidedly the
preparatory school from the college,
and receiving students in the college at
a more advanced age
THAT would do something" said
Diefenbach, but the system of gov
eminent and discipline of your colleges,
think. is not, and can never be
adapted to a free state. The nursing
system is carried TOO far, and the stu
dent is kept constantly in leading
strings, never suffered, hardly even in
his sports. to think and act for himself.
The maxim of the college is, everything
for the boys, nothing by the boys.
All this is very good, if your boys are
to be trained up to be monks or to live
in a society organized on the maxim,
Everything for the people, nothing by
the people. But it will not do in the
training of seculars who are to live in
a republican, not to say democratic,
state. Your American society is
founded on the maxim, Help thyself.
What is wanted, first of all, in the
government and discipline of the col
lege, is a system that shall form as
early as possible the child to self-help,
self-reliance and government You
fail precisely because you educate for
the monastery or for a society organ
lied on principles which American So
ciety repudiates. You overdo, you do
all for the boy and suffer him to do
nothing for himself and keep him ig-
norant where his only safety is in
knowledge, and weak ano dependent
on others, precisely where he needs to
be strong and able to help himself.
The college should image on a small
scale the society in which the boys arc
to live and play their parts as men.
and. therefore, in this country il
should be not a despOtism or a mon
archy, where the governor is every
thing and the governed are nothing,
but a miniature republic, in which
save in religious instruction and in the
hours Of study and recitation, the boys
govern themselves. where from the first
they begin to act the parts they are 10
act in real life. Your system may be
in other countries consti-
tuted differently from this, but it will
not answer here, where the boy sucks
in republicanism with his mothers (
milk. The failure of the non Catholic /
colleges of the country-for fail they |
dds owing to the adoption of a sim
liar system, system which makes |
the maintenance of the college author
ity the great thing to which. If need |
be, all else must be sacrificed Your
system does not and cannot fit young
men to take their proper rank and
exert their proper influence in Amer
lean society; for it breaks down the
sense of independence. too often de-
stroys the franknesS and ingenious
ness of the boy, and renders him shy.
artful, false, deceiful and hypocritical
lin one word, What Protestants ex-
press by the word JesuiticaL"
The first lesson TO be taught the |
child is submission. and his first virtue |
IS obedience, said Winslow: "and it /
IS only in proportion as you can en- I
,orce this lesson and obtain this virtue
hat you can organize society on q
Catholic basis. In my view there is an
innate antagonism between American
society and the Catholic religion. and
f you educate for the one you cannot
educate Cor the other"
so say. in principle, the Know
said Diefenbach. "Why.
hen, does Mr.. WinsIow find fault with
Americans for opposing
1atholicity on the ground that it is
lnti-American? No matter what les
IONS you teach in your college, a people
whose chiefs are trained under your
PRESENT system Of government and dis
,ipline can never be a free self-govern-
ns people. as we may learn from tho
Example of the French people, who
lave, notwithstanding their intelli-
renee, failed il every attempt at re-
)ublicanism. They cannot govern
themselves and must have u master
md the more absolute, the more they
owe him. There is no need of words
u speculation about the matter. But