Page:Jesuit Education.djvu/446

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426
JESUIT EDUCATION

trained had the same disposition, the same nature to be worked upon, perhaps it would. Does the same nourishment given to a number of children produce the same result, the same complexion, the same color of hair, the same seize? Why should mental food? Does the same training in a military academy produce a perfect likeness in all? The military system of the "Great Powers" gives the most uniform training in the world. Does it crush out individuality of the generals and officers in tactics and strategy? Jesuit pupils will be surprised at being told that their teachers have all the same mould of character and are destitute of individuality. But no one smiles more at the above mentioned assertion than Jesuit Superiors, whose hardest task it is to unite all the different characters in one common effort, without interfering too much with their individuality. They know too well that the crushing out of the individuality would mean the crushing of energy and of self-activity so much insisted on by. St. Ignatius in his Spiritual Exercises. It was St. Ignatius who told those who have charge of the spiritual training of the members of the Order: "It is most dangerous to endeavor to force all on the same path to perfection; he who attempts this does not know how different and how manifold the gifts of the Holy Ghost are."[1]

If one studies the works of the great writers of the Society, he will be struck by the variety and difference of opinions held by professors and writers of the same period, v. g. Suarez and Vasquez.[2] It is amusing to read

  1. Selectae S. Ignatii Sententiae, VIII.
  2. However, these two theologians did not teach together in the same university, as is often said. See the dates given by Fathers Frins, S. J., and Kneller, S. J., in the Kirchenlexikon, XI, 923, and XII, 634.