Note 30 — IV. SCHOOLS OF THE JESUITS.

The advantages of learning by heart are twofold, says Sacchini: “Primum memoriam ipsam perficiunt, quod est in totam ætatem ad universa negotia inæstimabile commodum. Deinde suppellectilem inde pulcherrimam congregant verborum ac rerum: quæ item, quamdiu vivant, usui futura sit: cum quæ ætate illa insederint indelebilia soleant permanere. Magnam itaque, ubi adoleverint, gratiam Praeceptori habebunt, cui memoriæ debebunt profectum, magnamque lætitiam capient invenientes quodammodo domi thesaurum quem, in ætate cæteroqui parum fructuosa, prope non sentientes parârint. Enim vero quam sæpe viros graves atque præstantes magnoque jam natu videre et audire est, dum in docta ac nobili corona jucundissime quædam promunt ex iis quæ pueri condiderunt?—First, they strengthen the memory itself and so gain an inestimable advantage in affairs of every kind throughout life. Then they get together by this means the fairest furniture for the mind, both of thoughts and words, a stock that will be of use to them as long as they live, since that which settles in the mind in youth mostly stays there. And when the lads have grown up they will feel gratitude to the master to whom they are indebted for their good memory; and they will take delight in finding within them a treasure which at a time of life otherwise unfruitful they have been preparing almost without knowing it. How often we see and hear eminent men far advanced in life, when in learned and noble company, take a special delight in quoting what they stored up as boys!” The master, he says, must point out to his pupils the advantages we derive from memory; that we only know and possess that which we retain, that this cannot be taken from us, but is with us always and is always ready for use, a living library, which may be studied even in the dark. Boys should therefore be encouraged to run over in their minds, or to say aloud, what they have learnt, as often as opportunity offers, as when they are walking or are by themselves: “Ita numquam in otio futuros otiosos; ita minus fore solos cum soli erunt, consuetudine fruentes sapientum.... Denique curandum erit ut selecta quædam ediscant quæ deinde in quovis studiorum genere ac vita fere omni usui sint futura.—So they will never be without employment when unemployed, never less alone than when alone, for then they profit by intercourse with the wise.... To sum up, take care that they thoroughly commit to memory choice selections which will for ever after be of use to them in every kind of study, and nearly every pursuit in life.”—(Cap. viij.) This is interesting and well put, but we see one or two points in which we have now made an advance. Learning by heart will give none of the advantages mentioned unless the boys understand the pieces and delight in them. Learning by heart strengthens, no doubt, a faculty, but nothing large enough to be called “the memory.” And the Renascence must indeed have blinded the eyes of the man to whom childhood and youth seemed an “ætas parum fructuosa”! Similarly, Sturm speaks of the small fry “qui in extremis latent classibus.” (Quoted by Parker.) But when Pestalozzi and Froebel came these lay hid no longer.