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Memoir of the Beginnings
I had imagined that the care which I assumed of the schools and the masters would amount only to a marginal involvement committing me to no more than providing for the subsistence of the masters and ensuring that they acquitted themselves of their tasks with piety and devotedness. It was a result of two occurrences, namely my meeting with Monsieur Nyel and the proposition put forth by this lady[Madame l'Eveque, and early sponsor of the schools] that I began to concern myself with schools for poor boys. Previously, I had given no thought at all to the matter... If in fact I had ever thought that the obligation of charity which prompted my concern for the welfare of the schoolmasters would lead me to feel it a duty to live with them, I would have abandoned the work. For, from a natural point of view, I considered as inferior to my manservant the men I was obliged, especially at the first stages of the undertaking, to employ in the schools, and the very thought that I would have to live with them would be unbearable. It was, in fact, a source of great trouble to me that, at an early stage, I brought them to live in my house, a situation which lasted for two years. Evidently this was the reason why God, who directs all things with wisdom and with gentleness and is not at all accustomed to force the inclination of men, wishing to draw me entirely into undertaking the care of the schools, did so in a quite imperceptible way, without my having foresee it in the beginning. Memoir on the Habit This community is usually called the community of christian schools, and at present is founded only on Providence. Those who live in it keep a Rule and are dependent for everything, having no personal property, and observe complete uniformity. The members of this community are occupied in teaching gratuitous schools, in towns only, and in teaching catechism every day, even on Sundays and feasts. It is necessary that the Brothers take as the foundation and support of their observance of the Rule what Saint Augustine says at the beginning of his Rule: that those who live in community should, before all else, love God and next their neighbor because these are the principal commandments given to us by God and because any observance of the Rule is useless if separated from the observance of these two commandments and is quite useless for salvation because it is established in communities only for the purpose of giving members facility to observe with exactness the commandments of God. |
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