being of souls.1275
Finally the oratory was the first place Don Bosco experienced real solidarity from many of his
collaborators: ecclesiastics, lay people, young and adult, aristocrats, professional people, middle -class people.
1276
Don Bosco writes with gratitude of his collaborators, first of all in his Historical Outline 18541277 and the Historical Outlines1278 l862, and finally with greater insistence and intentionality still, in the Memoirs of the Oratory when he hinted that he had the idea of forming the Cooperators Association.1279
2. Hospice and boarding school (collegio)
When it is a case of the more comprehensive institutions such as boarding schools and hospices, the real measure of Don Bosco's creativity should not be sought in their structures as such.1280 In fact boarding institutions, whether they be a hospice for abandoned youths or a boarding school for
academic students or young apprentices, artisans or a minor seminary, strongly limit the application of
some of the most original and dynamic elements of Don Bosco's system of education.
These elements, instead, appear to be more obviously seen in the oratory and in any other open
institution: spontane ous access, attendance, fewer disciplinary measures and regimentation, absence of
financial matters to be dealt with, contact with the family and the outside world, evaluation of what was
learned in daily lived experience, the non -existent problem of ‘holidays’.1281
On the other hand the boarding institution seems to allow for a more rigorous application of some protective and disciplinary aspects of the preventive system. Don Bosco in fact developed the more mature aspects of the preventive system in reference to thehospice and the boarding school. Vice versa the type of boarding schools he set up are softened by the features and style proper to the preventive system. He injected something new into already well-established structures and traditions. Given the craze for turning to boarding schools at the time, Don Bosco's collegio gave a new historical twist to them, but also a new preventive system came about along with a new type of (boarding) school.1282
The human, cultural, social qualities of the boys who frequented them necessarily affected the shape of
Don Bosco’s boarding school-boarding house. In many instances they brought a certain simplicity and poverty. It is this that made their living together less formal, more elementary and therefore more ready
1275 Regolamento dell'Oratorio...per gli esterni, part Ii, Cahp 1, art. 4, pp. 28-29, OE XXIX 58-59.
1276 “Equally important was the recourse (as Fr Cocchi already did in Vanchiglia) to collaboration from young people
already well formed and able to be significant pedagogical models for boys accustomed to very different settings, as
well as of course helping with catechism and free time”. (G. Chiosso, Don Bosco e l'oratorio..., in M. Midali, Don
Bosco nella storia..., p. 302).
1277 Cenno storico..., in P. Braido (Ed.), Don Bosco nella Chiesa..., p. 36, 41, 52.
1278 Cenni storici..., in P. Braido (Ed.), Don Bosco nella Chiesa..., p. 65, 66, 69, 81.
1279 MO (1991) 123, 124, 125, 128, 158, 188-189.
1280 Don Bosco wrote important texts on young people educated as boarders: the Lives of Dominic Savio, Michael
Magone, Francis Besucco, who mirror a kind of boarding setup that is really a seminary for ecclesiastical vocations.
The Oratory as a hospice for students and working boys – see the Cenno storico and Cenni storici (P. Braido Ed., Don
Bosco nella Chiesa..., pp. 53-59 and 74-81). The boarding school plays an important rolein Valentino o la vocazione
impedita (1886) (OE XVII 179-242). The boarding house experience is found in the Il sistema preventivo nella
educazione della gioventù 1877. As a codification of long experience with this institution, see the Regolamento per le
case...., 1877, OE XXIX 111-194.
1281 On the boarding school and 'collegialisation' see P. Stella, Don Bosco nella storia della religiosità cattolica, vol I,
pp. 121-127; Idem, Don Bosco nella storia economica..., pp. 123-157; (Collegi e ospizi in Piemonte e in Liguria 1860-
1870), 175-199 (Giovani e adulti convittori a Valdocco 1847-1870), 289-294 (La popolazione giovanile degli altri
collegi).
1282 Apparently paradoxical,(but only apparently), read O. del Donno, Don Bosco, il demolitore dei collegi,
l'antipedogista di convinzione, l'educatore di vocazione. Bologna, N.U. Gallo 1965, 389 p.