by faith and charity which, in turn, is both a sincere and a warm-hearted affection.165 The educators have a friendly relationship with the children; they have to try to win over their trust and thus advise
them. Punishments are the last resort and an unpleasant one. The first concern should b e one of preventing a child from doing something wrong through strict supervision and by fostering imitation.
166 Similar suggestions for the education of girls are to be found in The Rules for the children of Port Royal.167 Serious issues are certainly not omitted: there should be a painstaking, visible assistance, a dignified reserve, silence all over, an accent on mortification, on always keeping busy. But just the same, the manifestations of loving-kindness are relevant although with notable restraint.
The goal assigned to the care of girls — which should start from the age of four or five — is to point them to a deep awareness of Christian life.168 According to the founder’s, Saint-Cyran’s ‘Salesian dimension’, Christian life must be inspired by love which holds absolute primacy169, yet a love never separated from fear and always based on a twofold feeling: the ugliness of vice and the beauty of virtue. 170
The sublimity and purity of the goals of such an education do not exempt the author of the Règlement from prefacing it with a warning to recommend the educators to employmoderation in the
implementation of the rules. "Not all the girls are capable of keeping such a prolonged silence or of living such an intense kind of life without losing heart and feelingtired. For this reason, the teacher, while safeguarding discipline, should make efforts to win over their affection and their heart, something which is fully necessary to succeed in their education”. 171
What follows are a series of invitations to keep a watchful presence among the girls, with an attitude of both love and reserve.
We have to use a lot of charity and tenderness with the girls, never neglecting anything that has to do with their life, both their inner and external life, making them realise, at every opportunity, that there are no limits to our dedication to them, and that what we do we do with affection and with all our heart because they are daughters of God and we feel obliged not to spare anything to make them worthy of this. 172… Furthermore, living among the girls, we have to behave ourselves so they do not notice our change of humor when we deal with them, sometimes too indulgently, sometimes with severity; We should not become too familiar with them, neither should we give them too much confidence, even if they are older. We should, however, show them charity and a great amount of gentleness in everything they need; we should even anticipate them in their needs. They need to be be treated with great politeness and we should speak to them respectfully, doing all we can for them. It would be good at times to condescending things which are not important, if this helps us to win over their heart. When they do something wrong, we should speak with much gentleness and offer them good reasons to convince them of what they did wrong.173
Other suggestions follow: “educate the girls to live a simple life; use discretion in supervision; punish them without much fuss, without wasting a word; get them accustomed to being sincere; keep them busy alternating reading, playing and working.174 In reference to assistance, there is a fine
165 F. Delforge, Les petites écolee,. 277-285.
166ibid, 157-171
167 The text of the Règlement pour les enfants de Port-Royal can also be found in the work Les pédagogues de Port Royal
287-337.
168 Cf. Règlement, part II, I, n. 23, 400.
169 On the ‘Salesian dimension’ of Saint-Cyran, cf. J. Orcibal, cf.La spiritualité de Saint-Cyran avec ses écrits de pieté
inédits, (Paris: Libraire J. Vrin 1962), 35-79.
170 Règlement, part I, du travail, 8, 364; part 2,2, nos. 1-3, 401-402.
171 Ibid, Avertissement, 358..
172 Règlement…, part 2, I, n. 2, 393-394.
173 ibid, part 2, I, nos. 13-16, 397-398.
174 ibid, part 2, I, nos. 17-23, 398-400.