seems incredible that Don Bosco's work might have met with obstacles and even opposition. But what grants Don Bosco, most of all, the right to the gratitude of all citizens is the Hospice next to the Oratory which is open to the most needy and destitute children. When Don Bosco knows about or meets with some child who is a victim of poverty, squalid conditions, he never loses sight of him, takes him into his home, restores him, asks him to take off his filthy clothes and gives him new clothes to put on. He provides food for him day and night until he finds some employment and some work for him to do, so he may earn a decent livelihood in the future and can take better care of educating his mind and heart.438
On the day of the celebration of Don Bosco's month 's mind, the Archbishop of Turin, Cardinal Cajetan Alimonda, gave considerable room to Don Bosco's educational system in his eulogy on that occasion. “Education”, he said, was “the first area where Don Bosco brought the divine to the 19th Century”, as well as his “concern for the working class” and “for work”, the spirit of association, civilisation of underdeveloped peoples. “Don Bosco did not put aside anything which might be useful in educational discoveries but went one better. He did not have a problem with the method, because he had solutions stemming from principles. He introduced the religious dimension as a guide to natural affection, in the science of charity. This is why Don Bosco gives pedagogy a divine touch”.439 Don Bosco's pedagogy is “intensely religious and therefore not gloomy”. “Everything happened in an atmosphere of freedom and cheerfulness”.440 “All this came together with involvement and clever initiatives in an atmosphere of peace, dignity and trust”.441
The general style characterising his various undertakings was the preventive system. For Don Bosco the preventive system was the absolute, well-defined rule compared with the repressive method, often linked inevitably with civil strife. “The best and most miraculous power required for control, according to Don Bosco's recommendations, was moral power. Don Bosco knew and understood that unless we win over the pupils’ affection, we are building on sand, educating bodies and not spirits”.442
A biographical outline
Don Bosco's biography may be divided into three periods:
The period of preparation (1815-l844); the period where the fundamental features of his educational activity are outlined (1844-1869); the period when his institutions receive both organisational and theoretical substance (1870-1888).
Here we single out the more important moments of his life’s work and educational activity. 1815 (August 16) Don Bosco is born in the Becchi in the Municipality of Castelnuovo. 1817 Death of his father.
1824 A priest, Fr. Joseph Lacqua, introduces Don Bosco to reading and writing.
1827 First Communion, around Easter time.
1828 (February) Farmhand at the Moglia farm (until late Autumn l829).
438 In the Chronichetta in the Journal of the Society for instruction and education, Year 1, vol 1 1849, 459-460. There are
expressions emphasised here which give evidence of the important aspects of Don Bosco’s educational and pedagogical
experience.
439 Giovanni Bosco e il suo secolo. At the month’s mind in the Church of Mary Help of Christians in Turin, 1st March
1888. Homily by Cardianl Archbishop Gaetano Alimonda (Turin: Tipografia Salesians, 1888), 11.
440 Ibid., 13-15.
441 Ibid., 21-24.
442 Ibid., 39-40.