education is not possible.241

The good qualities and defects of the child require orderliness. 242

The child is curious, mobile, restless, eager to play games, hostile to submission….

Childhood is affected by frivolity; it loathes application, is presumptuous, violent, stubborn.

Childhood is the age of recklessness, of heated passions, and pleasures. All of these defects

come from the nature of a child. But at least, children have not yet acquired defects… In

children, everything is flexible and new. It is quite easy to straighten up those tender plants

and have them turn towards heaven… This is why, even with all their defects, nothing is as

delightful as when we come to notice how reason and virtue are born in

them…Notwithstanding the appearances of frivolity and passionate urge for amusements, a

child may be wise, reasonable and sensitive to virtue… I have no difficulty recognising that

a child, even without excluding that he be lucky enough to be born with a happier character,

is nothing but a voluble, frivolous human being who jumps from one wish to another, is at

the mercy of his own instability..But all pious instructors should know well that the very

task and glory of education lie in the ability to overcome such frivolity and know how to

turn this inconstancy into stability.243

Those responsible for the educative community should provide for this kind of growth. They are to operate on three fronts: l) They should keep constant, practical observance of the rules with steadfast exactness. 2) They should prevent the violation of the rules through zealous assistance. 3) They should repress transgressions of the rules with timely justice, in order to correct the disorder as soon as it appears. Discipline, therefore, has been assigned three tasks, the same ones assigned to education: to conserve, to prevent, to repress. Discipline is precisely directed towards the training of the will and the formation of the character, along with both intellectual and physical education and crowned by religious education.

The two terms 'discipline', 'education', strictly understood, and distinct from the various stages of formation (physical, intellectual and religious) find their expression in a threefold function which is 'repressive', 'preventive' and 'directive'. The task of 'repressive discipline' is to avoid leaving whatever is at fault uncorrected. The task of 'preventive discipline' is to eagerly keep dangerous occasions at a distance. The task of 'directive discipline' is to show the right path to be followed always and everywhere.

One can easily understand, without any need for comparisons, that it is better to prevent than to repress. But exactness in maintaining what is good and vigilance in preventing what is evil make the need to repress less urgent. Consequently, the greater importance lies with directive discipline which maintains what is good. Preventive discipline is of secondary importance. It prevents the onset of evil. The least important, though necessary, is repressive discipline which punishes.244

6. The preventive suggestions of Henri Lacordaire (1807-1861)

Henri Dominique Lacordaire , a French Dominican, brilliant orator and reformer of the Dominicans, spent the last years of his life (1854-1861) after his six year term as Provincial, entirely dedicated to an educational institution located within the Benedictine Abbey of Soreze, in the Toulouse area. The Soreze institute had been entrusted to the Dominican Third Order founded by Fr. Lacordaire, who was

241 F. Dupanloup, L’educazione, vol 1, book 3, ch. 3 La Disciplina, 126-127.

242 Cf. F. Dupanloup, L’educazione, vol 1, book 2, Del fanciullo e del rispetto dovuto alla dignità della sua natura, ch.1 Il

fanciullo, sue qualità, suoi difetti; quanto si presti all’uopo dell’Educazione, 67-68.

243 F. Dupanloup, L’educazione, vol 1, book 2, 70-74.

244 Ibid., vol 1, book 3, ch. 3 La Disciplina, 177-178.