For Greater Things Part 2

Did that cost him no effort? Had he no human respect to fight against? Think of how many times you may have grinned, cowardly, at a gross remark or shady story of a comrade - because you were not fighter enough to resent it! And then give this Stanislaus, who did resent, credit for his stouter courage, his more manly spirit.

His biographers tell us that he was simply' free from temptations against purity. That does not mean what many may think it means: that he was physically unlike other boys, that he had no animal desires, that he had nothing to fight against. It means that he was such a magnificent fighter that he had won the battle almost from the start. It means that he was not content, as so many of us are, with merely pushing a temptation a little aside, and then looking around in surprise to find it still there. He was like a skillful boxer, who wards off every blow of his adversary, so that he goes through the contest absolutely untouched. He watched, as we are too lazy to watch; he kept out of danger, where we foolishly run into it; he did not wait until temptation had set upon him and nearly battered him down before he began to resist; he saw it coming afar off, just as we can if we look out, and he met it with a rush that sent it again beyond reach or even sight.

OF COURSE he was the same as other boys; OF COURSE he had the same inclinations, the same promptings of the animal man; but with them he had more daring, more force and energy of will to cooperate with G.o.d's grace.

You always find it that way. The things the saints seem to do with ease are terrifically hard things, huge battles, regular slugging fights. The ease, if there be any, is not in the things they did, but in the men who did them.

You have seen skilled pianists sit down at their instruments and run off into brisk flowing music what looks like a hopeless jumble of notes. You may have seen an artist sketch in, whilst chatting idly, a swift, striking portrait. Well, all really good men are artists too; artists in fighting. And Stanislaus was one of the cleverest and strongest artists of the lot.

He began early, just as the musician Mozart did, just as the painter Raffaele did; and he studied hard at his art, just as all great artists have done. He began by saying his prayers well, not mere lip prayers, but heart prayers. He began by getting on easy terms with G.o.d, with our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament, with our Blessed Lady.

He learned to talk with them as we learn to talk with our fathers and mothers. He told them his troubles, his plans. He talked everything over with them. And it no more made him queer or stiff or unpleasant than talking things over with your comrades or your parents makes you queer or stiff or unpleasant. If you believe in G.o.d, it is the most natural thing in the world to try to take Him into your confidence.

Then it is easy to see how, as Stanislaus grew older, he liked to pray, he liked to talk about G.o.d and our Lady. You see, he had grown to know them. They were not remote, far away. They were as near to him as his own folk. They were his own folk. And it is easy to see how, keeping in G.o.d's sight all the time, he kept his soul clean and his heart merry.

CHAPTER IV

OFF TO VIENNA

In this way Stanislaus went on until he was nearly fourteen years old and his brother Paul was approaching fifteen. Then the Lord John Kostka thought his boys had better continue their studies, not at home, but at a regular school. He picked out John Bilinski, a young man who had lately completed his college course, as tutor for them. He gave them a couple of servants, mounted them all on good horses, and sent them off six hundred miles or more on horseback to Vienna.

You may be sure Stanislaus enjoyed the long ride. It would be strange if he, a n.o.bleman of the finest cavalry nation in the world, were not a good horseman. He loved the smell of the open fields, he loved the boisterous song of the mountain torrent. The hills and the plains were his home, for the hills and the plains were nearer to G.o.d than the houses of men.

In those days all travel was on foot or on horseback. The wealthy and n.o.ble rode, the poor footed it. Great highways cut Europe from end to end; though there were tracts in Stanislaus' country where the roadway was only the broad steppe, where the gra.s.ses waved and tossed like the sea, where men were few and their dwellings scattered far apart.

They crossed great rivers, they climbed the foothills of the Carpathian mountains. Many a night Paul and Stanislaus, with their people, slept under the stars. Many a wild, rough border town they pa.s.sed. Many a great forest they penetrated, the home of the wild boar and the aurochs.

And the tar burners in the forests looked up from under their matted brows at the fair oval face of the Polish boy, and said:

"He is like a wild flower blown by the wind. He is like the violets that laugh in spring at the sun."

And the s.h.a.ggy fighting-men of the frontier villages watched him ride through their streets, and thought:

"This is an angel. He looks toward heaven because he sees his Brothers there."

They crossed themselves piously as he pa.s.sed. And some of the light and laughter of his face glowed 'for a moment in their dark lives, as a gloomy glen in the forest is brightened up by a darting ray of sunlight.

He was wonderful, but he was always a boy. He was glad to feel the good horse under him, to grip the Tartar saddle with his knees, to feel the air rush by his cheek.

Sometimes they met poor people staggering wearily afoot along the road. Often Stanislaus checked his horse and lightly dismounted.

"Get up, get up, old father!" he would cry. "My legs are stiff from the saddle. I want to walk."

And though a peasant might often be afraid to accept the favor from a n.o.ble, or be surly and churlish, the folk never were so with Stanislaus. Up climbed the old father into the saddle, and Stanislaus stepped out by his side.

"G.o.d give your grace long years!" said the thankful old man.

"Long years!" cried Stanislaus. I want more than that. I want eternity. I was born for greater things than long years."

And the old man would understand; for he was of the poor, and the poor know more of this longing for heaven than do the rich. But he looked almost with awe at this richly dressed n.o.ble boy who had learned even now to value life so justly. Then it was easy for Stanislaus to talk of heaven to the old man.

"Old father, in the barony of the Lord Jesus there is no poverty or old age or weariness. Nor is there any difference of rank there as here, for we shall all be great lords and castellans in heaven."

"Aye, but your grace will be a hetman surely in the army of the Lord Jesus," said the old man.

"Who knows!" cried Stanislaus. "I should love that dearly. Though the generals in His kingdom are not always from amongst the n.o.bles.

It may be that you will be hetman, and I a common soldier. But it is good to be even a common soldier with Him."

"I went against the Tartars in my youth," said the old man. "Perhaps we shall have a campaign against that dog-brother Lucifer, and Saint Michael and Saint Wenceslaus will lead us under the Lord Jesus; and our Lady of Yasna Gora will look on when we come back victorious!"

And so they talked on until it was time to set the old man down, and Stanislaus mounted again to catch up with his party, which had gone ahead.

"With G.o.d!" cried the old man.

"With G.o.d!" echoed Stanislaus. 'And if you go to heaven before me, father, do not forget to plead for me with the Lord Jesus and with His Mother."

Then he clattered along the road, and shortly came up with Bilinski and Paul.

Sometimes they came to districts infested by robbers, and waited to join themselves to some larger party for protection. Sometimes they made long stretches of many hours in the saddle, when the inns were far apart and they could get no food on the road. Sometimes they tarried a day or two in a little town to rest their horses.

But everywhere Stanislaus thought of G.o.d, and prayed, and when occasion offered spoke of holy things as only he could speak.

Bilinski and Paul often laughed at him, for they were of a different stamp. But he did not mind their ridicule, and he bore them no grudge for it. And so, after. many days, they came at length to Vienna, on July 26, 1564.

CHAPTER V

SCHOOL DAYS

Vienna WAS a great city, even in those days, since for a long time it had been the residence of the Roman Emperors of the West. It was a Catholic city, though even in 1564, little more than forty years after Luther's revolt, the Lutherans in the city had begun to be quite numerous.

The Society of Jesus had been founded in 1540, only ten years before Stanislaus was born. But it had spread quickly. For some years now there had been a Jesuit house in Vienna. In i56o, four years before Stanislaus came to Vienna, the Emperor Ferdinand I had loaned to the Viennese Jesuits a large house next to their own, which they might use as a college. The Fathers built a connection between the two houses, so that they became practically one. Here they received boys from the city, from the country round about, even from Hungary and far Poland. Here Stanislaus took up his residence.

It was a simpler, less formal sort of school than we perhaps are accustomed to. The Fathers and the boys lived together, almost as one big family. They ate together in one large dining hall. There were always some of the Fathers with the boys in their games, as well as in their studies. It was a very pleasant place, and a very good place.

In those early days of Protestantism, Catholics, even Catholic boys, felt that they were in a fighting situation. The attacks upon the old faith woke new courage and devotion in those who remained faithful to the Church of the ages. And so, filled with that spirit of loyalty, that new earnestness which the times called forth, and living under the example of the simple manly piety of their Jesuit teachers, it is no wonder that the boys in the College of Vienna were an unusually good set of boys.

They had their regular cla.s.ses, in languages, mathematics, and such science as the age knew. Latin was then the language of all educated people in Europe, the language of courts, the common meeting ground of all nations. Many a time, both in those days and later; a n.o.ble proved his rank and saved himself from mischance by the mere fact that he spoke Latin. It was not a dead language then, as it is now.

It was in current use. Greek was comparatively new in Western schools. And though from their beginnings the Jesuits were famous teachers, we can hardly suppose that in their new and small college at Vienna the boys were much troubled by the speech of Plato and Demosthenes.

Of their games it is hard to know much at this late day. Sword-play and bouts of a soldierly sort were common enough. These boys were almost all of n.o.ble birth; most of them perhaps looked for-ward to the army for their profession. So they held mimic tournaments and played games in which they hurled lances through suspended rings; they shot with bows and arrows; and of course they had matches in running, jumping and wrestling.

We know that Stanislaus did uncommonly well in the schools. He was quick, had a good memory, and was too sensible to be lazy. And though the writers of his life say nothing about it, we are quite sure that he excelled in games and sports also. For one thing, he as a general favorite, esteemed by all his fellows; and that must mean that he was one with them in their play. For another, he was naturally no dreamer or moper, but the jolliest, cheeriest sort of boy. And finally, the boy who walked twelve hundred miles in a few weeks must have been well accustomed to using his legs. Try thirty miles a day on foot, day after day, you football players and baseball players, you trained athletes, and say whether it is the work of a weakling or of a boy who never played.

But it takes more than success in studies and in games to account for his great popularity with the other college boys. Such success may win a certain admiration and respect, but it does not of itself win friends. And Stanislaus had pretty nearly every one for his friend. To do that requires other gifts, gifts of character.

Everybody liked him, because he had such gifts. He was pious, but not merely pious; much more than pious, he was good. That means he was unselfish. There is only one way to make people really love you, and that is to love them. That is what Stanislaus did; he loved the people he lived with. He was naturally good hearted, and big hearted. He had kept away from petty meannesses. He had fought down his natural selfishness. He had learned not to be always seeking his own little advantage, not to put himself forward for praise, not to insist on his " rights," not to boast and carry a high hand with his comrades, not to talk a lot about himself.

He had learned to forgive little offenses, and big ones, too, for that matter. He knew all about how our Lord had suffered and put up with things and forgiven those who hurt Him. And he loved our Lord so much, was so much at home with Him, that almost without effort he acted as our Lord would want him to act. He had plenty of spirit, and a whole world of pluck and daring; but he was not quarrelsome.

Then he was as cheerful as sunshine, and he made every one else cheerful. Why, the boys could not help loving a boy like him.