Seminarist

“ A Seminarist is called upon to exercise the easier forms of obedience, to train him for the harder. He leads a regular daily life, in obedience to authority made known to us by definite commands and by fixed rules, in order that he may acquire a habit of submission which may give him his tone when he shall have gone forth from the Seminary and have no such definite rules or commands to guide him. ”

“ The reading of works which develop the rules and spirit of the seminary, which treat of Christian and ecclesiastical virtues, of fitness to receive holy orders, as likewise that of the lives of saints, is indispensable to the seminarist. ”

“ He does not, I suppose, think of making me a seminarist or a monk; the seminary, at my age, is devoid of interest, and as to the convent, it is attractive from the mystical point of view, and even enticing from the artistic standpoint, but I have not the physical aptitudes, still less the spiritual predispositions to shut myself up for ever in a cloister ”

“ The most necessary and the most certain mark is the decision of his director, when he has given him complete knowledge of himself, after having prayed with fervour and purity of heart.
"He that heareth you, heareth me." Luke, x. 16.
III. Spirit of the Seminary.
"If any one has not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of His." Rom. viii. 9.
The seminarist who wishes to profit by his stay in the seminary, and by its exercises, strives to direct his conduct and actions according to the spirit of our Lord, which is entirely opposed to that of the world. ”

“ Moreover, the spirit of obedience or disobedience in community life is very catching. One grumbler will make many. The Seminarist owes a duty to the institution which has done and is doing so much for him, to set up a high ideal for himself which will spread itself to others and affect the whole life led within the walls of the Seminary. It is a duty which he owes to his Bishop and likewise to his fellow students. ”

“ Its most frequent use is for a training college for the Roman Catholic priesthood, and in a transferred sense for a priest who has been trained in a foreign seminary, also often termed a “seminarist.” A German usage, adopted in America, applies the term seminar to a class for advanced study or research. ”

“ Finally the Seminarists came on in a black crowd; those of the Great Seminary of Chartres and of the Little Seminary of Saint Chéron preceding the priests, and behind them, under a purple velvet canopy embroidered in gold with wheat ears and grapes, and decorated at each corner with bunches of snow-white feathers, with his mitre on his head and holding his crozier, came Monseigneur Le Tilloy des Mofflaines. ”

“ We were then shewn three halls, in which we found at least one hundred and fifty seminarists, ten or twelve schoolrooms, the refectory, the dormitory, the gardens for play hours, and every pain was taken to make me imagine life in such a place the happiest that could fall to the lot of a young man, and to make me suppose that I would even regret the arrival of the bishop. ”

“ After supper, accompanied by this lay friar, who had the title of prefect, we all proceeded to the dormitory. There, everyone had to go to his own bed, and to undress quietly after having said his prayers in a low voice. When all the pupils were in bed, the prefect would go to his own. A large lantern lighted up the dormitory, which had the shape of a parallelogram eighty yards by ten. The beds were placed at equal distances, and to each bed there were a fold-stool, a chair, and room for the trunk of the Seminarist. At one end was the washing place, and at the other the bed of the prefect. ”

“ If the first bishop of New France had confined himself to creating one large seminary, it is certain that his chosen work, which was the preparation for the Church of a nursery of scholars and priests, the apostles of the future, would not have been complete.
98For many young people, indeed, who lead a worldly existence, and find themselves all at once transferred to the serious, religious life of the seminary, the surprise, and sometimes the discomfort, may be great. One must adapt oneself to this atmosphere of prayer, meditation and study. ”

“ Nothing that I may ever say or do can repay even a mite of the obligation that is upon me. As for you, and the other Catholics of this Diocese, you owe the Seminary for nine-tenths of the priests who have been successfully carrying on God's work in your midst. The collection to-day is for that Seminary. In other words, it is for the purpose of helping to train priests who shall take our places when we are gone. On the Seminary depends the future of the Church amongst you: therefore, the future of religion in your families. ”

“ Of the one hundred and three who had been connected with the female seminary, sixty, or more than one-half, gave good evidence of conversion; and the same might be said of three fourths who were then in the school. A large portion of the young men who had left the seminary, were either preachers of the gospel, or very competent teachers in the village school; and the greater part of the religious graduates of the other seminary were married to those missionary helpers. ”

“ The result of such teaching in our seminaries is that the student, unless he has had a Pauline experience before he came, has all his early conceptions of Scripture and of Christian doctrine weakened, has no longer any positive message to deliver, loses the ardor of his love for Christ, and at his graduation leaves the seminary, not to become preacher or pastor as he had once hoped, but to sow his doubts broadcast, as teacher in some college, as editor of some religious journal, as secretary of some Young Men's Christian Association, or as agent of some mutual life insurance company. ”

“ The porter brought to me the director of the seminary, who proved to be a young and very agreeable priest. He offered me the hospitalities of the seminary, and asked me to take a look at the house. He could converse fluently in English, having been several years in the United States. I learned from him that this institution, like the cathedral, was about three hundred years old, that the majority of candidates for holy orders were young men, natives of the Island, and that such was not the case till recently, as in the past all the aspirants for the ministry came directly from Spain. ”

“ IT would seem at first sight an anomaly that if the obedience practised by a secular priest is so different from that of a religious, in the time of preparation at the Seminary the life is modelled on that of a religious congregation; for, although it is no doubt easy compared with that of any religious Order, it is, nevertheless, of much the same character, and the occasions of practising obedience in a Seminary are very similar to those in a monastery. ”

“ That is the point; let a man give a sermon, and he may become a minister any day, provided he has an earl or a viscount at his back, and a bishop who sits tête â tête with either in the House of Lords, and has two or three sons whom he wishes to put into posts of honour. The sermon is everything. Any one can read the Service, provided he has a good voice and distinct utterance; but the sermon—that requires brains, views, style, and paper. How these things can be done without we shall see further on. For the present, poor George did not discover the secret. ”

“ The persons who aided in the building of the new seminary in good faith with edifices, incomes, and other things, which they liberally applied and gave for it, shall be petitioned to condescend to apply it all for the seminary which I have ordered to be founded. That seminary is to be maintained in the form abovesaid. In case that such persons do not agree thereto, they shall be paid the just price of all that which shall be esteemed useful and advantageous to the above-mentioned seminary. ”

“ Whenever the spirit of distributing prebends and bishoprics shall have departed from you, you will find that learned seminary perfectly recovered from the delirium of an installation, and, what in truth it ought to be, once more a peaceful scene of slumber and thoughtless meditation. The venerable tutors of the university will no longer distress your modesty, by proposing you for a pattern to their pupils. ”

“ I will take the liberty of suggesting to my brethren who address the congregation that our sermons should be short, and if they are not filled with life and spirit let them be shorter, for we have not time at this Conference to let all the Elders who speak preach a long sermon, but we have time to say a few words in bearing testimony, to give a few words of counsel to encourage the Saints, to strengthen the weak, to endeavor to confirm those who are wavering, and so forward the Kingdom of God. ”

“ And, while the discipline of the authorities and the exhortations and example of professors may do something, the tone of the college is determined by the students themselves. The state of feeling in a theological seminary ought to be such, that any man living a life inconsistent with his future profession should feel thoroughly uncomfortable, and have the conviction driven in upon his conscience every day, that the ministry is no place for him. ”

“ I have been informed that a large college in Paris, conducted by priests and containing 400 pupils, turned out in ten years but one of an ecclesiastical calling."—"Moniteur," March, 14, 1865. (Speech in the Senate by Cardinal Bonnechose.) "With us, discipline begins at an early age, first in the lower seminary and then in the upper seminary.... Other nations envy us our seminaries. They have not succeeded in establishing any like them. They cannot keep pupils so long; their pupils enter their seminaries only as day scholars." ”

“ Another form of intellectual activity is shown in the seminaries and scientific associations which have more or less of an official character. In the seminary, the professor engages with a small company of advanced students, in some line of investigation—the results of which, if found important, are often published. The relations of the head of a seminary to those whom he admits to this advanced work, are very close. The younger men have an opportunity of seeing the methods by which older men work. The sources of knowledge, the so-called authorities, are constantly examined. ”

“ A few seminaries—notably the Hartford Theological Seminary and the Boston University Department of Religious Education—are doing pioneer work along this line, but they are the exception rather than the rule, and the thing must be done by all if the desired result is to obtain in the future. ”

“ I have the more naturally fallen into these remarks, as they are in some sort suggested, and are certainly justified by the history of this institution. If you trace back the lives of the men, who at this moment occupy the most enviable pre-eminence in your native state, you will find that they received the rudiments of their professional and political education at this venerable but decayed seminary. There are certainly distinguished members of the profession, and illustrious men out of the profession, to whom this remark does not apply. ”

“ Coming to this definite work under the inspiration of this great thought, from a church which had been for years in the midst of a continuous revival, he had naturally given the Seminary a markedly practical tone of spiritual earnestness. A strong man himself, he attracted men of like stamp; and there had come, soon after he took charge of the institution, “a noble class of young men, uncommonly strong, a little uncivilized, entirely radical, and terribly in earnest.”
Dr. Beecher’s method of instruction was peculiar and in harmony with his spirit and purpose. ”

“ The idea of the seminary, and the episcopal or monastic school, is pre-eminently that of preservation; it takes the soul in the freshness of youth, and hedges round with thorns the garden that is to be consecrated to God. ”

“ All eyes are strained as the door opens beneath the pulpit, and the minister of the congregation comes in, and makes his way, as well as he can, for himself and his friend, the great preacher—there he is! that tall, commanding figure,—that is he, the “one-eyed man of Anglesea.”
A murmur of joy, whisperings of glad congratulation, which almost want to burst into acclamations, pass over the multitude. And the service commences with prayer, singing, reading a chapter, and a short sermon,—a very short one, only twenty minutes. ”

“ I believe his earliest appearance in this character, was on the ninth anniversary of the Church Missionary Society, before whom he was appointed, in 1809, to preach their annual sermon. This sermon may be appealed to as a fair and characteristic specimen of his powers in the pulpit; though I must be allowed to say, that to his flowing and harmonious language, his graceful delivery, and sweet expression of features, beaming with love to God and goodwill to men, imparted a charm which the mere reader of a printed sermon can by no means duly appreciate. ”

“ For three weeks, very few visitors came to the Seminary. The time seemed to be given expressly for the benefit of the pupils, and it was like one continual Sabbath. Every corner was consecrated to prayer, and most of the work was direct effort for the salvation of souls. But after that, visitors began to come, and then the young converts became helpers in Christ Jesus, even the sight of their devotion turning the thoughts of others to spiritual things. ”

“ Perhaps the more reprehensible fault of the seminary is not so much deficiency in the matter of its teaching as deficiency in its maturity. No thinking person wishes to receive his spiritual guidance from an unthinking boy. I am constantly puzzled by the ill-logic of our ministerial preparation when I reflect that the foundation of its teaching is the fact that God Himself thought it necessary to be thirty years a man with men before He was ready to teach or to preach. ”