Chapter 4.
School at Castelnuovo d'Asti
-An edifying occasion
-Wise answer to bad advice
e as far as he could in the little village school. Both his parents and himself desired this very much but they had not the money which would make this possible. They could only turn to God, the supreme master of everything, and who would see to all that was needed to make it possible.
“If only I were a bird”, Dominic would say sometimes, “I would fly morning and evening to Castelnuovo, and so I would be able to carry on with my lessons”.
His keen desire finally overcame all difficulties, and it was decided that he should go to the county school, although this was about three miles away. Dominic cheerfully walked the six miles there and back every day. The varieties of weather, the dust and the very hot sun in summer, mud, rain, storms and fierce winds at other times of the year, never got him down or stopped him from going to school, although he was barely ten years old when he started. He was obedient to his parents, which helped him to look after his health and to put up with any discomforts. A local farmer used sometimes to see Dominic on the road, and one afternoon when the sun was beating down mercilessly he approached the boy and started talking.
“Aren't you afraid to be on your own on this lonely road, especially in the dark winter evening”?
“But I am not alone: my guardian angel is with me”.
But don't you get fed up having to go backwards and forwards in heat like this”?
“No, I am doing it for a Master who pays well”.
“Oh, and who is that”?
“God the Creator, who rewards even a cup of water given for his sake”.
The farmer used often to recount this incident and predicted a great future for Dominic.
Some of his school companions were not very good, and on one occasion he was in grave danger of doing wrong. In the hot weather some of the boys used to go swimming in the streams and other water pools where water was available. Bathing has its physical dangers and, not infrequently, the death by drowning of young people and adults has to be lamented. It can also have its dangers for the soul in certain circumstances, when boys are stripped together and have little care and respect for each other.
Dominic was persuaded by some of his companions to go swimming with them on one occasion. But when he saw what was done and said, he was profoundly grieved and made up his mind never to go again.
A short time afterwards two of the same boys came to him again.
“Dominic, are you coming to play”?
“What are you going to play”?
“We're going swimming”.
“I'm not going. I am afraid of drowning”.
“Come on, be a sport: we'll have a great time and feel much fresher in this heat”.
“But I 'm afraid”.
“Don't be afraid. We'll teach you, and soon you will be swimming like a fish, and leaping about like the rest of us”.
“But isn't it wrong to go to such dangerous place to swim”?
“Not at all. If so many go, how can it be wrong”?
“Still, I feel uneasy about it and don't know what to say”.
“Come on, take our word for it, we'll look after you”.
“I think I'll go to ask my mother if it is all right for me to go”.
“Don't be stupid - don't say anything to your Mum. She won't let you go, and she will also tell our parents and we will be in for a good hiding”.
“Well if my mother won't let me go, I'm not going. In any case if you want the truth I'll tell you. I went once before, but never again; not simply because it is easy to get drowned there, but more still because from what I saw last time it is also easy to offend God; so don't talk to me any more about swimming. In any case if your parents don't want you to go, you know you should not go. God punishes children who disobey their parents”.
This is how Dominic answered the harmful suggestions of his companions and in doing so avoided a grave danger through which, if he had allowed himself to go, he might well have lost his innocence, the loss of which leads on to so many sad consequences.
