Introduction to The Companion of Youth
Don Bosco
There are two main tricks which the devil uses to tempt young people away from virtue. The first is to get them to think that serving the Lord consists in a sad life far from any enjoyment and pleasure.1 It is not so, my dear young people. I want to teach you a method2 of Christian living which will make you happy and content, pointing out to you what real pleasures and enjoyments are so you can say with the Prophet David: let us serve the Lord in holy cheerfulness: servite Domino in laetitia. This is the purpose of this little book, to serve the Lord and always remain cheerful.3
The other trick is the hope of a long life where you can easily convert in old age or at the point of death. Be careful, my children; many have been deceived in this manner. Who can be certain of growing old? We cannot expect death to await our convenience at old age since life and death are in the Lord's hands and he may do as he pleases. If God should grant you a long life, listen to what he tells you: a young man according to his way – even when he is old he will not depart from it. Adolescens iuxta viam suma etiam cum senuerit non recedet ab ea. This means to say that if we lead a good life when we are young we will be good when we are old, we will have a good death which will be the beginning of eternal happiness. Contrariwise, if vice takes hold of us when we are young, in most cases it will continue to do so until we die. That is too much of a deadly down payment for an unhappy eternity. So that such a misfortune will not happen to you I am offering a scheme of life, brief and easy enough, which will enable you to be the consolation of your parents, a glory to your country, good citizens on earth and one day blessed inhabitants of heaven. 4
This little book is in three parts. In the first part you will find what you must do and what you must avoid to live as good Christians. In the second there is a collection of devout practices. In the third part you will the Office of the Blessed Virgin with the main Evening Prayers throughout the year. Some hymns are added.
My dear young people, I love you with all my heart;5 it is enough for you to be young for me to love you very much. You will certainly find good books written by people who are much more learned and virtuous than I am, but I assure you that you would be hard put to find someone who loves you more than I do in Jesus Christ or who cares more about your true happiness than I do. May the Lord be always with you and grant that by practising these few suggestions you can save your souls and so give more glory to God, the only reason for which this book has been written.
May you have a happy life and may the Lord be with you.
Most affectionately in Jesus Christ,
Fr John Bosco
1“But (some say) if we start serving the Lord now we become sad. This is not true. The one who serves the devil becomes sad… Who was more pleasant and jovial than St Aloysius Gonzaga? Who was more pleasant and cheerful than St Philip Neri? But they constantly practised all kinds of virtue. So courage, my dear young people, start practising virtue now and I assure you your heart will always be happy and content, and you will know how pleasant it is to serve the Lord” – Il giovane provveduto, p. 13. – Cf. Certain tricks that the devil uses to trick young people, ibid, pp. 28-29.
2“method”. A habitual way of doing things, acting or behaving in a determined instance… according to S. Battaglia, Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, vol. X, Turin, UTET 1978, p. 277.
3“Although he was so focused on things of the spirit, you would never see him with clouded face or sad but always happy, always content, and with his pleasant way of speaking he made everyone he spoke with happy. He used often say that he liked the words of the Prophet David: Serve the Lord in gladness: Serve the Lord in holy cheerfulness. He liked to talk about history, poetry, the difficulties of Latin or Italian, but humbly, amiably enough such that while offering his opinion he always deferred to others”. – [G. Bosco], Cenni storici sulla vita del chierico Luigi Comollo… Turin, tip. Speirani e Ferrero 1844, pp. 23-24. – “What often aroused particular wonder in me was to see how committed he was not only to eliminating any behaviour unbecoming to a cleric, but how he acted with such an attractive promptness, grace, and cheerfulness” – P. Giordano, Cenni istruttivi di perfezione proposti ai giovani nella vita edificante di Giuseppe Burzio. Turin, tip. Artisti tipografi 1846, p. 138 [Testimony of Don Bosco's].
4“The Lord lets you know that if you lead a good life as a young man, you will be that way for the rest of your life, which will be crowned with glory and happiness. On the contrary whoever leads a bad life as a young man will too easily stay that way until death, and it will inevitably lead you to hell. Therefore if you see old men given to drunkenness, gambling, blasphemy, you can mostly say that these vices began when they were young: adolescens juxta viam suam, etiam cum senuerit non recedet ab ea. Prov. 22” – Il giovane provveduto, p. 12.
5“The facts… then that seemed more tractable and moving I gave more details about so that not only might the intellect be instructed but the heart might also be moved to its spiritual benefit” – Storia ecclesiastica, preface, p. 10. – “He is convinced of the great educational principle that the mind needs enlightenment in order for the heart to be good and so his entire history revolves around this focus.” – G. Ramello, review of Storia ecclesiastica, in «L'Educatore Primario» 1 (1845) N. 34, 10 Dec. p. 576.
