JANUARY 21

Don Bosco used to watch his boys attentively wherever they were. He would often come to the study hall and to the workshops. The slightest breach of the rules would immediately come to his knowledge and be righted by his intervention. He would often confer with his subordinates listening to their reports about the boys' behavior and he would give them rules of action for the improvement of discipline. He ordered that every pupil should be given his weekly mark of conduct, of study and of work, and he himself would publicly read those marks on Sunday evening encouraging the diligent and admonishing the negligent. 

Don Bosco was utterly convinced that reflection brings round boys in most cases and makes them acknowledge and correct their defects. Consequently he would never grow tired of admonishing and advising. His patience was heroic indeed. When a superior hesitated to accept or send away any boy he used to advise the practice of St Paul's rule: "Omnia probate: quod bonum est tenete" -"Test them all and retain what is good" and to this effect he would take this admonition seriously. At the beginning of the year, if he had an inkling that one of the new boys could do harm to his companions he would call him, he would admonish him in the most impressive way and he would keep him under a special vigilance. Many who got into the bad habit of evil talk and had just freshly arrived from the world improved with such solicitude.  

Don Bosco's ways to win over boys and bring them to God's service were his own secret Both in the order of nature and of grace he was gifted with such qualities that, no matter how wayward and recalcitrant to grace a boy might be, he would surely surrender to Don Bosco's paternal advice, on hearing fatherly words whispered into his ear. Don Bosco's admonitions were bound to be successful because, for souls he was ready to lay down his life a hundred times. 

His words used to fling open the hearts of boys. Often he would ask them to be sincere with the superiors in things pertaining to their souls. He used to extol the advantages of sincerity. He would call it the key to internal peace, the best weapon to drive sadness away, the safest secret for joy both in life and in death, as well as for achieving real perfection. These recommendations were intended to prevent evil and to neutralize its consequences. 

He used to tell his helpers: "We must keep sin away from our houses, our boys must all live in the grace of God; without this, things cannot go well." He used to say: "Remember that the best method of education is that of obtaining good Confessions and good Communions."