It is the custom with us to drop the family name on our reception, to signify the cutting away of all carnal ties, except inasmuch as they may help to benefit souls. A religious should be dead to nature, and his relationship henceforth is with the saints. This is why, among many religious orders of men, and nearly all of women, some saint or some mystery of religion to which the novice is specially devoted is substituted instead of the family name. In most cases, also, the Christian name is changed; this, following the example of our Lord, who changed the names of some of the Apostles, is useful in many ways, as well to typify newness of life as to help in distinguishing one from another when the aid of family names is taken away. Father Ignatius gave his reasons above for preferring this name, and events, both before and after, make us applaud the fitness of the choice. A novice's life is a very eventless one; it has little in it of importance to others, though it is of so much consequence to himself. The coming of a postulant, the going away of a newly-made brother, the mistakes of a tyro at bell-ringing, chanting, or ceremonies, are of interest enough to occupy several recreations. The absence of soul-stirring news from without gives these trifles room to swell into importance. When the little incidents are invested with ludicrous or peculiar circumstances, they often have a sheet of the chronicles dedicated to their history by the most witty or least busy of the novices. A postulant ran away the day after Father Ignatius was clothed; he heard the religious take the discipline, and no amount of explanations or coaxing could induce him to {357} accustom his ear to the noise, much less his body to the stripes, of this function. The senior novice left at the same time; he was a priest, and died on the London mission the very same year as Father Ignatius. In a few days more Father Dominic caught a novice dressing his hair and giving himself airs before a looking-glass. His habit was stripped off, and he was sent to the outer world, where, perhaps, the adorning of his good looks was of more service to him than it was at Aston Hall. It is a received tradition in the religious life that vocations which are not tried by difficulties seldom prove sea-worthy, so to speak. Before or after the novice enters, he must be opposed and disappointed in some way; he has to pay dear for the favour of serving God in this state of life, if he be destined to act any important part in the Church as a religious. Father Ignatius had his trials. He found it difficult to pick up all the _minutiae_ of novice discipline: he suffered a little from homesickness, and these, joined to chilled feet, a hard bed, and meagre food, did not allow him to enjoy to any great extent the delightful sensation known as _fervor novitiorum_. He got over all this, as we see from a letter he wrote to a friend in March:--