Society of Jesus

The Society of Jesus is mentioned in a note identifying the Jesuits as the educators in Conrad Ferdinand Meyer’s story Die Leiden eines Knaben. The reference presents the Society in a specific literary context: a boy at the court of Louis XIV suffers under a strict and uncongenial educational regime imposed by Jesuit teachers.

Literary Reference

The book’s note describes Die Leiden eines Knaben, published in 1883, as a story about a boy at Louis XIV’s court whose education under the Jesuits is strict and ill-suited to him. The Society therefore enters the discussion through the depiction of schooling as an oppressive constraint on the child, rather than through an account of the organization itself.

Scope and Significance

The reference is brief and does not identify individual Jesuits, explain the Society’s structure, or discuss its wider aims and history. Its significance here is limited to the educational regime attributed to Jesuit authorities in Meyer’s story: the institutional discipline provides the circumstance under which the boy suffers.