Lumen 2018

round. The third scrutiny was held on June 20, 1655, and, again, the result was identical: all three novices — John of St. Apolonia, Al- bert of St. Teresa, and Stanislaus of Jesus Mary — received nine pos- itive votes each. 39 Theological Studies According to the constitutions of the Piarist Fathers, the novitiate was supposed to last two years. 40 Since Stanislaus showed great progress in the spiritual life, Fr. Alexander Novari, Vicar-Provincial Superior of the Piarists, allowed him to continue his studies during the second year of the novitiate, which was allowed by the religious statutes anyway. 41 Therefore, on July 17, 1655, Papczynski left Podoliniec and moved to Warsaw to study theology. He could begin these studies immediately for he had already completed the courses of poetics, rhetoric, and philosophy. At that time, the Piarist Fathers’ house in Warsaw was located on Dluga Street, but since they did not have their own house of studies, they sent their seminarians to the lectures at St. Anthony’s Monastery of the Franciscan Brothers Minor on Senatorska Street. Brother Joseph of St. Catherine of Siena Starck, a Piarist of German descent, who had made his profession as aggregatus in 1653, 42 participated in these lectures together with Stanislaus Papczynski. Papczynski arrived in Warsaw just before the famous Swedish “del- uge.” We shall now focus our attention a bit more closely on the gen- esis of this war and its initial course in order to understand better what Stanislaus Papczynski experienced during his studies of theology. The First Encounters with the Swedish Aggressor In 1652, an event that was very dangerous for the Republic of Poland occurred. Deputy Sicinski broke off the session of the Diet and, thus, singlehandedly made its further deliberations impossible. S TANISLAUS P APCZYNSKI 102