41. The red horse, 1862
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On the night of July 5, 1862, Don Bosco had a dream which he narrated on July 6, as follows: "Last night I had a singular dream. It seemed to me that I met a person who said to me: 'You take care of educating the young boys, but leave it to others to educate the young girls'.
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I said to him: But did Jesus Christ come into the world to redeem only the boys, or did he also come to redeem the girls? And I added: "If Jesus came to save the boys and the girls, I must work in such a way that the blood of Jesus is not shed uselessly for the boys and the girls.
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And at that moment a frightful noise was heard and I looked again in the distance and I saw a huge red horse coming, taller than a multi-storey building, taller than the Madama Palace.
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Everyone ran away. I stayed to watch it and although I was trembling from head to toe I approached it.
- What a huge horror of a beast! And on it came many people. And they even had wings.
And I exclaimed: "This is the same demon!".
And I asked one, "What is this huge horse?".
And he answered me, "This is the Red Horse spoken of in the Apocalypse.
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Afterwards I woke up very frightened and that morning during mass and while going to confession I remembered many times the terrible Red Horse and I set out to find out what the Book of Revelation says about it.
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Note: Don Bosco commissioned Father Durando to look up in the Holy Bible what the Book of Revelation says about the Red Horse, and what he found was this: "When the second seal was opened, a Red Horse appeared and it was granted to him to take peace from the earth, so that they might kill one another. And he was given a very great sword" (Rev. 6:4).
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Don Bosco understood that much violence was going to come to the earth and that many killings and cruelties were going to come, and that enormous persecutions were going to come to the Catholic Church. And he said: "We should all contribute to the triumph of our Holy Mother the Catholic Church by spreading much of the good readings, and we should collaborate for the peace of the world, spreading the teachings of Jesus in the Gospel".
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42. The Serpent and the Hail Mary, 1862
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On August 20, 1862, after evening prayers, Don Bosco told the students: "I want to tell you about a dream I had a few nights ago.
I dreamed that I was in the company of all the young people at Castelnuovo, at my brother's house. While everyone was having recess, a stranger came towards me and invited me to join him. I followed him and he led me to a meadow near the courtyard and there he showed me a snake 7 to 8 meters long and extraordinarily thick. Horrified, when I saw it, I wanted to run away.
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- No, no. - said my companion - don't run away. Come with me, see.
- And how do you want - I answered - that I dare to approach that beast? - Don't be afraid. It will do you no harm. Come with me.
- Ah," I exclaimed, "I am not so imprudent as to expose myself to such danger.
- Then," said my companion, "wait here.
And he went off at once in search of a rope, and with it in his hand he returned to me and said, "Take a firm hold of that rope at one end, and hold it securely. I took hold of the other end so that we could keep it up in the air over the snake.
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- And then? - Then we'll drop it down by way of a whip on its dorsal spine.
- Oh no, please. Woe to us if we do that. The snake will jump up in anger and tear us apart.
- No, no. Let me act," added the stranger, "I know what I must do.
- No, no, no way. I don't want to make an experience that could cost me my life.
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And I was about to flee. But he insisted again, assuring me that there was nothing to fear, that the snake would do me no harm. And he insisted so much that I stayed where I was, ready to do as he advised me.
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The personage passed to the other side, lifted the rope or noose and gave it a strong lash on the animal's back. The snake jumped up, turning its head back to bite the object that had wounded it, but instead of sinking its teeth into the rope, it remained entangled in it as if by a slip knot. Then the stranger shouted at me: - Hold the rope tightly, hold it tightly so that it does not slip out of your hands.
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And he ran to a pear tree nearby and tied the end of the rope in his hand to its trunk. Then he ran to me, took the other end of the noose and went to tie it to the grating of a window of the house.
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In the meantime the snake became agitated, moved the rings furiously, and gave such blows with its head and rings on the ground, that its flesh broke, bursting to pieces at a great distance. Thus it continued as long as it had life, and once it had died, nothing remained of it but the fleshless skeleton.
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Then that same man untied the rope from the tree and from the window, picked it up, formed it into a ball and said to me, "Pay close attention.
He put the rope in a box, closed it and after a few moments opened the box again. The young people had come to join me. We looked inside the box and were amazed. The string was arranged in such a way that it formed a sign: "AVE MARIA (Hail Mary).
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- But how is this possible? - I said to the stranger - you put the rope into the box in the right way, without any order, and now it appears bent to form those letters? - Look - he said - the snake represents the devil, and the string represents the Hail Mary, that is to say the Rosary, which is a series of "Hail Mary", with which one can defeat, overcome and destroy all the attacks of the enemies of the soul.
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And Don Bosco concluded by saying: "Let us always remember what that person said about the Hail Mary and the Rosary. Let us devoutly pray this beautiful prayer before any assault of temptations, with the certainty that we will emerge victorious.
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Explanation: The pear tree is the same one on which St. John Bosco as a child tied a rope to give acrobatic performances to the peasants so that he could later teach them catechism.
Don Bosco was always an enthusiast of the Rosary. In his houses it was prayed every day, and he insisted that by praying the Rosary one could keep away and overcome the enemies of the soul and obtain marvelous favors from Heaven.
In the last years of his life, when he could hardly leave his room at night and the light was very harmful to his eyes, several of his friends would go to the Saint's room every night to pray the Rosary with him in the dark. Witnesses say that as he prayed the Hail Marys of the Rosary, the Saint's face was filled with glowing lights and that these lights coming from his forehead were so bright that one could read a book with the illumination of them alone.
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