Chapter IV. Conclusion of the Whole of This Second Part by a Short Enumeration of Many Excellences Which Are in the Catholic Doctrine as Compared with the Opinion of the Heretics of our Age.*

Sailing thus then without needle, compass or rudder on the ocean of human opinions, you can expect nothing but a miserable shipwreck. Ah! I implore you, while this day lasts, while God presents you the opportunity, throw yourselves into the saving bark of a serious repentance, and take refuge on the happy vessel which is bound under full sail for the port of glory.

If there were nothing else, do you not recognise what advantages and excellences the Catholic doctrine has beyond your opinions? The Catholic doctrine makes more glorious and magnificent the goodness and mercy of God, your opinions lower them. For example, is there not more mercy in establishing the reality of his body for our food than in only giving the figure and commemoration thereof and the eating by faith alone? All seek the things that are their oiun, not the things that are Jesus Christ's (Phil. ii. 21). Is it not more honourable to concede to the might of Jesus

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• This cliapter seems to fulfil the design referred to in the following detached note of the Saint's: " A chapter is also to be composed on the greater glory of the Gospel in the faith of Catholics than in the faith of the heretics. Where reference is to be made to what was said at the end of the chapter de visibili [Pt. L c. 6.], viz., that in the visible Church the eye of mind and of body is fed, in the invisible neither." [Tr.]

Christ the power to make the Blessed Sacrament, as the Church believes it, and to his goodness the will to do so, than the contrary? Without doubt it is more glorious to Our Lord. Yet because our mind cannot comprehend it, in order to uphold our own mind, all seek the things that are their own, not the things that are Jesus Christ's. Is it not more, in justifying man, to embellish his soul with grace, than without embellishing it to justify him by a simple toleration (connivence) or non-imputation? Is it not a greater favour to make man and his works agreeable and good than simply to take man as good without his being so in reality? Is it not more to have left seven Sacraments for the justification and sanctification of the sinner than to have left only two, one of which serves for nothing and the other for little? Is it not more to have left the power of absolving in the Church than to have left it not? Is it not more to have left a Church visible, universal, of striking aspect, perpetual, than to have left it little, secret, scattered and liable to corruption? Is it not to value more the travails of Jesus Christ when we say that a single drop of his blood suffices to ransom the world, than to say that unless he had endured the pains of the damned he would have done nothing? Is not the mercy of God more magnified in giving to his saints the knowledge of what takes place here below, the honour of praying for us, in making himself ready to accept their intercession, in having glorified them as soon as they died, than in making them wait and keeping them in suspense, according to Calvin's words, until the judgment, in making them deaf to our prayers and remaining himself inexorable to theirs. This will be seen more clearly in our treatment of particular points. Our doctrine [then] makes more admirable the power of God in the Sacrament of the Eucharist, in justification and inherent justice, in miracles, in the infallible preservation of the Church, in the glory of the Saints.

The Catholic doctrine cannot have its source in any passion, because nobody follows it save on this condition, of captivating his intelligence, under the authority of the pastors. It is not proud, since it teaches not to believe self but the Church. What shall I say further? Distinguish the voice of the dove from that of the crow. Do you not see this Spouse, who has nought but honey and milk under her tongue, who breathes only the greater glory of her Beloved, his honour and obedience to him? Ah! then, gentlemen, be willing to be placed as living stones in the walls of the heavenly Jerusalem. Take yourselves out of the hands of these men who build without a rule, who do not adjust their conceptions to the faith, but the faith to their conceptions. Come and offer yourselves to the Church, who will place you, unless you prevent her, in the heavenly building, according to the true rule and proportion of faith. For never shall any one have a place there above who has not been worked and laid, according to rule and square, here below.

[The following detached notes of the Saint bear upon the matter of the foregoing chapter. Tr.]

All the ancient sacrifices of a farinaceous nature were as it were the condiment of the bloody sacrifices. So the Sacrifice of the Eucharist is as it were the condiment of the Sacrifice of the Cross, and with most excellent reason united to it.

The Church is a mountain, heresy a valley: for heretics go down, from the Church that errs not to an erring one, from truth to shadow.

Ismael, who signified the Jewish synagogue (Gal. iv), was cast out when he would play with Isaac, that is, the Catholic Church. How much more heretics, &c.

That of Isaias (liv. 17) agrees excellently with the Church as against heresy: No weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper; and every tongue that resisteth thee in judgment thou shalt condemn. This is the inheritance of the servants of the Lord^ and their justice with me, saith the Lord.