have always had need of external aid for the accomplishment of their mission, this need is to-day making itself more vividly felt owing to the very serious conditions of the time in which we are living, and of the continual assaults to which the Church is exposed on the part of her enemies.
And here do not suppose, Venerable Brethren, that we wish to allude to events in France, painful as they are, since they are largely compensated for by very precious consolations—by the admirable union of that venerable episcopate, by the generous disinterestedness of the clergy and the pious firmness of Catholics ready to face every sacrifice for the defence of the Faith and the glory of their fatherland. Once more it is proved that persecutions but put in evidence and mark out for the admiration of all the virtues of the persecuted. At the most they are like the waves of the sea, which, dashing themselves against the rocks in the tempest, purify them, if it is necessary, of the mud which has defiled them. You know. Venerable Brethren, how for this reason the Church felt no fear when the edicts of the Caesars bade the first Christians either abandon the worship of Jesus Christ or die, being assured
