And it would for a certainty fall on the day when it should allow a single stone of its edifice to be touched.

Remember the terrible period through which it passed at the time of the Council of Trent.

The Reformation had just deeply shaken it, laxity of discipline and morals was everywhere increasing, there was a rising tide of novelties, ideas suggested by the spirit of evil, unhealthy projects born of the pride of man, running riot in full license.

And at the Council itself many members were disturbed, poisoned, ready to vote for the wildest changes, a fresh schism added to all the others.

Well, if Catholicism was saved at that critical period, under the threat of such great danger, it was because the majority, enlightened by God, maintained the old edifice intact, it was because with divinely inspired obstinacy it kept itself within the narrow limits of dogma, it was because it made no concession, none, whether in substance or in form! Nowadays the situation is certainly not worse than it was at the time of the Council of Trent.