Thus the Church shows to her children that the faith they hold rests on a most solid foundation.

Wherefore, totally unlike is the condition of those who, by the heavenly gift of faith, have embraced the Catholic truth, and of those who, led by human opinions, are following, a false religion." "OF FAITH AND REASON .-- Moreover, the Catholic Church has ever held and now holds that there exists a twofold order of knowledge, each of which is distinct from the other, both as to its principle and its object.

As to its principle, because in the one we know by natural reason, in the other by divine faith; as to the object, because, besides those things which our natural reason can attain, there are proposed to our belief mysteries hidden in God, which, unless by him revealed, cannot come to our knowledge.
"Reason, indeed, enlightened by faith, and seeking, with diligence and godly sobriety, may, by God's gift, come to some understanding, limited in degree, but most wholesome in its effects, of mysteries, both from the analogy of things which are naturally known and from the connection of the mysteries themselves with one another and with man's last end.
But never can reason be rendered capable of thoroughly understanding mysteries as it does those truths which form its proper object.

For God's mysteries, in their very nature, so far surpass the reach of created intellect, that, even when taught by revelation and received by faith, they remain covered by faith itself, as by a veil, and shrouded, as it were, in darkness as long as in this mortal life.
"But, although faith be above reason, there never can be a real disagreement between them, since the same God who reveals mysteries and infuses faith has given man's soul the light of reason, and God cannot deny himself, nor can one truth ever contradict another.

Wherefore the empty shadow of such contradiction arises chiefly from this, that either the doctrines of faith are not understood and set forth as the Church really holds them, or that the vain devices and opinions of men are mistaken for the dictates of reason.