Every apology for Christianity must henceforth make great account of the intrinsic proofs of religion, without which people of the world would be more and more drawn to see the church only on her human side.
The Holy Spirit, by means of the sacraments, consummates the union of the soul of the believer with God. It is this end which true religion should pursue. The placing in relief the internal life, and the constitution of the church, and the intelligible side of the mysteries of the church—in short, the intrinsic reasons of the truths of the divine revelation combined with the external motive of credibility—will complete the demonstration of Christianity. Such an exposition of Christianity, founded on the union of these two categories of proofs, will have the effect of producing a more enlightened and intense conviction of religion in the souls of the faithful, and of stimulating them to more energetic action; and it will have, as its last result, the opening of the door to their wandering brethren, and gathering them back into the bosom of the church. With the vigorous co-operation of the faithful, the ever-augmenting action of the Holy Spirit will raise the human personality to such an intensity of strength and greatness that there will result from it a new era for the church and for society—an admirable era, which it would be difficult to describe in human expressions, without having recourse to the prophetic language of the inspired Scriptures.
II. The Mission of Races.—In pursuing his study upon the action of the Holy Spirit in the world, the author says that a wider and more explicit exposition of the dogmatic and moral verities of the church, with a view to the characteristic gifts of every race, is the means to employ in order to realize the hopes he has conceived.
God is the author of the different races of men. For known reasons of his providence, he has impressed on them certain characteristic traits, and has assigned to them from the beginning the places which they should occupy in his church.
In a matter in which delicate susceptibilities have to be carefully handled, it is important not to exaggerate the special gifts of every race, and, on the other hand, not to depreciate them or exaggerate their vices.
It would, however, be a serious error, in speaking of the providential mission of the races, to suppose that they were destined to mark with their imprint religion, Christianity, or the church. It is, on the contrary, God who makes the gifts and qualities with which he has endowed them co-operate in the expression and development of the truths which he created for them.
Nevertheless, no one can deny the mission of the Latin and Celtic races throughout the greater part of the history of Christianity. The first fact which manifested their mission and established the influence they were to exercise was the establishment of the chair of S. Peter at Rome, the centre of the Latin race. To Rome appertained the idea of the administrative and governmental organization of the whole world. Rome was regarded as the geographical centre of the world.
The Greeks having abandoned the church for schism, and the Saxons having revolted against her by heresy in the XVIth century, the predominance which the Latin race, united later on to the Celtic race, assumed in her bosom, became more and more marked.
This absence of the Greeks and of a considerable part of the Saxons—nations whose prejudices and tendencies are in many respects similar—left the ground more free for the church to complete her action, whether by her ordinary or normal development, or by the way of councils, as that of Trent and that of the Vatican.
That which characterizes the Latin and Celtic races, according to our author, is their hierarchical, traditional, and emotional tendencies.