Xlriii. PROLEGOMENA. 



forth about education separated from relii^ion as 

 is the case nowadays, and having all its fruits 

 before me in the multiplication of crime, that the 

 wisdom of antiquity is scandalously reviled and 

 insulted by an age of frivolity ; and that the 

 early ages of Christianity, to be learned from the 

 Saints' lives, are only called dark, by those who, 

 being hoodwinked themselves and led blindfold 

 by prejudice, cannot see their light. 



In reading of the martyrdoms suffered by 

 the early propagators of Catholicism, let the 

 candid reader ask himself, — did they suffer more 

 than our Lord ? In the voluntary privations, 

 poverty, and deep humility of St. Francis, — was 

 he more abject, despised, or poor than Jesus ? 



When we read of St. Teresa, and the un- 

 shodden Carmelites, — enquire, did not our Lord 

 do more than walk barefooted ? 



When we peruse the life of St. Francis 

 Xavier, the miracle of God's mercy in the wilds 

 of India, let us enquire, — was his life more 

 abandoned to conversion than our Saviour's ? 

 The life of St. Clare will astonish a modern fine 

 lady from its austerity, but did she suffer more 

 than the Blessed Virgin Mary, at the foot of the 

 cross, and is not every family to take its example 

 of life from the Holy Family ? 



It is by such questions and exercises as 

 these that we shall see whether the Saints were 



