LECTURE FIFTH. 



Decembek 29, 1867. 



AVAE. 



• My Lord ÂRcnBisnop, akd Gentlemen" : If I 

 glance backward at the way over whicli we have come, 

 I mark our starting-point on the line between domestic 

 society, the subject of our last year's lectures, and civil 

 society, Avhich we had proposed for our study this year. 

 After attempting to define the relations of the family 

 to the State, we have demonstrated the sacred character 

 of the twofold element which constitutes the nation — 

 Power, which is essentially divine, and the national 

 soul, which is essentially religious. Considering, then, 

 that nations, like families, arc many, we asked ourselves 

 whether there was not some bond by whicli they, in 

 their turn, w^ere united in a higher society ; and after 

 eliminating the political bond, as not adapted to this 

 work, we have paused with admiration before the fel- 

 lowship of nations constituted, at once, in the natural 

 order, by the law of nations — in the supernatural order 

 by the Catliolic Church. 



To-day the course of reasoning brings me into the 

 presence of a fact not less frequent than terrible, which 

 seems the negation of national fellowship. I mean 

 War. 



