he principle here enunciated to be the mere preamble in the
formal credentials of the Catholic Church, as an Act of Parliament
might begin with a "_Whereas_." It is because of the intensity of the
evil which has possession of mankind, that a suitable antagonist
has been provided against it; and the initial act of that
divinely-commissioned power is of course to deliver her challenge
and to defy the enemy. Such a preamble then gives a meaning to her
position in the world, and an interpretation to her whole course of
teaching and action.

In like manner she has ever put forth, with most energetic
distinctness, those other great elementary truths, which either are
an explanation of her mission or give a character to her work. She
does not teach that human nature is irreclaimable, else wherefore
should she be sent? not that it is to be shattered and reversed, but
to be extricated, purified, and restored; not that it is a mere mass
of evil, but that it has the promise of great things, and even now
has a virtue and a praise proper to itself. But in the next place
she knows and she preaches that such a restoration, as she aims at
effecting in it, must be brought about, not simply through any
outward provision of preaching and teaching, even though it be her
own, but from a certain inward spiritual power or grace imparted
directly from above, and which is in her keeping. She has it in
charge to rescue human nature from its misery, but not simply by
raising it upon its own level, but by lifting it up to a higher level
than its own. She recognises in it real moral excellence though
degraded, but she cannot set it free from earth except by exalting it
towards heaven. It was for this end that a renovating grace was put
into her hands, and therefore from the nature of the gift, as well as
from the reasonableness of the case, she goes on, as a further point,
to insist, that all true conversion must begin with the first springs
of thought, and to teach that each individual man must be in his own
person one whole and perfect temple of God, while he is also one of
the living stones which build up a visible religious community. And
thus the distinctions between nature and grace, and between outward
and inward religion, become two further articles in what I have
called the preamble of her divine commission.

Such truths as these she vigorously reiterates, and pertinaciously
inflicts upon mankind; as to such she observes no half-measures