A few words more, and I have done. Under a well grounded and well understood system of religious freedom, not only can different religious sects live peacefully and harmoniously together, but can contribute, by their pacific co-existence, to their mutual religious prosperity. What has been for Catholicism in France one of the most glorious and pious periods? Surely, the seventeenth century. French Catholicism then flourished in the presence of Protestantism, which was still tolerated, and Jansenism, then in full vigour. What has prevented the Anglican church from falling into that apathy which has appeared more than once ready to overcome her? What but the neighbourhood of opposing and half free sects, who have always kept her in play, and forced her to overcome her langour? There is no establishment, no power, that is not benefited by a sense of control, and by the necessity of making an effort to maintain its position. {26} It is good to overcome, not to exterminate an enemy; and in spiritual as in temporal orders, the reign of liberty bestows on all their just rewards. While it preserves their rights to the weak, it incessantly regenerates the victorious. Doubtless, Catholicism leans on the principle of authority; but without detaching itself from this base, it can admit, and in the course of its career has often admitted, very different degrees of liberty. From the eleventh to the fourteenth century, while the Catholic church was for civil society a great school of authority, she was in her own bosom a great theatre of freedom. For in her councils, her congregations, her correspondence with the faithful, discussion between her chiefs was ever open and animated. It is not for me to ask whether our times advise or warrant a return to such methods of government; and I am rather disposed to hesitate than undertake the task. But one great fact strikes me; one which deserves, if I mistake not, the entire attention of the Catholic clergy: it is that the disposition of the mind and heart of the faithful who are under their charge is not always the same, and neither the same measure nor the same quality of religious nutriment is requisite at all times, if I may so speak, for Christian souls. After the fall of the Roman empire, when the mission of the Catholic clergy was to convert the barbarians, and to cause a little moral light to penetrate amongst the rude conquerors, and the miserable population who lived under their yoke, it was above all by the firm and striking exercise of religious authority that the priests were enabled to attain their end. {27} They found amongst the Christian population, high and low, many passions to repress, and but few intellectual wants to satisfy. There was greater need to strike and to govern the imagination than to nourish and direct mental activity. Time and individuals are now different. Minds are now active, varied, curious, eager. The spiritual life of faithful Christians, of the most faithful