Every truth should be proved. The French mind is pre-eminently logical; but it is also prompt and quick, and likes neither that which is long, nor that which is heavy; nor that which affirms without proving, nor yet that which proves too much. State your principles, therefore, in a clear and concise form, and then demonstrate them in prompt and vigorous language; making your audience feel from the outset that you are master of the situation; thereby precluding the possibility of resistance on the part of the ingenuous or even of the disingenuous, and that while listening to you they may be led to repeat the remark of the great Condé when he saw Bourdaloue ascending the pulpit:--"Attention! voilà l'ennemi." Such however, is far from being the case with ourselves. ... The faithful are fed with nothing but frigid, precise, dogmatic and even unintelligible discourses, which are supposed to convey solid instruction. But what if it be so, if the discourses are neither listened to nor understood? Dry bread is also solid, yet nobody likes it only, any more than you do yourself; and if you provide nothing but such food at your table, rest assured that you will find but few guests. We should animate or impassion reason itself. Demosthenes did this, and so did all great orators. The Rev. Père Ravignan, whose reasoning is always so forcible and logical, gives sensation and life to his arguments in a masterly manner. {234} In his sermon on the divinity of the Lord Jesus Christ, after demonstrating that we must admit the mystery of the Incarnation or else submit to many other mysteries, he subjoins:--"But the objection is raised that a mystery is inexplicable, insolvable. So be it; nevertheless not to admit it, is to throw every thing into the most frightful chaos. ... Then is Christianity false; the world believes what is false; has been converted, regenerated, civilized, by what is false; there is falsehood in the faith, in the love, and in all the other inspirations of the Christian religion; falsehood in all the blessings which have been conferred upon humanity in the name of God the Redeemer; falsehood in the heroism of innumerable martyrs; falsehood in all the master-minds who have adorned Christianity; falsehood in the whole chain of science, zeal, devotion, and superhuman virtues; falsehood in the entire series of the ages of the Church, in all its monuments, in all its testimonies; falsehood in the Catholic priesthood and in the sacred ministry of all centuries; falsehood in the happiness springing from faith and a pure conscience; falsehood in the pulpit; falsehood on my lips and in my heart. What! does your light and disdainful tongue find a lesser mystery in all these consequences which necessarily result from your principles? ME THEY TERRIFY." {235}