CHAPTER I.

GENERAL NOTIONS.


No one who is given to serious reflection, can gaze over the face of
the earth at the present day without being struck by the religious
confusion that everywhere reigns. Who, indeed, can help being
staggered as well as saddened by the extraordinary differences, the
irreconcilable views, and the diversities of opinion, even upon
fundamental points, that are found dividing Christians in Protestant
lands! The number of sects has so multiplied, that an earnest enquirer
scarcely knows which way to turn, or where to look for the pure
unadulterated truth. A spiritual darkness hangs over the non-Catholic
world; and chaos seems to have come again.

Yet, amid this almost universal confusion, one bright and luminous
path may be easily descried. As a broad highroad runs straight through
some tangled forest, so this path runs through the ages, from the time
of Christ, even to the present day.

We can trace its course, from its earliest inception in apostolic
times, and then in its development age after age, down to our own day:
from Peter to Gregory, from Gregory to Leo, and from Leo to Pius X.,
now gloriously reigning. We refer to the mystical (and one might
almost say the miraculous) path trodden by the Popes, each Pontiff
carrying in turn, and then handing on to his successor, the glorious
torch of divine truth. Though clouds may gather and thunders may roll,