Progress in the Christian life keeps pace with the activity of these
virtues. This increase of virtue is, likewise, a gracious gift of God.
We are ever obliged to co-operate with grace. We must strive for the
increase of our faith, hope, and charity, by frequently practising
these virtues, by the worthy reception of the holy Sacraments, by
attentively contemplating the divine truths and, especially, by humble
and heartfelt prayer.

How feeble, indeed, is our faith, how wavering our hope, how
insufficient our love of God and our neighbor. They need the
strengthening grace of God.

To pray rightly, and to be worthy of being heard, we must awaken these
fundamental virtues. Therefore, at the beginning of the Rosary we say
devoutly one Our Father and three Hail Marys to ask God for an increase
of these virtues. Because faith, hope, and charity should be both the
basis and the fruit of the Rosary. Amen.




X. THE EXCELLENCE OF THE ROSARY IN REGARD TO ITS FORM


"She reacheth therefore from end to end mightily, and ordereth all
things sweetly."--Wisdom viii, 1.

The disposition of the heart is in prayer of more consequence than the
manner of expression. Yet an appropriate form of prayer is helpful in
avoiding distraction and in inducing devotion. Our Divine Saviour