Excerpt from The Principles of the Religious Life: Or an Explication of the Catechism of the Vows
It is not hard to show that all the principles of the religious life are connected with the profession of the vows that are made therein; because these vows already include its chief obligations; and any explanation of them, done as it should be, even though brief, inevitably touches all the others.
Now, in the little treatise which we published under the title, "The Catechism of the Vows," our purpose was only to state very briefly these principles and these obligations of the religious life. It was simply an elementary work which we designed for all persons who live in the religious state, and we hoped that its usefulness would be all the more general, for the reason that its very brevity would make it easy to learn and to remember. And, as it turned out, we have had the consolation to see the little book find its way, in the course of a few years, into a large number of religious communities.
But a Catechism usually makes necessary an explication. On the other hand, it cannot tell everything to the teachers of it, who, nevertheless, have need, in order to expound an abridgment with more confidence and profit, to know beyond what it contains. Accordingly, a number of persons, whose duty it is to explain to others "The Catechism of the Vows," have expressed to us their regret that questions of such importance were presented by it with such conciseness. At least they would be glad to find elsewhere the same subjects with developments apt to elucidate them.
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