It is often dangerous to apply the conduct of the past as a norm to the present. Only too often a facile parallel between days gone by and the present has led to an absurdly literal equation between the two, as we may observe sometimes in the use made of precedent. At the same time fresh light may occasionally be thrown on a situation by indulging in such fancies without intending too rigid an application. It is a fanciful comparison of this sort which we set down here as a feeler, searching out a possible method of regaining the proletariat for Christ, and so of counteracting the powerful appeal which Communism makes to our age.

The facts of St. Dominic's life and vocation are generally known, and here we wish only to draw attention to certain aspects of it. When St. Dominic came to Languedoc, on his way to negotiate a marriage with a foreign princess on behalf of his Sovereign, he found the Church hard pressed by an enemy powerful because popular. One of the causes of the popularity of Albigensianism was the apparently severe interpretation of Christian life by the leaders of the movement, and the people, as always, were profoundly impressed at the sight of rigid austerity linked with a burning zeal. The Church had, of course, attempted to save her people from the ravages of the heresy, and had sent out her emissaries in the sombre yet rich state appropriate to their condition as bishops, abbots and priests. But if such attire and accoutrement was the due of these defenders of the faith, it turned out to be a hindrance to their fight for truth since it contrasted ill, in the minds of the populace, with the ostentatiously ascetic lives of the Albigensian leaders.