“Having laid down in broad terms the fundamental doctrine of the supernatural life, it is proper to say a word of the natural virtues and of their relation to the supernatural.  It has been already intimated that the goodness of nature is often indistinguishable from the holiness of the supernatural life; and, indeed, as a rule, impulses of the Holy Spirit first pour their floods into the channels of natural virtue, thus rendering them supernatural.  These are mainly the cardinal virtues:  Prudence, Justice, Fortitude, and Temperance.  Practised in a state of nature, these place us in our true relations with our nature and with God’s providence in all created nature around us; these are the virtues which choice souls among the heathen practised.  They are not enough.  When they have done their utmost they leave a void in the heart that still yearns for more.  It is the purpose of the Spirit of God to raise our virtue to a grade far above nature.  The practice of the virtues of faith hope, and love, which bring the soul into direct communication with God, and which, when practised under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, are supernatural, following upon the practice of the cardinal virtues under the same guidance, place the soul in its true and perfect relation with God—­a state which is more than natural.

“Let us, if we would see things clearly, keep in sight the difference between the natural and supernatural.  In the natural order a certain union with God was possessed by man in all ages in common with every creature.  The union of the creature with the divine creative power is something which man can neither escape from nor be robbed of.  But in the case of rational creatures this union is, even in a state of nature, made far closer and its enjoyment increased by a virtuous life—­one in which reason is superior to appetite; a life only to be led by one assisted, if not by the indwelling Holy Spirit peculiar to the grace of Christ, yet by the helps necessary to natural virtue and called medicinal graces.  The practice of the four cardinal virtues—­Prudence, Justice, Fortitude, and Temperance—­in the ordinary natural state gave to guileless men and women in every age a natural union with their Creator.  Although we maintain that such natural union with God is not enough for man, yet we insist that the part the natural virtues play in man’s sanctification be recognized.  In considering a holy life natural virtues are too often passed over, either because the men who practised them in heathen times were perhaps few in number, or because of the Calvinistic error that nature and man are totally corrupt.