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Legion HANDBOOK D10944_1 26/02/2014 15:53 Page 72

72 THE EXTERNAL AIMS OF THE LEGION CHAPTER 12
to the Legion. Nothing else can supply for this; without it
their work will be like a body without a soul. Reason tells us,
and experience proves, that neglect in regard to this primary
duty will be attended by ineffective work, and will too soon
be followed by defection from the Legion’s ranks.
“To those who do not march with Mary, we apply the words of St.
Augustine: ‘Bene curris sed extra viam’: ‘you run well, but you are out
of the path.’ Where will you arrive in the end?” (Petitalot)

12

THE EXTERNAL AIMS OF THE
LEGION

1. THE ACTUAL WORK IN HANDS

The Legion aims not at the doing of any particular work, but
has as a primary object the making of its members holy. For
the attainment of this it relies, in the first place, upon its
members’ attendance at its various meetings, into which
prayer and devotion are so wound and woven as to give their
complexion to all the proceedings. But then the Legion seeks
to develop that holiness in a specific way, to give it the
character of apostleship, to heat it white hot so that it must
diffuse itself. This diffusion is not simply a utilisation of
developed force, but (by a sort of reaction) is a necessary part
of the development of that force. For the apostolic spirit is best
developed by the apostolate. Therefore, the Legion also
imposes on each member, as an essential obligation, the
weekly performance of some active work prescribed by the
praesidium. The work proceeds from the meeting as an act of
obedience to it, and, subject to the exceptions later indicated,
the praesidium can approve of any active work as satisfying
the member’s weekly obligation. In practice, however, the
Legion outlook would require the directing of the work-
obligation towards actual needs, and among the latter, towards
the gravest. For that intensity of zeal which the Legion strives