Chronicles of Notre Dame du Lac
Edward Sorin, CSC -- Translated by John M. Toohey, CSC, 1895

---

1857

pg 311            In one of those critical moments in which we see only a large 
             debt to be paid and ho human hope of being able to prevent a sale 
             under the hammer of the property on which the creditors had a 
             claim, divine Providence calls into existence one of those 
             circumstances which Providence alone can deal with, and puts in 
             the hands of the supervisors the funds necessary to emerge from 
             this first embarrassment; and although there still remains nine 
             tenths of the load, one feels in the depths of his heart a 
             conviction that supports him in spite of all human fears; that is 
             to say, that not only will Notre Dame weather this storm, but she 
             will come forth from it more religious, more devoted to her sacred 
             obligations, and more solidly grounded on the basis of holy 
             poverty, to continue fearlessly the edifice begun in the United 
             States.
                  The crash of colossal ruins that was daily heard in the 
             financial world around us, the shock we all felt during several 
             months, made each of us see how necessary it was to be deeply 
             grounded in economy and in the spirit of poverty.  Every one could