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I myself and the Work appeal not only to faith but we address ourselves to reason, to justice, to respect, to the love of freedom “this supreme good of man” as Leo XIII said (Encyclical “In Plurimis”, 5 May 1888, to the bishops of Brazil on the abolition of slavery in their country). “I am a man, and nothing of what is human is foreign to me.” Injustice towards other men revolts my heart, the oppression, the cruelty against such a great number of my fellow beings; what I would like done to restore to me freedom, honour, the sacred goods of family, I want them done to restore to the sons of this unfortunate Africa.

Slavery exists in all its forms in Africa: trafficking with its manhunt and public markets, indigenous and traditional slavery and, under the name of freedom, the “Free workers”, that is to say, subject to the yoke for a time instead of being so for ever…

Letter to the Prefect of the Congregation for the Propaganda (16th November 1880)
Your Eminence,
I have waited until the end of your holidays before acknowledging receipt from Your Eminence of the decree by which you have deigned to raise the two missions of Nyanza and Tanganika to the status of apostolic pro-vicariates and to create the new missions of northern Upper Congo and southern Upper Congo, to be entrusted to our Mission Society. I can but be deeply grateful for this new token of confidence on the part of the Holy See and I assure Your Eminence that my missionaries and I shall do all we can to justify it.

Letter promulgating the decisions of the first General Chapter (11th November 1874)
My very dear Sons in Our Lord, as you know, by Episcopal Order of the 1st of October last, I convoked your first General Chapter for the 11th of the same month. Today, I must report on the decisions of this Chapter and modifications that these decisions entail for the government of your Society.

Letter to Father Deguerry (14 November 1887)
My dear Father,
I waited before answering your letter of 23rd October, until the acrimony it caused had subsided enough to allow me to remain self-possessed. I can say to myself today only one thing: Bonum mihi quia humiliasti me. This is also what I say to myself when re-reading the sad letter in which you summarized, as if with pleasure, with the cold harshness that characterizes you, the insults and calumnies that I have received over the last twenty years. You would have saved yourself such a serious wrong if you had questioned me before accepting as truths hypothèses and reports which are unsupported.