At the outset of his grand Olympic mission, as he launched the modern Games, Baron Pierre de Coubertin harbored no illusions about the ways in which sport could be perverted or used to manipulate individuals or the masses.  In his essay, “The Character of Our Enterprise,” which appeared in the first Olympic Bulletin in 1894, he framed the argument above.  Essentially, he was helping his colleagues and supporters to understand that the Olympic Movement was founded on a set of values that embodied the highest aspirations of humanity, and they, as the guardians of the ideal, would be responsible for protecting the Games against the intrusion of base passions or corruption.