December 28, 2007

HUMILITY

1. Humility is born not only from the acknowledgement of one's imperfections both natural and willed, but also from the acknowledgement of divine excellence, so that the soul humbles itself to embrace any lowliness.

2. Humility is born from both prudence and justice. Therefore, a blind or unjust man cannot be humble.

3.
One isn’t humble if he knows and condemns himself as a sinner but does not abandon sin.

4. Since the first fruit of humility is spiritual science, the one who is not enlightened by this science is not humble.

5. The more a person humbles himself and has a low esteem of himself the closer he comes to God.

6. He who does not care to know things out of curiosity, as noble and desirable as they might be, but is happy to remain uninformed gets closer to humility.

7. Humility of beginners has poor sight, so that they see only coarse things. The humility of those advanced has clear sight. The humility of the perfect is like the Sun, and although they look through fog, they see clearly all things both ugly and beautiful.

8. In the midst of any insult, damage, or sin truly humble person places himself at the bottom.

9. The humble regrets not finding a place as humble as his lowliness, which is the lowest of any inferior thing.


10. The humble who is not deserted by others as much as he deservers to be is sorry for not finding a chastiser that is able and willing to chastise him. The truly humble one feels that he deserves abandonment.

11. A truly humble person is ashamed to ask God for help, but does not know how to despair. On the other hand, he does not dare to raise his eyes to heaven while he rejoices over his own confusion.

12.
A truly humble person is far from falling, because there is no place lower than his from where he could fall.

13. The humble possesses a plant which bears the fruit of every virtue. The roots are in the lowest place of the world while the branches and fruits are in Paradise.

14. The humble one is justified by God, nonetheless, he condemns himself justly. Though, well aware of God’s gifts he is confused by them. He is also aware of his own faults and he weeps for his own defects.

15. The truly humble person does not care about honors or shame, because, like the dead, he lives outside these extremes.

16.
The eyes of a truly humble person are like a source of continuous tears. The more he washes himself the uglier he perceives himself to be.

17. Humility always aspires for greater things and with full power achieves them. Just as it is peculiar of the humble person to despise himself, so it is peculiar for humility to exalt him.


18. The truly humble person does not know how to make excuses for himself or to give an accountability for himself. He joyfully supports everything and rejoices only in suffering.

19. Often the humble one is judged as crazy because he acts against what is common among people. He is also considered conceited because he talks of sublime things.

20.
Everyone praises humility in others, but only a few desire it in themselves because they do not know how great it is. Thus perfection of this virtue can only be understood by those who possess it.

21. Just as the absence of pain is a sign of good health, so the absence of complaints is a sign of humility. The one who complains and accuses others wants to exult himself.

22.
Because humility, which on the outside appears more than what it is inside, is a danger for himself and others, the humble does not know how to laugh, or cheat with his companions instead he knows how to cry in public.

23. The hypocrite who humbles himself with maliciousness has only the shadow of humility, hence he is worst than a proud person who is open.

24. Some lose heart by their own deception, others because basically they have a mean character. Therefore, they are not called humble by the humbled.


25. The truly humble person is the only one who can heal a proud person capable of being healed.

26. Only Christ is truly humble. All others drink from the stream of His humility.

27. Humility is taught by holy men, by the Angels, the Scriptures, but first of all by Christ. He says, learn from me how to be humble and meek of heart.

28. No one can excuse himself if he does not learn humility from an imperfection teacher, since Christ always preaches humility from his Cross, as if from a pulpit.

29. Our humility, in comparison with the one of Christ, does not deserve to be called humility.

30. Our humility is born from the awareness of our own misery. However, Christ’s was born from the knowledge of his nobility. He wanted to be humbled from where he could justly be glorified. Here we see the excellence of this virtue, which has been able to exalt the Most High and adorn the Most Beautiful.

31. Our humility willingly embraces justice as a punishment for one's defects. Christ's humility used violence toward justice and against nature itself.

32. Christ, the sinless one, in his innocence wanted to embrace all our sins and our punished. In no other way could they have been wiped out. We, full of sin, even if we endured every penalty, could never have satisfied the debt.

33. Christ's humility was preceded, accompanied and followed by his highness, but our humility can only be exalted after itself.

34. The greatest height of Christ is his humility, and our exaltation comes only from Him.

35. Our humility would be worthless if Christ's humility would not accept it, because our justices without God’s grace are like the linen of a woman in menstruation. Where would our height be if not based in the greatest cowardice and misery?

36. Christ's humility in its origin, in its way, and in its effects is contrary to ours. It cannot be understood by the wise of the world because earthly reason does not understand how the most high could be exalted with the lowest.

37. The one who does not know his illness cannot be humble. Without humility he can never be perfect and, since he is imperfect, he will always be bashful and in doubt.

38. If, through experience, you want to know your own cowardice, be aware of all the wretchedness of the soul and of the body. Then, you will know your nothingness.

39. Be aware that on your own you can do nothing, and that any good of yours comes from God. Therefore, why don't you voluntarily humble yourself in front of Him? Like it or not, it is convenient to humble yourself.

40. If you are tempted and your mind is forced to go through awful imaginings, remember that God allows this so that you learn humility.

41. If man had perfect knowledge of himself, he would be above any temptation. He has to come to know himself, through temptations.

42. Just as pride is the mother of blindness of the mind, so humility generates a holy hate of oneself.

43. If it was possible to find the humble sinner and the proud just, God would prefer the first to the second.

44. The just person who does not know his infirmity well has sown his goods in sterile ground and so will have a poor harvest.

45. The higher a person is in virtues, even more, through humility he must be inferior. Otherwise, he will plunge from the highest to the lowest of places.

46. Humility gives rise to discretion, discretion to vision and vision to foresight. The truly humble person has the foresight of his fall and resurrection and does not despair but, moment by moment, has more confidence.

47. Since he is poor and ill, the one who has fallen in any defect can rise again only through patience and humility.

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