Path of Humility

Fourth Week
Directions for the Humble Soul

Preparation for the Fourth Week

We are convinced and resolved we will be humble.

But this impulse needs direction. False ideas, our own mistakes, and ingrained habit, all tend to draw us from the true path. Laws misunderstood and half-digested knowledge may leave us with an incomplete humility, ineffective and even dangerous.

On the other hand, the glory of true humility will show up the imperfection of ours, and by its charm will win our heart. To acquire a taste for good is already to live in accordance with its standards. Desire is the springing shoot, the mounting sap, the effort that tends to growth.

Certain of the following meditations will be concerned with various applications of the sentiment of humility in regard to God, to our neighbor, and to ourselves. Others will teach the cultivation of this virtue by exterior practice, by inner sentiment, and by that great spiritual flight that is known as the love of contempt.

Lastly, the virtue of prudence must be allowed to teach these impulses its own wise and careful methods of procedure.

This fourth week is, then, especially to be given up to the study of practical humility.

Some False Forms of Humility

These reflections regarding weak, false, and illusive forms of humility seem less useful for meditation than for reading and self-examination.

They fix our attention chiefly upon ourselves, while the aim of meditation is rather to fix it upon God. Since, however, there may be some who may prefer to make meditations upon them, the various parts have been so arranged as to make this possible.

I.- Rational Humility

This kind of humility is to be found in almost every soul of ordinary virtue. A little observation will soon show this to be the case. Now, merely rational humility is not the humility of Jesus, nor of the Saints, nor of those souls who are advancing in virtue. Not resting upon faith, it has not the strength to sustain high virtue; it does not soften the heart, nor shed abroad the light of the Divine reflection.

O my God, clear from my mind its narrow prejudices, and reveal the truth to me. I ask it for the sake of the humility of Jesus, that surpasses human reason by the whole height of Calvary.

I. In what rational humility consists.- That we shall not foolishly esteem ourselves, nor despise estimable people; that we shall not undertake what is beyond our strength or capacity; that we shall not exalt ourselves above our deserts, and that we shall be neither arrogant nor vain. This suffices for a merely natural humility. The humility of the Saints is offensive to it, it calls it extraordinary; if it dared it would call it fanatical.

The teaching of the masters of the spiritual life does not find grace in its sight. Its private opinion of it is expressed in such varying phrases as: "We may take or leave it," or "It is absurd."

Rational humility is not always dogmatic, it is often merely practical.

In such a way we are not deceived by reason, it is nature that carries us away.

We are ready nonchalantly to admit every Christian theory on this virtue without dreaming of applying it to ourselves. It is besides, the most natural thing in the world that we should seek to be seen and to rule.

If a certain need of justifying ourselves arises in our mind, we satisfy it by the most plausible excuses: to take the first place is no more than what is due to our rank; to speak well of ourselves, merely simplicity; and to accept without affectation all that flatters our self-love, only a holy liberty. This is no better than pagan virtue. Nonne ethnici hoc faciunt? sadly exclaims the Divine Master.

Such a humility is false in its principles, for, taking no account of the dogmas of faith, it is a mutilation of Christian humility. It is inadequate in its moral import, for it does not attain to its end; it is not that humility that maintains peace and charity, it is not such as produces self-abnegation and disperses illusions.

II. Why merely rational humility is to be feared.- Such a seemingly reasonable humility easily deceives us; we are shocked by no excess; nor yet is there anything seriously amiss, none of those moral deformities that betray evil.

Not only our reason but our own nature approves it. Of ourselves we can advance as far as that, and our innate sense of justice and goodness is satisfied.

Human common sense, in accordance with reason and nature, confirms us in a state of mind that excludes doubtful practices. Does not everyone think thus? A victim of the common error, though I have been in good faith, I am none the less utterly lacking in true humility.

III. The inadequacy of this humility.- It stops short on the threshold of the supernatural, and through its short-sightedness sees only the human aspect of humility. Now, in order to judge an object truly, we must not content ourselves with seeing only a part of it, however clearly.

The mistake here is not in seeing indistinctly, but into not seeing the whole, and in drawing conclusions as if we had seen the whole.

The dogmas relative to original sin and to our need of grace wonderfully elevate the point of view; to the eye of faith the undreamed-of extent of our dependence is revealed, and in the light of this discovery the inadequacy of a merely rational humility is plainly seen.

Recall the meditations of the second week, and the extraordinary impression they doubtless made upon you.

We have said that all dogma, that is true, becomes a legitimate principle of reasoning, and the conclusions thus arrived at, however unexpected they may be, have the fullest right to enter the domain of virtue.

Nothing, then, is more strictly reasonable than supernatural humility; but reasonable though it may be. it is far from appearing so to us.

We are terribly like those vulgar people who will admit nothing that they cannot understand. Speak to them of disinterestedness, and they will answer you, with a smile on their lips, that au fond everyone has, as a motive, some kind of self-interest; that disinterestedness does not exist, and that if by any chance we come across it, it is only trickery.

And these people are very sure of themselves. They are like those rustics who, depending on their own good sense, refuse disdainfully to avail themselves of the most authentic scientific remedies.

In the matter of humility, do not let us trust too much to what it is convenient to call good sense, for it is only of the earth, earthy.

Earth, of the earth, has no capacity to judge the the things of heaven. It is that human sense that, in the Pagans, treated us folly the sublime self-annihilation of Calvary, and which, among Christians themselves, stirred up to those "enemies of the Cross of Christ," of which S.Paul "could only speak weeping." It is found again, alas! in the rationalistic spirit of today.

Who can be sure that he is not tainted with it? Our natural instincts are full of it, and our minds are perhaps not wholly free from it. How many souls, of reputed piety, having lost in a measure the Christian sense, have despoiled the humility of Jesus of its supernatural exigences! Evacuerunt crucem Christi!

Let us seek, then, to see more clearly and to feel more keenly. The day is long in dawning, it is hard to rid ourselves of habit, though it be only a habit of mind, for the mind, too, needs to become accustomed to an idea in order to believe what it has only admitted by force of reasoning.

Reflections.- If my humility is not the humility of Jesus, it is too weak to support the supernatural edifice of virtue, and it is powerless in the eyes of God to attract His graces. It possesses neither that profound sweetness that assures peace, nor that special charm that makes it pleasing in the eyes of men. It is no more than an incomplete virtue, dry and unfruitful.

Yet we say that we believe we are humble because we are neither vain, ambitious, arrogant, nor susceptible. Ah! let us return to the school of Bethlehem, of Nazareth, and of Calvary; let us lend a more attentive ear to the Divine Master; and let us take as our ideal not the modesty of the worldly-wise but the humility of the Saints.

II.-A Narrow and Pusillanimous Humility

Is not the practice of humility likely to become a source of preoccupation? Will it not make me hesitate to take my part, fearful of giving an order, easily disturbed when the necessity arises to act with firmness? Will it not put me under tiresome obligations? Shall I not be liable to be easily scandalized by others?

Humility ought certainly not to cramp our ideas, nor on any account to paralyze our actions and make us timid.

To refuse to practice a virtue or to do a good work that circumstances clearly call for, because it may be an occasion to us of vanity, is the excuse of a narrow and exclusive soul.

To tremble in the presence of difficulties is not humility, but weakness.

Our first regard ought to be for the will of God, our sole rule of action, and we should base our confidence on the grace that accompanies it. Are we to defend our shy virtue even against God? or rather, can that even be called a virtue that exhibits a selfish fear for its own security and is so narrowing in its influence upon the heart and so paralyzing to zeal.

Self-complacence is a vice, but to be sad even to discouragement about oneself is another; it arrests all progress. To see evil in everything we do is neither just nor wise; the good that is in me is not mine but God's.

To be irritated at our faults is to know neither God nor self. True humility stirs us to regret, to prayer, to effort. False humility produces cowardice that has not even energy to arouse us to regret, much less to prayer and combat.

It is especially in the exercise of authority that this narrow spirit makes itself felt in the most deplorable fashion. We dare not give orders, or orders are given timidly, and we do not realize that we are depriving subordinates of a strength that they have a right to expect. We allow them to criticize and find fault without thinking that it is God in the superior that is being held up to scorn; all this is very prejudicial to the good.

This sort of defect is the very opposite of the preceding. Rational humility limits the virtue too much; narrow and pusillanimous humility carries it beyond the limits of prudence. This is not such a common fault, and that is easily explained. Rationalistic humility is the action of reason left to itself, while narrow and pusillanimous humility betrays, in addition to a natural defect, an excessive preoccupation with the views of faith.

To discover this eccentricity, and to institute means of getting rid of it, it is good to analyze the causes that produce it: the one, narrowness, belongs to the disposition of the mind; the other, pusillanimity, depends on the character. Thanks to this distinction, each will know where to set to work at reform.

I.Narrow humility.- Like rationalism, narrowness of mind sees humility only in part, but it sees it in its exigencies. It supposes pride where it does not exist, in such and such a principle or act that it believes is infected by it.

We shall deceive ourselves if we think that this defect is only t be found in persons of small intelligence.

Narrowness, as the word indicates, is only a want of expansion. The view is not wide enough, it does not embrace the whole, and it is only this complete view that permits the value of each detail to be seen; on the contrary, some particular point is seized with great clearness and energy, and given undue proportions, and it is not realized as possible that some other virtue such as charity, for example, may on occasion forbid humility, not to exist, but to appear.

Now the portion of truth that is found even in this error satisfies and gains the assent of the judgment. Then let us extend our view of the truth as far as possible.

The remedy is difficult of application, for it consists of self-doubt, and doubt of that part of the self that we are wont to defend most jealously: our judgment. Yet we must not hesitate, this self-doubt must be aroused, and we may aid it with the reading of books, and by laying open our minds freely to our director.

We shall find that as our minds widen they will become more just.

Education is often the sole cause of the defect of narrowness, and the inculcation of larger views may be a sufficient corrective.

If, however, the long application of narrow principles has developed a kind of mental twist, the cure is more laborious, and will be still more so if the evil has attacked the nature of the mind itself.

How are we to have sufficient judgment to recognize our own false judgment?

II.Pusillanimous humility.- We have already seen that pusillanimity belongs not to the mind but to the character, and it consists in a disposition peculiarly accessible to fear.

Fear may arise from an exaggerated circumspection, or from a feeble will. These two defects alike produce hesitancy and instability, though in a different manner. The mind that is over-circumspect foresees numberless possibilities in every decision, and is uncertain how to act; the feeble character would and would not, all the time seeing clearly what it ought to do. Neither the one nor the other can act decidedly, and both are equally liable in the course of action to be deterred from proceeding by the slightest obstacle.

These defects are not peculiar to mediocre souls. Some people are firm in governing others, and yet when it is a matter f themselves they are tortured with fears; they see pride in everything they do and think.

Pusillanimity, then, does not exactly indicate a want of intelligence, but an intelligence of a particular stamp, and it is often allied with extreme subtlety of mind. A multitude of aspect blinds, and numberless possible solutions confuse.

3.The choice of the remedy depends on the cause that produces the evil. Are you excessively prudent, very particular, even meticulous? Force yourself to quick decisions in ordinary matters. Even in serious matters do not reflect too much, and always make definite decisions. Then, having once decided, do not call the matter into question again, and if you have blundered never give way to self-reproach. Even the most wary do not escape such mistakes of human foresight.

If you are of an irresolute nature, easily put off by difficulties or opposition, beware, for you must not call this defect humility, you are simply giving way to your own weakness.

Stir up your courage, then, and impose upon yourself the duty of safeguarding more carefully your rights and your dignity. Maintain your commands and your observations so long as you are clearly in the right.

A narrow and pusillanimous humility gives to the face, the words, the whole exterior, something constrained and even artificial that makes others feel ill at ease, or leads them to impose. Direction will greatly help and encourage those who find in themselves such defects.

At bottom, narrowness and pusillanimity proceed from preoccupation with self, forgetfulness of God. These faults are contrary to prudence, whose mission it is to control all the virtues. They also offend against the social order, and bring discredit upon humility.

O my God, I beseech Thee give me that simple and courageous humility that only looks to Thee, but in looking to The feels all the force of duty and all the fearlessness of zeal.


III. Humility that is False in Expression

No one should pass over this subject, for very few entirely escape this defect, and the commoner a defect is the less it is noticed. Without being conscious of it, I may have much to correct in this regard. Yet I do not wish to be either false or artificial in my words or in my experience. I desire that my humility, if it is not of a very high order, may at least be genuine. Thy light, O my God! Thy indulgence! Thy help!

I. The nature of this defect.- Man has a certain inveterate tendency to place virtue in exterior actions, while, in reality, these actions are only the manifestation and effects of virtue. He is thus led by the logic of this mistake to content himself with forms of words and vain appearances. The baleful effects of such an idea prove too late the falseness of it. The Jews, in the time of our Lord, had fallen into ths error. When they had said to their poor parents, "The gift whatsoever proceedeth from me, shall profit thee," they believed they had fulfilled the law not realizing that besides due respect this law exacts the love that assists and is not satisfied with a mere form of words. Again, the Pharisees believed they were humble because they prostrated themselves in the streets, while they were entirely convinced of their superiority, and held others in supreme contempt.

Certainly we are not so bad as that! The teaching of the Gospel has penetrated Christian society too deeply to allow us to fall into such abuses, but we must take care, for our nature is still human, and human nature never alters essentially, and is prone to indulge its propensities as far as want of reflection and the conventions will allow. Jesus asks us to be humble, towards our neighbor a gentler attitude and more deferent manners, let us go into the church with more humble looks. Look at us, how humble we are! No one, of course, will say this explicitly, but some of us are secretly influenced by such sentiments.

Probe your heart well. When you say that you are worthless do you really mean it? When you abase yourself, would you permit others to look down on you? Do you not rebel when someone expresses doubt of your capacity, when you are neglected by someone or contradicted?

"There are some people who say that they are nothing, that they are abject, miserable, and imperfect, and yet who cannot bear the least word of disapproval, but complain of it at once; and if you notice some imperfection in them, on no account must you mention it, for they would be offended."

"I do not call humility," once said S.Francis of Sales, "that ceremonious assemblage of words, of gestures, prostrations, reverences, and genuflections, when all is done, as it is often is, without any inner sense of real abjection, or of just esteem for others; for all that is only the vain amusement of feeble minds, and ought rather to be named the phantom of humility."

II. The origin of this defect.- Every society forms for itself a language, and each member borrows its expressions. Pious people necessarily adopt certain expressions of humility that in some are perfectly sincere, while in others they are only an echo. This is often harmless enough, since forms of words do not count for much; but at the same time it is prejudicial to humility, since it disparages it, and to piety since it discredits it.

What we say, that let us sincerely strive to feel, for there should be a perfect correspondence between our words and our sentiments.

How beautiful humility is when it is sincere! But if it is ever so little defective in this respect, it loses all its beauty and charm.

This is a great lesson for ordinary virtue. If our humility is not deep enough to inspire us with the lowly sentiments of the Saints-do not let us express such sentiments, let us content ourselves with something less, that has at least the beauty of truth. We are certain to be aware of some defects that we may honestly avow, some inferiorities of which we are convinced, and to experience some wrongs that we can learn to accept with a good grace. Let our humility

Path of Humility

Third Week
Jesus Humble

Preparation for the Third Week

We must make these meditations respectfully: Jesus is God; with docility: Jesus is Master; with confidence: Jesus is good.

He calls us in order to train us Himself. O sweet hope! He has His examples, His lessons, and His secrets!

By his example He walks before us to show us how to be humble.

By His words He explains His example.

In His secrets He reveals to us the humility of His Heart: Mitis sum et humilis corde; and He keeps this secret for those who are lowly and for those who desire to be so. Revelasti ea parvulis.

The heart is a fire, and its heat at times becomes its light; we must meditate effectively. But, better than the heart, grace is our light, and we must draw its radiance into ourselves.

O Holy Spirit, O Creator, create in me purified desires and thoughts, a new heaven and a new earth. Teach me Jesus. "Give to me of Jesus": De meo accipit et annuntiabit vobis. I wish to be humble like Jesus and by Him.

This week will advance us in the knowledge of humility, putting in a clearer light truths already meditated, and extending our view of them. It will excite us to the practice of this virtue by the force of the most authoritative example.

May it truly transform our heart, that it may also transform our life!

I

To the end that these meditations may exercise upon our resolutions the full extent of their influence, let us disengage ourselves from certain ideas which represent the actions and sentiments of Jesus as being too much outside our own condition to serve for an example to us.

Certainly the state to which the soul of Jesus is exalted by His personal union with the Word is so different from ours that is impossible for us to state precisely its nature and its laws. Expressions fail us; but if the far horizon is lost to view, the nearer prospect is in sight. Let us approach this.

The aspect of Jesus suffering and humiliated suggests two inquiries. Could He really suffer?- He Who even here on earth enjoyed the Beatific Vision! Could He, Who knew Himself to be so great, sincerely entertain lowly opinions of Himself? Externally, humiliation and suffering were evident; but did they affect Him interiorly? Were they not perhaps simply appearances designed to give us a great lesson of example?

At any rate, if these humiliations and sufferings were real, Jesus had His divine virtue to support Him. He was the Infinite, the all-powerful, the preeminently strong; and as for me, I am only a poor little creature, full of weakness! His humility accorded with His stature.... I can scarcely raise my eyes high enough to contemplate His greatness, how can my life hope to attain to it? Let me fall on my knees in admiration of such a prodigy, but do not ask me to reproduce it.

II

According to such a view, the humility of Jesus was only an appearance, an ornament, a lifeless model! and His example can have no power to arouse my emulation, for it belongs to conditions different from my own. But such a view is false, utterly false. The humility of Jesus, my Brother, is not merely an appearance, nor an example which is out of my reach, with which God deceives me. Could the God of justice force us to submit to humiliations which He had not Himself suffered? Could the God of wisdom impose on us a burden which His divine shoulders alone could bear?

Jesus felt the shame of humiliation with that natural repulsion which the sense of personal dignity inspires; and He accepted it, as we shall presently see, with a feeling of its justice.

These two conditions were indeed necessary: to feel, and to accept- to feel really in His man's heart, to accept freely with His will, as a submissive Son-if His humility was to be a virtue, and His acts were to possess any merit.

The Soul of Jesus resembled our soul as His Body resembled our body. Both were made of the same elements as are ours; His Body had blood, nerves, and organs like ours; His Soul like ours was endowed with intelligence, will and sensibility.

If our human blood ran in His veins, our human feelings palpitated in His heart.

III

Two great differences, nevertheless, may be seen in His manner of feeling and ours; but these two differences only add force to His example. Jesus, better endowed than we are, felt more keenly; Jesus, more virtuous than we are, accepted more filially.

We know that the richer the nature, the greater the capacity for suffering: elevation gives a clearer vision; greater refinement seizes the least shades; greater constancy makes forgetfulness impossible.

Thus our adorable Jesus has suffered all the more, and has all the more right to offer us His actions and His sentiments as true examples.

Doubtless, His example will always leave us far behind, and we shall be outdone not only by the greatness of His actions, but by the perfection of His self-sacrifice. Jesus foresaw suffering and loved it- Desiderio desideravi.

But, then, where was the merit if it cost Him nothing? if He did it all for love?

Since when has love that makes everything easy been regarded as decreasing merit?

Do we feel less gratitude for an affection whose warmth makes a happiness of stanching our wounds or of sacrificing to us its joys? Since when has virtue, that also makes every duty light, deprived actions of their merit? In that case an increase of Divine love and virtue would lessen the worth of our actions!

If the actions of Jesus were determined by His immense love, they were determined freely if sorrowfully, for in Jesus, we must remember, it was not the Divinity Who felt but our human nature, a nature more sensitive than ours and more accessible to suffering. Then do not let us say: "I am not God, I cannot do what the Almighty has done." We have before us not God alone, but the Son of man; and it is He Who offers Himself for our imitation.


First Meditation
Exercise XV
The Infancy and Hidden Life of Jesus
The Humility of Self-Effacement

Evening Preparation.- In this meditation we shall see the humility of Jesus appearing in the quiet light of His hidden life; in the touching mysteries of His birth, of His presentation, of His flight into Egypt; and in the long monotonous years that flowed slowly by in the voluntary eclipse of Nazareth.

Thirty years out of thirty-three. What a marked preference! Jesus has come to speak to men, and they are all about Him; though He is only a child, He has an eloquent tongue; His young heart burns with ardent zeal,... yet He is silent. Could He do anything better than save souls?- or rather, in order to save them, could He employ any better means than to show Himself and to act?

Yes, for it is humility that, by stripping a man of all selfish preoccupation which hinders the Divine action, by rendering him insensible to what is hard and disconcerting, and by keeping his heart tender and considerate towards others, paves the way to success.

But for the acquisition of humility, human nature needs time and many victories over self. Jesus knew that our eagerness needed this lesson.

True humility also tends to self-effacement. Obscurity is her chosen place, the place where she is at ease; she tends towards it with all the force of her nature, and will remain in it if she is not called forth by God. Ama nesciri- "Love to be unknown."

This sacred and silent retreat is like a sanctuary where God reveals Himself and gives Himself more intimately. How can God refuse His favors to a heart that is full of love?

Tomorrow we will read the sacred passages which tell of that period in the life of Jesus that was entirely filled with gentle humility, a period so calm and touching and beautiful.

O Mary, O Joseph, and the holy angels, you who were the only witnesses of this self-annihilation, lend me your eyes and your hearts that I may worthily contemplate Jesus in His humility.

Meditation

First Prelude.- To represent to ourselves the contrast between the vast and shining heavens where the Word reigns, and that poor corner of the cold earth to which the Savior descends. To cast our eyes towards the uncreated splendor on high, and then to contemplate on earth the humility of a comfortless stable.

Second Prelude.- To ask the grace to realize deeply the love of Jesus for all that is humbling, and to see in His unnecessary self-abasement a supreme lesson for myself.

I

Et verbum caro factum est. Let us compare the two terms: The Word, the glorious image of the Father; and the flesh, vivified dust, the lowly flesh of man. The one approaches the other until union is accomplished. This phrase factum est. seems to imprison, to hide the Word in the flesh, and, as it were, to annihilate it.

Exinanivit semetipsum! This first act was God's alone, those that followed belonged to the Man-God.

Edictum a Caesare. Behold Him, even before His birth, submissive to a master; He accepts his exactions; Caesar is to have another subject, and Jesus is to have neither dwelling nor a cradle. Thus He wills it, thus He has chosen.

Non erat eis locus in diversorio. This was quite natural: they were poor and they were turned away.

Reclinavit eum in praesepio. The trough where the animals fed became His cradle; a handful of straw supported and surrounded His tender little body. Gentle Child, asleep in the crib, You seem to repose in humility!

Pastores erant in regione illa. Some herdsmen, poor people, these were the first to whom He gave an audience. He prefers them because He is humble.

Et hoc vobis signum. The littleness of the Savior-God is to be His sign: invenietis infantem, a little child without word or look. In praesepio, like a feeble lamb in His nest of straw.

The shepherds adore Him and return home. Jesus remains unconscious. We are not told that the shepherds said anything, but if they did no one listened to them- they were such insignificant folk. Jesus only quits the stable to go into a poor house close by.

The angels have proclaimed the Messiah, but they have not drawn away the veils with which humility covers Him.

II

Postquam impleti sunt dies purgationis. Forty days pass. They go to Jerusalem, alone, for no one is interested in them.

In the Temple, however, they are welcomed by some prophets; Simeon, venerated by the people, declares Him to be the Light of nations, and Anna speaks of Him to those who are expecting the Redeemer of Israel.

It is a momentary glory, and then the veil of humility once more enwraps Him; and when the Magi come to seek Him in Jerusalem, who has received Him in their temple, does not even know Him.

The repose of the city is troubled all day by the caravan of these sons from the East. Sages declare that the Messiah should be born, and born at Bethlehem.

Bethlehem is only two leagues away, yet no one hastens thither, nor accompanies the Magi there. What extraordinary indifference!

Surge, fuge. In the middle of the night a voice rings out: "Joseph, arise, take the child and flee!"

Is this all that God will do for His Son? Think of the power of the Almighty, and admire in Jesus His resolute will to be accounted as nothing.

The return into Galilee is just as dependent, obscure, and humble.

III

Nazareth, with its long years of oblivion, is next shown to us, a little village hidden in verdure, with two or three streets in which strangers are seldom seen, the silence of the houses only interrupted at intervals by the monotonous sound of some implements on toil. And in this obscure spot, where the days and the hours pass so slowly away, Jesus, the hidden God, dwells, unknown by those who employ Him, by those who hear Him! Mary and Joseph alone are there to adore Him, but neither do they reveal Him. His life is simply the life of a child of poor parents, nothing more! To the soul that sets herself in meditation to reproduce the scene and the details of each day, infinite prospects unfold themselves.

She sees what passes, hears what is said, and contemplates the veritable humility that is displayed in all those unnoticed actions.

O Jesus, thy desire for annihilation is so evident and so persistent that it impresses my heart and my mind.

O Jesus, "the Way, the Truth, and Life," have pity on my pride that misleads and torments me!

Accustom me so to love Thee, that the neglect of creatures is no longer bitter to me. Teach me to efface myself, that I may attract Thee; defend me from the impulsive desire to act and to succeed.

For thirty years Thou dost prolong Thy lesson, in order to teach me to keep the spirit of it, not merely on occasion or from time to time, but every day of my life.

What hast Thou found so delightful in obscurity that Thou didst not desire to leave it? There Thou hast found the Infinite, for in the shade Its brightness shines forth, and in the silence Its voice is heard.

Resolution.- To wait until the hand of God draws me out of silence and obscurity.

Second Meditation
Exercise XVI
Public Life. Humility in Action

First Point: The humility of Jesus was simple.
Second Point: It was magnanimous.

Evening Preparation.- In order fully to profit by this meditation, we must realize that in the active life humility changes its role; it no longer tends to effacement, but acts as a safeguard.

When God calls it into action, it folds itself up in the heart without suffering decrease, and there brings its useful influence to bear upon the exercise of the other virtues, imparting to them that stamp of simplicity and personal disinterestedness that gives them their power.

To be humble in obscurity is comparatively easy, but to remain humble under the stress of public activity demands solid virtue and wise caution. To delight in praise and the sight of the good we do is such a subtle poison!

To exalt oneself to the level of a high position, and to change our attitude as we rise, is a common temptation to which many yield. Is it not proper that we should show ourselves, talk, do, and make a success of things? Is it not right to show an imposing appearance?

O Jesus, Thou wilt enlighten me by Thy example. If I love Thee, it will be easy to me to follow it and to be steadfast.

O Jesus, to put Thee in place of self and to keep Thee within me, to act only for Thee and by Thee, is the ideal of humility in the active life.

Meditation

First Prelude.- Composition of place. Contemplate Jesus leaving Nazareth without a noise, as He has lived there. The humility of his thirty obscure years does not satisfy Him, He wills to commence His ministry by more obvious humiliations. Let us watch Him setting off on the road to the Jordan, mixing with the crowd of publicans, and receiving the baptism of sinners. Let us then follow Him into the desert, where He submits to the companionship of wild beasts, and the contact of the devil, allowing him to tempt Him as if He were a soul liable to fall.

Second Prelude.- Let us ask the grace to be freed from all self-confidence and dangerous self-complacence in the esteem of others.

I. The humility of Jesus was simple.- His humility has all the brilliance of truth, and all the charm of simplicity. His approach is heralded by nothing surprising; His dress is poor, His gait modest, His head slightly bowed.

Whether He looks, or speaks, or acts, all is perfectly natural, Jesus does not pose.

His entourage.- There are people in working dress, little children and their mothers, despised publicans, and even people who have lost their reputations. He prefers these; He draws them to Himself and lifts them up again, and has for them treasures of indulgence.

How can this same Heart feel such indignant repulsion? Jesus hates pride, and He is pitiless to the proud Pharisees. He takes into account neither their probity, nor their alms, nor their respect for the law, nor their lengthy prayers. Virtue inspired by pride only fills Him with horror.

His life is a daily privation; He has "no stone whereon to lay His head"; poor people receive Him into their houses; poor women provide for His needs. For His preaching He asks neither temple nor pulpit; a hillock of grass, the angle of a street, the side of a boat, suffice Him.

His language is so simple in its grandeur that all can understand Him. It is so clear, and its truth shines so radiantly, that the words seem to disappear. He borrows the expressions, the customs, even the ideas of the people.

Nothing is farther from studied elegance than His discourses.

And His virtue, how simple it is! Habitually Jesus manifests nothing extraordinary. He leads an ordinary life, He eats and drinks like everyone else, He has His hours of weariness.

When He wishes to give Himself up to long meditation He withdraws to a mountain.

Doubtless, His perfect virtue betrayed itself at every turn, but it was so entirely natural that it created no astonishment, like a monument whose harmonious proportions disguise its great size.

II. The humility of Jesus was magnanimous.- As soon as the hour designed by His Father has struck, Jesus comes forth from obscurity, shows Himself, speaks, and surrounds Himself with disciples. He gains the crowd and makes the authorities tremble. He heals the sick, raises the dead, and stills the tempest. Yet he does these things quite naturally; He seeks no honor, nor does He flee from gibes; to both alike He appears indifferent.

We must admire this magnanimous humility that frees the soul from all pusillanimity and from all hesitation. Listen to the Divine Master revealing His secret. "My Father in Me, He doeth the work." An instrument must not resist, an instrument cannot be puffed up.

Humility, when it is true, makes the heart generous. Before a superior will, it permits neither refusal nor reserve; it inspires a desire for good that has God for its sole object, and a confidence that expects everything from Him.

Humility that has not this character is insincere or incomplete.

Jesus appears and speaks with authority- tanquam potestatem habens. He appears for what He is, He says what it is His mission to say. He has none of those timidities that arise from self-consciousness, nor those set phrases for humility that often contain a secret pride.

This example gives us some important lessons.

When we undertake a mission, let us forget ourselves and make ourselves forgotten. Let God alone appear, and souls be saved.

We are not to attract attention by too much repeating that we are incapable and unworthy. What does it matter about ourselves? Let us lend to God what we hold from Him, and let the feeling of our nullity go on growing with the success of our work.

At the end of his life, S.Francis of Assisi allowed the crowds to kneel before him and to kiss the sacred stigmata. A brother showed surprise at this. "Ah!" said the Saint, "I do not deceive myself. It is not I whom they come here to see. I receive this homage, but I give it all back to God.

Resolution.- In the good that I am called to do, to see only God, and to see Him unceasingly. The danger of self-seeking, even in the most fleeting sentiment of complacency.


Third Meditation
Exercise XVII
Humility of the Heart of Jesus

First Point: Mystery of this humility in Jesus.
Second Point: Humility produced by the feeling of His nothingness.
Third Point: Humility preserved by the Beatific Vision.

Evening Preparation.- The two preceding meditations have shown us the humility of Jesus in its exterior manifestations; we have seen its gentleness and courage. Tomorrow and the following days we shall contemplate the humility of the Sacred Heart, and we shall find it profound, even to mystery.

Let us put ourselves without flinching the question that was raised at the beginning of these meditations: How could Jesus, Infinite God and perfect man, have a lowly opinion of Himself? Exterior acts of humility might find some explanation to justify them; but the sentiment, persuasion, and certitude, that constitute true humility, appear inconsistent. O Jesus, make me to understand this tomorrow.

Under the influence of this astounding revelation of humility, shall I not, in my turn, be constrained to become humble? O Jesus, shall I hold my head high when I see Thee lower Thine? Canst Thou have more cause for humility than I? or am I so blind that I can see no reason for humility? or so dull that I cannot draw the right conclusions?

O Jesus, touch my heart when Thou hast convinced my mind. I would that my humility too should be that of the heart, a humility inclining me to self-abasement, and even a love for it.

O Jesus, Who dwellest in me by Thy sanctifying grace, and Who dost animate all my actions by Thine actual grace, fill me with Thine own delight in humility.

Make me to love and follow Thee, even into those depths of detachment where self is forgotten, but where Thou and Thy joys alone are to be found.

Meditation

First Prelude.- Composition of place. To represent to myself one of those dark mountains where, at night, Jesus loved to pray under the quiet light of the stars. To see Him, kneeling, His eyes turned to heaven, lost in the contemplation of Him Who is.

Let us with holy respect strive to penetrate the secret of the great temple of His Soul, which in Its humility is filled with adoration and love.

Second Prelude.- To ask the grace of detachment from self-esteem, in a profound sense of the preponderating part played by God in all my well-doing.

I. Mystery of the humility of Jesus.- Let us recall the words of our Master: "I am meek and humble of heart." This is the Heart upon which we are about to meditate; the Heart, from whence arises the desire of humility; the Heart that has tasted its bitter sweets.

Let us gaze into this sanctuary as into a temple of deep mystery; we must accustom our eyes to this holy darkness. Actions are seen, but motives are hidden, and motives are the virtue itself. We must beg for the light of the Holy Ghost, and ask Jesus Himself to teach us the secret of His humility.

O Jesus, Heart of love, Thou didst desire love. To touch my heart, to attract and delight it, Thou hast undertaken the greatest sacrifices!

To give Thy life was much, but Thou hast also sacrificed Thine honor. It is, then, the love of our love that makes Thee humble!

O Jesus, wise God, devoted Savior, Thou hast seen pride to be the greatest evil of humanity, and its most dangerous fault; to draw us into the way of humility Thou hast deigned to travel along it Thyself, that for very shame we should blush not to follow Thee. It is, then, O Jesus, the duty of example that makes Thee humble!

Slowly I peruse these noble motives; I meditate upon them with emotion.

Must I not indeed submit, and determine to make myself humble, that I may help Jesus to save me, prove my love for Him- as near as possible? Yet, my Jesus, in proportion that I realize Thy wisdom, Thy goodness, and Thy perfection, I am the more astonished at Thy humility. Thou hast said, "I am humble of heart," and Thou art truth; yet humility of heart involves a sense of lowliness, and Thou art so great!

II. Humility produced in Jesus by a sense of His nothingness.- We will commence by forming in our minds an enchanting picture of Him. He is the most beautiful of the children of men. His flesh is pure and holy,... His mind is free from illusion,... His heart is master of all its emotions,... His imagination is as beautiful as poetry,.. His look is ravishing, His words persuasive, His kindness compelling. No stain, no imperfection, disfigures Him. Virtues and gifts in their supreme manifestation adorn Him. He sees on high the angels prostrate before Him, and on earth an obedient creation. He foresees that future generations will kiss the marks of His footsteps, and that in His honor countless beautiful devotions will spring forth.

We will recall all the wondrous attributes that theology discovers in Him: His transformed Soul that exhausts our ideas of grace; His knowledge that extends to all created things, but above all His absolutely infinite dignity, Body and Soul subsisting in the unity of a single person, the person of the Word: drawn into its orbit and receiving the same homage of adoration- what transplendent glory!

And in the midst of all this, Jesus is humble! Is it the effect of a miraculous illusion? Not at all. Jesus, fully conscious of His greatness, realizes to a nicety the smallness of His human nature.

What does He see then? He sees that this Divine dignity which He enjoys is only a splendid garment, and that this garment is purely a gift clothing simple nothingness. This soul, thus vested, did not exist yesterday, and at any moment might return again to the void if it were not each moment sustained by the Almighty, for the created being, even of a Man-God is frail and carries within itself the seeds of dissolution.

We may suppose this adorable Soul saying, long before S.Catherine of Siena: "I am she who is not." Coming from such a quarter, these words almost appal us, and they conjure up before our eyes the imperceptible image of nothingness.

III. Humility preserved in Jesus by the Beatific Vision.- We know that we are nothing, and yet we are not humble. Why? Because we do not live in the unceasing realization of all that our nothingness means.

Pride begins in forgetfulness and breeds illusion; it is never true.

If a saint from heaven came again among us while still enjoying the Beatific Vision, he might by a miracle merit and suffer, but he could never be proud. The sight of God and at the same time of his own nothingness would make pride an impossibility.

Let us consider our Divine Savior on earth thus enjoying Beatific Vision, and imbibing from it His profound humility.

What a spectacle this is- the Word face-to-face with the nature He has associated Himself with! The soul of Jesus plunges her astonished and enchanted gaze into the depths of this Divine ocean, depths that are inaccessible even to her. At all points her gaze is arrested and she is conscious of an infinite Beyond. Throughout the centuries of eternity never will this soul, united to the Word, fully understand the Word.

Though the hosannahs of the crowd surround Him like a brilliant cloud, He does not raise His head. Though His face is spat upon, yet His heart does not rebel. His thought soars high above these things.

In default of the Beatific Vision, let us endeavor to call up this vision of faith: God infinite and for ever infinite; ourselves, before Him, always and in everything a kind of nothing.

Do we not find this vision in the great souls of the Saints? and do we not meet with it ourselves in certain simple, ignorant souls? How is it that we do not attain to it? for our light is greater than theirs. We know our nothingness; but they see it, feel it, realize it.

Let us make ourselves familiar with this view, that it may penetrate our whole moral being. Let us recall it when we place ourselves in the presence of God, and especially when we are at our prayers.

What a sweet manner of preparing ourselves for the Beatific Vision of eternity! Whether it be on earth, or in heaven, whoso sees God becomes humble.

Resolution.- To see God in all our successes, and to see Him so clearly that we forget ourselves.


Instructions on the Three Succeeding Meditations

The humility we considered yesterday is that which is proper for all created beings. It was the disposition of Adam in the terrestrial paradise, and it will be that of our blessed state in heaven; it is the sentiment of the Nothing in the presence of the Infinite.

The humility of abjection belongs to what is ugly and low, it does not befit a being coming from the hands of God. It is made, alas! entirely by the hands of men; it is the work of sin alone.

Let us carefully note this: that all evil, how small soever it may be, is a deformity, and descends lower than simple nothingness. This is clear to the reflective mind, but it is in a very different guise that it is presented to our ideas and tastes.

We certainly do not understand abject humility, nor have we any deep and real conviction of our vileness. Neither do we feel a disposition to put ourselves very low.

Alas! the most guilty souls are the most refractory to such sentiments, and on the other hand we see innocence doubting and despising itself, so true it is that pure eyes alone can see clearly. "The pure in heart shall see God," says the Gospel, and they will also see, by contrast, the hideousness of what is opposed to Him- evil.

To see the hideousness of evil in himself, and to judge himself according to this view, especially constitutes the humility of fallen man; but this view is so much opposed to common opinion that it passes away as soon as we leave our meditations. It is a dream of the night, of which we retain but a vague and indistinct remembrance. It is a form of words that we repeat without really believing it. Belief, dream, remembrance, all have vanished when temptation comes, and under the stress of real humiliation we find in ourselves only the sentiments of outraged human nature.

What is to be done, O my God, to overcome these persistent illusions? How can I raise myself above these natural sentiments? I seemed to feel the force of the preceding meditations, yet I not only lack the courage to be Christianly humble, but even the simple conviction of its necessity.

In this again Jesus offers Himself to be our Light. He makes Himself the Man of Humiliations, even more, perhaps, than the Man of Sorrows.

He shows Himself so degraded, so vilified, that we gaze in amazement. Before such a spectacle our softened hearts condole with Him, and our trembling hands seek to tear from His head the odious crown of shame. But He Himself exclaims: "Do not do that! These humiliations... I deserve them!"

Deign, O Master, to explain this mystery to me.


Fourth Meditation
Exercise XVIII
Jesus Christ's Humility of Abjection

First Point: Exterior Humiliation
Second Point: Interior Humiliations
Third Point: Spiritual Humiliations

Evening Preparation.- This meditation is to be a kind of picture of the humiliations of Jesus in His Passion. We will do our best to understand them, and so to enter into them that they will really impress us. As we peruse them we may feel sure that in spite of all our efforts we shall never do more than discern the outer confines of the abyss. The Passion comprehends depths of abasement such as the human mind cannot fathom; it sees what is obvious and is appalled by what it sees, but after a little meditation it begins to realize that it has seen nothing. How would it be if we had the soul of a S.Francis of Assisi, of a S. Catherine of Siena, of a S.Theresa, of a S.John of the Cross? We should find a Jesus humiliated in ways that we never even surmised. With them we should then be ready to trample underfoot all earthly pride, and to tear the last sensitive fiber of vain esteem.

O Jesus, I have not their sight, nor such a soul as theirs, to see and feel. The Holy Ghost alone can bestow them. Beseech Him, my Jesus, to dissipate my false ideas and to do His work in revealing Thee; I desire so deeply to know Thee! Thou needs must be so beautiful: so beautiful in Thy humiliations, for I realize that there is in Thee a moral beauty so exalted that I cannot grasp it, so enchanting that it casts over humiliation itself a luster that makes it to be desired!

This meditation does not exactly demand a return upon ourselves; its aim is rather to set before us, before our mind and heart, a striking picture of Jesus humiliated. May it create sincerity in our reflections, and express itself in the fervency of our love. May our soul be filled with Jesus, and we shall have then done more towards developing our personal humility that if we had anxiously surveyed our own defects; we shall then love humility with the love that we have for Jesus.

Meditation

First Prelude.- Composition of Place. Make a rapid survey of the scenes of the Passion: Gethsemane, that witnessed the Agony, the treason of Judas, and the flight of the Apostles; the houses of Anna and Caiaphas; Pilate's Pretorium; Herod's palace, where injustice and hatred flung themselves in fury upon Jesus; the hall of the flagellation; the way to Calvary; the death on the Cross between two thieves, full in the public eye. A raging torrent seems to bear away its victim into an ocean of humiliations.

Second Prelude.- To ask the grace of meek and sincere resignation in humiliations.

I.Exterior humiliations.- Let us present ourselves before Him Who was "the scorn of men and the outcast of the people." We see Him as a leper, cursed of God, degraded even to the dust.

Let us glance rapidly through all the various kinds of humiliations that would most distress and revolt us.

Jesus was humiliated:

1.In His dignity as a free man.- His enemies throw themselves brutally upon Him, bind Him, and drag Him to prison. We, so jealous of our independence if it is even threatened.

2.In the modest dignity of His Body.- Stripped of His garments, scourged, nailed naked to the Cross in the sight of the people! An honorable man would prefer a thousand deaths to this shame.

3. In His personal dignity.- Insulted, spat upon, struck! How do men act under such outrages?

4. In the dignity of His Mind.- He was looked upon as a fool; He was given a fool's dress; He was forced to pass slowly between two rows of gaping people. And we, how troubled we are if any of our qualities are called in question, or any of our opinions ridiculed!

5. In His prophetic dignity.- His eyes were bandaged, and He was struck on the back and head. "Prophesy! who struck Thee?"

6. In His royal dignity.- He is clothed again in an old fragment of purple, a reed is placed in His Hand, a Crown of Thorns on His Brow. The soldiers make mock genuflections before Him, laughing rudely while they strike Him with His sham scepter.

7. In His dignity as God.- His enemies tear from Him everything that is in their power. "He is an impostor," they cry, "for He made Himself the Son of God." On this account the sentence of death is passed upon Him by recognized authority. At Calvary, the Pharisees sneeringly cry, "If Thou be the Son of God, come down from the Cross." Ah! when we are wrongly condemned, when we are scoffed at, how we long for revenge! And if our anger is useless, how our impotent rage consumes us!

8. In His doctrine.- He has come to destroy the law! He deceives the people! he blasphemes! He is the enemy of God!

9. In His reputation.- He is condemned by all the tribunals, Jewish, Herodian, and Roman. He is delivered up to every possible physical torment. Like the greatest criminal, He is crucified publicly in full daylight, between two thieves, and at a time of the year when Jews and strangers crowd into Jerusalem from all parts.

10. In His disciples.- Betrayed by one, denied by their chief, and forsaken by all, Jesus sees even the small section of the community that had hitherto been His adherents lost to Him.

What is left to this humiliated One?

II.Interior humiliations.- Let us go farther. Upon the ruins of exterior honor pride can still stand erect and prolong resistance. Routed elsewhere, it will take refuge in its sense of personal worth, as in a citadel as yet unassailed. It is by this moral force that man is greatest. Under the brute strength that oppresses him, he remains unconquered.

Too often, alas! this greatness of soul is unstable because it is made up of of pride.

Jesus is set before us in the shame of His apparent weakness. Even before His Passion He appears to be vanquished. Feelings of fear take hold of Him- Coepit pavere,... and He breathes them forth as if He cannot suppress them- Tristis est anima mea usque ad mortem!...

He is so overcome that a sweat of blood bursts from His trembling limbs.... He seems so little like Himself that He repulses the long-desired chalice. He is so cast down that He seeks help from His Apostles and accepts it from an angel!

O beautiful and profound humility- in aspect so human, and in intention so compassionate!

III.Spiritual humiliations.- There is another kind of pride, more rare but not less pernicious, and this is a spiritual pride. Formidable in the midst of approbation, it is no less so in ignominy.

Despised, calumniated, persecuted, we still find, as did Jesus on Calvary, a few sympathetic friends. If our attitude is dignified, if our words bespeak lofty sentiments, and if we manifest a soul superior to misfortune, sympathy becomes admiration. And should God, by some sign of special protection, grant us the aureole of martyrs, admiration is transformed into enthusiasm!

Ah! what dangers beset the soul that is not very humble! What a pedestal for its pride!

Jesus chooses unmitigated humiliation. He wills it in all its spiritual nakedness. On the Cross no discourse, but a kind of stupor, broken by occasional words that are like sobs! No radiance of the soul; everything in Him is somber as the night that enfolds Calvary! His Father is pitiless; Jesus cries out that He has forsaken Him!

Already abandoned by men, He is now abandoned by God. Nothing, nothing on earth or in heaven, but humiliation!

His abasement is consummated and He dies in it. Oh! this Crucifix that rears itself everywhere before our eyes, with its bent head, its livid Face, its distressing lassitude, is the image of the humiliated Man. It is indeed the very image of humility, even more than that of sorrow. When sorrow ceases, that poor Body suspended to the gibbet remains in humiliation.

Oh! what an example for us, and what a help!

Resolution.- To kneel today three times before a crucifix, asking Jesus to make me understand this humility.


Fifth Meditation
Exercise XIX
The Need for Abject Humility

First Point: Reasons for it.
Second Point: Our example.
Third point: Our law.

Evening Preparation.- O Jesus, yesterday I surveyed with emotion all the infamies Thou hast suffered, all the distress Thou hast endured; I saw Thee forsaken by all, despoiled of everything, Thine incredible abasement only too evident. There is no doubt that Thou didst will to be the Man of Humiliations. I see it and I feel it. But why hast Thou willed it? This I have not yet grasped.

Was it only to make Thyself a great example? No, for then, though I see humiliation, I do not see the humility that can sincerely say: "This is justice!" Yet in coming into the world Thou didst utter these words; Thou didst repeat them in Thine abasement, for Thy lowered eyes speak them, Thy troubled brow, Thy trembling limbs; Thy whole attitude attests the guilty one!

O Jesus, everything in Thee is necessarily sincere, even to the expression of a look, and the simple movement of a muscle. A voice comes forth from all these lamentable things repeating: "It is justice. I deserve it."

O Jesus, wilt Thou not today make me understand it?-and understand so truly that I shall never again forget.

If humility is justice for Thee, what is it, then, for me?

This is not a matter of mere sentiment, but of strict reasoning. It is a starting-point upon which depends the whole course of life; abject humility, once recognized as necessary, means a revolution in the whole of my moral nature.

Meditation

First Prelude.- Let us set against the picture of accumulated humiliation of yesterday's meditation the moral hideousness of sin. This latter surpasses the former in horror. The cause contains the effect; sin results in these humiliations that are only its just penalty.

To see sin as synonymous with the ignominy of the spitting, the blows, the bleeding nakedness, the infamous death.

Second Prelude.- To ask the grace to accept humiliation on principle, as a matter of justice and for the love of Jesus.

I.The reason for it.- Let us compare carefully two texts of Scripture.

This is the first: Exinanivit semetipsum formam servi accipiens- "He took upon Himself the form of a servant." This is Jesus as we saw Him before His Passion. He made Himself nothing in making Himself man. Had this design been realized in the terrestrial Paradise, among the splendors of original nature, He would still have found Himself face to face with the All and the nothing, the Being Supreme in Himself and the created being; and even then His Incarnation would have been an annihilation, and His humility the sense of His nothingness.

But a second text completes the idea of this virtue by showing it such as was fitting to fallen man. Humiliavit semetipsum usque ad mortem , mortem autem crucis. Humiliavit- He is like a despised object thrown upon the ground. Usque ad mortem- like a guilty man dragged forth to die. Mortem autem crucis- an ignominious death, the death of capital punishment, the kind of death that exposes the executed criminal, with his distorted features, his nakedness and his torments, to the gaze of the crowd.

This is no longer the God Incarnate, it is God the Redeemer. It is not the humility of annihilation, it is the humility of abjection. It is no longer neglect, but spite. The origin of this growing virtue is no longer nothingness but evil.

II. The Example.- Let us contemplate Jesus covered with every infamy. He bears the sins of the whole world. Qui tollit peccata mundi. He is responsible for it, He is charged with it- Qui peccata nostra ipse tulit. Sin is His own thing, He is the personification of it- Eum pro nobis peccatum fecit. He is not only charged and clothed with it, He is penetrated and devoured by it; it is a leprosy that consumes Him. He is an object of horror to God, of disgust to His people- Ut percussum a Deo et humiliatum.

Listen to the exclamation of Jesus: Vemis sum et non homo. Sound the depth of humiliation in these words-"I am no longer a man, but a worm of the earth"- a worm that is trodden under foot and that hides itself in the depths of the earth. To be humiliated is to be humbled to the ground, but Jesus goes farther. What a picture!

Let us try to understand the secret thoughts of the Savior.

Every virtue shows itself in its love for its proper object, and consists in a practical inclination tending towards it. Here the object is abasement. The first degree is acceptance, then comes desire, the quest, and finally satisfaction.

It will be extremely profitable to recall to our memory either the words or the circumstances that display these sentiments in our Lord.

Let us in silence contemplate them reigning in His Heart.

III.The Law.- Is it really true that this humiliation of Jesus is to be the model for us? Is it really true that in order to be Christians our humility must incline us to judge ourselves worthy of contempt?

Or are we rather to look upon it as an admirable excess, an unparalleled stimulus calculated at least to constrain us to ordinary humility?

Doubtless such an example is stimulating, but it is something entirely different: it is a law, or rather the revelation of a law and its authentic promulgation.

It is not a question of being satisfied with words and of holding vague sentiments. Let us dig to the roots of this truth.

Under what title did Jesus submit Himself to such abject humiliation? In His capacity as the Man-God? No, but in His capacity as Redeemer, and in that capacity alone.

As our Redeemer, He is our Representative and our Surety. Now the attitude adopted by my representative is exactly what is proper to me, what is incumbent upon me, and is my clear duty.

The price paid by my surety is the extent of my debt. The abject humility of Jesus does not create an obligation, it only exhibits it.

The duty of such humility existed for us sinners, but we did not know it, and without Jesus we should never have known it. He comes, He takes our faults, He knows the humiliation they deserve; and He submits to this humiliation, He wills it, and even loves it.

And when He says to us: "I am humble of heart," it is as if He said: "Be humble, for it is the law, and I have submitted to it for thee. But it is before everything else, thy law; then submit to it also."

O Jesus, what a lesson! and I have never really understood it.

Yet everything pointed to it, well-known phrases, my own observations, the very nature of things; I must have known it, and yet this truth seems to be something quite new. It is because at last I understand it. Oh! I thank Thee for having revealed it to me. Thou hast seen my goodwill, my desires, and above all my needs, and in Thy mercy Thou hast said: "Let My own abject humility open the eyes of this poor soul at last!"

Resolution.- If humiliation is my law, why am I irritated by it? I will suffer with meekness everything that is painful to my pride.


Sixth Meditation
Exercise XX
Humility of Abjection- Its Mysterious Nature

First Point: It is a kind of mystery
Second Point: This mystery is explained by the mystery of sin.
Third point: Original sin sufficiently explains it.

Evening Preparation.- Tomorrow's meditation explains and completes the two preceding ones- or rather, it establishes their conclusions by irrefutable proofs. These proofs, we may remark, result primarily from our faith, and this explains the sort of anxiety that fastens upon our reason, for the reason is afraid of profundities, even of logic, where it cannot follow. In the darkness, even though it is conscious of truth, it is not reassured, for it would fain see it clearly, and in its own light.

Our first duty, then, is not to mistrust our reason, but its habits. Reason looks upon everything as strange with which it is not familiar; it treats all that is beyond it as imaginary, and disdainfully calls profound doctrine mysticism. What is to be done in this case? We appeal from bad reason to logical and just reason. Are the dogmas of faith true? Does abject humility result from these dogmas? These principles once demonstrated, their conclusion must be admitted, though such humility may remain a mystery, like other mysteries of the faith.

We believe and affirm, and still we are undecided, so obstinate is nature, so true it is that our will no more than our reason is able to suffice unto itself.

From this disposition proceeds a second duty, that of imploring grace, that Divine help, which will enable us to make the difficult passage from recognized proof to free and entire adhesion.

O my God, establish me at last in the truth, create in me an unshakable conviction! Such a conviction is rarer than we think, and yet even conviction is not virtue, and it is the virtue itself that Thou dost look for in me.

The virtue is a facility that offers to humiliation a gentle welcome! it is the holy habit that peacefully bears the burden, since Thy Will imposes it. In some souls it becomes a love that opens its arms to them, and that sometimes even invites them.

O my God, what need I have of Thy powerful grace! O Jesus, Thy past example does not suffice me; come into me, come Thyself and live it again in me!

Meditation

First Prelude.- To remember that Jesus regarded His Passion and death as lesser evils than the evil of original sin. With Him let us plunge our eyes into the mystery of this sin as into an abyss- an abyss so dark that though the eyes tire with gazing, they distinguish nothing; and so deep that the ear does not catch the sound of the fall of the stone thrown into it. Jesus possesses what is lacking to us: let us see with His eyes and judge according to His penetrating mind.

Second Prelude.- Ask the grace to abandon myself to Jesus, that I may follow Him with confidence and love along the way of humility.

I.There is something mysterious in humility of abjection.- It is mysterious to the rationalist, who thinks it absurd; it is so even to us, who, alas! regard it, at least practically, as a pious excess.

In order to better our ideas, it will be as well not to isolate the Divine Master from the more enlightened among His servants. It is always He, because His mind was in them, but in them He seems nearer to us and more like us.

Let us recall the epithets that the Saints heaped upon themselves: "An abyss of malice," "An abortion," "The scum of humanity," etc.

They considered themselves unworthy to speak, unworthy even to live. Such expressions were familiar to them, and are to be found in the mouths of them all. They are like echoes from Calvary, sounding across more than nineteen centuries; echoes of the same kind of humility, the only humility that is ever canonized.

Their humility was logical and passed from words into actions. Though despised and persecuted, they were meek; though betrayed and struck, they bore all with a joyous smile; when they were called wicked, they declared they were worse; when forsaken, they were contented. They looked upon themselves as useless, and the good they did they attributed to God, Who, they said, accomplished His work less with their aid than in spite of them.

This is what they say, this is what they feel, and- we must try to realize it-this is what they truly think.

Let us notice more especially those who have been transformed by humiliations; they aspire to contempt as the ambitious aspire to glory; and when God asks them what prize they will choose as the recompense of their travail they answer: "To suffer and be contemned for Thy sake!"

We are confounded before them, for they are men like ourselves, often less guilty and always more deserving.

II.This humility is explained by the mystery of sin.- Man would understand the humility of abjection if he were capable of sounding to its depths the abyss of sin. Jesus Christ explored its somber depths by the double light of His infused knowledge and of the Beatific Vision.

The holiness of the Infinite Being, His majesty, His goodness, His supreme beauty, all the splendor of the Divine attributes inundating His Soul with their brilliant light, showed Him the degree of love, respect, and praise that are due to God.

Then the scene suddenly changes. Sin attacks this Beauty and Splendor, aiming its blows at the Divine Honor as if it would destroy It. At this sight He Who bore the sins of the world is overwhelmed with horror and confusion. Let us contemplate Him in His Agony, weighed down with anguish. Listen to His strangely depressed words: Transeat a me- "Let this chalice pass from Me." See the sweat of blood that bears witness to the conflict.

Yet, without hesitation we may say that the holy Humanity of the Savior Itself did not know all the disorder, all the outrage contained in sin; only His Divine Nature had a full realization of it.

I am ashamed, O adorable Father, to find that I have measured sin by its exterior appearance, or by the knowledge of it that reason gives! Yet even to the mind of Jesus, sin was, in some sense, a mystery. Ah! I begin to see that I know nothing of humility, and that I shall never know everything!

The mystery is to be found in sin alone, and not in humility, which is the only logical outcome of it. It is, in fact, the state that is proper to the sinner, the just sentence that he ought to pronounce against himself. But how can he pronounce it if he is incapable of estimating the gravity of his fault? He has one resource, and that is to see with eyes more penetrating than his own, to judge, not according to the opinion of men, but by the standards of God. The Saints did this, and this is why the celestial folly of their self-abasement is the highest wisdom. "Learn of Me," once again the Savior says to us. Why should I seek anywhere else? Humility is a virtue almost wholly supernatural, high as heaven, deep as hell.

How weak and circumscribed reason appears in the presence of the revelation!

III.Original sin imposes such a humility.- To clear away the last traces of uncertainty, let us ask the grace to understand how the Saints, who had not committed any serious sin, could yet be abjectly humble. Also, they are not responsible, as Jesus was, for the sins of others.

This is true, but they were tainted with original sin, and their participation in the fall justifies, even in them, abject humility. We must once more frankly acknowledge it, this is still a mystery that is explained by another mystery.

But the reality of original sin is a defined dogma that throws the light of faith on the subject that we are considering.

Original sin effects the whole of humanity. It was chiefly on its account that Jesus was Incarnate, that He died, and that He made Himself so humble.

Now every man, even the most just, bears this shameful stain, the object of God's aversion. It is also true that he bears its humiliating effects, even unto death.

Do not our errors, our illusions, our rebellious thoughts, and the evil propensities that trouble the blood and the brain, work like leaven, towards all kinds of sin? We are in constant danger. There is not a single sin that man has committed that I may not become capable of committing.

And if such a misfortune has not happened to me, may it not be because the supreme temptation, with all its insidious preparations, has not yet presented itself? Countless examples of unexpected failure prompt this fear and this humility. Misericordia Domini quia non sumus consumpti-"Lord, it is by Thy mercy that I am not consumed.

Oh Jesus, I resist no longer, i believe in Thy humility and in that of the Saints. I blush to think of mine, with its reserves that I now yield up Thee. Do I need to understand when Thou dost teach? I do not even need to hear; I have only to contemplate Thee. In thy exterior humility I have a living picture that instructs me, and from afar I endeavor to surmise Thine astonishing interior humility.

But as humility is a practical virtue that mingles itself with every sentiment and action, I wish to practice it with generosity, and without measuring the obligation that binds me.

Perhaps I may thus arrive at a better understanding of the secret of the Saints.

Resolution.- Since the knowledge of sin and that of humility go together, I will make my confessions serve to this double end: a sincere contrition, and humiliating accusations. Have I not been rather careless in this matter?

Instructions on the Next Meditation

I

We are coming to a consideration of that delicate point in humility, the putting of ourselves below others. Several questions arise here. Does this virtue demand this of us? Is it of precept or of a counsel? Ought we to carry it to the point of really persuading ourselves that we are the least among men?

Let us begin by recalling several indisputable truths.

First truth.- At the Last Supper, our Lord placed Himself at the feet of every one of the Apostles, even at the feet of Judas; and later He declared that this abasement should be our law. S.Paul recalls this obligation in these words: "Treat others as your superiors." Nothing is clearer from a practical point of view. All the Saints without exception have followed this rule of conduct, and the Church has never canonized a lesser humility.

Thus we see what we considered as excesses are made legitimate and glorified.

Second truth.- Humility is the sense of our guilty resistance to grace, of our faults, and of our defects. Now this sentiment, when it is real, takes complete possession of the soul, veiling from the eyes the faults and defects of others, and making her sincerely seek the lowest place as that most suitable to her unworthiness. This tendency to self-depreciation has always been regarded as essential to the perfection of this virtue.

Third truth.- An indirect but very strong reason for this law of humility is found in its connection with the law of Christian charity, of which it is the surest safeguard. This throws a wonderful light on the subject, for it appears that charity can only grow in the space made for it by humility.

II

From these truths it results: (1) That abasement before others really does enter into the exigences of humility in this sense, that we should despise no one, and should prefer ourselves to no one, in an absolute sense. (2) That beyond this, self-abasement is of counsel only, and has no limits assigned to it except those dictated by prudence.

III

But is this counsel of abasement at the feet of all men to be a practical rule? Would it be in accordance with good judgment? In other words, in placing myself at the feet of all, must I really believe that it is my rightful place? Certainly, for the Divine Master, the implacable enemy of all hypocrisy, would not ask us to do anything that would be a contradiction of our inmost feelings.

How can we form such a conviction? and how can it be sincere? This is what we are going to study in tomorrow's meditation.

We may clear the ground by observing that, from now, we must base our estimate of self upon the manner of its close, for it is this that ranks us.

Now an impenetrable veil conceals the future- our own and that of the very man whom we despise.

This impossibility of preferring ourselves before anyone allows us sincerely to place ourselves beneath all. It is a matter of simple prudence, indeed, but we shall see that humility counsels it.

Coming to closer grips with the question, must we ask if perfect humility exacts that we should, in a numerical sense, consider ourselves the lowest among others? We frankly answer: No. To be the lowest, precisely the lowest, of the multitude of persons who fill the earth, is speculatively improbable, and if each must think himself so, all must be wrong but one! But this detracts nothing, as we shall soon see, from our previous conclusions.

Practical inclination remains, and it is in this that humility consists.


Seventh Meditation
Exercise XXI
The New Commandment: To Place Ourselves at the Feet of All

First Point: It is humility that Jesus means to teach us here.
Second Point: This humility is of supernatural order.
Third Point: Reasons that confirm it.

Evening Preparation.- The nature of this meditation, well understood, is such as profoundly to modify our ideas. Though apparently obscure, the reasons for a self-abasing humility are, au fond, extremely cogent. Its demands are the demands of a wise God Who knows human nature through and through. Were men dominated by it, an immense peace would possess them, and no duty would be found too hard.

I will begin by allowing to my mind complete freedom to examine the subject. What is conventional and superficial results in nothing solid either in conviction or virtue.

On the other hand, I must beware of prejudice that emanates either from nature, refractory to these ideas, or from human opinion, that is blind in such matters.

I must remember that supernatural truths, once ascertained, become, like intellectual truths, principles, whose consequences must be admitted.

But above all I will pray, I will invoke the heavenly light, and when I am fully convinced once more I will pray that the vital sap of a like humility, permeating all my sentiments, may give to my charity towards my neighbor the kindliness and charm that are its fruits.

O Mary so humble! O Jesus, utterly humble! Why should I fear to abase myself as low as you?

Sacred waters of humility that flow only into lowly valleys, transform into an oasis the arid sands of my barren pride!

Meditation

"And when supper was done(the devil now having put into the heart of Judas Iscariot, the son of Simon, to betray Him), Jesus riseth from supper and layeth aside His garments; and having taken a towel girded Himself. After that, He putteth water into a basin, and began to wash the feet of the disciples, and to wipe them with the towel wherewith He was girded. He cometh,therefore to Simon Peter. And Peter saith to Him: Lord, dost Thou wash my feet? Jesus saith to him: What I do thou knowest not now, but thou shalt know hereafter....

"Then after He had washed their feet, and taken His garments, being set down again, He said to them: Know you what I have done to you? You call Me Master and Lord; and you say well, for so I am. If, then, I, being your Lord and Master, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet. For I have given you an example, that as I have done to you, so you do also. Amen, Amen, I say to you: the servant is not greater than his Lord, neither is the Apostle greater than He that sent him.

"If you know these things, you shall be blessed if you do them."

First Prelude.- To represent to ourselves the large upper room furnished. Outside, the last rays of daylight rest upon the long draperies of the window. Inside, the torches are gleaming. In the midst stands the table, surrounded by rich divans and prepared for the Pasch. Outside, Jerusalem lies silent.

Second Prelude.- To ask for a holy self-abasement before everyone.

I. It is humility that Jesus means to teach us here.- Everything proves it, the action itself and also the words of the Master.

The meaning of the action.- In every age, men and especially Orientals, have used material representations to impress upon the mind their most important lessons. Now, what action can better express humility than that of washing the feet? The feet! Those lowly members that tread the earth and are soiled by it! But here it is not any kind of humility, but humility with regard to men.

Humility without parade: Jesus does not ask to be helped. Resolute humility: He does violence to S.Peter. Extreme humility: He kneels at the feet of the lowest of men, Judas. Let us study all these significant details.

The intention of the Master.- By this action Jesus intends to give a new form to the relations of Christians with one another, otherwise the solemnity of the lesson would exceed the importance of its object. He calls the attention of the Apostles to it: "You have seen what I have just done." He explains His motive: "I have done it to give you an example." He takes pain to point out that the obligation arising from this: "If I, your Lord and Master, etc." He dwells on the importance of this precept by calling "blessed those who will understand and will do it."

This is no incidental or equivocal lesson; it is a lesson prepared, explained, and attested: it is complete and indisputable.

We must not, however, for a moment imagine that the lesson was to be specifically applied to the actual washing of feet. This would be to convict the infallible guardian of sacred tradition, the Church, of unfaithfulness. The usage, often difficult of practice, has disappeared. It was but a symbol of which humility was the reality, and its immortal, flexible spirit adapting itself to changing customs has not ceased to animate Christian society.

II.This humility is of the supernatural order.- What is this humility, that even the chief of the Apostles "cannot understand now, but will understand later"? It is not mere ordinary humility, it is supernatural humility, that the Holy Ghost alone can impart.

Ordinary rational humility is humility before God, than which nothing is more natural. It is also modesty, the curb to our pretensions that human wisdom prescribes. But abasement before our fellows, even before the evil, in fact before everyone-this attitude of the greatest at the feet of the least, that was the attitude of Jesus-this God alone can teach and impose upon man.

But why should I put myself beneath everyone? and how can I sincerely do so, since everyone should do the same in his turn? Is not this an exaggeration, contrary to good sense, a pious fiction that cannot be put into actual practice?

No, it is not an exaggerated theory, it is the universal teaching of the masters of the spiritual life, commencing with S.Paul. "Let each esteem others," he says, "better than themselves."

It is not a mere fiction, it is an essentially Christian inclination. All the Saints have considered themselves the least among men; and if there is one thing that surprises us more than their superlative virtue, it is their profound conviction of their own worthlessness.

The secret of this lesson is to be found in a consideration of our own condition. We must bring to this matter an unbiassed mind, for we are frequently disconcerted by truths that run counter to current opinion.

III.Reason foe this humility.- In all of us there is both good and evil. The good comes from God, and we have no right to be proud of it as if it were our own. The evil, on the contrary, comes from ourselves, and we observe all the shame of it. Such is our position in the eyes of Divine justice.

Now, in the matter of good and evil, man finds himself in a very different position. according as it is a question of the good and evil that is in himself and the good and evil that he sees in his neighbor.

In his own case he is bound to judge, for he knows himself and his conscience, and he feels himself responsible. He sees the evil that is in him, and he can and ought to admit it.

But when it is a question of his neighbor, he is no longer judge, for he is not competent to be so. Guilt depends on the intention, and of this he is ignorant; ingratitude is in proportion to graces received, and of these he has no knowledge; and the whole sum of worth depends on the final result, and this he cannot estimate.

Of his own state he is certain, of his neighbor's he can only form conjectures. In his own case it is his duty to judge; in his neighbor's, mark the warning: Qui judicat fratrem detrahit legi- "He who judges his brother transgresses the law."

If I have no right to judge others, how can I prefer myself to anyone?

O Divine Master! penetrate my soul with this doctrine, that seems to me so strange; to judge others has hitherto seemed to me as just as to judge myself. Men do it everyday; they are in the wrong, and I as much as they.

O Jesus, have pity on my poor reason, that scarcely knows how to assent to such humility. Grant to me the strength of mind to embrace it, and the strength of will to act accordingly.

In others I must see only the good that comes from God. In myself I must see good as a Divine work, and evil as my own.

O wise partiality, that makes life peaceful and its relationships delightful!

O sublime point of view, that mingles in one the two eminent Christian virtues, charity and humility! Humility discovers God in our neighbor, and charity loves Him there.

This is a new precept, and it is not surprising. Since God became man all is changed, everything is made new, and if by His Almighty Will and by a mysterious bond this God incarnate perpetuates Himself in each man, is it astonishing He should command that a supernatural respect be paid to him?

Resolution.- If I have no right to judge anyone, how can I prefer myself to anyone? To show myself today more deferential to everyone.

Path of Humility

Second Week
Reasons for Being Humble


Preparation for the Second Week

The need of humility is sufficiently demonstrated to us when we see how persistently pride tempts us even when it is held in check. It is a life-long enemy.

The foundations of virtue are undermined by this vice, and become unstable; the principles of the spiritual life are threatened; our good deeds are deprived of their merit, and punishment and destruction follow.

We must, then, make ourselves humble. This need, well established though it is, does not, however, give us the clue to the raison d' etre of humility, though it assures us that such a raison d' etre exists.

All disorder, indeed, points to some evil, since God has put goodness, like health, in equilibrium.

Then humility should result from the very nature of things, and to be humble is merely to be true. It is this that will be shown in the following meditations.

1. The first four meditations set forth the condition of man considered as a created being, as a fallen being and as a being transformed by grace.

The result of these considerations should be a humility that all alike need, the most perfect as well as the most faulty- humility before God.

It would seem that such humility should be easy, since it is only in accordance with right feeling; it is, however, a very puissant humility, for it has made saints. Why has it made many saints? Is human weakness the reason? In great part, for we see the best and pursue the worst. But it is also due to a want of conviction.

Traditional truths do not arrest the attention, they are too familiar; and even when seriously examined, they do not strike us with any force, for abstract truth makes little impression on the generality of people.

The preceding meditations, on the contrary, should have impressed us, for they envisage our tendencies as moral facts- facts well nigh as tangible as material facts- and facts have the power to strike and convince us.

Though this cannot be said of the new truths which we are about to consider, we should take care not to fall into the mistake of regarding as uncertain what is less tangible, and looking upon revelations that surprise us as doubtful.

We are apt to resemble those ignorant people who shrug their shoulders when a scientific man shows them all that is contained, for instance, in a drop of water. They do not know that beneath the outward shows of things an unknown world lies hidden.

2. To these four abstract, and in some sort personal, meditations succeed a consideration of our faults. This entirely concerns ourselves and no one else. It is no longer metaphysical truth but our own work that is spread out before our eyes, the work of our whole life, including all our actions, all our thoughts, and all our guilty omissions, a vast field, some portions of which, belonging to the distant past, are shrouded in obscurity and shadowed by illusions, but which, under the light of a serious examination, will become clearly distinguishable.

This meditation must become the basis of our humility, our personal humility, a humility which abases us not only before God, but before men; a humility which extinguishes an exaggerated sense of self-esteem, and forbids us to seek an esteem from others which we know we do not deserve.

3. To esteem an object is to recognize its worth, and its worth can only be measured by some comparison. In this case it is the comparison with others. With whom shall I compare myself? With the low and miserable? No, for they do not merit esteem. Then I must compare myself with the great and good, and I see that God and the Saints are the only true measure of the greatness and goodness that deserve esteem. This meditation is designed to complete the effect of abstract reasoning by force of a sensible impression.

4. Because we find in certain motives for humility a reason to abase ourselves only before God, are we to conclude that such motives can have no influence on our intercourse with men, because they do not prompt us to a practical humility?

Not at all. Humility, though it has indeed two objects, God and our neighbor, is in essence one and the same, an inclination to self-abasement.

These meditations, developing in the first place our humility towards God, will enable us to overcome our disposition to overrate ourselves, and will lead us to a wise measure of humility towards our neighbor.

As all intellectual culture increases our power to assimilate knowledge, and all true affection disposes us the better to love God, so it is with the acquisition of humility, whatever may be its object.

Endeavour to absorb these truths, which, however, will cause you to lower your head and will make you feel that you dare not again rashly suppose yourself superior to anyone.



First Meditation

Exercise VIII
The Nothingness of the Creature


First Point: The nothingness of being: I am nothing.
Second Point: The nothingness of action: I can do nothing.

Evening Preparation.- If we derived our being from some matter that exists outside God, or if, being created by Him, we could appropriate as our own even the smallest fraction of our substance, we should have a value- and a value, though minute, that would be appreciable.

But this is not the case; for though we come from God, we do not pass out His fruitful bosom except by His creative act and almighty will. We are not beings, properly speaking, but something as unsubstantial and as fugitive as notes of music coming forth from a instrument under the fingers of a musician. God is neither enriched by the fact that He becomes a Creator, nor diminished by the fact that we exist.

This is a definite truth, demonstrated by reason, and admitted by the most rigorous philosophy.

And yet, in spite of all this, I am, I have, a kind of being; this being has an extension and a form; it acts, it displaces matter, and it transforms it; it wills or it does not will; it is free; it is conscious, by its intelligence, of the universe; and by its genius it can produce marvels. Is then, all this nothing? A being and its actions must be something.

Let us clearly understand at once that this something, in the sight of God, is so vain and so ephemeral that the Scriptures call it "a quasi nothing": tanquam nihilium ante te- in short, a being that does not count!

Thus are explained the words of S. Paul: Quis te discernit? Quid habes quod non accepisti? "What hast thou that thou hast not received?"

This profound point of view is disconcerting and startling enough to confuse us, but it is an inevitable conclusion that imposes itself upon the whole soul and determines the whole will; for humility is not only a conviction, it is an active virtue. It is not enough to philosophize on all these questions; the chief thing is to practice them.


Meditation

Prelude.- To ask the grace to conceive such a lively sense of my own nothingness that it may penetrate and direct me.

1. The nothingness of being: I am nothing.- Our Lord said to S. Catherine of Siena: " Does thou know, My daughter, Who I am and who thou art? Thou art happy if thou knowest it; I am He Who is; thou art she who are not."

God is Being in the fullest meaning of the word, it is the name He gives to Himself: Ego sum, qui sum. " I am nothingness in all its emptiness, and this is my name": Substantia mea tanquam nihilium- " My substance is a kind of nothing."

Before my creation I did not exist, even in the most elemental sense. A thousand years ago, a hundred years ago, I was a possibility- that a mere nothing might have prevented from coming into existence.

One day I appeared on the earth. Centuries had preceded me; centuries doubtless, will succeed me. For the present I fill a few short fleeting hours. Then silence will close about me, as deep water engulfs the stone that for a moment has rippled its surface.

This being of mine is as fragile and inconsistent as a vapor which disappears as soon as it arises: Vapor est modicum parens. It is only vivified dust: Memento, homo quia pulvis es.

In the light of pure truth, the visible substance of my body and the invisible substance of my soul are alike nothingness, sustained in being only by creative power. Take away for a moment this unseen but necessary action, and my being would faint and vanish away like smoke in the air, like a cloud in the sky, without leaving any trace: Ad nihilium redactus sum et nescivi.

" O unknown nothing! O unknown nothing!" cried Blessed Angela of Foligno- cry of profound truth, the summary of our poor greatness, but also the origin of sentiments the most powerful, the most elevated, and the most worthy of God.

If I am nothingness, O Lord, Thou art Being! If I am naught, Thou art All.

This double vision, by its contrasts, forms the rhythm of the songs of heaven. In this celestial light the condition of the blessed appears as similar to my own; but their humility is my shame as well as my lesson. Their glory makes their nothingness ever more and more resplendent in their eyes, while my many miseries succeed in obscuring mine from me....

II. The nothingness of action: I can do nothing.- Our acts are of the same nature as our being. Our being subsists, and we do not see the creative power that sustains it. We act, and we see no more clearly the power that makes action possible. It seems to us that our actions are our very own.

I move my hand or my head, I contrive a thing, I solve a problem, I think, I choose, I love, and all that is positive in these actions is produced far more by the action of God than by mine. It cannot be otherwise. The nature of things demands it; and God, Who can do all things, is unable to give me the power to accomplish a single positive action without Himself; otherwise He would make me a creator. This is a mystery as overwhelming as it is true, a deduction that invades even the sanctuary of my free will.

Even in the resolution I have made to become humble and which seems so exclusively mine, because I might have chosen not to make it, God has acted a thousand times more than myself; and my participation is only to be found in my correspondence with the influence that solicited me.

And if I search into the origin of my correspondence, why I have given it and the strength which has enabled me to give it, once more I find God.

At length, in order to explain how with all this I still remain free, I am forced to say to myself: I feel that I am free, and I know that God is powerful enough to respect my essential liberty while maintaining it ti the utmost degree.

If I do evil, the action of God, obeying the general laws of supreme wisdom, lends its concurrence to all that is positive in what I do, and accompanies me still even to the moment when, divorcing myself from order, I escape from its influence.

Evil is a falling away for which I am responsible; I divert the action of God and hinder its fruition; I force it into strange channels, and finally it is lost.

O Lord, I do not understand myself! Then how vain and absurd is my self-complacence! How foolish my confidence in my own will even when it is strongest! How unjust I am when I attribute to myself any good that I may do! How dare I believe in myself, or prefer myself to another?

The simple veil of the created masks all this nothingness, but the veil is light and a thousand accidents displace it; yet it is sufficient to deceive me. It is, besides, very transparent; but I am careless, and do not discern what it hides. I continue to attribute an absolute reality to human action, and thus bolster up my pride.

Lord, Thou Who seest all things, what dost Thou think of this blind one? Have pity upon him, open his eyes, and make Thine Infinity shine upon his littleness, for he is ashamed of his past pride.

In the midst of success as well as in reverses this sight will give serenity; is it not, then, worth all our trouble? It is the highest wisdom that sets all things in their proper light and true proportion. The shadow of our nothingness throws into relief the greatness of the Being Who is All.

Resolution.- To contemplate frequently the Infinite that envelops me, to lose myself in It, and to leave there all my pride. To resolve to spend a few moments, morning and evening, on my knees, pondering these beautiful words: " My God and my all."


Second Meditation
Exercise IX
The Necessity of Actual Grace

First Point: Its necessity in general.
Second point: The necessity of disposing grace.
Third point: The necessity of concomitant grace.

Evening Preparation.- The preceding meditation casts a light upon the meditation of tomorrow.

If, in the order of nature, I am nothing, what am I, then in the order of grace? Grace is not a right, and when it is given it does not become a part of my substance; it remains a divine vesture which at any moment may be sripped from me.

Again, if the natural life needs for its least action the cooperation of God, how much greater is our dependence upon Him for the supernatural life whose actions partake of the divine!

Many Catholics, without suspecting it, hold almost heretical views on the subject of the operating of actual grace. Their error arises from ignorance, and their good faith excuses them, but it is their duty to inform themselves. Grace is not, as they believe, a complement of strength; it is the first principle of all supernatural action, even of those actions which long use or a personal predilection make extremely easy to us; this is a dogma of faith.

Seeing our nothingness and our position from this new point of view, we shall not fail to realize that here at least our dependence adds to our greatness; our supernatural life is essentially a dependent life because it is a participation in the divine life, and God alone is the author and sustainer of it. This condition is ours not only in the present, but will be ours throughout eternity, for God will still be the principle of all our actions. O happy dependence! God Himself will adore, love and sing through us in an indestructible union in approaching unity!


Meditation

Prelude.- To ask the grace of a still deeper, though less depressing, sense of my own nothingness.

I. The necessity of actual grace in general.- In the supernatural order man is absolutely helpless. Actual grace is as indispensable to him for the least as well as for the greatest actions. "No man can say 'Jesus' except by the Holy Ghost."

We have often heard this truth expressed, and we have accepted it; the Church has made it an article of faith, and we firmly believe it, but do we realize all it means?

To help us do so, let us take some prominent example, and observe the supernatural life led by a perfect Catholic, a religious or a priest.

He has kept his baptismal innocence, he has served God with unswerving fidelity; he is full of merit, of virtues and of fervor. His merits have procured for him a marvelous increase of sanctifying grace. His nature is perfectly controlled. His fervor brings his love into the fullest activity. Should occasion offer, he is capable of showing great heroism.

Yet even such a man would be unable to pronounce the name of Jesus with faith unless immediate grace came to his aid.

" The most perfectly formed eye," said S. Augustine, "can see nothing without the aid of light."

The most holy man can do no good thing without the divine help of the eternal light of grace.

II. Necessity of predisposing grace.- Let us draw a comparison from the physical order that will help us.

We will suppose a harp absolutely in tune, we may say that it contains an infinite number of latent melodies, yet to produce them there is constant need of the hand of the harpist.

It is inert and silent, but draw the hand across the strings and they vibrate. Look for the origin of a supernatural action, and you will find predisposing grace. It is this grace that has prompted the thought, the desire, this reawakening of activity, and it is this which has aroused the will.

And in this will, by which the action has been decided upon, let us seek again; we shall find it mysteriously informed with actual grace, without robbing human liberty of its prerogatives.

I will, and it is more God than I Who wills through me.

Harp of so great a Master, docile instrument of His beauteous inspirations, left to thyself thou art not more capable than any other harp of giving forth even the most elementary harmony!

Thou art inert; thou wilt remain mute, though thou art the most perfect soul of a saint.

3. The harp- string struck by the artist vibrates. The soul of the just man, set in motion by grace, commences a supernatural action. Neither the sound nor the action can surpass in strength the impulse that has been received. According to the motion will be the effect. The soul, associating itself with the action, neither adds nor subtracts anything, any more than the harp does.

Where is our part? We cooperate, we lend ourselves, we make the impulse received our own: a mere nothing of which God makes something.

III. The need for concomitant grace.- Let us consider one aspect of our incapacity in which it appears more complete than that of the harp. Set in motion, the instrument continues to vibrate for some time. The soul, on the other hand, at once ceases to operate unless the action of grace continues as concomitant grace.

I have commenced a loving deed, for instance; my lips are already forming expressions of affection; but if the action of grace ceases, I may continue the words, but they will be cold and empty.

Then truly I can attribute to myself nothing of my own! Nothing, not even a wish or a simple desire. No, it is contrary to the faith. What! not even the power of meriting this desire, and of obtaining it by the natural efforts of my mind and of my will? No, this claim would be contrary to faith.

But at least leave me some part, however small! Did not S. Paul say, " Yet not I, but the grace of God in me." Then I have my share in this supernatural action. Yes, but so small a share that it cannot beget pride, otherwise the Apostle would not have said: Quis te discernit?-"What distinguishes thee from others?" Yes, it is from God that I have received even what I do of my own free will, and even that by which I have freely done it. Deus est qui operatur in nobis et velle et perficere.

If it is true that I am created being, it is strictly true that my nothingness extends to my activity as well as to depths of my nature.

Reflections and affections.- Astonishment at our sentiments of pride. A clear view of their error and injustice. The grandeur of humility foreshadowed.

Its place.- It is to be found at the basis of every right action and of every virtue. The need of it is not a merely moral need of the utmost importance.

Humility partakes of the same nature as grace, and is just as indispensable.

The whole of this doctrine may be summed up in these significant words: God has the right to exact humility from us, for He has the right to maintain order in His creation. He cannot properly allow us an atom of pride. Let us represent to ourselves this just and Sovereign Lord, His hands full of graces, watching to see where He shall bestow them. He is perfectly free to choose, and He may turn away from me. Let us try to understand the text: Deus superbis resistit!... Humilibus autem dat gratiam-"He resisteth the proud, but giveth grace to the humble."

Before Him let us make ourselves very small, and remain very submissive and dependent. We should love to prostrate ourselves in adoration before Him- it is the attitude that becomes us.

And if, before men, such an attitude is inconvenient, let us keep the sentiment of it in our hearts, a deep sense of our own littleness that will at least serve to make us modest in our deportment.

Resolution.- To contemplate in myself the unceasing action of God. To do nothing without Him- a source of joy as well as of humility. To make myself familiar today with this thought.

Third Meditation
Exercise X
The Necessity of Special Graces

First Point: Their necessity in order to persevere in well-doing.
Second Point: Applications
Third Pint: Humility as the saving virtue.

Evening Preparation.- Tomorrow we are to approach a subject not only based upon sound reason, but of the greatest importance to humility. We shall see that without special graces, to which we have no real claim, we could not resist certain temptations; and that, should we succumb to them, without such graces we could never rise again. Furthermore, simple perseverance in the spiritual life depends absolutely upon their aid.

And it is not only myself, poor, imperfect creature that I am, but the greatest saint among men also lives under this hard condition; like me he, too, must confess his own utter helplessness.

Ah! if only I could realize this as S.Philip Neri did when, each morning, he tremblingly breathed forth this prayer: "O my God! do not trust me. Lay Thy Hand upon my head, for without Thee there is not a fault that I may not be guilty of this day." Now this fear, even in him, was perfectly justified; one act of pride, for instance, depriving him of certain graces, might have led to this fall.

A feeling of fear; a lively sense of my need of God; a desire to sound to its depths this difficult and important truth. These are what are necessary to me.

Meditation

Prelude.- To ask the grace to feel that profound sense of fear that casts us down at the feet of God broken and submissive.

1. The need of special graces for perseverance in well-doing.- Man is assured of receiving all the graces he needs, but he is not certain of corresponding with them. For this he must have special succor, which none of us can claim as strictly our due. This succor consists in the intensity of grace itself.

Listen to the Council of Trent: "Man in a state of grace cannot persevere in this state except by the special help of God."

Let us weigh each word.

1. It concerns man in the state of grace- that is, man possessing the supernatural life, man having the right to ordinary graces.

It seems that such a man should have all that is necessary to the attainment of his end. Yet, considering his frailty, it is not enough.

2. It concerns every man, though he be a saint. But surely a saint has an indubitable right to these graces! Not at all.

3. It is a question not of perfecting or of improving ourselves in this state, but of persevering in it. But can I not maintain myself where I am, and keep what I have, if I desire with all my heart? No, for without special help even this desire would be lacking.

4. It is a question of real incapability. The holy Council does not say difficulty, or great difficulty; it says impossibility- non posse.

II.Applications.- Let us meditate upon these conclusions:

1. In order to persevere for any considerable time, a special grace is necessary.

2. In order to persevere in face of great danger, an equal grace is required.

3. The brevity of life is often a special gift.

4. The choice of a favorable moment for our death is always so.

O God, I have perhaps before me some years of existence. I shall be lost if I do not obtain special grace from Thee.

O God, some great danger may assail me suddenly when I am unprepared. If Thy special grace does not support me, I shall succumb to it. O God! I may be unfaithful in my later years, in my old age, on the last day of my life; I may sin gravely, and without Thy special grace may be surprised by death.

If, falling into mortal sin, I were to lose my soul's life, in myself I have nothing that would enable me to recover it; I could do nothing to deserve that God would give it back to me; I should not even know how to dispose myself properly to receive it, nor how to pray earnestly enough to obtain it, without a special grace!

Let us try to feel clearly what it is to be thus at the mercy of God, to keep ourselves prostrate before Him in an attitude of total dependence, and to dread as a signal impertinence the attitude of pride.

III.Humility as the saving virtue.- Fearful and depressed, I cast anxious looks around me. My condition appears unendurable. Sin is the cause of it. ... I cannot depend on myself... I can expect nothing from Divine justice. Am i faced with an insoluble problem? No, for the Divine Mercy solves it, stooping to my unworthiness with the tenderness of a mother, and reassuring my fears with unhoped-for promises of pardon, help, grace, and even love. And the engagements made by this Divine Mercy are sacred, and constitute an order of mercy as formal as the order of justice.

We must clearly remember this: that if the regime of justice has its laws, that of mercy has also its laws, which are consequent upon its very nature.

Under the rule of justice, right is the condition; under the rule of mercy, humility is the condition. If I will make myself humble, if I will recollect at all times my own helplessness, if I will keep myself from despising others, and if I continue to pray, I shall fulfill the law, and God, holding to His engagements, will do His part; in spite of my misery, He will love me, He will protect me, He will give me His grace. What I could not claim from His justice I shall infallibly receive from His mercy.

Mercy and humility are correlative terms. Misery abases us as well as humility; but misery is the result of our condition, humility results from our will.

Mercy loves the misery that humbles itself, and rescues it.

I understand now why the Saints attribute the gifts of perseverance to humility.

If I am humble, I remain under the law of universal submission. I dare not make any distinction in God's wishes, and choose to comply only with those which bind under pain of sin. Nor should I murmur in face of difficult duties or sad circumstances, for if I do not strictly owe God certain degrees of submission, neither is He bound to give me certain graces.

The role of prayer is very clearly brought out in this connection. By it I may obtain what I neither have nor deserve. The more I feel the weight of these tremendous truths, the more I shall feel the need of prayer. How heartily I shall repeat the cry of the sacred Liturgy: Deus, in adjutorium meum intende! How I shall tremble when I repeat: Et ne nos inducas in tentationem! How I shall address myself in supplication to those who can intercede for me, to Mary, to the Saints, and to the angels! What a note of faith I shall put into the all-powerful words: "We ask it for the sake of Jesus Christ, our Lord!"

The grace that I implore at this instant, the grace of graces, is that I may become humble. I shall incessantly plead for this, and in order to obtain my petition I will be as lowly as the woman of Canaan. I will be humble, for I wish to be saved.

Resolution.- To see myself at the mercy of God, as I am today and shall be tomorrow, always, even unto death. At the same time to fear any want of confidence in God Who is my Father.


Fourth Meditation
Exercise XI
Our Condition

First Point: The nature of our liberty.
Second Point: Our evil inclinations.
Third Point: The world and the devil.
Fourth Point: Circumstances.

Evening Preparation.- Tomorrow's meditation will develop the preceding one, and in a manner illustrate it. An analysis of our position with regard to good and evil will show us the poverty of our own resources to sustain our virtue, and the power of the enemy that seeks it overthrow.

The sight of our precarious position will prove to us the need of special help, and thus to the impression made by the disturbing meditation of yesterday will be added the force of a reasoned conviction.

I will apply all my attention to this research, which I am undertaking not to establish a truth of faith by reasoning, but to increase my knowledge of it.

O my God, can it be a matter of sorrow to one who loves Thee, to own dependence on Thee for salvation? O my God, to one who trusts Thee can the sense of utter helplessness be distasteful? O my God, if my misery appears to me to be limitless, Thy mercy is infinite, and this mercy is ever within my reach, so long as I retain the conviction of my own weakness, and am ready to cry: "Pity! O my Father!"

Meditation

Prelude.- In order that conviction may follow, to ask for grace to see clearly the circumstances rendering a special intervention of mercy necessary.

I. The nature of our liberty.- Let us first consider the nature of this frail instrument by the aid of which we may make our eternity happy or unhappy- our liberty.

I am conscious of it, with its frequent hesitations and variations; it is disturbed by diverse successive influences, and is profoundly dependent upon the impressions which strike it. Good influences and good motives are needful for its right governance.

Imprudence of choice and a weakness for unwholesome influences will be the means of its undoing. Now I must remember that even after a lifetime of fidelity my liberty remains essentially defectible.

O God, with what joy do I give Thee back my liberty, to subject it to Thy power, to trust it to Thy mercy! Take it, govern it, sustain it, and at need extend to it Thine inexhaustible pardon.

O my God, to address Thee thus is surely to begin to be humble?

II. Our evil inclinations.- Among those fatal influences which lead us to abuse our liberty, our inclinations take the first place. They are inherent in our being. A simple want of balance is their origin. They disguise themselves under countless appearances of good, and if they slumber, they are none the less to be feared, for their awaking may find us self-confident and unarmed. With or without our will they persist in the depths of our nature. Encouraged, they master us; combatted, they remain in a latent influence always secretly at work.

Our inclinations tends towards evil rather than towards good. The Church teaches this, experience proves it, and original sin explains it.

Only the sophists told that man, au fond, is always good. He may vaguely wish to be so, but in practice he confuses what is good with what seems good to him, and it is often the latter that he chooses. There again he allows himself to be deceived by appearances, placing his good solely in enjoyment, wishing to enjoy and enjoy immediately.

This misguided propensity acts upon liberty by illusion and attraction.

We may well be horror-stricken when we look into the depths of ourselves! In order the better to illumine these depths, let us suppose that there is neither hell nor God to love; neither reputation to keep up nor the loss of it ti fear; and let us ask ourselves to what pitch we should then carry our excesses and what our life would be.. It would be exactly what our inclinations would make it, if they were not restrained. Now these inclinations exist, though under control, and they are, alas! ourselves.

If habit is added to this innate power, what a tyranny we fall under! Liberty is then enslaved and disinherited; horror of evil is no longer operative; evil inclinations grow, bearing us away like a torrent; the consciousness of past weakness robs us of all courage; and what grievous and even despotic habits are formed by our countless failings!

In such a pass, who will succor us? God's mercy alone can do so. And what will attract His mercy? Humility. Persons have been known who, in the midst of an evil career, have repented, and, plunging themselves into humility as into a place of refuge, have not been rejected by the Divine Mercy.

III. The world and the devil.- The world that was cursed by the Savior envelops us like an atmosphere, and penetrates us with its poisons as epidemics do with their infection.

Nothing influences a man so much as the conduct of other men. What everyone does, we instinctively suppose may be done; and argument breaks down before this irrational opinion.

The Saints, who are not such free-thinkers as we are, know the devil's power and the extent of his activity. But his influence is most dangerous to those who are unaware of it. We cannot flee the world nor avoid the devil, but we must be on the watch lest we become enervated by the spirit of the one and fall a victim to the cunning of the other.

The devil is ever ready to take advantage of a favorable opportunity ; and our inclinations are only too apt to become his accomplices in his efforts to ensnare our thoughtless liberty.

What will become of us if our pride, alienating us from the Heart of God, leaves us at the mercy of such enemies?

IV. Circumstances.- In circumstances such as we have described, free though we are we shall most certainly succumb.

God knows them all, even the most trying. He measures the degree of resistance we can offer, and He knows that in certain cases this degree, sufficient in itself, will be rendered totally inadequate by our own weakness.

In such cases will He leave us to ourselves or will He deliver us? once we are engaged in battle, will He come to our aid, or will He permit us to fall? God alone knows. If He removes the danger or strengthens our resistance, it is a grace which is not our due. How complete then is our dependence!

O my God, Thou knowest the concourse of events; Thou forseest those days of idle enervation , when the soul abates her watchfulness and the energy of the will is relaxed. Before Thou dost determine to grant the special help Thou designest, Thou dost survey the dispositions of the soul that is in danger. If Thou seest her humble and submissive, Thou stretchest forth Thy hand and she is saved. If Thou seest her hardened in pride, Thou dost turn away Thy face, and she is lost.

O God, O Father, I have no distrust of Thee! I only fear myself, and I shall not fear myself if I hide myself in the bosom of Thy mercy. I do indeed desire to enter there and never go out again. I will study lovingly Thy beneficent laws; I will learn to be gentle and indulgent to others as Thou art towards me; to expect no esteem for any excellence in myself, for Thou alone art the Author of it, and it is none of mine.

All the pains of my poor life, every slight, every neglect, every disappointment, and even the deepest humiliation, I will accept, my God and Father, as the united action of Thy justice and Thy mercy, as the providential means of my present rehabilitation and of my future glory.

O my God, hast Thou not given me Thy Son, Jesus? With Him I am sure of Thee. Living in Him I am sure of myself. O Jesus, visit my nothingness, inform and animate it. Let me live in Thee, love in Thee, and with Thee go forward.

O God, O Father, Thou givest me an overwhelming sense of my helplessness only to draw me to Thine Arms! What happiness to rest there forever! I depend on Thee and press myself ever more closely to Thine adorable Bosom!

Resolution.- To take pity on my own vain self-confidence, supplicating God to heal my blindness.


Remarks on the Two Preceding Meditations

The study of any kind of life, whether it be the life of the soul, the life of the body, or even the humble life of the plant, fills us with astonishment not unmixed with fear. Everything appears so delicate, so complex, so fragile, that every moment we expect to see the organism destroyed by the slightest accident. The perusal of medical books has this effect.

Happily, experience reassures us. Our being appears too frail to exist, yet it does exist; too weak to resist so many destructive agencies, yet it endures. Thus it is in the supernatural order. Its life seems to be perpetually threatened, yet our knowledge of he facts allays our fears. There is ever in play, as a constant remedy, that marvelous power that we call Providence, but which here may receive the better name of Mercy.

1.As a matter of fact, there is no Christian who has not largely in his power to avoid every mortal sin, and to lift himself up again if he sins.

2.There is not a soul who cannot obtain by prayer all that he needs; and not one who, for a single moment, is deprived of the power to pray.

3.What we cannot, perhaps, do today we shall be able to do tomorrow, if we use well every little grace we have. (Gratiae remote sufficientes.)

4.Certain aids which are not strictly our due, will infallibly be given to us; and it is of no consequence to us that they are not ours by right if they are granted to us by favor.

5.At the day of judgment, each soul will be compelled by the evidence to admit that God has been good, and very good, to her; there will have been no exception to this rule, for we are under the dispensation of mercy. Therefore, let us not forget that we are also under the obligation of humility.


Fifth Meditation
Exercise XII
Our Faults

First Point: An examination of their cause.
Second Point: The judgment assigned to them.

Evening Preparation.- Here we set foot on our own territory, for nothing is so much our own as sin. It is ours and ours alone, the only thing in which God is not.

Let us step into this dreary land with courage, and set ourselves to explore it thoroughly.

Too often we have run our eyes absently over it, as if it were a familiar road where nothing can surprise us.

We must learn to see ourselves clearly and to judge ourselves fairly if we are to arrive at our true worth. Do not let us permit ourselves to pass over our humiliating discoveries with this thought: I am not the only one!

Though others may be sinners, are we less guilty? A prison may be full of criminals, but each individual must bear his own disgrace. Man is confronted with God alone. Tibi soli peccavi.

Were he only face to face with himself, with his conscience, his dignity, his ideal, these three great things would accuse without any regard to like faults committed by other men.

And besides, what is our rank among sinners? We shall never know until the last day. It is neither the number nor the apparent gravity of faults that determines the degree of guilt. Farther on we shall see what is the attitude that humility imposes upon us with regard to others; here we are chiefly concerned to ascertain the judgment we ought to pass upon ourselves and upon our work; and if we arrive at a reasonable persuasion of our small personal worth, if we feel abased before God and before our conscience, we shall find it very easy to deny ourselves all contempt for others, all arrogance, and all susceptibility.

We shall have, besides, sufficient logic not to aspire to a particular esteem that we know we do not deserve.

O my God, help me to know myself truly. Disperse the illusions which obscure from me the gravity of my misdeeds, and keep me from exaggerations which will hinder me from arriving at the truth. I wish to judge myself as Thou Thyself judgest me.

I will not set out with the preconceived idea that in order to be humble, it is necessary to believe oneself ill and miserable; I will study the matter coldly, with the freedom of an independent mind, and with the minute care of one who is bent solely on the quest for truth, and on arriving at just conclusions.

Meditation

Prelude.- To ask the grace of clear illumination on mt life, and my great loyalty in judging it.

I. The examination of causes.-1.Deeds.- This is a kind of general confession, renewed before God alone. It is a secret and sorrowful review of the actions of our arbitrary liberty.

It is a good plan to divide the life into successive periods, and to pause upon the dominating feature of each.

It should be possible to arrive at an approximate number of faults, at least of grave faults.

We will fix our attention to the most humiliating faults, if our imagination is not likely to suffer from it.

2. Motives.- The true ones, those we do no avow. The motives of faults are always bad; some are worse than others, some are abominable. In the main, it is for self-gratification that we have sinned.

Even in our good actions we shall find corrupt motives. Sometimes we shall find that they have been inspired by the craving to appear better than we are.

3. Graces.- Side by side with the story of ingratitude runs the story of mercy: the privilege of a religious education, favorable environment, graces of piety,even of fervor, graces of preservation. What should we have been without them? Repentance long awaited and almost miraculously granted. Let us count the number of our absolution... and of our fresh falls.... If we had not counted upon this ready pardon, perhaps we should have sinned less.

We should feel astonishment that God's Providence should have been so good and so persevering, and a still greater astonishment at our ingratitude and persistent estrangement,...and we were not even happy!

Our attitude today is not exactly that of repentance, but it is that of humility. Peccatum meum contra me est semper. Faults may be effaced, and perhaps their effects; but deeds never.

II. The judgment assigned.- 1.From the point of view of our personal worth, what trust do we deserve?

Trust can be placed only in uprightness of character and firmness of soul.

Now, to be continually alternating from faults to repentance, and from repentance to fresh faults, is not to govern our lives.

To succumb to the least temptation, sometimes without resistance, just because, after a short time, tiresome habits return, is not to be masters of ourselves.

We have willed to do better, and so we fancy we have changed, and then we have fallen again. What does our will count for? We say to ourselves again and again: "How foolish I am!" and yet reason, that sees so clearly, has no power to control us.

Sometimes the lower instincts gain such an ascendancy over reason itself that they furnish it with false justifications.

Truly evil has too often been my master, and I have no right to self-confidence.

2. From the point of view of personal dignity, have we any claim to honor?

Honor is allied to dignity. Now dignity demands that we hold to our rank without derogating from it, and that we unfalteringly adhere to our word.

How many times and to what extent have I not disgraced my Christian dignity, and perhaps even my dignity as a man?

I have allowed derogatory principles to enter my soul and to affect the dispositions of my body.

Have not caprice, passion, egotism, and pride too often replaced as motives the noble love of goodness?

And still I would fain believe myself worthy of honor!

Is he worthy of honor who is a breaker of his word?

I have given pledges in full cognisance of their meaning, pledges of conscience, to my confessor, to my God. The breaking of a single pledge would dishonor a man of the world, and I cannot count the number of my defections.

In truth, have I not lost all personal dignity? and to what honor can I aspire?

3. From the point of view of my ideal, how do I stand?

My ideal was my possible history, written by the goodness of God; it was the series of gifts which were to have been offered to me if I were faithful. It was the perpetual growth of my personality, and my destiny that should have grown ever more and more beautiful with time.

What an ideal!- and to what a condition has it given place! graces rendered fruitless, effort refused, diminution everywhere. After each absolution, the plan restored, though on a smaller scale, but again disfigured by failure.

I see God working incessantly to remake it, and myself working no less industriously to unmake it.

The ideal realized would have meant the embellishment and elevation of my whole being. What have I made of it? And what am I? Ugliness and baseness- what a contrast!

Gradually the action of God in me has decreased in power; His image has faded; His joy has gone out!

Ah! I have no refuge but in confusion, confession, and repentance. I have no refuge except in the sincerest humility!

O magnanimous God, Thou wilt not strike him who humbles himself even to the dust. O God of pity, pity the beggar who has naught but the rags of his poverty to show Thee.

In this poor man, O heavenly Father, behold the features, the disfigured features, of Jesus, Thy well beloved Son! Thou wilt not ignore His likeness in me. Have compassion on His glory. His glory? Oh! how pure and great will it be if from a miserable being Thou wilt make a new creature, good and beautiful, strong and tender, confident and generous, and above all humble.

Put far from me in the future all my faults, I desire never to commit another; but if it must be so, leave me above all a lively sense of my own unworthiness, that it may accompany me in my progress and in the success of my zeal, stimulating continually my gratitude, my desire for reparation, and in a profound humility that sacred love which is Thy life and mine, the divine fruit of Thy mercy and delight of my repentance!

Resolution.- To feel confusion of an unhappy being appearing before a tribunal, and who has there to face grievous accusations. To keep this impression throughout the day.

Sixth Meditation
Exercise XIII
Prayer Edited by Pope Urban VIII
(Placed at the beginning of the Roman Breviary)

Evening Preparation.- In this meditation we shall seek to establish ourselves in humility, rather by the sincere and ardent expression of our feelings than by the aid of reasoning.

In acquiring a virtue, to be convinced of our need of it is of the first importance; but sentiment is, perhaps a more powerful lever. It stirs the whole soul, and even deepens our consciousness of our need. Conviction belongs to the intelligence, but the expression of a sentiment is an act of the will, and it is in the will that virtue is formed and perfected.

We shall have but one aim tomorrow: to plunge ourselves into humiliation. With heartfelt words of a saint, we will deplore our ingratitude, our ever-recurring egotism, our countless failures; and also, with a great access of confidence, we will throw ourselves unreservedly upon God's mercy, surrendering ourselves to Jesus our Savior.

O my God grant me tomorrow a warmer heart, a softened heart, a heart at least striving to feel. I do not ask Thee for tears, but for real sorrow. O my God, bestow upon my soul that inclination towards humility that alone can make me humble, but grant me also that confidence which alone can make me valiant.

I am full of faults and wretchedness of myself, but by Thy grace I may obtain the riches and beauty of Jesus. O, Life of Jesus, like a divine seed, deign to thrust Thy roots into the soil of our wretchedness; one day Thou shalt blossom in heaven.

Meditation

Prelude.- To ask the grace of a sincere repentance. Ante oculos tuos, Domine, culpas nostras ferimus. Weighed down and depressed, we place before Thine eyes, O just God our Father, the heavy burden of our faults! Et plagas quas accepimus conferimus- "And we show Thee the wounds made by our sins." They disfigure us, they make us suffer, they keep us in a state of pitiable weakness, for they are many, deep and badly dressed.

Si pensamus malum quod fecimus, minus est quod patimur, majus est quod meremur. My head bowed down, my lips that kiss Thy feet, my tears that bathe them, the pity I implore, all cry to Thee that I recognize my faults, and that I accept the punishment. The trials of my present life, those that the future holds, all together are nothing compared with my deserts. Gravius est quod commisimus, levius est quod toleramus.

Peccandi poenam sentimus te peccandi pertinaciam non vitamus. Inconceivable cowardice! Under the sting of punishment I burn with indignation against myself, but under renewed temptation I find myself as feeble as before.

Despite the graces that I have received, the resolutions I have made, the many chastisements I have suffered; despite my penitence and my regret, despite my oft-renewed aspirations, evil still has the power to conquer me, to lift its head again when trials pass!

In flagellis nostris infirmitas nostra teritur et iniquitas non mutatur- Thou breakest us and we are not changed; we are bruised and persist in wrong-doing! Mens aegra torquetor et cervix non flectitur- Sad, sick, tortured, still we will not bend.

Vita in dolore suspirat, et opere non se emendat- Our life is wasted in sorrow and lamentation and we find no way of return!

O human heart, O heart of mine, how feeble thou art, and easily led astray! How inconstant and changeable! Thou dost suffer from evil-doing, and thou willest to suffer still more; thou knowest thyself sick, and thou dost not sincerely seek a cure!

Thou groanest in thy fetters yet thou dost cling to them!

Si expectas, non corrigimur. O Lord, Thy patience is long-suffering, and by my fault it is useless! Thou dost wait and we do not correct ourselves.

Si vindicas, non duramus- If thou becomest a God of vengeance, we cannot endure it.

Confitemur in correctione quod egimus, obliviscimur post visitationem quod flevimus- Thou comest to chastise us, and we confess our faults; Thou withdrawest Thyself, and presently we forget what we have bewailed!

Si extendas manum, facienda promittimus: si suspenderis gladium, promisa non solvimus- Thou extendset Thy hand, and we promise everything; Thou withdrawest the sword, and we are forsworn.

Si ferias, clamamus ut parcas, si peperceris, peccamus ut ferias- Tho strikest and we cry for pardon, and again we provoke Thy blows!

Habes, Domine, confitentes reos! novimus quod nisi dimittas, recte non perimus. Ah! at least, Lord, I do not excuse myself; I am guilty and I freely confess it. This avowal solaces me; it is the unloading of my conscience, in view of my endless falls and incessant provocations! If Thou dost not take pity on me I am lost, and justly so!

Praesta, Pater omnipotens, sine merito quod rogamus, qui fecisti ex nihilo, qui te rogarent per Christum, Dominum nostram. O Almighty Father, this being whom Thou hast created from nothing beseeches Thee! He is without merit, but since Thou hast bestowed the grace of prayer, use Thy right to pardon. Thou puttest in my mouth the accents that will touch Thee; Thou armest my prayer with a name that compels Thee; Thou seest in me Him Whom Thou lovest, Jesus, by Whom I pray.

In this long litany of our miseries, let us study the action of humility.

It is humility that speaks, that groans, that touches. It is humility that gives to God His rightful place, and to us the attitude that befits us.

It is to the tears of humility that mercy stoops, and it is on her head that pardon descends.

It is humility that causes Jesus to put Himself in the place of our sorry personality.

Should pride wish to raise its head, what confusion and what punishment! Pride could never soften the heart of God, nor our own!

"Our misery is the throne of the mercy of God," said S.Francis de Sales.

The road from the Heart of God to ours, and of ours to His, is humility.

As soon as they are touched by the reflection of this virtue, our miseries take on a hue of supernatural beauty. As soon as they are touched by mercy, they are transformed in love.

Resolution.- To entertain a profound and sweet sense of the goodness of God. "I will sing of Thy mercies forever."


Seventh Meditation-(1)
Exercise XIV-(1)
In the Presence of the Saints

Note.- If thirty days only are given to these exercises, the two following meditations may be taken together. Though traversing different roads, they meet at the same point: the lively sense of our humiliating mediocrity.

Evening Preparation.- What effect should I look for from a contemplation of the virtues of the Saints? A keen sense of my littleness, and also a stimulus to my laxity, for a humility that destroys false pretensions excites true courage.

In the presence of the virtue of the Saints we are overpowered by a sense of greatness, such as we experience at the foot of a high mountain or in sight of the ocean. But we must not be satisfied with this general impression, we must pass on to an examination of the details of their superiority, their virtues, their sentiments, their works,...and at the same time consider our virtues, our sentiments, our works!

In an uneducated society the man who can read prides himself on his accomplishment. Do you admire him? No; then beware of a vain esteem which sets you above your fellows.

But must we compare ourselves with the Saints, whose lives were exceptional, if we are to form a just appreciation of our worth? Yes, since we pretend to a special esteem. In fact, the measure of a desert is found in what is exalted and not in what is mediocre.

For what matter for pride is there in being a little less debased than some poor wretch?

In the presence of all superiority, one of the two feelings may be aroused: that of despair, which, feeling itself unable to reach such a height, gives up the attempt; or that of courage, true greatness of soul, which repeats with S.Augustine, " Can I not do what others have done?" Tears of holy emulation fill the eyes, an almost violent emotion swells the breast, and, with eyes directed to heaven, we cry: "I can do all in Him Who strengthens me!"

The proud man reflects upon his own insufficiency, and sinks down; the humble considers the Divine strength and casts himself upon it. Oh! Thou Who makest Saints, commence to fashion me to humility. I shall be in Thy hands like common but malleable clay, lending itself to receive the likeness of Thine image.

Meditation

Prelude.- To ask the grace of such a vision of the moral beauty of the Saints, that I shall feel nothing but a profound self-contempt.

The Apostles.- S.Peter, S.Andrew, S.Paul. They belong no more to themselves, the Spirit of God possesses and governs them; their zeal extends over the whole world and stoops the lowest slave.

Weariness, persecution, the sword only stimulate them; scourgings rejoice them; miracles accompany them. Towns, peoples, fall at their feet. They die and are buried in obscurity, the time and place of their martyrdom often remaining unknown.

And what of my zeal? my courage? my abnegation? my divine conquests? my personal gifts? I regard them with pity! and the thought of my pride covers me with confusion! Yet I accept praise, and I am complacent about the little things I do.

What a humiliation, to set myself beside an Apostle and to measure myself by him!

The Virgin Martyrs.- S.Lucy, S.Agnes, S.Agatha. They loved Jesus only, and they loved Him with holy passion. Their souls are a heaven in which a pure and gentle light is diffused. Not a shadow of an unworthy thought. Love has gone on growing until it has left no room for dreams of sense. Never would they belong to a mortal being. Smiling, they bow the head to the executioner; to die is to be with Jesus. O quam pulchra est casta generatio cum claritate!- "How beautiful is this noble race in its dazzling purity!"

Let us set our own souls and our own lives beside this whiteness, this peace, this gentle love: imaginations, dreams, torments, struggles,... all the past that I have forgotten but which God remembers.

Ah! how can we be proud of our virtue, preserved perhaps, perhaps restored, but always so imperfect!

The Hermit Saints.- S.Anthony, S.Pacomius, S.Hilary. Let us follow them into the desert.

Silence and forgetfulness envelop them! The eye of God is the only star that lights their way; their prayer is almost continuous, and sleep and food are curtailed to a degree only just sufficient to preserve life. They undertake terrible mortification each day, each night, their whole life through.

Let me see myself beside them, enjoying every comfort of life! Perhaps my health demands it. But it would be absurd for anyone to think I am mortified or to suppose it myself. Ah! how easy it should be for me to be humble and lowly!

The Doctors of the Church.- S.Ambrose, S.Augustine, S.Chrysostom, S.Thomas. Their knowledge is so wide that even we of the present day are confounded by it. The influence they exercised in their own period, and that they will continue to exercise until the end of time, testifies to their high worth.

And yet I am conceited about my little knowledge- shallow and of small worth, very limited, and just what is to be found in countless books.

I should rejoice immoderately to see that my influence was felt a hundred paces off!

The Contemplatives.- These form the supreme hierarchy of souls: S.Francis of Assisi, S.Catherine, S.Theresa. What ascents! what heights! what visions! what flights!- and in their service of God, what love! what union! Purity, brilliant lucidity, in all their intellectual faculties; fiery affections; supreme detachment; marvelous celestial favors; souls in a sense melted and liquefied, molding themselves marvelously to the fashion of the heart of God!

On my knees, my eyes raised to heaven, I watch the unfolding of this vision, and in its light I behold myself dull and coarse. Can I be of the same nature as these wondrous beings? What kind of prayers are mine, and what is their result? What is my attention to God? Is my love ever growing purer, higher, more intimate, warmer, brighter?

The Unknown Souls.- They have passed their lives in work, in prayer, in suffering. They did good so quietly that it was never noised abroad. God alone knows what graces have been bestowed at their intercession. Others have reaped the harvest that they have sown.

What heroism has been shown by poor women struggling with the harshness of existence!

They looked calm and were supposed to be happy- and so they were indeed, but in another way. We have perhaps known such; have we appreciated them?

Resolution.- To keep in mind one of these great groups of holy souls, and to think of them many times during the day.


Seventh Meditation-(2)
Exercise XIV-(2)
In the Presence of God

Evening Preparation.- Our aim in this meditation is to extinguish the vain lights of self-esteem by a contemplation of the beauty of the Infinite. We must try to reserve some long time for this meditation, and to keep ourselves in great interior peace. We need long and close attention if we are to understand anything of the mysterious splendor of the Supreme Being.

We must be wholly detached in our interior as well as our exterior senses, that we may be open to those sights that are beyond sense.

Consider one by one the Divine perfections, and set beside them your own poverty and ugliness.

This comparison is easy, suggestive, and convicting, and it will fill you with sentiments of confusion that will influence your practical life.

To feel oneself abased and annihilated before God is to dispose oneself not to value self before others.

This evening, notice that what are the most unworthy tendencies and the most humiliating faults of your life, and propose to yourself to contrast them with the Divine perfections in such a manner as will best show up their ugliness: inalienable purity opposed to our stains, serene immutability opposed to our inconstancy, sovereign peace to our agitations and troubles, etc.

Meditation

Prelude.- To ask the grace to feel such a sense of the Divine grandeur as will absorb all feeling of vain personal esteem.

From the contemplation of the Saints let us ascend to the contemplation of God. Before the perfection of God the sanctity of man appears as a drop of water compared with the majestic ocean, or a tiny night-light with the brightness of the sun.

To the greater number of souls, the mysterious abysses of the Divine attributes, where thought loses itself in ravishment, are a sealed book. The heart needs great purity to plunge into their depths, and the intellect entire attention to understand their silences.

We will not here attempt to trace the route to those abysses, and those who have found the way of light will need no aid. But we may be allowed to contrast our littleness with such majesty, as a painter places a man at the foot of a great monument in order to give a true idea of its size.

O God, Thou art all-powerful, and I am infinitely weak!

Thou art immensity, and I occupy an imperceptible point in space!

Thou art wisdom, peace, harmony, measure; and I am error, improvidence, haste, trouble, disorder!

Thou art sanctity, pure, exalted, complete, the imperious enemy of all evil; while I am defect, lust, sin!

Thou art immutability; what Thou art, Thou remainest always; what Thou thinkest, what Thou willest, Thou thinkest, Thou willest eternally. While I am nothing but inconsistency and instability.

My impressions and my tastes change like a passing cloud!

Thou art beauty, without flaw, without shadow, without decline; everything which on earth delights, enchants, and beguiles us from ourselves, is but a dim reflection of Thy ravishing beauty!

The vault of heaven of of azure blue, with its pensive stars; soft winds of spring, drunk with the perfume of a thousand flowers; noble voices of the forests and the waters; streams of light filling every place with brightness; the whole concert of nature- what are you? A little movement, an appearance, a nothing.

Soul of man, genius of man, what are you? A higher reflection of the eternal Intelligence, but only a reflection: heart of man, source of all our feelings, spring of our generosities, greater, higher than all in thy love, thou art but a spark in comparison with the infinite Love!

This comparison of the perfections of God with our unspeakable miseries provokes two kinds of reflections and sentiments:

1. What am I beside Him? What absurdity to compare myself with Him! How empty is pride!

2. What does it mean to offend God? It is to attack all His perfections, and they rise against us and condemn us, for of what an injury, a profanation and folly are we guilty!

How sweet and gentle will that humility be that is the outcome of these two considerations- the consideration of God, and the consideration of myself.

A glance towards God fills me with confidence and ravishment! A glance at myself must make me sad, but grateful and above all humble. How well might we cry with S.Francis all through the night: "My God and my all! My God and my all!"- the expression of a humility full of love and of adoration.

Resolution.- To be ashamed of my rags, but still more ashamed of my pride, and to feel a holy emulation, for is not God given to me to be my model? What is wanting to the Almighty to make me a saint? Great humility on my part.