Untitled - Saints' Books

"
INSTR. vi.]
Humility. 3 1 5
And in
from us all the good we do. 1
another place he
says: "Pride lays snares for good works that they may
2
be lost." St. Joseph Calasanctius used to say, that the
more God favors a soul by special graces, the more she
ought to humble herself that she may not lose all. All
is lost by every little consent to self-esteem. He, says
St.
Gregory, who performs many virtuous actions, but
has not humility,
is
the wind. 3
like a man who scatters dust before
Trithemius has written:
Thou hast despised
others: thou art become worse than others." 4
The saints have not only not boasted of any perfec
tion, but have sought to make known to others what
redounded to their own contempt. Father Villanova,
to tell all
of the Society of Jesus, felt no repugnance
that his brother was a poor workman. Father Sacchini,
also a Jesuit, meeting in a public place his father, who
was a poor muleteer, ran to embrace him, and said:
"Oh, behold father!"
my Let us read the lives of the
saints, and pride ^shall depart from us: there we shall
find the great things that they have done, at the sight
of which we shall feel ashamed of the little we have
done.
3. WE MUST DISTRUST OURSELVES.
Thirdly, it is necessary to live in contiriual distrust of
ourselves. Unless God assists us, we shall not be able
to preserve ourselves in his grace: Unless the Lord keep the
city, he watcheth in vain that keepetJi it? If God work not in
us, we shall be unable to do any good: Unless the Lord
1 "
Nisi
Ep. 1 1 8, E. B.
2
humilitas praecesserit, totum extorquet de manu superbia."
"Superbia bonis operibus insidiatur, ut pereant." Ib. 211.
3 "
Qui sine humilitate virtutes congregat, quasi in ventum pulverem
portat."
In Ps. pcenit. 3.
4 Caeteros "
contempsisti; caeteris pejor factus es."
5
Nisi Dominus custodierit "
civitatem, frustra vigilat, qui custodit
earn." Ps. cxxvi. I.