Volume II, Treatise III, Chapter XXV

The Exercises of Humility, Which Are Practised Ameng Us of the Society

One of the reasons which St. Basil lays down, to shew that the life of religions, who live in community, is preferable to that led in solitude, is, that the life of hermits is not only exposed to great dangers, but is deprived of those exercises of virtues, which are necessary for Christian perfection, and consequently is less proper than the other, for the acquiring of them. For how can he exercise humility, who meets with no one before whom he can humble himself? Or how can he perform works of charity or mercy, who has no communication with others? Or how can he shew patience, who meets with no one to vex him? But it is not so with a religious, who lives in community. The frequent‘ occasions he has to exercise all sorts of virtues, are a great means to acquire them. If you consider humility, he meets with those before whom he may humble himself: if charity, he has objects thereof: if patience, the commerce he has with all his brethren, gives him a thousand occasions to practise that also; and so it is, as to all other virtues.

All religious in general owe doubtless great obligations to Almighty God. for the grace whereby he has called them to a. religious life, which furnishes so many ways to acquire virtue, and which, in fine, is a school of perfection; but we of the society are more obliged to him than all the rest; because, besides the means which are common to us with others, he has given us particular ones, especially in what relates to humility. For our constitutions have taken such care herein, and the rules of them are so express, that provided we keep them well, we shall never want wherewith to exercise ourselves in humility. One very profitable rule, for example, is that which enjoins us, to lay open the very bottom of our heart and conscience to our superior, by giving him. an exact account of our temptations, passions, bad inclinations, and generally of all our defects and indispositions of mind. For though this is ordered us upon another account than that of humbling us, as we shall shew in its proper place; it is nevertheless very certain, ‘that it contributes very much to humility, and is a great practice thereof. Another very profitable rule is that, which for the making a greater progress in spiritual things, and for the entering into deeper sentiments of confusion and humility, enjoins us to rejoice that all our faults, and whatever is perceived amiss in us, should be carried to our superiors; and that by any one, who-should know them out of confession. Take notice of this, that thereby you may bethe more confounded and humbled; for this is the end of its practice. So that if youdesire to acquire true humility, you will rejoice to have all your faults exposed to your superiors; or if you have already acquired it, you yourself will go and tell those faults, and desire a penance for them; and as you are the first in knowing them, so you will also be the first in discovering them. But we have yet another and greater exercise of humility required of us, which is to accuse ourselves of our own faults in public, to be thereby the more despised. For it is only with that view, you are to do all this; and not that you may be taken for an humble and mortified man; as then it would be an act of pride, rather than an exercise of humility. It is also with the same intention we must receive reproofs, whether they may be made in private or public; being glad in good earnest they are given us, and that every body should be fully convinced that what is said of us, is true. In fine, it is with the same spirit, that we are to undergo all exterior mortifications, which are used among us: as kissing the feet of our brethren; eating under the table, or upon our knees; lying prostrate at the door of the refectory, and a great many others; which conduce much to acquire and preserve humility; provided that we perform them with such disposition of mind as is necessary to perform them well. So that when you eat upon the ground; when you kiss your brother’s feet, and when you lie prostrate for them to pass over you; you are then to think; how unworthy you indeed are, to sit at the table with them; how you ought to kiss the ground they tread upon; and how you deserve to be under the foot of every one. Nor are you only to think thus yourself, but to be willing also, that every body else should think the same of you; and thus you are to entertain yourself with such reflections as these, after the example of those holy men, whom we have spoken of, in the foregoing chapter. For when mortifications are thus taken, it is impossible but they should produce profound humility in the heart; if, on the contrary, you perform them only outwardly, and without any interior submission of mind, they will be good for nothing; because, as the apostle teaches us, “bodily exercise profits little,” (1 Timothy 4:8), and the doing things without aiming at the end for which they were instituted, is, to do them only out of form and custom. If, therefore, after having kissed your brethren’s feet, and lain down for them to walk on you, you should speak rudely and after a surly manner to them, how can you reconcile such behaviour that so much contradicts itself; and how can you hinder people from believing, that all you did was mere dissimulation and hypocrisy.

Thus have I shown you one part of the exercises of humility to which our rules oblige us; and though I have elsewhere spoken of them upon another occasion, yet I wished to take notice of them here also; that every one may again consider them, and so set themselves to the practice of humility. For the progress and perfection of a religious man, consisting in the exact observance of his ‘rules; the practice of virtue to which he is most to apply himself, is that which his rules prescribe to him; so that if he performs not the exercise of humility and mortification, to which they oblige, he may reckon all which he does of himself, as nothing. We may say _ 9as much of Christians in general: the things in which every one of them has most need of humility, are those, where humility is necessary to keep God’s commands. If he has no humility in them, it will be to-no purpose to have it in other actions. For if he has not humility enough to confess a great sin, which through shame or ‘rather pride he hides from his confessor, and hereby fails in so essential a point, what will all other actions of humility signify, since he will be condemned for failing in this? It is the same with a religious, in all other things that are of obligation. If you have not humility enough to discover the bottom of your conscience to your superior, thereby to comply with your rules; if you cannot endure to be put in mind of your faults, that you may mend them; if you receive correction and penances with trouble and disquiet; if you will not be employed in mean and humble offices, and submit to all the functions the society has appointed; where is your humility?—Where is that indifference of will which your superiors require of you? And why do they require it of you, if not for things of this nature? Every religious may thus run over with himself, what belongs to the obligations of his rule, and each particular person may do the same according to what the condition and profession he has embraced require of him.

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