Christ Healing the Blind Man, Gioacchino Assereto (1600-1649), c. 1640, oil on canvas. Carnegie Museum of Art, photographed by Moira Burke / Wikimedia Commons.

Various Thoughts on Humility

Humility of heart is necessary for salvation, yet many souls are ensnared by the deceit of pride and false humility. Take to heart this holy counsel from Pope Leo XII, excerpted from The Practice of Humility.


Abandon Yourself to God

Abandon yourself entirely to God in order to follow the dispensations of His loving Providence, even as a tender child casts himself without reserve into the arms of his beloved father. Let God do with you whatsoever He pleases, without disturbing or disquieting yourself about anything that may befall you.

With joyfulness, with confidence, and with reverence, accept everything that comes to you from Him. To act otherwise, would be to requite the goodness of His heart with ingratitude—would be to distrust Him! Humility plunges us infinitely below the infinite Being of God, but at the same time, it teaches us that in Him alone is all our strength and every consolation.

Acknowledge Your Weakness Without God

Since it is clear that without God you are not able to do any good whatsoever and that you would fall at every step and be overcome by the slightest temptation, always acknowledge yourself to be the weak and impotent creature you are, bearing in mind that in all your actions, you stand continually in need of the divine assistance.

By means of these thoughts, keep yourself inseparably united to God, even as the infant clings to the bosom of his mother, knowing of no other secure support.

Say often with the royal Prophet:—“Unless the Lord had been my helper, my soul had almost dwelt in hell.” And:—“Look You upon me and have mercy on me, for I am alone and poor.” And:—“O God, come to my assistance; O Lord, make haste to help me.”

Lastly, cease not to give thanks to the Lord with all the outpouring of your heart. Above all things, thank Him for the protection with which He forestalls and encompasses you. Beg Him constantly to deign to give you those special helps of which you stand in need, and which He alone is able to bestow.

Give All Glory to God

Be ever most prompt in giving to God the entire glory both of your good deeds and of the happy issue of the undertakings committed to your care.

To yourself, attribute nothing except their defects, for these emanate from yourself alone; whereas every good is from God, and to Him only are due the thanks and the glory of every good deed. Impress this truth so deeply upon your mind as never to forget it.

Believe that any other person helped by divine grace as you have been, would have succeeded far better than you have done and would not be guilty of so many imperfections.

Reject the praises which may be offered you for any unexpected success, for they are not due to so vile an instrument as you are; but rather to that immense, sublime, and eternal Master-Builder Who is able, if He has a mind, to make use of a rod to strike water out of the rock, of a little clay to restore sight to the blind, and Who has power to work an infinity of miracles.

Accepting Humiliations for Love of God

If, on the contrary, the affairs placed under your direction go wrong, it is much to be feared that the failure must be attributed to your incapacity and to your negligence.

Your self-love and your pride, which recoil from every humiliation, would seek perhaps to throw the blame upon others, and when unable to do this, would strive at least to extenuate the fault.

But do not encourage these vicious inclinations. Examine your conduct conscientiously, and trembling lest you have failed in doing your duty, acknowledge your fault before God, and accept the humiliation as a chastisement which you have deserved.

If, however, your conscience does not reproach you, adore even in this case the dispensations of God, and reflect that perhaps your past sins and too much self-confidence have caused the blessing of heaven to be withdrawn from your labors.

This article is taken from a chapter in The Practice of Humility by Pope Leo XIII which is available from TAN Books

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