From the Winter 2009 issue of Knowing & Doing [C.S. Lewis Institution] :
by Jeremy Taylor
17th Century Clergyman and Author
1. Confess your sins to God
often, and consider what all that evil amounts to, which you then charge
upon yourself. Do not look at them as scattered at large distances in
the course of a long life, but unite them into one continued
representation. If all our sins and follies were heaped against us, we
would certainly appear vicious and miserable. Possibly this exercise
really applied to your spirit may prove useful.
2. Remember that we usually criticize others on slight grounds
and for little cause, and that one fly is enough to spoil the ointment
as far as they are concerned. Since we are so severe to others, let us
consider that whatever good they can think or say of us, we can tell
them of hundreds of base, and unworthy, and foolish acts, any one of
which were enough to destroy someone else’s reputation. So let them
destroy our over-high opinions of ourselves.
3. When our neighbor is lifted up by public fame and popular
acclaim, we cry out that the people is a herd of unlearned and ignorant
persons, poor judges and fickle. Let us use the same art to humble
ourselves, and never take delight and pleasure in public acclamation.
4. We change our opinion of others by their kindness or
unkindness towards us. If my patron is bounteous, I think him wise and
noble, and his faults are but small blemishes, while his virtues are
mountains. But if he proves ungenerous, he is ill-natured, covetous,
gluttonous; all he speaks is flat, and dull, and ignorant. This is
indeed unjust towards others, but a good instrument if we turn the edge
of it upon ourselves. It is reasonable that we should at least not
flatter ourselves with too kind opinions.
5. Call to mind every day some one of your foulest sins, or the
most shameful of your disgraces, or your most indiscreet act, or
anything that most troubled you, and apply it to the present swelling of
your spirit, and it may help allay it.
6. Pray often for God’s grace, with all humility of gesture and passion
of desire, and interpose many acts of humility, by way of confession to
God, and reflection upon yourself.
7. Avoid great offices and positions, and those conditions where
many ceremonies and occasions though necessary, will destroy the
sobriety of your thoughts. It is certain that God is as greatly
glorified by your example of humility in a low or temperate condition as
by your generosity in a great and dangerous one.
8. Do not become introspective about your own humility or any other
grace with which God has enriched your soul. For since God often hides
from his servants the sight of those excellencies which shine to others
so that he may secure the grace of humility, it is good that you do so
yourself. And if you behold a grace in yourself, be sure to give Him
thanks for it, that you may not boast in that which is not your own.
Consider how you have soiled it by handling it with dirty fingers, with
your own imperfections. Spiritual pride is very dangerous, not only
because it spoils so many graces by which we draw near the Kingdom of
God, but also because it so frequently creeps in upon the spirit of holy
persons. It is not a wonder for a beggar to call himself poor, or a
drunkard to confess that he is not a sober person. But for a holy
person to be humble, for one whom all men consider a saint to fear lest
he himself become a devil, nesses, and to uncover his bad tendencies, is
as hardas for a prince to allow himself to subject to discipline like
the lowest of his servants.
9. Often meditate upon the effects of pride and humility. First, that pride is like a cancer, and destroys the beauty of the most excellent gifts and graces, while humility crowns them all. Second,
that pride is a great hindrance to the perceiving of the things of God,
and humility an excellent instrument of spiritual wisdom. (Cf. Matthew
11:25) Third, that pride hinders the acceptation of our prayers, but humility pierces the clouds. Fourth, that humility is but truth and all pride is a lie. Fifth, that humility is the most certain way to real honor, and pride is ever affronted and despised. Sixth,
that pride turned Lucifer into a devil, and humility exalted the Son of
God above every name, and placed Him eternally at God’s right hand. Seventh,
that God “resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble”: grace and
pardon, remedy and relief, contentment in all conditions, tranquility of
spirit, patience in afflictions, love abroad, peace at home, and utter
freedom from contention and the sin of censuring others and the trouble
of being censured themselves. For the humble man will not judge his
brother for the splinter in his eye, being more troubled by the beam in
his own eye. He is willing to be reproved, because himself has cast the
first stone at himself, and is not surprised that others are of the same
mind.
10. Remember that the blessed Savior of the world has done more to
secure this grace than any other. His whole life was a continued example
of humility, a vast descent from the glory of the Father to the womb of
a poor maiden, to the form of a servant, to a state of poverty. It
would be a good but reasonable design if we would be as humble in the
midst of our greatest imperfections and basest sins as was Christ in the
midst of His fullness of the Spirit and perfect life.
11. Drive away all flatterers and never endure them. He who
allows himself to be so abused by another not only loves to have his own
opinion of himself heightened and cherished, but is a fool for
entertaining mockery.
12. Never change what you are doing when someone approaches you
suddenly. Do not try to seem studious or devout before him, but be the
same as you were to God and yourself in privacy.
13. To the same purpose, it is of great use that he who would
preserve his humility should choose some spiritual person to whom he
shall be accountable to reveal his very thoughts and imaginations, every
act of his and all his behavior towards others in which there may be
danger. By such an openness of spirit he may expose every blast of
vain-glory, every idle thought, to be chastened and lessened by the rod
of spiritual discipline. He who finds himself tied to confess every
proud thought, every vanity of his spirit, will also perceive they must
not dwell with him nor find any kindness from him; and, besides this,
the nature of pride is so shameful and ugly that the very revealing of
it is a huge mortification and means of suppressing it.
14. Anyone who knows the laws of God, the rewards of virtue, the
consequences of sin, and in spite of all this, runs foolishly into his
sin and his ruin, merely because he is a fool, is like a madman rushing
to his death. He that can think great and good things of such a person
may admire a swine for wisdom and go for counsel to the prodigal and
trifling grasshopper.
