2. He even had some doubt of humility though residing in the will, because it is quite possible to misuse it, and to turn humility itself into vanity. Take for instance those who, having been invited to a banquet, take at once possession of the very lowest place, or of one which they know to be inferior to that due to their rank. They may do this on purpose to be invited to go higher amidst the applause of the company, and with advantage to themselves. He called this a veritable entering into vanity, and through the wrong door: for the truly humble do not wish to appear humble, but only vile and lowly. They love to be considered as of no accounts and, as such, to be despised and rebuffed.
3. Even this did not satisfy him. He was not content with mere natural virtue, but insisted that humility must be Christian, given birth to, and animated by charity. Otherwise he held it in small esteem, refusing to admit that among christians it suffices to practise virtues in pagan fashion. But what is this infused and supernatural humility? It is to love and delight in one's own humiliation, for the reason that by its means we are able to give glory to God, Who accepts the humility of His servants, but puts far away from His heart the proud in spirit.
4. Again, our Saint taught that in striving to please God by bearing humiliations, we should aim at accepting such as are not of our own choice rather than those that are voluntary. He used to say that the crosses fashioned by us for ourselves are always of the lightest and slenderest, and that he valued an ounce of resignation to suffering above pounds' weight of painful toil, good though it might be in itself, undertaken of one's own accord.
5. Quiet endurance of reproaches, contempt, or depreciation, was, in his opinion, the true touch-stone of humility, because it renders us more like to Jesus Christ, the Prototype of all solid virtue, Who humbled and annihilated Himself, making Himself obedient unto death, even the ignominious death of the Cross.
6. He commended voluntary seeking after humiliations, yet he insisted upon great discretion being practised in this search, since it easily happens that self-love may subtly and imperceptibly insinuate itself therein.
7. Next he considered that the highest, or more properly speaking, deepest degree of humility is that of taking pleasure and even delight in humiliations, reputing them to be in truth the greatest of honours, and of being just as much ill-content with honours as vain persons are with contempt and contumely.
In illustration of this he would quote Moses, who preferred the reproach of Israel to the glories of a kingdom offered to him by Pharaoh's daughter; of Esther, who hated the splendid ornaments with which they decked her to make her pleasing in the eyes of Assuerus; of the Apostles, whose greatest joy was to suffer shame and reproach for the name of Jesus; and of David, who danced before the Ark amid a crowd of buffoons and mountebanks, and who exulted in thus making himself appear contemptible in the eyes of Michol, his wife.
8. Blessed Francis called humility a descending charity, and charity an ascending humility. The former he compared to those streams which come down from the heights and flow down into the valleys. The latter to the slender column of smoke spoken of in the Canticle[1] which rises up towards Heaven, and is composed of all the sweet essences of the perfumer.
9. The Saint next gives a rare lesson on the measure or means of gauging humility. Obedience is to be its source and touch-stone. This teaching he grounded on the saying of St. Paul: that our Lord humbled Himself, making Himself obedient.[2] "Do you see," he would say, "by what scale humility must be measured? By obedience. If you obey promptly, frankly, cheerfully, without murmuring, expostulating, or replying, you are truly humble. Nor without humility can one be easily and really obedient, for obedience demands submission of the heart, and only the truly humble look upon themselves as inferior to all and as subject to every creature for the love of Jesus Christ. They ever regard their fellow-men as their superiors, they consider themselves to be the scorn of men and the off-scouring of the world. Thus these two virtues, like two pieces of iron, by friction one with the other, enhance each other's brightness and polish. We are humble only in as far as we are obedient, and in fine we are pleasing to God only in as far as we have charity."
10. He recommended all to endeavour to steep their every action in the spirit of humility, as the swan steeps in water each morsel she swallows, and how can this be done except by hiding our good works as much as we can from the eyes of men, and by desiring that they may be seen only by Him to Whom all things are open, and from Whom nothing can be hid. Our Saint himself, urged by this spirit, said that he would have wished, had there been any goodness in him, that it might have been hidden from himself as well as from all others until the Judgment Day, when the secrets of all hearts will be revealed. The Gospel itself exhorts us to observe this secrecy, for it warns us to serve God in secret, and by hiding our virtues, our prayers, our almsgiving, fittingly to worship Him, Who is a hidden God.