A Year with the Saints. Anonymous

an old priest was exorcising a possessed person, the demon said that he would never come out, if he did not first tell him what the goats and what the lambs were like. The good priest quickly answered: "The goats are all those who are like me. What the lambs may resemble, God knows." At these words, the devil cried out: "Through your humility I can no longer remain here," and immediately departed.

      6. Persons who keep themselves low in their own estimation and love to be considered of little account and despised by others please God in the highest degree; and, therefore, He willingly lowers Himself to them, pours upon them the treasures of His graces, reveals to them His secrets, invites and draws them sweetly to Himself. Thus, the more one lowers and abuses himself before men, the more he rises and becomes great in the sight of God, and the more clearly he will, one day, behold the Divine Essence.----Thomas a Kempis

      St. Gertrude, one day hearing the little bell ring for Communion and not feeling as well prepared as she desired, said to the Lord: "I see that Thou art even now coming to me; but why hast Thou not first adorned my heart with some ornaments of devotion, with which I might be more suitably prepared to come and meet Thee?" But the Lord answered: "Know that sometimes I am more pleased with the virtue of humility than with exterior devotion."

      A Religious, not being able to understand a passage of Holy Scripture, fasted for seven weeks, and not understanding it then resolved to go to another monk and inquire about it. But scarcely had he gone out of his cell when there appeared to him an Angel sent expressly from God, who said to him: "Thy fast has not rendered thee pleasing to God, but rather this humiliation of thine"; and then he solved for him the doubt.

      After Tais was converted, she held herself always so low in her own eyes, on account of her past evil life, that she did not dare to utter the holy name of God even in invoking Him, but only said, "My Creator, have mercy on me!" And by this humility, she arrived at such a sublime degree of perfection that when Paul the Simple saw a most beautiful place in Paradise, which he supposed to be intended for St. Anthony, he was informed that it would be occupied by Tais within a fortnight.

      St. Bonaventure [pictured above] said: "I know a thing to do which will please the Lord. I will consider myself as refuse, I will become intolerable to myself. And when I find myself shamed, degraded, trampled upon and loaded with insults by others, I will rejoice and exult, because of myself I cannot abuse or detest myself as much as I ought. I will call in help from all creatures, desiring to be confounded and punished by them all, because I have despised their Creator. This shall be my dearest treasure----to solicit insults and slights upon myself, to love above all others those who will help me in this, and to abhor all the consolation and honors of the present life. If I do this, I believe it certain that the treasury of Divine Mercy will open above me, miserable and unworthy as I am."

      St. Francis of Assisi considered himself not only a mere nothing, the greatest sinner in the world, and deserving of Hell, but unworthy even that God should give him a thought. One day while he was speaking in this manner to one of his companions, the latter saw, in spirit, that there was prepared for him in Heaven a seat among the Seraphim.

      7. One day of humble self-knowledge is a greater grace from the Lord, although it may have cost us many afflictions and trials, than many days of prayer.----St. Teresa

      St. Gertrude, once reflecting upon the benefits she had received from God, blushed for herself and became so odious in her own eyes that she seemed unworthy to remain in the sight of God, and she would gladly have found some nook, where she might conceal from man, if not from God, the odor of corruption with which she felt herself tainted. At this, Christ humbled Himself to her with so much goodness that the whole celestial court stood amazed.

      The venerable Mother Seraphina di Dio received, one day, a spiritual light, by means of which (as she states in her account of it to her director) she perceived clearly that God, being by His nature luminous truth, can behold in Himself only that which He really is----that is, infinite perfection, in which He rejoices and delights. Therefore, when He wishes to unite a soul to Himself, He communicates to it a light of truth, by which it sees, without error or deception, its own nature; that is, that by itself it has never done any good, neither is it able to do any; that in itself it has only inclination to evil, and what good it has is altogether from God. And such a person has no need of much consideration and analysis, because with such a light of truth, all appears so clear that to think otherwise would be mere darkness and deceit. But though the soul, in this clear light, appears ugly, deformed and odious in its own eyes, yet, in the eyes of God, it seems beautiful and very pleasing, because it becomes like His own most true and luminous nature. It happened that this same servant of God, after leading an innocent and most perfect life, came at one time to know her imperfections with such clearness that they seemed to her to become very grave and frightful sins, so that she experienced great bitterness of spirit and could obtain no peace; when she was reproved for any failure, she was not at all disturbed, but said in her heart: "What you see is nothing. Oh, if you saw all, how you would abhor me!" But the Lord consoled her by telling her interiorly that her past imperfections seemed to her so unusually great because her soul was in a state of clear light, but that these deformities were no longer in existence, as He had already cancelled them by His Blood.

      8. Hold thyself as vile; rejoice to be so held by others; never exalt thyself by reason of the gifts of God, and thou shalt be perfectly humble.----St. Bonaventure

      A soul of precisely this type was St. Mary Magdalen de' Pazzi. It is recorded of her that she was so vile in her own eyes that she constantly looked upon herself as the lowest of creatures and the most disgraceful and abominable thing upon earth. Being one day called to the grate by the Duchess of Bracciano, she said with great feeling, "If my lady Duchess knew that Sister Mary Magdalen is the abomination of this convent, she would not think of naming her, much less of sending for her." In the same light in which she looked upon herself, she desired also to be viewed by others; and when she was treated contemptuously, or in any way humiliated, she rejoiced so much that in reward for the great gladness with which she received humiliations, she was often rapt in ecstasy after them. For this reason she could not bear to see that she was honored and esteemed, and that others had a good opinion of her; and to prevent this, she would often accuse herself in public and in private of her smallest defects, even with exaggeration.

      And so, with things which were not really faults, she mentioned them in such a way as to make them seem grave faults. For example, in cutting up a pineapple one day, she ate two morsels that fell from it. Therefore, she accused herself of gluttony, and of eating outside of the refectory, contrary to the Constitution. She took, besides, all possible pains to conceal from others her virtues and holy works, and when she could not do this, she would try to depreciate them by showing that they were full of defects; in this way she would make the most perfect actions seem worthy of reproof, or, at least, merely natural, and springing from her own inclination. And as she could neither prevent nor conceal the ecstasies which were granted to her, it displeased her exceedingly to be looked at, or listened to, while they lasted, even to such a degree that she once complained to the Lord, saying: "O my Jesus! how is it that Thou hast conferred upon me so much that is known only to Thee and myself, and now Thou wilt have me reveal it? Hast Thou not promised me that as Thou wast hidden, so should I also be?" Once when her confessor ordered her to report to her companions what happened to her in these ecstasies, she wept bitterly, as she did also in making the relation, so that finally she went so far as to entreat the Lord to make her no more communications of the kind. She was so far from drawing any complacency or self-esteem from this source that, as if she had committed a fault, she would humble herself after these favors, even to the last novice or lay-sister, and set herself to perform the daily exercises with them, and converse with them with so much humility and charity that it was an admirable thing to see and hear her, first holding communion with the Divine Majesty with such loftiness of ideas, and then, immediately after, to behold her so humble, dependent, and submissive to her neighbors.

      9. Humility, which Christ recommended to us both by word and example, ought to include three conditions. First, we are to consider ourselves, in all sincerity, worthy of the contempt of men; secondly, to be glad that others should see what is imperfect in us and what might cause them to despise us; thirdly, when the Lord works any good in us or by our means, to conceal it, if possible, at the sight of our