Do you forget your own nothingness? Have you any self-esteem?

If such be the case you are a

seducer, a deceiver of your own self, because, as St. Paul says: Whoever believes himself to be
something “deceives himself.” Do you delight and glory in your knowledge, your power, your riches,
or in some other gift natural or moral? Remember the word God spoke by the Prophet Jeremiah: “Let
not the wise man glory in his wisdom, and let not the strong man glory in his strength, and let not the
rich man glory in his riches. And again by St. Paul: “We ought not to please ourselves.” This delight
and glory insinuates itself insensibly, but he who is humble notices it quickly an repels it as being
nothing but vanity and only puffing up and filling the heart with pride. In the same way with the
spiritual life. Do you think yourself virtuous because you sometimes do a little good? You would do
well then not to regard yourself as good, but to imagine yourself in Jerusalem repudiated by God,
because, as the prophet said, thou art “trusting in thy beauty.” And St. Gregory says of such as you:
“The soul hath confidence in its beauty when it takes some good action upon itself.”