Chapter VII.
How vainglory and pride can be consummated
without any assistance from the body.
And to go on in the order which we proposed,
with our account of the way in which the other passions act (our analysis of
which was obliged to be interrupted by this account of gluttony and of the
Lord's temptation) vainglory and pride can be consummated even without the
slightest assistance from the body. For in what way do those passions need
any action of the flesh, which bring ample destruction on the soul they take
captive simply by its assent and wish to gain praise and glory from men? Or
what act on the part of the body was there in that pride of old in the case
of the above mentioned Lucifer; as he only conceived it in his heart and
mind, as the prophet tells us: "Who saidst in thine heart: I will ascend
into heaven, I will set my throne above the stars of God. I will ascend
above the heights of the clouds, I will be like the most High."16
And just as he had no one to stir him up to this pride, so his thoughts
alone were the authors of the sin when complete and of his eternal fall;
especially as no exercise of the dominion at which he aimed followed....
Chapter X. How six of these faults
are related, and the two which differ from them are akin to one another.
OF these eight faults then, although they
are different in their origin and in their way of affecting us, yet the six
former; viz., gluttony, fornication, covetousness, anger, dejection,
accidie, have a sort of connection with each other, and are, so to speak,
linked together in a chain, so that any excess of the one forms a starting
point for the next. ...But the two remaining faults; viz., vainglory and
pride, are connected together in a somewhat similar way as the others of
which we have spoken, so that the growth of the one makes a starting point
for the other (for superfluity of vainglory produces an incentive to pride);
but they are altogether different from the six former faults, and are not
joined in the same category with them, since not only is there no
opportunity given for them to spring up from these, but they are actually
aroused in an entirely different way and manner. For when these others have
been eradicated these latter flourish the more vigorously, and from the
death of the others they shoot forth and grow up all the stronger: and
therefore we are attacked by these two faults in quite a different way. For
we fall into each one of those six faults at the moment when we have been
overcome by the ones that went before them; but into these two we are in
danger of falling when we have proved victorious, and above all after some
splendid triumph. In the cases then of all faults just as they spring up
from the growth of those that go before them, so are they eradicated by
getting rid of the earlier ones. And in this way in order that pride may be
driven out vainglory must be stifled, and so if we always overcome the
earlier ones, the later ones will be checked; and through the extermination
of those that lead the way, the rest of our passions will die down without
difficulty. And though these eight faults of which we have spoken are
connected and joined together in the way which we have shown, yet they may
be more exactly divided into four groups and sub-divisions. For to gluttony
fornication is linked by a special tie: to covetousness anger, to dejection
accidie, and to vainglory pride is closely allied.
Chapter XI. Of the origin and
character of each of these faults.
And now, to speak about each kind of fault
separately: ...Of vainglory, although it takes various forms and shapes, and
is divided into different classes, yet there are two main kinds: (I) when we
are puffed up about carnal things and things visible, and (2) when we are
inflamed with the desire of vain praise for things spiritual and unseen.
Chapter XII. How vainglory may be
useful to us.
But in one
matter vainglory is found to be a useful thing for beginners. I mean by
those who are still troubled by carnal sins, as for instance, if, when they
are troubled by the spirit of fornication, they formed an idea of the
dignity of the priesthood, or of reputation among all men, by which they
maybe thought saints and immaculate: and so with these considerations they
repell the unclean suggestions of lust, as deeming them base and at least
unworthy of their rank and reputation; and so by means of a smaller evil
they overcome a greater one. For it is better for a man to be troubled by
the sin of vainglory than for him to fall into the desire for fornication,
from which he either cannot recover at all or only with great difficulty
after he has fallen. And this thought is admirably expressed by one of the
prophets speaking in the person of God, and saying: "For My name's sake I
will remove My wrath afar off: and with My praise I will bridle thee lest
thou shouldest perish,"24 i.e., while you are enchained by the
praises of vainglory, you cannot possibly rush on into the depths of hell,
or plunge irrevocably into the commission of deadly sins. Nor need we wonder
that this passion has the power of checking anyone from rushing into the sin
of fornication, since it has been again and again proved by many examples
that when once a man has been affected by its poison and plague, it makes
him utterly indefatigable, so that he scarcely feels a fast of even two or
three days. And we have often known some who are living in this desert,
confessing that when their home was in the monasteries of Syria they could
without difficulty go for five days without food, while now they are so
overcome with hunger even by the third hour, that they can scarcely keep on
their daily fast to the ninth hour. And on this subject there is a very neat
answer of Abbot Macarius25 to one who asked him why he was
troubled with hunger as early as the third hour in the desert, when in the
monastery he had often scorned food for a whole week, without feeling
hungry. "Because," said he, "here there is nobody to see your fast, and feed
and support you with his praise of you: but there you grew fat on the notice
of others and the food of vainglory." And of the way in which, as we said,
the sin of fornication is prevented by an attack of vainglory, there is an
excellent and significant figure in the book of Kings, where, when the
children of Israel had been taken captive by Necho, King of Egypt,
Nebuchadnezzar, King of Assyria, came up and brought them back from the
borders of Egypt to their own country, not indeed meaning to restore them to
their former liberty and their native land, but meaning to carry them off to
his own land and to transport them to a still more distant country than the
land of Egypt in which they had been prisoners. And this illustration
exactly applies to the case before us. For though there is less harm in
yielding to the sin of vainglory than to fornication, yet it is more
difficult to escape from the dominion of vainglory. For somehow or other the
prisoner who is carried off to a greater distance, will have more difficulty
in returning to his native land and the freedom of his fathers, and the
prophet's rebuke will be deservedly aimed at him: "Wherefore art thou grown
old in a strange country?26 since a man is rightly said to have
grown old in a strange country, if he has not broken up the Fount of his
faults. ..
Chapter XV. How we can do nothing
against our faults without the help of God, and how we should not be puffed
up by victories over them.
And that we ought not
to be puffed up by victories over them he likewise charges us; saying, "Lest
after thou hast eaten and art filled, hast built goodly houses and dwelt in
them, and shalt have herds of oxen and flocks of sheep, and plenty of gold
and of silver, and of all things, thy heart be lifted up and thou remember
not the Lord thy God, who brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the
house of bondage; and was thy leader in the great and terrible wilderness."29
Solomon also says in Proverbs: "When thine enemy shall fall be not glad, and
in his ruin be not lifted up, lest the Lord see and it displease Him, and He
turn away His wrath from him,"30 i.e., lest He see thy pride of
heart, and cease from attacking him, and thou begin to be forsaken by Him
and so once more to be troubled by that passion which by God's grace thou
hadst previously overcome. For the prophet would not have prayed in these
words, "Deliver not up to beasts, O Lord, the soul that confesseth to Thee,"31
unless he had known that because of their pride of heart some were given
over again to those faults which they had overcome, in order that they might
be humbled. Wherefore it is well for us both to be certified by actual
experience, and also to be instructed by countless passages of Scripture,
that we cannot possibly overcome such mighty foes in our own strength, and
unless supported by the aid of God alone; and that we ought always to refer
the Whole Of our victory each day to God Himself, as the Lord Himself also
gives us instruction by Moses on this very point: "Say not in thine heart
when the Lord thy God shall have destroyed them in thy sight: For my
righteousness hath the Lord brought me in to possess this land, whereas
these nations are destroyed for their wickedness. For it is not for thy
righteousness, and the uprightness of thine heart, that thou shalt go in to
possess their lands: but because they have done wickedly they are destroyed
at thy coming in."32 I ask what could be said clearer in
opposition to that impious notion and impertinence of ours, in which we want
to ascribe everything that we do to our own free will and our own exertions?
"Say not," he tells us, "in thine heart, when the Lord thy God shall have
destroyed them in thy sight: For my righteousness the Lord hath brought me
in to possess this land." To those who have their eyes opened and their ears
ready to hearken does not this plainly say: When your struggle with carnal
faults has gone well for you, and you see that you are free from the filth
of them, and from the fashions of this world, do not be puffed up by the
success of the conflict and victory and ascribe it to your own power and
wisdom, nor fancy that you have gained the victory over spiritual wickedness
and carnal sins through your own exertions and energy, and free will?
For there is no doubt that in all this you could not possibly have
succeeded, unless you had been fortified and protected by the help of the
Lord.
Chapter XVI. Of the meaning of the
seven nations of whose lands lsrael took possession, and the reason why they
are sometimes spoken of as "seven," and sometimes as "many."
These are the seven
nations whose lands the Lord promised to give to the children of lsrael when
they came out of Egypt. And everything which, as the Apostle says, happened
to them "in a figure"33 we ought to take as written for our
correction. For so we read: "When the Lord thy God shall have brought thee
into the land, which thou art going in to possess, and shall have destroyed
many nations before thee, the Hittite, and the Girgashites, and the Amorite,
the Canaanite, and the Perizzite, and the Hivite, and the Jebusite, seven
nations much more numerous than thou art and much stronger than thou: and
the Lord thy God shall have delivered them to thee, thou shalt utterly
destroy them."34 And the reason that they are said to be much
more numerous, is that faults are many more in number than virtues and so in
the list of them the nations are reckoned as seven in number, but when the
attack upon them is spoken of they are set down without their number being
given, for thus we read "And shall have destroyed many nations before thee."
For the race of carnal passions which springs from this sevenfold incentive
and root of sin, is more numerous than that of Israel. ... And though these
are far more numerous than the virtues are, yet if those eight principal
sins, from which we know that these naturally proceed, are first overcome,
all these at once sink down, and are destroyed together with them with a
lasting destruction.... For from vainglory proceed contention,
heresies, boasting and confidence in novelties. From pride, contempt, envy,
disobedience, blasphemy, murmuring, backbiting. And that all these
plagues are stronger than we, we can tell very plainly from the way in which
they attack us. For the delight in carnal passions wars more powerfully in
our members than does the desire for virtue, which is only gained with the
greatest contrition of heart and body. But if you will only gaze with the
eyes of the spirit on those countless hosts of our foes, which the Apostle
enumerates where he says: "For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but
against principalities, against powers, against the world-rulers of this
darkness, against spiritual wickedness in heavenly places,"39 and
this which we find of the righteous man in the nineteenth Psalm: "A thousand
shall fall beside thee and ten thousand at thy right hand,"40
then you will clearly see that they are far more numerous and more powerful
than are we, carnal and earthly creatures as we are, while to them is given
a substance which is spiritual and incorporeal.
