Of the Imitation of Christ/Book III/Chapter XIV
CHAPTER XIV.
OF CONSIDERING THE SECRET JUDGMENT OF GOD, THAT SO WE BE NOT LIFTED UP FOR ANYTHING GOOD IN US.
HOU, Lord, thunderest forth Thy judgments over me, Thou shakest all my bones with fear and trembling, and my soul is very sore afraid.
I stand astonished; and I consider "That the heavens are not pure in Thy sight."
If in angels Thou didst find wickedness, and didst not spare even them, what shall become of me?
Even stars fell from heaven, what then can I presume who am but dust?
They whose works seemed commendable, have fallen into the lowest misery: and those who did eat the bread of angels, I have seen delighting themselves with the husks of swine.
2. There is therefore no holiness, if Thou, Lord, withdraw Thine hand.
No wisdom availeth, if Thou cease to guide.
No courage helpeth, if Thou leave off to defend.
No chastity is secure, if Thou do not protect it.
No vigilance of our own availeth, if Thy sacred watchfulness be not present with us.
For, if we be left of Thee, we sink and perish; but being visited of Thee, we are raised up and live.
Truly we are unstable, but by Thee we are established: we wax lukewarm, but by Thee we are inflamed.
3. O how humbly and meanly ought I to think of myself! how ought I to esteem it as nothing, if I seem to have any good.
With what profound humility ought I to submit myself to Thine unfathomable judgments, O Lord; where I find myself to be nothing else than very nothing!
O weight that cannot be measured! O sea that cannot be passed over, where I discover nothing of myself save only and wholly nothing!
Where then can glorying hide itself? Who can trust in his own virtue?
All vain-glorying is swallowed up in the deep of Thy judgments over me.
4. What is all flesh in Thy sight?
Shall the clay glory against Him that formed it?
How can he be lifted up with vain words, whose heart is truly subject to God?
He whom the Truth hath subjected unto itself, not all the world will make him proud: neither shall he, who hath firmly settled his hope in God, be moved by the tongues of flatterers.
For even they themselves who speak are all nothing, for they will pass away with the sound of their words; but the truth of the Lord remaineth for ever.