De gradibus humilitatis et superbiae
The Ordered Ascent to Truth
The author transitions from discussing the benefits of humility to outlining the ordered steps by which truth is sought.
I've said what I can about the benefit by which the steps of humility ought to be climbed; now I'll say what I can about the order in which they lead to the prize of truth that's been set before us.✦1
Three Ways of Seeking Truth
Truth is sought in three ways: in ourselves through self-judgment, in our neighbors through compassion, and in its own nature through pure contemplation.
But because the recognition of truth itself also consists in three steps, I will briefly distinguish them, if I can, so that it may become clearer from this to which of the three kinds of truth the twelfth step of humility reaches. We seek truth, you see, in ourselves, in our neighbors, and in its own nature. In ourselves, by judging ourselves; in our neighbors, by sympathizing with their sufferings; in its own nature, by contemplating it with a pure heart.
The Order of Love: Neighbor Before Self
Drawing on the Beatitudes, the author argues that truth is first perceived in neighbors through brotherly love before it is contemplated in its own nature.
Pay attention to order just as much as you pay attention to number. Let Truth herself teach you first the order in which the nature of things ought to be sought — that neighbors come before self.2 After this you'll learn why you ought to seek truth in yourself before seeking it in your neighbors. In the number of the beatitudes, which he distinguished in his discourse, he placed the merciful before the pure in heart.✦3 The merciful quickly perceive truth in their neighbors, since they extend their own feelings toward them; and so through love they conform themselves to them, that they may feel their neighbors' good and evil as if it were their own.4 He is made weak with the weak; with the scandalized he is burned.✦5 They have learned to rejoice with those who rejoice and to weep with those who weep.✦6 Once the keen edge of the heart has been cleansed by this brotherly love, they delight in contemplating the truth in its own nature; and for the love of truth they endure the evils of others as their own.7
The Failure of the Uncompassionate
Those who do not share in the feelings of others cannot grasp the truth about them, lacking the necessary empathetic experience.
But those who don't join themselves to the brothers in this way — who instead either mock those who weep or look down on those who rejoice — since they don't feel in themselves what is in them, how can they grasp the truth about others, when they haven't been moved in the same way themselves?
Learning Mercy Through Shared Suffering
Only those who know their own wretchedness can truly share in another's suffering, following Christ's example of learning obedience through suffering.
Well, then, that common proverb fits them perfectly: the healthy person has no idea what the sick person feels, or the full person what the hungry person suffers. And the sick person suffers with the sick, and the hungry with the hungry — the closer the bond, the more intimately they share each other's pain. For just as pure truth is seen only by a pure heart, so a brother's misery is felt more truly by a heart that is itself wretched. But in order to have a wretched heart because of another's misery, you must first recognize your own — so that you may find your neighbor's mind reflected in your own, and from knowing yourself learn how to come to that person's aid. Follow the example of our Savior, who willed to suffer in order to know how to suffer with us, who became wretched in order to learn how to show mercy — even as it is written of him: "And he learned obedience from what he suffered." In the same way, learn whose mercy reaches from eternity to eternity. What he knew by nature from all eternity, he learned through temporal experience.✦
Read the original Latin
Dixi, ut potui, quo fructu humilitatis gradus ascendi debeant; dicam, ut potero, quo ordine ad propositum bravium veritatis perducant.
Sed quia ipsa quoque veritatis agnitio in tribus gradibus consistit, ipsos breviter, si possum, distinguo quatenus ex hoc clarius innotescat, ad quem trium veritatis, duodecimus humilitatis pertingat. Inquirimus namque veritatem in nobis, in proximis, in sui natura. In nobis, nosmetipsos diiudicando, in proximis, eorum malis compatiendo; in sui natura, mundo corde contemplando.
Observa sicut numerum, ita et ordinem. Primo te doceat Veritas ipsa, quos prius in proximis quam in sui debeat inquiri natura. Post haec accipies, cur prius in te quam in proximis inquirere debeas. In numero siquidem beatitudinum, quas suo sermone distinxit, prius misericordes quam mundicordes posuit. Misericordes quippe cito in proximis veritatem deprehendunt, dum suos affectus in illos extendunt, dum sic per caritatem se illis conformant, ut illorum vel bona, vel mala, tamquam propria sentiam. Cum infirmis infirmatur, cum scandalizatis uruntur. Gaudere cum gaudentibus, flere cum flentibus consueverunt. Hac caritatis fraterna cordis acie mundata, veritatem delectantur in sui contemplari natura, pro cuius amore mala tolerant aliena.
Qui vero se ita fratribus non consociant, sed e contrario aut flentibus insultant, aut gaudentibus derogant, dum quod in illis est, in se non sentiunt, quia similiter affecti non sunt, veritatem in proximis qualiter deprehendere possunt?
Bene namque convenit illis illud vulgare proverbium: Nescit sanus quis sentiat aeger, aut plenus quid patiatur ieiunus. Et aeger aegro, et ieiunus ieiuno quanto propinquius, tanto familiarius compatiuntur. Sicut enim pura veritas non nisi puro corde videtur, sic miseria fratris verius misero corde sentitur. Sed ut ob alienam miseriam cor miserum habeas, oportet tuam prius agnoscas, ut proximi mentem in tua invenias, et ex te noveris qualiter illi subvenias, exemplo scilicet Salvatoris nostri, qui pati voluit ut compati sciret, miser fieri ut misereri disceret, ut quomodo de ipso scriptum est: Et didicit ex his quae passus est oboedientiam, ita disceret, cuius misericordia ab aeterno et usque in aeternum; se quod natura sciebat ab aeterno, temporali didicit experimento.
Scripture echoes
- ↩1Cor.9.24;Phil.3.14 — Do you not know that those who run in a stadium all run, but only one receives the prize? Run in such a way that you may obtain it. Phil.3.14 — I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.
- ↩Matt.5.7-Matt.5.8 — Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy. Matt.5.8 — Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.
- ↩1Cor.11.29;Rom.14.21 — For the one who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself. Rom.14.21 — It is good not to eat meat or drink wine or do anything by which your brother stumbles.
- ↩Rom.12.15 — Rejoice with those who rejoice; weep with those who weep.
- ↩Heb.5.8 — Although he was a Son, he learned obedience through what he suffered.
Notes
- 1 ↩Bravium (βραβεῖον) is a Greek loanword meaning 'prize' or 'reward,' echoing Pauline usage (cf. 1 Cor 9:24, Phil 3:14). The two instances of ut are ambiguous between result and manner; the result reading ('as far as I was able') is chosen as more likely given the potui/potero frame.
- 2 ↩'quos prius in proximis quam in sui debeat inquiri natura' — the relative clause is compressed. The sense is that the nature (of truth) ought to be sought first in neighbors rather than in oneself. Rendered to preserve the priority of neighbor over self.
- 3 ↩Refers to the ordering of the Beatitudes in Christ's Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5:7 before 5:8). 'mundicordes' (pure-hearted) is a rare Latin formation.
- 4 ↩'ut' clause treated as result/purpose. 'caritatem' rendered as 'love' per lexeme policy default; the context is fraternal charity.
- 5 ↩Both 'cum' clauses with subjunctive read as causal or temporal. The sense echoes 1 Corinthians 11:29 and Romans 14:21 — the empathetic suffering of the merciful person.
- 6 ↩Direct echo of Romans 12:15.
- 7 ↩'Hac...mundata' is an ablative absolute: 'With this keen edge of the heart having been cleansed.' 'pro cuius amore' — 'cuius' refers back to 'veritatem': for the love of truth.
De gradibus humilitatis et superbiae (On the Steps of Humility and Pride) companion
Humility is climbed one day at a time
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