Un errore di molti, dai quali la pusillanimità è tenuta per virtù
The Trap of False Humility
Many mistake the anxiety following a fall for virtue, failing to see it as a symptom of hidden pride.
Many are still deceived by this, attributing to virtue the timidity and anxiety that follow sin, simply because they are accompanied by some displeasure. They don't realize that these feelings arise from hidden pride and a presumption based on confidence in themselves and their own strength—a strength they had excessively trusted because they thought they were something. When these people see evidence that they have fallen into error, they become disturbed and amazed as if it were something strange. They grow timid, witnessing that the support they had vainly placed their confidence in has fallen to the ground.
The Calm of True Humility
The truly humble person remains peaceful after a fall, knowing their strength comes from God alone.
This doesn't happen to the humble person, who, trusting in his only God and presuming nothing of himself, when he falls into any sin, although he feels sorrow for it, does not become anxious or astonished; he knows that all this happens to him because of his own misery and weakness, which he recognizes very well with the light of truth.
Read the original Latin
In questo ancora si ingannano molti, i quali attribuiscono a virtù la pusillanimità e l'inquietudine che seguono dopo il peccato, perché sono accompagnate da qualche dispiacere: ma essi non sanno che nascono da occulta superbia e presunzione fondate sulla confidenza in se stessi e nelle proprie forze nelle quali, perché si stimavano qualche cosa, avevano eccessivamente confidato. Costoro, scorgendo dalla prova della caduta di sbagliare, si turbano e si meravigliano come di cosa strana e diventano pusillanimi, vedendo caduto per terra quel sostegno in cui vanamente avevano riposto la loro confidenza.
Questo non accade all'umile, il quale, confidando nel suo solo Dio e in niente presumendo di sé, quando incorre in qualsiasi colpa, pur sentendone dolore, non se ne inquieta o se ne meraviglia: egli sa che tutto ciò gli avviene per sua miseria e propria debolezza da lui molto ben conosciute con lume di verità.
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