De confessione propriæ infirmitatis, et hujus vitæ miseriis.

Confessing Weakness Before God

The soul confesses its unrighteousness and frailty, acknowledging how even small things and trivial temptations overwhelm it.

I confess my own unrighteousness against myself; Lord, I will confess my weakness to you.^✦ Often it's a small thing that brings me down and saddens me. I set myself firmly to act, but when even a slight temptation comes, it becomes all the more distressing to me. Sometimes the thing from which a heavy temptation arises is utterly worthless; while I think myself somewhat safe, without even sensing it, I find myself sometimes almost conquered by a mere breath.

A Cry for Mercy from the Mire

The soul lays bare its instability and weariness before God, pleading for deliverance from the mire of passion and intrusive thoughts.

See, then, Lord, my humility and my frailty, known to you on every side. Have mercy on me, and rescue me from the mire, so that I may not be stuck fast — so that I may not remain defeated at every turn.^✦¹ This is what frequently strikes me down and shames me before you: that I am so unstable and so weak when it comes to resisting the passions. And even if I don't give in to them fully, still their pursuit of me is troubling and burdensome, and I am weary — so weary of living every day in conflict like this.² From all this, let my weakness be plain to me, because abominable fantasies always rush in far more easily than they depart.³

The Misery of This Wretched Life

The soul calls upon God for strength against the old self and laments a life never free from tribulations, snares, and relentless successive trials.

Mighty God of Israel, most strong, you who burn with zeal for the souls of the faithful — look on the labor and grief of your servant, and stand by him in everything, wherever he may go.^✦ Strengthen me with heavenly fortitude, so that the old self — this wretched flesh, not yet well subjected to the spirit — may not gain dominion over me, against which I'll have to struggle as long as breath remains in this most wretched life.^✦ Alas, what kind of life is this? Where tribulations and miseries are never absent, where everything is full of snares and enemies. For when one tribulation or temptation recedes, another takes its place — and even while the earlier struggle is still raging, several more come upon me, unexpected ones.

The World's Deceit and the Soul's Blind Love

The soul questions how a life so full of bitterness can still be loved, exposing the world's deceit and the fleshly desires that keep souls bound to it.

And how can human life be loved, when it holds so many bitternesses, and so many things are subjected to calamities and miseries? And how can it even be called a life, when it produces so many deaths and plagues? And yet it is loved, and many seek their delight in it. The world is often blamed for being deceitful and vain, and yet it is not easily abandoned, when the lusts of the flesh hold sway. Some things draw us to love, others to despise; still others draw us toward the love of the world, the desire of the flesh, the desire of the eyes, and the pride of life; but the punishments and miseries that follow these things produce weariness and hatred of the world.^✦⁴

The Contrast: Worldly Delight and Divine Sweetness

The soul contrasts the worldly mind conquered by corrupt pleasure with those who despise the world and taste the divine sweetness promised to true renouncers.

But — what grief! — corrupt pleasure conquers a mind given over to the world, and it counts its delights as nothing but thorns, because it has neither seen nor tasted the sweetness of God nor the inner beauty of virtue.⁵⁶ But those who perfectly despise the world and strive to live for God under holy discipline — they know well the divine sweetness promised to true renouncers, and they see how grievously the world errs and is deceived in all sorts of ways.⁷

Read the original Latin

Confiteor adversum me injustitiam meam; confitebor tibi, Domini, infirmitatem meam. Sæpe parva res est quæ dejicit et contristat. Præpono me firmiter acturum, sed cum modica tentatio venerit, magis mihi sit angustia. Valde vilis quandoque res est, unde gravis tentatio provenit; dum puto me aliquantulum tutum, cum non sentio, invenio me nonnunquam pæne devictum ex levi flatu.

Vide ergo, Domine, humilitatem meam, et fragilitatem tibi undique notam. Miserere mei, et eripe me de luto, ut non infigar, non permaneam devictus usquequaque. Hoc est quod me frequenter reverberat, et coram te confundit, quod tam labilis sum, et infirmus ad resistendum passionibus, et si non omnino ad consensionem, tamen mihi etiam molesta et gravis est earum insectatio, et tædet valde sic quotidie vivere in lite. Exhinc nota sit mihi infirmitas mea, quia multo facilius irruunt abominandæ semper phantasiæ, quam discedunt.

Utinam, fortissime Deus Israel, zelator animarum fidelium, respicias servi tui laborem et dolorem, adsistasque illi in omnibus ad quæcumque perrexerit. Robora me cælesti fortitudine, neque vetus homo, misera caro spiritui necdum bene subjecta valeat dominari, adversus quam certare oportebit, quamdiu spiratur in hac vita miserrima. Heu, qualis est hæc vita? Ubi non desunt tribulationes, et miseriæ; ubi plena laqueis, et hostibus sunt omnia. Nam una tribulatione seu tentatione recedente, alia accedit, sed et adhuc priore durante conflictu aliæ plures superveniunt et insperatæ.

Et quomodo potest amari vita hominis habens tantas amaritudines, et tot subjecta calamitatibus et miseriis? Quomodo etiam dicitur vita tot generans mortes et pestes? Et tamen amatur, et delectari in ea quæritur a multis. Reprehenditur frequenter mundus tanquam fallax sit, et vanus, nec tamen facile relinquitur, cum concupiscentiæ carnis dominantur. Sed alia trahunt ad amandum, alia ad contemnendum, alia ad amorem mundi, carnis desiderium, desiderium oculorum et superbia vitæ; sed pœnæ et miseriæ sequentes ea odium mundi pariunt et tædiunt.

Sed vincit, proh dolor, delectatio prava mentem mundo deditam, et esse sub sentibus delicias reputat, quia Dei suavitatem, et internam virtutis amœnitatem nec vidit nec gustavit. Qui autem mundum perfecte contemnunt, et Deo vivere sub sancta disciplina student, isti dulcedinem divinam veris abrenuntiatoribus promissam non ignorant, et quam graviter mundus errat, et varie fallitur, vident.

Scripture echoes

↩Ps.32.5 — I acknowledged my sin to you, and my iniquity I did not hide. I said, "I will confess my transgressions to the LORD," and you forgave the iniquity of my sin. Selah.
↩Ps.68.3;Ps.70.3 — As smoke is driven away, so may they be driven away; as wax melts before fire, so may the wicked perish before God. Ps.70.3 — Let those who seek my life be put to shame and confounded; let those who delight in my harm be driven back and humiliated.
↩Num.25.11;1Kgs.19.14 — Phinehas son of Eleazar son of Aaron the priest has turned my wrath away from the Israelites, by being zealous with my zeal among them, so that I did not consume the Israelites in my zeal. 1Kgs.19.14 — And he said, 'I have been very zealous for the LORD, the God of hosts, because the sons of Israel have forsaken your covenant. Your altars they have torn down, and your prophets they have killed with the sword. And I alone am left, and they seek my life, to take it.'
↩Rom.6.6;Eph.4.22;Col.3.9 — We know this: our old self was crucified with him, so that the body of sin might be rendered powerless, that we might no longer be enslaved to sin. Eph.4.22 — you were taught to put off your former way of life, the old self, which is being corrupted according to the desires of deceit; Col.3.9 — Do not lie to one another, since you have put off the old self with its practices,
↩1John.2.16 — For all that is in the world—the desire of the flesh and the desire of the eyes and the pride of life—is not from the Father, but is from the world.

Notes

1 ↩eripe me de luto, ut non infigar echoes Psalm 68:3 (Vulgate) / Psalm 69:3 (Hebrew): 'eripe me de luto, ut non infigar.' Candidate allusion pending Moses resolution.
2 ↩passionibus likely dative with resistendum (gerund of obligation/purpose); rendered as 'the passions' in a general sense of disordered impulses or affections.
3 ↩phantasiæ (phantasies) here refers to intrusive mental images or disordered thoughts, a common monastic usage.
4 ↩The italicized Latin span 'carnis desiderium, desiderium oculorum et superbia vitæ' echoes 1 John 2:16 (Vulgate). Final resolution deferred to tx-08 Moses stage.
5 ↩The italicized clause 'esse sub sentibus delicias reputat' is rendered as 'it counts its delights as nothing but thorns.' The image treats worldly pleasures as thorns beneath which one lies.
6 ↩mundo (dat/abl) rendered as 'to the world' (dative sense: a mind given over to the world).
7 ↩autem rendered as 'But' (adversative force, contrasting with the previous sentence). veris abrenuntiatoribus rendered as 'true renouncers' (dat/abl plural).