Against Pride
January 12
(A Discourse of Saint Evagrius on the Humble and the Exalted)
By Archpriest Victor Guryev
January 12
(A Discourse of Saint Evagrius on the Humble and the Exalted)
By Archpriest Victor Guryev
Since the sin of pride has harmful consequences for everyone in general — raising people high and casting them low, and even drawing some into the very abyss of perdition — we therefore, for the sake of removing the proud from this sin and teaching them humility, offer for edification one of the discourses of Saint Evagrius, which we ask you to hear with attention.
Saint Evagrius says:
“Why do you take pride, O man, being filth and corruption? Why do you exalt yourself above the clouds? Consider your nature: for you are earth and ashes, and in a little while you will return to dust. Today you are proud, and tomorrow a worm. Why do you lift up a neck that cannot escape corruption? For man is great only when the Lord helps him; but when the Lord leaves him, he immediately sees his own nothingness. And you possess only that true good which God has given you. Why do you exalt yourself, when today you are, and tomorrow you will not be? Why do you boast of the grace of God as though you had purchased it? Know the Most High and do not exalt yourself. Being a creation of God, do not depart from Him who created you. Receiving help from God, do not remain ungrateful. Do not vaunt yourself in virtues, for they are not from you, but from God. Even if you have done a good deed, yet God helped you in accomplishing it; therefore glorify Him who exalted you. Do not despise your kindred, even if they are poor and lowly. Do not offend the humble: he is better than you; he is firm, and therefore, though he walks upon the earth, he does not soon fall, whereas the lofty quickly fall and are dashed to pieces. Pride is a rotten seat, for he who sits upon it soon falls. Humble wisdom is a man’s fence and wall, and he who holds to it will stand. A bubble upon the water perishes, and the memory of the proud does not endure after death. The word of the humble is the strength of the soul, but the word of the proud is filled with fury. The prayer of the humble reaches God, but the prayer of the proud provokes Him. Even when you have ascended to the summit of virtues, you still have no need to boast. He who falls upon the ground soon rises, but he who falls from a height may quickly be dashed to death.”
After these words of Saint Evagrius, what more is there to say to you, brethren? From this discourse you have heard that we are all earth and ashes, and in a little while we shall return to dust. From this it becomes evident of itself that we have nothing in which to take pride — and indeed so it is. Look around you: “What,” says one of the most renowned preachers of the Russian Church (Innocent), “becomes of rank and glory, of wisdom and knowledge, of wealth and luxury? Alas! the most eminent man in the cemetery is food for worms just as much as the poorest beggar; the wisest and most eloquent is as voiceless as a little child; the bones of the richest lie just as bare as those of him who throughout his life had nothing with which to cover his nakedness; all is leveled, smoothed, and erased by the hand of death.” And yet we take pride in all this, we exalt ourselves before those known and unknown to us! Is it for us to act thus? No, brethren, it remains for us only to humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God, to acknowledge our unworthiness, and, striking our breasts, to cry out with the publican: "God make atonement for me the sinner!" And this will be the very best for us. Amen.
Source: Translated by John Sanidopoulos.
