The Steps of Humility and Pride XII:40 67
The Steps of Humility and Pride XII:40
curiosity with the last306 and levity with the second last;307 and the same will hold for all others, if they are compared one with the other. We will proceed now to the third step of pride—to teach it, not I hope, to practise it.
THE THIRD STEP: GIDDINESS 3 0 8
XII.
40. The proud always seek what is pleasant and try to avoid what is troublesome. In the words of Scripture: "Where there is gladness, there is the heart of the fool." 3 0 9 The monk that has come down the two steps of curiosity and levity of mind will find much to upset him. He is saddened every time he sees the goodness of others, impatient with humiliation.
He finds an escape in false consolations. His eyes are closed to anything that shows his own vileness or the excellence of others, wide open to what flatters himself. He is largely saved now from his moody exaltation and depression; he has retired into a happy cloud-land. This is the third step. There are indications by which you can know when you yourself or another have reached this point. Watch such a man and you will never notice anything like a tear or a sigh. His appearance is that of 306. "The twelfth degree of humility is that a monk not only have humility in his heart but also by his very appearance make it always manifest to those who see him. That is to say that whether he is at the Work of God, in the oratory, in the monastery, in the garden, on the road, in the fields or anywhere else, and whether sitting walking or standing he should always have his head bowed and his eyes toward the ground. Feeling the guilt of his sins at every moment, he should consider himself already present at the dread Judgment and constantly say in his heart what the publican in the Gospel said with his eyes fixed on the earth:
"Lord, I am a sinner and not worthy to lift up my eyes to heaven." and again with the Prophet: " I am bowed down and humbled everywhere."—RB 7:62-66.
307. "The eleventh degree of humility is that when a monk speaks he do so gently and without laughter, humbly and seriously, in few and sensible words, and that he be not noisy in his speech. It is written, 'A wise man is known by the fewness of his words.' "—RB 7:60-61. Bernard's descriptive semper vero irrationabilia... verba is in contrast to Benedict's pauca verba et rationabilia.
308. In Gra 14 Bernard brings out how truly miserable is this giddiness or false joy: Nulla autern verior miseria, quam falsa laetitia. (OB 3:176; CF 19). More important he points out the source of true joy: hope in the Lord rather than in self—SC 37:3; OB 2:10; CF 7.
309. Eccles 7:5.
The Steps of Humility and Pride XIII: 41 a man who is forgetful of what he is or at least is now purified of all trace of sin. He is scurrilous310 in sign-makiirg,311 overcheerful in appearance, swaggering in his bearing, always ready for ajoke, any little thing quickly gets a laugh.312 He is careful not to remember anything he has done which could hurt his self-esteem; but all his good points will be remembered, and added up, and if need be, touched up by imagination. He thinks only of what he wants and never of what is permitted.
At times he simply cannot stop laughing or hide his empty-headed merriment. He is like a well-filled bladder that has been pricked and squeezed. The air, not finding a free vent, whistles out through the little hole with squeak after squeak. The rule of silence313 will not let a monk relieve himself of his vain thoughts and silly jokes. They gather pressure inside until they burst out in giggles.314 In embarrassment he buries his face in his hands, tightens his lips, clenches his teeth. It is no use! The laughter must explode and if his hand holds it in his mouth, it bursts out through his nose.
THE FOURTH STEP: BOASTING
XIII. 41. When vanity has swelled the bladder to its limits a bigger vent must be made or the bladder will burst. As the monk's silly merriment grows, laughing and signs are not 310. Scurrility is quite strongly reprobated by the Benedictine Rule: "But as for scurrility and idle words or words that move to laughter, these we condemn everywhere with a perpetual ban, and for such conversation we do not permit a disciple to open his mouth."—RB 6:8.
311. Not only the Cistercians but many of the Black Monks of this time shared a common sign language whose origins are lost in abscurity. It is still employed in some monasteries. See R. Barakat, The Cistercian Sign Language: A Study in Nonverbal Communication,
Cistercian Studies Series 11 (Spencer, Mass.: Cistercian Publications, 1972).
312. Facilius ac promptus in mu—RB 7:59, where Benedict uses it to describe the tenth step of humility by negation.
313. This is found especially in. RB 6, the chapter immediately proceeding the steps of humility. For a thorough study of the provisions in RB for silence see
Ambrose Wathen, OSB, Sileme: The Meaning of Silence in the Rule of St Benedict, Cistercian Studies Series 22 (Spencer, Mass.: Cistercian Publications, 1972).
314. Bernard might have had in mind here Persius, Satires 3:8: ingeminant tremulos naso crispante cachinnos, especially in view of his use of cachinnos on the way he ends the paragraph. See The Satires of A. Persius Flaccus, tr. J.
Covington, ed. H. Nettleship, 3 ed. (Oxford: Clarendon, 1893), pp. 66-7.