The fight against pride is the first of all — first in origin, not the first to face nor the first to win (see below): “the beginning of all sin is pride,” according to the traditional formula of Sirach[1], and the whole tradition sees in it the root of which the other vices are only branches. Saint Thomas Aquinas gave it its most exact definition: not mere boasting, but “the disordered appetite for one's own excellence”[2] — the movement by which man places himself above his rightful place, before God and before others.
It is also, of all the vocabulary of the spiritual life, the most poorly identified fight. The word at once evokes the braggart, the self-satisfied man, the one who boasts: a caricature in which no one recognizes himself, so that everyone believes himself safe. Yet true pride is often invisible to the one afflicted by it — it can lodge in touchiness, in the need to be right, in judging others, in discouragement after a fault, even in devotion. Spotting it first requires sweeping away the false ideas that mask it.
“God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.” — First Letter of Saint Peter 5:5[3]
This article reviews the most frequent misconceptions about the fight against pride, grouped according to whether they concern its nature, discernment (what pride is not), the fight itself and its remedies, or the fault and its duration. For each, it states the error in its common formulation, shows why it appeals, why it is false, then recalls what the Church and the saints teach. The reader should note the distinction observed throughout the article: only passages quoted with their source carry authority; diagnoses, summary formulas, and practical applications are the vocabulary and work of the editor.
This is neither a practical guide nor a florilegium: for the detailed nature of pride, its two faces, Saint Bernard's twelve degrees, and the concrete means of fighting it, see How to Grow in the Fight Against Pride; for the distinctive voice of the Fathers, doctors, and mystics, see What the Saints Say About the Fight Against Pride. And since pride is the exact reverse of humility, the reader is referred for misconceptions about the opposite virtue — false humility, self-contempt, scrupulosity — to Common Errors Regarding Humility. Here, as in the twin article Common Errors Regarding the Fight Against Acedia, we clear the ground: we first learn to recognize the enemy in order to wage the true fight.
Why is the fight against pride so misunderstood?
A vice thought to be reserved for the arrogant
The first misunderstanding is one of portrait. Pride is filed among spectacular defects: the boaster, the megalomaniac, the self-satisfied man who speaks loudly and thinks himself superior to all. It is the image of the peacock, of displayed arrogance. Since almost no one recognizes himself in this caricature, everyone concludes that pride is the vice of others — and believes himself exempt. The error brings relief: it files the fight under problems one does not have.
But the pride defined by the Fathers and doctors is not first a behavior: it is an interior movement. Saint Augustine calls it “the appetite for perverse exaltation”[4]; Saint Thomas, “the disordered appetite for one's own excellence”[5]. That desire has no need to boast: it can live just as well in the timid man who ruminates over his humiliations, in the scrupulous man who cannot bear his faults, in the devotee proud of his devotion. The braggart is only one coarse and visible variety; a frequent form is silent, and all the more tenacious for being disguised. Believing pride is recognized by boasting is confusing the disease with one of its symptoms.
A fight thought to be secondary
Second misunderstanding: pride would be a minor defect, a trifle of temperament beside “serious” sins. People fight anger, impurity, avarice; pride, meanwhile, passes for an almost likeable flaw, the sign of a strong character. The error appeals because it removes guilt and spares one the most demanding fight.
But tradition holds pride to be the root of all sin and the queen of vices. Sirach says it bluntly, in the formula handed down by the Vulgate: “the beginning of all sin is pride”[6]; Saint Thomas takes up the affirmation and explains it — pride is “the beginning of all sin” as the first turning away from the submission owed to God[7]. This primacy is understood of origin: some particular sins also come from ignorance or weakness, as Thomas himself specifies[8]. Saint Gregory the Great makes it the sovereign commanding the whole army of vices:
“The queen of the vices, pride, when she has fully subdued a heart, immediately hands it over to seven principal vices, as to her lieutenants, to be utterly laid waste.” — Saint Gregory the Great, Moralia on Job, XXXI, 45[9]
It is also the only sin that lost the angels: Lucifer neither killed nor stole; he preferred himself to God[10]. Scripture warns of it bluntly: “Pride goes before collapse, and pretension, the fall”[11]. Minimizing pride is therefore not neglecting a harmless flaw: it is leaving intact the source from which everything else flows. That is why the fight against pride is not one fight among others, but the one that secretly decides all the others.
Errors about the nature of pride
“Pride means boasting and openly admiring oneself”
This is the foundational error, the matrix of all the others: pride would be boasting, the display of self, self-sufficiency put on show. It is imagined as noisy, visible, measurable by the volume of one's voice. The error appeals because it is convenient — it makes the vice exterior, hence easy to avoid, and easy to recognize… in others.
But the object of pride is not the noise one makes: it is one's own excellence, desired in a disordered way[12]. And this desire can take silent forms: always wanting to be right, being unable to bear contradiction, judging others from on high, constantly comparing oneself, craving approval, smarting at being forgotten, being discouraged by one's faults because one expected better of oneself. None of these forms resembles the braggart, and all can pertain to pride — without each of these movements, taken in isolation, proving by itself a proud consent[13]. Vain glory — the desire to be praised and noticed — is only its first “daughter,” one of its manifestations among others[14]. Reducing pride to boasting means hunting only its caricature, and leaving free its most common form: the one that hides.
“I don't have a good opinion of myself, so I am not proud”
A direct variant, and perhaps the most deceptive: since pride would be excessive love of self, the one who finds himself worthless, who devalues himself, who suffers from an inferiority complex, would by definition be its opposite. People believe themselves humble because they dislike themselves. The error appeals because it mistakes suffering over oneself for modesty.
But self-contempt can be pride turned inside out. The one who collapses at not measuring up perhaps expected to measure up: his dejection may betray the high image he had of himself. Touchiness, bitterness, envy, the need to justify oneself can be born not from too low an esteem of self, but from a wounded self demanding its due. A reflection added by Lamennais to his translation of the Imitation diagnoses it in a word:
“What troubles you is pride, which cannot bear to be corrected.” — Reflection by Félicité de Lamennais added to The Imitation of Christ, book II, ch. 2[15]
Humility is not a bad opinion of oneself: it is the truth about oneself, which refers to God all that one has received and peacefully accepts one's limits. The inferiority complex, meanwhile, may be only a way of looking at oneself — in negative. One can therefore be both eaten up with complexes and profoundly proud: these are sometimes the two faces of a single self not yet surrendered to God. The wound, the complex, or the collapse do not, however, prove by themselves a proud consent: fear, ignorance, or the passions can lessen the fault[16].
“Pride is just one defect among others”
An error of gravity, already glimpsed: pride would be a second-rank vice, without the gravity of murder or adultery. It is fought half-heartedly, in the belief that it does not really threaten salvation. The error appeals because it leaves one in peace.
But Saint Thomas places pride apart, “above” even the seven capital vices distinguished by tradition — “pride, avarice, envy, anger, lust, gluttony, sloth or acedia”[17] — as their root and queen[18]; Cassian holds it to be “the most dreadful of all vices”[19], the one that “destroys all virtues” at once[20]. There is no contradiction here: with Saint Gregory, whose doctrine Thomas takes up, pride commands the list of the seven — including vain glory — without counting itself among them, because it is their root and not one of the branches[21]. The reason is profound: pride does not attack this or that good, as avarice attacks money or gluttony the table; it attacks the very relationship with God, by making oneself one's own rule. That is why it can corrupt even the best actions: one can be chaste, sober, generous out of pride. Saint Gregory applies to the blindness of the proud the image of dust thrown against the wind (Homily 7 on the Gospels, § 4): without humility, the virtues themselves are carried off and scattered. It is therefore not one defect among others: it is the one that can vitiate all the others, and the only one that ever cast an archangel into hell.
Errors of discernment: what pride is not
This is the heart of the matter, and the ground where the most damage is done. For fear of pride, upright souls condemn in themselves perfectly sound movements, forbid themselves to rejoice in a good, refuse their gifts, stifle great desires. One fights well only what one has first correctly identified — and pride is neither self-esteem, nor joy in the good, nor confidence.
“Having a sound esteem of oneself is already pride”
A frequent error among scrupulous souls: any positive appreciation of oneself would be suspect; to be humble, one would have to hold oneself to be bad, incapable, worthless. Just esteem is confused with complacency. The error appeals because it seems safer — aiming too low seems less risky than aiming too high.
But humility is not the lie about oneself in reverse: it is the truth. Saint Teresa of Avila fixed it forever: God being supreme truth, humility is nothing other than walking according to the truth — a paraphrase of her teaching in the Interior Castle, Sixth Mansions, ch. 10[22].
Now the truth about oneself has two sides, and denying either would be equally false. In the same chapter, Teresa teaches that we must render to God what belongs to Him, and render justice to ourselves out of respect and love for the truth — a paraphrase of the same passage[23]. Believing oneself devoid of every gift, when one has received them, is not humility: it is another lie, and often a false modesty angling for contradiction. Healthy self-esteem — knowing what one is worth as a creature loved and endowed by God — has nothing proud about it; pride begins only when one attributes to oneself what one has received, or raises oneself above one's rightful place. For the misconceptions proper to the virtue of humility, see Common Errors Regarding Humility.
“Recognizing one's gifts and rejoicing in a good accomplished is pride”
The error of delicate hearts: as soon as one has done something good, or becomes aware of a talent, one worries about drawing “vain glory” from it and forbids oneself all joy. One believes it more holy never to consider the good received. The error appeals because it rightly fears complacency — but it places the barrier in the wrong spot.
Saint Francis de Sales corrects this scruple precisely:
“Many […] dare not think of the graces God has given them in particular, for fear of taking vain glory and complacency in them, in which certainly they are mistaken. […] We must not fear that the knowledge of what He has put in us will puff us up, provided we are attentive to this truth, that what is good in us is not of us.” — Saint Francis de Sales, Introduction to the Devout Life, III, 5 (excerpt, omissions marked)[24]
Recognizing a gift is not attributing it to oneself; rejoicing in it is not glorying in it. The Virgin herself, in the Magnificat, does not deny the “great things” God does in her: she proclaims them and refers them to their author. The rule lies entirely in Saint Paul: “Who has set you apart? What have you that you did not receive? And if you received it, why do you boast as if you had not received it?”[25]. One may therefore enjoy a good accomplished and thank God for it without an ounce of pride; the vice is born only if one severs the gift from its giver. Gratitude is the exact opposite of vain glory: the one renders to God, the other keeps for self.
“Desiring great things, accepting a responsibility, is pride”
A paralyzing error: aiming high, undertaking, accepting a charge, nourishing great spiritual desires would all be presumption. In the name of humility, people take refuge in willed mediocrity, refuse responsibilities, shrink their aspirations. The error appeals because it confuses magnanimity with pride.
But Saint Thomas teaches that there is no contradiction between magnanimity — the virtue that carries one toward great things — and humility. In his reply on magnanimity (II-II, q. 129, a. 3, ad 4), he distinguishes two sides in man: what is great in him by God's gift, and what is defective by the weakness of his nature — humility restrains presuming of oneself; magnanimity carries one toward great things according to God's gift[26]. What precedes is an editorial synthesis of his doctrine, not a textual quotation.
The two virtues look at the same truth from two angles: humility, my own weakness; magnanimity, the gift received. Saint Thérèse of the Child Jesus is the perfect example of their alliance: it is because she expects nothing of herself that she dares “immense desires” — “in the heart of the Church, my Mother, I shall be Love”[27]. Renouncing great things out of distrust of God is not humility: it is pusillanimity, a defect, not a virtue. The truly humble man does not aim low; he aims high, but without counting on his own strength alone. On this distinction between humility and suffered littleness, see again Common Errors Regarding Humility.
“My touchiness is just being thin-skinned”
The reverse error to the preceding ones, and just as harmful: what may be pride refusing to know itself is excused as mere “sensitivity.” Being wounded by a remark, ruminating over a slight, being unable to digest criticism, demanding apologies, bearing a grudge over an oversight — all this is put down to a raw temperament, even to a quality (“I am a sensitive person”). The error appeals because it turns a defect into an extenuating circumstance.
But wounded self-love can be the signature of pride. If the slightest contradiction troubles me, it may be that my “self” believed itself entitled to things just denied it. A reflection added by Lamennais to his translation of the Imitation said it in one sentence: “What troubles you is pride, which cannot bear to be corrected” (book II, ch. 2)[28]. The truly humble soul is not insensitive — Christ Himself knew anguish — but it is not governed by its self-love: it can be contradicted, forgotten, unjustly criticized without collapsing, because it no longer holds its rest from the esteem of others. Chronic touchiness is therefore not always an innocent fragility: it is often pride ignoring itself and giving itself a fine name — without this mechanism alone proving a proud consent[29].
Errors about the fight and its remedies
Once the enemy is identified, one can still choose the wrong weapon — and pride is so crafty that several spontaneous “remedies” are precisely what nourish it. Its supreme ruse is hiding even within the efforts made to conquer it.
“To conquer pride, one must lower and despise oneself”
The most instinctive error: since pride is love of self, the remedy would be to despise oneself — to lower oneself, call oneself good for nothing, cultivate a bad image of oneself to counterbalance. Humility is confused with self-denigration. The error appeals because it seems energetic and radical.
But despising oneself is still looking at oneself — unfavorably. Saint Bernard defines humility not as hatred of self, but as a true knowledge that lowers in one's own eyes:
“Humility is the virtue by which man, in a most true knowledge of himself, becomes vile in his own eyes.” — Saint Bernard of Clairvaux, The Degrees of Humility and Pride, I, 2[30]
The mainspring is not hatred of self, but “most true knowledge”: it is the truth that makes humble, not lying denigration. Let this be well understood: Bernard joins true knowledge with lowering in one's own eyes — this traditional ascetic lowering before God remains, and it is neither lying denigration nor hatred of self, which alone this article condemns. Francis de Sales, in the same sense, distinguishes “abjection” — the real littleness we suffer — from the virtue of humility, which is the “voluntary acknowledgment” of that littleness, peaceful and untroubled, then goes on to the love of abjection[31]. Despising oneself, being discouraged with oneself, rehearsing one's nullity — this is not fighting pride: it is feeding it in another way, by remaining centered on one's “self.” The true remedy is not to lower oneself, but to turn away from oneself toward God. For the misconceptions of self-contempt and discouragement, see Common Errors Regarding Humility.
“It suffices to conceal one's qualities and play the modest”
An error of façade: fighting pride would consist in appearing modest — minimizing one's successes, saying one is nothing, refusing compliments, putting on self-effacing airs. One works on the appearance of humility. The error appeals because it is visible, easy to stage, and flattering to one's reputation.
But this surface modesty is often pride turned inside out. Francis de Sales drew its merciless portrait:
“We say many times that we are nothing, that we are misery itself […] ; but we would be very sorry to be taken at our word and […] to be published abroad as what we say. On the contrary, we pretend to flee and hide, so that people will run after us and seek us out.” — Saint Francis de Sales, Introduction to the Devout Life, III, 5 (excerpt, omission marked)[32]
This is false humility: lowering oneself in words in order to be contradicted and raised up, begging for denial. It leaves pride intact; it only disguises it. Francis de Sales decides the matter — excerpt: “either let us say no words of humility, or let us say them with a true interior sentiment”[33]. True humility does not play a part: it does not “pretend,” it simply wishes to be hidden[34]. Working on modesty as a mask means fighting pride with its own weapons — and granting it victory at the very moment one believes victory won.
“I shall conquer pride by my own will alone”
The error of courageous souls, and the most paradoxical of all: the fight against pride would be a matter of will — gritting one's teeth, correcting oneself by discipline, conquering by one's own strength. It is made into a personal exploit. The error appeals because it is generous — but it is trapped at the root, for counting on oneself is already the pride one claims to fight.
This is the whole meaning of Cassian's great lesson: pride is not conquered by self, but by attributing all to grace. Cassian teaches that perfection is not reached by one's own strength alone — a theme developed in chapter 10 — but by the Lord's help, referring all to God's grace, with the Apostle's words (1 Cor 15:10; Phil 2:13): a synthesis of the teaching of book XII, chapters 9 and 10[35].
The first weapon against pride is therefore not the strained will, but the avowal: “What have you that you did not receive?”[36]. Lorenzo Scupoli, in The Spiritual Combat, makes it the cornerstone of the whole interior life: distrust of oneself united with confidence in God[37]. Wanting to lay pride low by one's own energy feeds the self-sufficiency that is its mainspring: the vice is chased out the door and returns through the window, proud of having fought so well. The only force that disarms pride is the one asked for on one's knees. On this distrust of self and this confidence, see Common Errors Regarding Trust.
“Fighting pride means fleeing all honor and all limelight”
A subtle error of fervent souls: to escape pride, one would have to systematically flee every charge, every honor, every visibility, refuse responsibilities, hide on principle. Safety is thought to lie in absolute self-effacement. The error appeals because it seems prudent and disinterested.
But spiritual pride hides just as well in fleeing honors as in seeking them. One can be proud of one's self-effacement, draw vanity from never appearing, take complacency in one's own humility — this is the pitfall Cassian reserves for the “perfect,” the pride that no longer attacks beginners through coarse goods, but the advanced through their very virtues[38]. True humility is not the anxious flight from all limelight: it is indifference to being seen or not, accepting a charge when duty calls and leaving it without regret when duty requires. Refusing all responsibility on principle may be pusillanimity — or a pride that prefers risking nothing to risking public failure. The criterion is not the quantity of limelight fled, but the heart's point of support: God, or the gaze of others.
Errors about the fault and its duration
“The slightest movement of pride is already a grave sin”
An error that tortures delicate souls: since pride is the root of all sin, the slightest movement of pride felt — a flash of satisfaction, a twinge of vanity after a compliment, the urge to be noticed — would prove one has already gravely sinned. Temptation is confused with fault, and one sinks into scrupulosity. The error appeals because it takes sin seriously — but it places it too early.
Yet the Church is precise: for a sin to be mortal, three conditions are jointly required — grave matter, full knowledge, complete consent[39][40]. Three degrees must therefore be distinguished: involuntary temptation, without fault — the first movement of pride, the satisfaction that rises before any deliberation, is not yet a sin; the imperfectly voluntary movement, where the will begins to take complacency without full consent — venial, not mortal sin (cf. CCC § 1862; Thomas, q. 162, a. 2 and a. 5)[41]; and mortal sin, when the will consents fully and knowingly. As one can be tempted without sinning, one can feel pride without consenting to it. This first movement is even the occasion of the fight, not its defeat: it is the instant when, spotting it, one refers it at once to God. The scruple that sees a grave sin in every quiver of self-love mistakes the degree — even if irritation at discovering oneself so fragile may itself mingle a remainder of self-love.
“Once pride is conquered, it is conquered for good”
A last error, and the most widespread: the fight against pride would be a stage crossed once and for all, after which one would have “become humble,” safe, dispensed from watching. People believe themselves arrived — and that is precisely the moment they fall back. The error appeals through its convenience: it turns a permanent fight into an acquired title.
But pride is, in the order of combat, the last enemy to die — which does not contradict its primacy of origin: it is first as root, last as final adversary, according to Cassian's distinction (XII, 1 and XII, 6) — and the craftiest: it waits until one is advanced to attack through the virtues themselves. Cassian distinguishes two prides, and the second — spiritual pride — lies in wait precisely for those who have conquered the coarse vices[42]. Believing oneself humble is already not being so: humility that knows itself and congratulates itself has changed into its opposite. That is why the fight knows no definitive truce; Saint Bernard describes the twelve degrees of pride as a descent that can restart at any instant, from mere curiosity to the habit of sinning[43]. Pride is not a state one leaves: it is a slope to watch until one's last day. The one who falls asleep on his victory is already losing it — for the first thing conquered pride does is disguise itself as acquired humility.
Error and truth at a glance
The table below recapitulates the misconceptions covered: on the left, the error in its common formulation (the editor's formulation); in the center, what makes it false; on the right, what the Church and the saints teach, with its source — only the quotations in this last column carry authority. It is read line by line, as a quick antidote to received ideas.
| The common error | Why it is false | What the Church and the saints teach |
|---|---|---|
| Pride means boasting openly | Its object is one's own excellence, not the noise one makes | “Disordered appetite for one's own excellence” (Thomas, q. 162, a. 1)[44] |
| I devalue myself, so I am not proud | The inferiority complex can be pride turned inside out | “What troubles you is pride” (Lamennais's reflection on the Imitation, II, 2)[45] |
| Pride is just one defect among others | It is the root of all sin, the queen of vices | “The beginning of all sin is pride” (Vulgate, Sir 10:15)[46] |
| Sound self-esteem is pride | Humility is the truth, rendering justice to God and to self | Humility means walking according to the truth (Teresa of Avila, paraphrase)[47] |
| Recognizing one's gifts is pride | Recognizing is not attributing to oneself; gratitude renders to God | “What have you that you did not receive?” (1 Cor 4:7)[48] |
| Desiring great things is pride | Magnanimity does not contradict humility | Greatness of the gift and one's own weakness (Thomas, q. 129, a. 3, ad 4)[49] |
| My touchiness is mere sensitivity | Wounded self-love can be the signature of pride | “Pride cannot bear to be corrected” (Lamennais's reflection, Imitation, II, 2)[50] |
| To conquer pride, despise yourself | Despising oneself is still looking at oneself | “A most true knowledge of oneself,” not contempt (Bernard)[51] |
| It suffices to play the modest | False humility begs for contradiction | “Either let us say no words of humility…” (Francis de Sales)[52] |
| I shall conquer pride by my own will | Counting on oneself is already pride | Attribute all to grace, not to one's own strength (Cassian, XII, 9-10)[53] |
| Fighting pride means fleeing all limelight | Spiritual pride hides in fleeing honors | The two prides: coarse and spiritual (Cassian, XII, 2)[54] |
| The slightest movement of pride is a grave sin | Temptation is not fault: distinguish temptation without fault, imperfect (venial) movement, and mortal sin | Grave matter, full knowledge, and complete consent jointly required (CCC §§ 1859, 1862)[55] |
| Once conquered, it is acquired for good | Spiritual pride attacks the advanced | The twelve degrees, a descent always possible (Bernard)[56] |
Pride, vanity, self-love, healthy esteem, false humility: do not confuse
Many errors come from fuzzy vocabulary, where one word is taken for another. A few classical distinctions suffice to dispel the haze — the synthesis words used here (“self-love,” “daughter of pride”) are the editor's, and only the quotations carry authority. Pride is the disordered appetite for one's own excellence — the substance of the vice, that movement placing the “self” above its rightful place, before God and before others[57]. Vanity (or vain glory) is, according to Thomist doctrine, its first “daughter”: the desire to be praised, noticed, admired for what one is or believes oneself to be[58]. What is here called self-love — the attachment to self that makes one touchy, craving esteem and quick to take offense — pertains to that love of self which Augustine describes as “love of self even to contempt of God,” the love that builds the “earthly city”[59] — the connection is an application by the editor, not a quotation of Augustine on self-love.
At the opposite pole, healthy self-esteem is not a vice but part of the truth: recognizing what one is worth as a creature loved and endowed by God, and giving thanks for it[60]. Finally, false humility is not attenuated humility: it is pride disguised, lowering itself in words to be contradicted, or being discouraged by its faults out of vexation at not being perfect[61]. These words are therefore not synonyms: only pride — with its daughters, vanity and self-love — is the vice to fight; healthy self-esteem is a truth to keep; and false humility is a masked pride, more dangerous than avowed pride because it already believes itself virtue. Confusing them risks fighting an innocent truth, or letting pride triumph under the very name of humility.
Restoring the fight against pride to its true light
Once the misconceptions are cleared away, the fight against pride appears in its proper light. Far from being a struggle against mere boasting, or an exercise in self-denigration, it is the restoring of one's whole being to its rightful place: receiving from God what one has, accepting what one is, ceasing to make oneself the center. Conquering it is not despising oneself nor effacing oneself out of calculation; it is turning away from oneself toward God and toward others — and doing so not by one's own strength, but by the grace that only the humble know how to ask for.
That is why the term of the fight is not the crushing of self, but a new peace and freedom: the one who no longer has to defend his “self” is no longer at the mercy of a criticism, an oversight, a comparison. And the model of this victorious humility is not a downcast figure, but Christ Himself, who explicitly proposes His example — in words as in deeds:
“Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble of heart, and you will find rest for your souls.” — Gospel according to Saint Matthew 11:29[62]
“If I then, the Lord and Master, have washed your feet, you also must wash one another's feet. I have given you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you.” — Gospel according to Saint John 13:14-15[63]
Christ's humility is not the weakness of the destitute: it is the free lowering of fullness — He “who, being in the condition of God, emptied Himself, taking the condition of a servant… humbling Himself even to death, death on a cross”[64]. And it is this descending path that opens exaltation: “whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted”[65], as the tax collector of the parable went home justified, and not the self-assured Pharisee[66]. Such is the truth the caricatures had masked: the fight against pride is not a war against oneself, but the path by which a heart ceases to carry the weight of its own “self” to find, in loving dependence on God, a rest that pride had always refused it.
Further reading
- How to Grow in the Fight Against Pride — the practical guide: nature of pride, the two prides, Saint Bernard's twelve degrees, the concrete weapons (grace, distrust of self, vigilance, acceptance of humiliations, recourse to Christ), the fruits of victory.
- What the Saints Say About the Fight Against Pride — the florilegium: the voice of the Fathers, doctors, and mystics, from Cassian and Gregory the Great to Francis de Sales and Teresa of Avila.
- Common Errors Regarding Humility — the misconceptions about the opposite virtue: humility confused with littleness, self-contempt, false humility, refusal of gifts and great desires.
- Common Errors Regarding the Fight Against Acedia — the twin article of the same series, on the “noonday demon.”
- Common Errors Regarding Trust — distrust of self united with confidence in God, the first weapon against pride.
- Common Errors Regarding Spiritual Vigilance — watching the heart over its first movements, where the fight against pride is won.
Notes and References
Sirach (Ecclesiasticus), traditional formula handed down by the Vulgate, Sir 10:15: “initium omnis peccati est superbia” — “the beginning of all sin is pride.” Founding verse of the whole doctrine of pride as the root of sin. The official liturgical translation (AELF), at the same passage (Sir 10:12-13), expresses the relation the other way round: man's pride begins when he turns away from the Lord, “for pride begins with sin” (text collated on aelf.org). It is therefore not a mere difference of numbering between two identical witnesses: the Vulgate and the AELF formulate two different relations here (pride at the beginning of sin / sin at the beginning of pride); this article keeps the traditional witness, the one cited by Saint Thomas and the whole tradition.
1 6 46Saint Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274), Summa Theologiae, IIa-IIae, q. 162 (De superbia), a. 1-2. Pride is there defined as “appetitus inordinatus propriae excellentiae” — the disordered appetite for one's own excellence. Reference edition: Summa Theologiae, French translation under the dir. of Fr. Aimon-Marie Roguet, Cerf, or éd. de la Revue des Jeunes.
2 5 12 44 57First Letter of Saint Peter 5:5-6, official liturgical translation (AELF, text collated on aelf.org): “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble. Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time.” Takes up Proverbs 3:34 (cf. James 4:6). Humility is the condition of access to grace; pride, what closes access to it.
3Saint Augustine (354-430), The City of God, book XIV, ch. 13. Latin text: “Quid est autem superbia nisi perversae celsitudinis appetitus ?” — “What is pride but the appetite for perverse exaltation?” Reference translation: The City of God, Bibliothèque augustinienne, Institut d'Études Augustiniennes; or Seuil / Points ed. (trans. L. Moreau revised by G. Combès).
4Saint Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, IIa-IIae, q. 162: a. 2 (is pride always a mortal sin? — no, some imperfect movements remain venial); a. 7, “utrum superbia sit initium omnis peccati” — pride is the beginning of all sin, as the first turning away from the submission owed to God, citing Sir 10:13, with this precision (a. 7, ad 1) that some particular sins also come from ignorance or weakness; a. 8 (and not a. 7 alone): following Saint Gregory, pride commands the list of the seven vices — including vain glory — without counting itself among them, because it is their common root.
7 8 18 21Saint Gregory the Great (c. 540-604), Morals on Job (Moralia in Job), book XXXI, ch. 45, § 87: “Ipsa namque vitiorum regina superbia cum devictum plene cor ceperit, mox illud septem principalibus vitiis… quasi quibusdam suis ducibus devastandum tradit.” — “For the queen of the vices, pride, when she has fully subdued a conquered heart, soon hands it over to seven principal vices… as to her captains, to be laid waste.” (Latin corrected from the text consulted: quasi quibusdam, not veluti quibusdam; SC 525 not directly collated in session.) The image of dust thrown against the wind, cited in the body of the article, does not come from this development: it belongs to Homily 7 on the Gospels (§ 4) and concerns the blindness of the proud — a reference now added in the body of the text.
9John Cassian, Cenobitic Institutions, book XII, ch. 4 (“Pride made an archangel into a demon”): Lucifer “imagined that this splendor and beauty came to him from his own nature and not from the infinite goodness of the Creator.” Sources Chrétiennes 109, Cerf.
10Book of Proverbs 16:18, official liturgical translation (AELF, text collated on aelf.org): “Pride goes before collapse, and pretension, the fall.” Vulgate: “Contritionem praecedit superbia, et ante ruinam exaltatur spiritus.”
11Catechism of the Catholic Church, §§ 1735 and 1767-1768: the imputability of a fault can be lessened by ignorance, fear, the passions, and other factors; in morals, the passions in themselves are neither good nor bad, and the movement suffered must be distinguished from voluntary consent. Hence the rule of discernment followed in this article: a possible mechanism (wound, complex, touchiness, collapse) never proves by itself a proud consent, and no general frequency is advanced.
13 16 29Saint Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, IIa-IIae, q. 132 (De inani gloria), a. 4, and q. 162, a. 8: vain glory is held to be the first “daughter” of pride, which is its common root. Takes up the doctrine of Saint Gregory the Great (Moralia, XXXI).
14 58Reflection added by Félicité de Lamennais (1782-1854) to his translation of The Imitation of Christ (1824), book II, ch. 2: “What troubles you is pride, which cannot bear to be corrected.” This sentence therefore does not come from Thomas a Kempis (c. 1380-1471) himself — to whom no ecclesial title is attributed here, for lack of an official act — but from the translator; it is cited here for its diagnostic aptness, without the authority of a word of Kempis.
15 28 45 50Catechism of the Catholic Church, § 1866, exact text of the official French edition (Mame/Plon, 1992; no omissions): “Vices can be classified according to the virtues they oppose, or also be linked to the capital sins which Christian experience has distinguished following Saint John Cassian and Saint Gregory the Great. They are called capital because they engender other sins, other vices. They are pride, avarice, envy, anger, lust, gluttony, sloth or acedia.” (The version formerly given replaced terms of the paragraph and omitted without marking the explanation of capital; it is withdrawn.)
17John Cassian (c. 360-435), Cenobitic Institutions, book XII (On pride), ch. 1 (“Pride is the most dreadful of all vices”). Critical edition: Sources Chrétiennes 109, Cerf, 1965 (ed. and trans. J.-C. Guy).
19John Cassian, Cenobitic Institutions, book XII, ch. 3 (“Pride destroys all virtues”): the image of the tyrant seizing the citadel of virtues and striking the whole city down. Sources Chrétiennes 109, Cerf.
20Saint Teresa of Avila (1515-1582), The Interior Castle (or The Mansions, 1577), Sixth Mansions, ch. 10: the teaching is indeed present there (God supreme truth; humility as walking according to the truth), but the texts formerly given in quotation marks were reworked — they are now presented in the body of the article as paraphrases, from the Carmelites' translation (carmel.asso.fr), the only version consulted; neither the exact translator, nor the edition, nor the exact page location having been established, no quotation marks are maintained. The formula “Humility is truth” is found in Saint John Paul II in his homily at Anagni of 31 August 1986 (§ 2): this connection is thematic, with no explicitly declared borrowing from Teresa demonstrated by the official text.
22 47Saint Teresa of Avila, Interior Castle, Sixth Mansions, ch. 10: the teaching is indeed present there (rendering to God what belongs to Him; rendering justice to oneself out of respect and love for the truth), but the text formerly given in quotation marks was reworked — it is now presented as a paraphrase, from the Carmelites' translation (carmel.asso.fr), the only version consulted. Humility renders justice to God and to oneself: it does not deny the good received, it refers it to its author.
23 60Saint Francis de Sales, Introduction to the Devout Life, Part III, ch. 5 (On more interior humility), excerpt (omissions marked by […]; text not collated on the Annecy edition in session): « Plusieurs […] n'osent penser et considérer les grâces que Dieu leur a faites en particulier, de peur de prendre de la vaine gloire et complaisance, en quoi certes ils se trompent […] : il ne faut pas craindre que la connaissance de ce qu'il a mis en nous nous enfle, pourvu que nous soyons attentifs à cette vérité, que ce qui est de bon en nous n'est pas de nous […]. »
24First Letter of Saint Paul to the Corinthians 4:7, official liturgical translation (AELF, text collated on aelf.org): “Who has set you apart? What have you that you did not receive? And if you received it, why do you boast as if you had not received it?” Key verse: all that is good in us is God's gift, which excludes vain glory without requiring the gift to be denied.
25 36 48Saint Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, II-II, q. 129, a. 3, ad 4 (article on magnanimity; the former reference to q. 161, a. 1, ad 3, which treats the harmony of the virtues according to right reason, was incorrect): magnanimity and humility do not contradict each other, for man has something great by God's gift and something defective by the weakness of his nature. Editorial synthesis of Thomist doctrine, not a textual quotation.
26 49Saint Thérèse of the Child Jesus (1873-1897), Story of a Soul: Manuscript B, 3 v° (letter to her sister Céline, September 1896) — “in the heart of the Church, my Mother, I shall be Love” (the expression formerly cited in the transformed form “to be Love in the heart of the Church” is restored in its exact wording); the “immense desires” (Ms B) and the “little way” of spiritual childhood — accepting one's littleness and expecting all from God's mercy rather than from one's own strength (developed in Manuscript C) — are joined there: great desires and humility together. Reference edition: Œuvres complètes, Cerf/DDB, 1992.
27Saint Bernard of Clairvaux, The Degrees of Humility and Pride, I, 2: “Humilitas est virtus qua homo verissima sui cognitione sibi ipsi vilescit” — “Humility is the virtue by which man, in a most true knowledge of himself, becomes vile in his own eyes.” The mainspring of humility is therefore “most true knowledge” (verissima cognitione): Bernard joins true knowledge with lowering in one's own eyes — the traditional ascetic sense, to be distinguished from lying denigration and hatred of self. Sources Chrétiennes 647 ed.
30 51Saint Francis de Sales, Introduction to the Devout Life, Part III, ch. 6 (That humility makes us love our own abjection), excerpt (unmarked omissions in the current edition used; to be collated): « Il y a néanmoins différence entre la vertu d'humilité et l'abjection ; car l'abjection, c'est la petitesse, bassesse et vileté qui est en nous, sans que nous y pensions ; mais la vertu d'humilité, c'est la véritable connaissance et volontaire reconnaissance de notre abjection. » Abjection is suffered; the virtue of humility is a peaceful knowledge and a voluntary act — and Sales goes on to the love of abjection: the traditional ascetic sense of voluntary lowering before God remains and is not erased by the condemnation of lying denigration.
31Saint Francis de Sales, Introduction to the Devout Life, Part III, ch. 5, excerpt (omissions marked by […]; text not collated on the Annecy edition in session): « Nous disons maintes fois que nous ne sommes rien, que nous sommes la misère même […] ; mais nous serions bien marris qu'on nous prît au mot et […] qu'on nous publiât tels que nous disons. Au contraire, nous faisons semblant de fuir et de nous cacher, afin qu'on nous coure après et qu'on nous cherche […] : ou ne disons point de paroles d'humilité, ou disons-les avec un vrai sentiment intérieur […]. »
32 33 52 61Saint Francis de Sales (1567-1622), Introduction to the Devout Life (1609), Part III, ch. 5: true humility “does not pretend” and wishes to be hidden — excerpt, from the teaching of ch. 5 (the former accumulation of unlocalized references to ch. 5-6 and the Spiritual Conferences is withdrawn; text not collated on the Annecy edition in session). Seuil or Téqui current eds.
34John Cassian, Cenobitic Institutions, book XII: ch. 9 (“How we must also conquer pride”) — attributing all to grace, with the Pauline quotations (1 Cor 15:10; Phil 2:13); ch. 10 — the theme of “own strength” insufficient without the Lord's help. Editorial synthesis with the correct references: the sentence in the body of the article beginning “You will recognize,” formerly presented in quotation marks as a verbatim of ch. 9, is not established in that form — SC 109 having not been directly collated in session, no verbatim is advanced here. Sources Chrétiennes 109, Cerf, 1965 (ed. and trans. J.-C. Guy).
35 53Lorenzo Scupoli (c. 1530-1610), Theatine, The Spiritual Combat (Il combattimento spirituale, Venice, 1589), ch. 1: the four weapons of combat are distrust of oneself, confidence in God, exercise (right use of the faculties), and prayer. French translation: Téqui or Le Cerf ed. (The former claim that Saint Francis de Sales carried this book on him and recommended it is withdrawn: the exact primary references could not be established in session, and thematic agreement does not suffice.)
37John Cassian, Cenobitic Institutions, book XII, ch. 2 (“There are two kinds of pride”). Sources Chrétiennes 109, Cerf. The grounding distinction of the whole treatise: the carnal pride of beginners, and the spiritual pride of the perfect, which attacks the advanced through their very virtues.
38 42 54Catechism of the Catholic Church, § 1857: “For a sin to be mortal, three conditions must together be met: ‘Mortal sin is sin whose object is grave matter and which is also committed with full knowledge and deliberate consent.’” Text verified on the official French edition (local PDF), 16 June 2026.
39Catechism of the Catholic Church, §§ 1859-1860 and 1862: mortal sin jointly requires grave matter, full knowledge, and complete consent; impulses of sensibility and the passions can reduce the voluntary and free character of the fault; and sin is venial — not mortal — when it concerns light matter, or even in grave matter when full knowledge or complete consent is lacking (§ 1862). Cf. Saint Thomas, q. 162, a. 2 and a. 5: the first movements of pride, imperfectly voluntary, remain venial. Hence the three degrees distinguished in the body of the article: involuntary temptation without fault, imperfectly voluntary movement, mortal sin with three conditions. Texts verified on the official French edition (local PDF), 16 June 2026.
40 41 55Saint Bernard of Clairvaux (1090-1153), The Degrees of Humility and Pride (De gradibus humilitatis et superbiae, c. 1120 according to the notice's dating — the date of c. 1124 formerly advanced is withdrawn, for lack of justification), second part. The twelve degrees of pride, mirroring the twelve degrees of humility of Saint Benedict's Rule (ch. 7): 1. curiosity; 2. levity of mind; 3. foolish mirth; 4. boasting; 5. singularity; 6. arrogance; 7. presumption; 8. defending one's sins; 9. deceitful confession; 10. revolt; 11. freedom to sin; 12. the habit of sinning. Reference translation: Sources Chrétiennes 647, Cerf, published October 2025 according to the publisher (the year 2022 formerly announced was erroneous); Téqui current ed.
43 56Saint Augustine, The City of God, book XIV, ch. 28: “Two loves have made two cities: love of self even to contempt of God, the earthly city; love of God even to contempt of self, the heavenly city.” (“Amor sui usque ad contemptum Dei… amor Dei usque ad contemptum sui”). Bibliothèque augustinienne.
59Gospel according to Saint Matthew 11:28-29, official liturgical translation (AELF, text collated on aelf.org): “Come to me, all you who labor under the burden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble of heart, and you will find rest for your souls.” Vulgate: “discite a me, quia mitis sum et humilis corde.” Passage where Christ explicitly proposes His example — for humility and gentleness of heart — but not the only one: at the washing of the feet, He likewise proposes His example in deeds, Jn 13:14-15 (AELF, text collated on aelf.org): “If I then, the Lord and Master, have washed your feet, you also must wash one another's feet. I have given you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you.” The exclusivity formerly affirmed is therefore withdrawn.
62 63Letter of Saint Paul to the Philippians 2:6-8 (Christological hymn of the kenosis), official liturgical translation (AELF): “Christ Jesus, being in the condition of God… emptied Himself, taking the condition of a servant… humbling Himself, becoming obedient unto death, even death on a cross.” The Greek verb ekénōsen (“He emptied, annihilated Himself”) gave the theological term kenosis. Christ's humility is the free lowering of fullness, not the weakness of the destitute.
64Gospel according to Saint Luke 14:11, official liturgical translation (AELF, text collated on aelf.org): “For whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.” The same sentence returns in Lk 18:14, at the end of the parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector. The exaltation of the humble is not despite their humility, but because of it.
65Gospel according to Saint Luke 18:13-14 (parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector), official liturgical translation (AELF, text collated on aelf.org; omission marked by […] in the body of the article): “The tax collector […] beat his breast, saying: ‘My God, be merciful to me, a sinner!' I tell you: when the latter went down to his house, it was he who had become righteous, rather than the other. Whoever exalts himself will be humbled; whoever humbles himself will be exalted.” The final sentence takes up Lk 14:11.
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