Pretexts

140. This last danger is for us the greatest of all, and all the more because we ourselves seem to co-operate so as not to recognize this vice, inventing titles, colours, artifices to conceal its ugliness, and studying innumerable pretexts in order to deceive ourselves into believing that pride is not pride, and does not reign in our heart at the very moment when it is more dominant than ever.
As humility is generally called weak and contemptible by the blind lovers of this world, so pride is called courage and greatness, and the proud are said to be spirited, dignified, of noble behaviour and good judgment, sustaining their position with honour, maintaining their reputation, keeping up their rank and fulfilling the duties of their state. What a vocabulary of vanity! But let us set against it the vocabulary of truth which was used by Job: "I have said to rottenness, Thou art my father; to worms, my mother and my sister." [Job xvii, 4]
If you sift these worldly expressions, you will find that the quintessence of a most consummate pride issues therefrom. This is indeed the only thing I ask of you, that if you have unfortunately been deceived by others, you will at least not deceive yourselves. Study to know your own ills, if you wish to be cured of them. I recommend you only to apply yourselves to learn the truth and profit by this advice, that if the knowledge of this truth seems difficult to you, it is a sign that you are proud.
It is St. Thomas himself who will convince you of this. You can learn truth in two ways, that is by the intellect and by the affections. The proud man does not know it by his intellect, because God hides it from him, as Christ said: "Thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent"; [Matt. xi, 25] and still less will he know it with his affection, because no one who takes pleasure in vanity can take pleasure in truth. "When the proud delight in their own excellence," explains St. Augustine, "they recede from the excellence of truth." [D. Th. 2a 2æ, qu. clxii, art. 3]
The proud man does not take any pleasure in sermons, meditations, instructions concerning eternal truth, in fact they are wearisome to him. If you discover any signs of this in yourself, you must at once conclude that you are proud, and humble yourself a little, O you who read this doctrine, in order that the eternal Father of all light may give you light even as Christ said: "I confess to Thee, O Father, Who hast revealed them to little ones." [Matt. xi, 25]