No one of all the children of Adam ever approached the Blessed Virgin Mary in humility. What had she to make her humble? No sin or imperfection for which to humble herself before God. Yet the greatest of sinners never humbled himself as did Mary. How was this? It was because no one save she ever recognized her own nothingness in God's sight. This is the surest basis for humility. It is because we do not recognize our utter insignificance and the absence of any good in us save what is the gift of God, that we are so wanting in humility.

Thus it was that, because Mary had a right to the highest place, she always sought the lowest. This is the law that everywhere prevails. Those who deserve the lowest place seek the highest, and those who deserve the highest seek the lowest. It is the enemies of God who do not like to come down. His friends recognize the lowest place as the place most suitable for them. Am I in this respect one of God's friends or one of His enemies?

Mary's humility was also the result of her desire to be like to her Divine Son in all things. When she saw Him stoop from the highest Heaven to earth, she longed to stoop to the very dust. She placed herself in spirit beneath the feet of all, and would have placed herself lower still if it had been possible. For what humiliation could even Mary endure that was in any way comparable to that of her Son? If Mary, then, is my Queen and Mother, I will seek to imitate her in this. If the Immaculate Mother of God loved to humble herself, how much more should I, who am but a miserable worm of earth?

O God, who resistest the proud, and givest thy grace to the humble, grant me that true humility of which thy adorable Son has left us the example. Notwithstanding the powerful obstacles which my natural inclinations oppose to this virtue, I ardently desire to learn of Him to be meek and humble of heart. I am filled with confusion, O Lord, when I reflect on my inordinate love of esteem and applause, my extreme fear of contempt and humiliation, my independence of spirit, my attachment to my own ideas and opinion, my secret satisfaction in success, my latent mortification at seeing others preferred, my insatiable desire of praise and honor. O Lord, I should despair of the cure of maladies so numerous and grievous, did not I know that thou art an Almighty Physician, to whom nothing is impossible. Cast on me, O my God, a look of compassion, and have mercy on me. Grant that I may know thee, to love thee alone ; that I may know myself, to comprehend the depth of my miseries.

May I never forget the many motives that urge me to the practice of humility, the sins of my past life, my inclination to evil, my inconstancy in virtue, my tepidity in thy service, my ingratitude towards thee, my daily infidelities, and the innumerable defects which, notwithstanding my pride, I cannot disguise from myself. May I at length do myself justice, by sincerely believing myself to be the last of all creatures; may I henceforth shun praise as sedulously as I have hitherto sought it; may my only aim be to please thee, my only desire to be forgotten by the world; may the remembrance of the account I shall have to render of Thy graces, prove a perpetual stimulus to the practice of humility in the use of them. If by thy grace I am ever capable of doing any thing to promote Thy honor, I will refer the glory to thee alone; I will think of the voluntary humiliations of my Savior; I will take Him for my model, that by attaining resemblance with Him, I may deserve to be one day ranked among His elect in the kingdom of heaven. Amen.