If you want to overcome vainglory, do not love praise.


If you want to overcome vainglory, do not love praise, nor honors, nor expensive clothes, nor leading places, nor primacy, but, on the contrary, rejoice when you are insulted and dishonored, and rebuke yourself that you are more sinful than all sinners.

If you want to overcome pride, do not say about anything you do that it is done by your labors or your powers, but whether you fast, or spend time in vigil, or sleep on the bare ground, or engage in singing psalms, or make many prostrations to the ground, say: "Only with the help of God and with the protection of God is this done, not by my power and not by my effort"

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