What Dispositions Are Required for Success in Acquiring Virtues in General, and How to Go About Habituating Oneself to Any One of Them

Acquiring virtues requires a courageous and great soul, and a will that is not weak and listless, but resolute and strong—with clear foresight of the many obstacles and heavy labors involved, and with readiness to take up and endure them all. At the foundation of such dispositions must lie a firm love for each virtue and for the whole virtuous life, and a burning zeal for it. This is the driving force along the laborious path of virtue, and it must therefore be continually kindled lest it weaken and be exhausted, since when that happens movement itself inevitably ceases. Therefore do not be lazy about kindling your zeal for virtue, reflecting with heartfelt engagement on how pleasing to God a virtuous life is, how beautiful and lofty virtue is in itself, and how necessary and beneficial it is for us—for in it lies the beginning and end of our true perfection and progress in it.

Therefore each morning, with full attentiveness, strive to examine and foresee what occasions are likely to present themselves during the day for performing this or that good deed, adding to this both the desire and the firm resolution to act accordingly; and in the evening examine yourself as to whether and how well your morning good thoughts and desires were fulfilled. Then the following morning renew again those same intentions and desires, with livelier zeal and the wish to carry them out exactly.

Strive to direct all of this toward exercise in the virtue in which you have resolved to form a habit at the present time. Likewise, the examples of the saints, prayers, meditations on the life and sufferings of Christ the Lord, and everything else considered fitting and necessary for progress in virtues and in the spiritual life—all of this must be directed by you primarily toward the virtue in which you are now engaged. But also with all the incidents of the day, however varied they may be, try as much as possible to make use of them in such a way that through them the habit of that virtue about which you are now especially zealous is not only not disturbed but on the contrary more firmly established and rooted.

Let the goal of such habituation be this: to arrive at the point where virtuous acts, whether outward or inward, are performed with the same ease and readiness with which acts contrary to them were formerly done—or better, with the same ease with which the natural needs of our nature are ordinarily fulfilled. That is the same as bringing the habit of virtues to the point where they become, as it were, natural in us. At this point I will recall what was said earlier: the more inner or outward obstacles there are to acquiring any virtue, the more quickly and deeply it becomes embedded in our soul, if with full determination and without sparing ourselves we press on to overcome them.

Appropriate sayings of Holy Scripture, when pronounced aloud or even only in the mind, exert a wondrous power in impressing upon the mind the image of the virtue sought and in awakening in the heart a disposition toward it—and both of these things, what great help they give to one who is zealous to acquire it! Seek out then those passages of Scripture about the virtue you are pursuing, and learn them by heart so that they are always ready at hand; and then repeat them to yourself in your mind as often as possible, especially when the opposing passion stirs.

For example, when striving to acquire the virtue of patience, you may select, memorize, and frequently repeat the following passages of Scripture: ”A man of great understanding is slow to anger” (Prov. 14:29). ”The hope of the poor shall not perish forever” (Ps. 9:18). ”Woe… to those who have lost patience” (Sir. 2:14). ”A patient man is better than a strong one, and he who rules his spirit than he who takes a city” (Prov. 16:32); ”by your endurance you will gain your souls” (Luke 21:19); ”let us run with endurance the race that is set before us” (Heb. 12:1). ”Indeed we count them blessed who endure” (James 5:11). ”Blessed is the man who endures temptation” (James 1:12). ”But let patience have its perfect work” (James 1:4). ”For you have need of endurance” (Heb. 10:36).

To these you may add brief prayers of your own devising—such as these and similar ones: “My God! When at last shall my heart be clothed in the armor of patience!” “When at last shall I bear every unpleasantness with a calm heart, so that my God may rejoice in me!” “Oh, how beloved you are to me, afflictions, making me like my Lord Jesus who suffered for my sake!” “My Jesus! Grant me even at times to live peacefully amid a thousand afflictions, for the glory of your name!” “Happy shall I be if, even in the midst of the fire of sorrows, I am inflamed with the desire to endure still greater sufferings!”

Such prayers must be used in order to make progress in the virtues, each time adapted to the virtue in which one is especially exercising oneself, as the spirit of faith and piety may inspire. Such brief prayers may rightly be called with the prophet ”ascents laid up in the heart” (Ps. 84:5), which, bursting forth from a heart full of faith and hope, ascend to heaven and enter into the ears of God. These are ”sighs” that are never hidden (Ps. 38:9) from the eyes of the merciful God. These are ”cries” always heard and understood (Ps. 5:2) by the most compassionate Lord. We must not forget to add to them the following two assurances, as it were two wings: the first, that God rejoices to see us laboring to acquire virtues, and that in ardently desiring perfection in them we seek nothing other than to please God.