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An angel fell from Heaven without any other passion except pride, and so we may ask whether it is possible to ascend to Heaven by humility alone, without any other of the virtues.

John Climacus

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More quotes by John Climacus

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Forgetting offences is a sign of sincere repentance. If you keep the memory of them, you may believe you have repented but you are like someone running in his sleep. Let no one consider it a minor defect, this darkness that often clouds the eyes even of spiritual people.
John Climacus
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As fire does not give birth to snow, so those who seek honor here will not enjoy it in heaven... As those who climb a rotten ladder are in danger, so all honor, glory, and power are opposed to humility.
John Climacus
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Repentance lifts a man up. Mourning knocks at heaven's gate. Holy humility opens it.
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He does not show humility who accuses himself (for who will not accept rebukes from himself?), but he who, being rebuked by another, does not decrease his love toward him.
John Climacus
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The lover of silence draws close to God. He talks to Him in secret and God enlightens him.
John Climacus
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Confession is like a bridle that keeps the soul which reflects on it from committing sin, but anything left unconfessed we continue to do without fear as if in the dark.
John Climacus
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When you hear that your neighbor or friend has reproached you in your absence or presence, then show love and praise him.
John Climacus
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A proud monk needs no demon. He has turned into one, an enemy to himself.
John Climacus
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A servant of the Lord stands bodily before men, but mentally he is knocking at the gates of heaven with prayer.
John Climacus
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The first stage of this tranquility consists in silencing the lips when the heart is excited. The second, in silencing the mind when the soul is still excited. The goal is a perfect peacefulness even in the middle of the raging storm.
John Climacus
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Obedience is the burial of the will and the resurrection of humility.
John Climacus
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The man who pets a lion may tame it, but the man who coddles the body makes it ravenous.
John Climacus
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The friend of silence comes close to God. In secret he converses with him and receives his light.
John Climacus
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Simplicity is an enduring habit within a soul that has grown impervious to evil thoughts.
John Climacus
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When you are depressed, bear in mind the Lord's command to Peter to forgive a sinner seventy times seven (cf. Mt. 18:22). And you may be sure that He Who gave this command to another will Himself do very much more.
John Climacus
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I would not consider my spirituality worthwhile that wants to walk in sweetness and ease and run from the imitation of Christ.
John Climacus
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Faith furnishes prayer with wings, without which it cannot soar to Heaven.
John Climacus
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Pride is the utter poverty of soul disguised as riches, imaginary light where in fact there is darkness.
John Climacus
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Ascend, my brothers, ascend eagerly. Let your hearts' resolve be to climb. Listen to the voice of the one who says: 'Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of our God' (Isa. 2:3), Who makes our feet to be like the feet of the deer, 'Who sets us on the high places, that we may be triumphant on His road' (Hab. 3:19).
John Climacus
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Meekness is an unchanging state of mind, which both in honor and dishonor remains the same. Meekness consists in praying sincerely and undisturbedly in the face of afflictions from one's neighbor. Meekness is a cliff rising from the sea of irritability, against which all the that waves that strive against it break, but which is itself never broken.
John Climacus