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WHEREFORE if we wish the summit of our building to be perfect and to
rise well- pleasing to God, we should endeavour to lay its foundations not
in accordance with the desires of our own lust, but according to the rules
of evangelical strictness: which can only be the fear of God and humility,
proceeding from kindness and simplicity of heart. But humility cannot
possibly be acquired without giving up everything: and as long as a man is
a stranger to this, he cannot possibly attain the virtue of obedience, or
the strength of patience, or the serenity of kindness, or the perfection of
love; without which things our hearts cannot possibly be a habitation for
the Holy Spirit: as the Lord says through the prophet: "Upon whom shall My
spirit rest, but on him that is humble and quiet and ears My words," or
according to those copies which express the Hebrew accurately: "To whom
shall I have respect, but to him that is poor and little and of a contrite
spirit and that trembleth at My words?"
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