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 2. My knowledge, my virtue, my power, my discretion, my fortitude, my beauty, and all whatsoever good' I have or can have, is as nothing in comparison with that which God has; for which our Saviour said with great reason, " None is good but God alone;" none is potent, nor strong, nor beautiful but God: for He only is goodness, wisdom, and omnipotence itself, in comparison of which that which creatures have deserves not the name.

Colloquy. — Then what intelligence can understand how a man of so little being dares to despise Almighty God, and to offend Him by so many sins? O fool, what hast thou done? O wretched I, that have been so audacious! O immense God, in comparison of whom I am as if I were not, by the infinite excellence of Thy being, I beseech Thee to pardon my sins and illuminate me to know the vileness into which I am fallen through them. Grant me that I may abhor and despise myself, and esteem myself less than nothing; and that, like Job, I may " do penance in dust and ashes," accounting myself for such a one in Thy divine presence.

This meditation has most efficacy to move to perfect contrition and sorrow for sin, which proceeds from the love of Almighty God above all things, considering the grievousness of sin, not only by the baseness of the offender, but by the highness of the offended; for by how much greater the injured is, so much greater is the injury; and as Almighty God is infinite in His essence and perfection, so sin in this