“The higher, the more in danger…”

For the Supernatural, entering a human soul, opens to it new possibilities both of good and evil. From that point the road branches: one way to sanctity, love, humility, the other to spiritual pride, self-righteousness, persecuting zeal. And no way back to the mere humdrum virtues and vices of the unawakened soul. If the Divine call does not make us better, it will makes us very much worse. Of all bad men religious bad man are the worst. Of all created beings the wickedest is one who originally stood in the immediate presence of God. There seems no way out of this. It gives a new application to Our Lord’s words about “counting the cost”.

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C. S. Lewis, Reflections on the Psalms (San Diego: Harcourt Brace & Company, 1986), 31-2.