constitutes the vice of pride.

God alone is excellent and all greatness is from Him alone. And those
who are born great, who acquire greatness, or who have greatness thrust
upon them, alike owe their superiority to Him. Nor are these advantages
and this preeminence due to our merits and deserts. Everything that
comes to us from God is purely gratuitous on His part, and undeserved
on ours. Since our very existence is the effect of a free act of His
will, why should not, for a greater reason, all that is accidental to
that existence be dependent on His free choice? Finally, nothing of all
this is ours or ever can become ours. Our qualities are a pure loan
confided to our care for a good and useful purpose, and will be
reclaimed with interest.

Since the malice of our pride consists in the measure of affection we
bestow upon our excellence, if we love it to the extent of adjudging it
not a gift of God, but the fruit of our own better selves; or if we
look upon it as the result of our worth, that is, due to our merits, we
are guilty of nothing short of downright heresy, because we hold two
doctrines contrary to faith. "What hast thou, that thou hast not
received?" If a gift is due to us, it is no longer a gift. This extreme
of pride is happily rare. It is directly opposed to God. It is the sin
of Lucifer.

A lesser degree of pride is, while admitting ourselves beholden to God
for whatever we possess and confessing His bounties to be undeserved,
to consider the latter as becoming ours by right of possession, with
liberty to make the most of them for our own personal ends. This is a
false and sinful appreciation of God's gifts, but it respects His and
all subordinate authority. If it never, in practice, fails in this