Transformation in Christ_ On the Christian Attitude - Dietrich Von Hildebrand [108]
Secondly, our habitual being, generally considered, is outside the range of our direct power. We are not able to conjure up in ourselves, merely by an act of free will, either humility or faithfulness, either confidence in God or loving kindness, either mildness or mercy. This does not mean, however, that we can do nothing relevant to the unfolding of those virtues in us. The ways in which our free central personality may exercise an influence in this sense vary, it is true, according to the single virtues.
We can influence the development of certain virtues
In some cases, such as the readiness to change, the virtue in question originates in a direct act of our free central personality, the effectiveness of which is similar, however, not to that of our will when it commands our single actions proper, but to the way in which our ultimate free assent (as discussed earlier in this chapter) determines our behavior. Only the engagement of our person as implied in our readiness to change—in an act of conversion, notably—necessarily affects the depth of our being; also, this virtue chiefly consists—the very term readiness indicates it—in a durable disposition of the will as such.
The essential moment here is, therefore, the free act of inner conversion, the central decision of our will to let ourselves be transformed by Christ without any reservations. The road that leads herefrom to our habitual readiness to change is marked by many single acts reviving the original one, by which we again and again actualize, as it were, the attitude of readiness once adopted, This progressive penetration of the entire personality by a definite direction of will, which has started by a basic personal decision and has unfolded in manifold single decisions or types of conduct (mostly such as come within our range of direct power), finally leads to the acquisition of a habitual readiness to change. The way in which the virtue of confidence in God may develop in us presents a similar structure.
These virtues, then, though they cannot be acquired by our will except in an indirect manner—inasmuch as, like everything habitual, they can only be brought about gradually and not at once—are yet subject to our direct power of will insofar as the free self-engagement of the person constitutes their inmost essence, and moreover, insofar as a set of concrete single acts equally subject to our direct will power will serve, not merely as an accidental means to acquire them, but as a substantial element of their unfolding and amplification.
In regard to certain other virtues, however—such as humility, charity, and kindness—we are in an entirely different position. To be sure, here, too, the act of a free and self-engaging assent to God’s will, both as an initial presupposition and as a permanent element of our attitude, is of eminent importance. But our free decision as such does not suffice to generate, as it were, the living substance of these virtues (nor of the single attitudes correlative to them). The full affective reality of what we call humility—and the more so, that of charity towards God and our fellow men—implies an integral response of our personality to God and the world of values, which we are not free to command directly by our will. In an indirect sense, we can do a great deal to acquire them by removing obstacles from their path, as we shall see it more in detail later.
Again, with regard to another class of virtues such as simplicity, patience, or consciousness as described in Chapter 4, the central element of what we must do to acquire them consists in definite single acts which, in given situations, can be called forth and sustained by our free will. The man who, in the various trials and tribulations of life, again and again endures the test—expressly recognizing God as the lord of Time—and masters, by a free