Virtue in itself is the worship that attaches us to God and attracts us to Him, while radiating around us. (GTUFS: EsoterismPW, The Virtues in the Way)
A spiritual VIRTUE is nothing other than consciousness of a reality. (GTUFS: SPHF, The Spiritual Virtues)
Virtue consists in allowing free passage, in the soul, to the Beauty of God. (GTUFS: EchPW, 15)
Virtue is not a merit in itself, it is a gift; but it is nonetheless a merit to the extent that we exert ourselves towards it. (GTUFS: RootsHC, Virtue and Way)
Virtue consists essentially in humility and charity; these are the fundamental qualities from which all others derive, to which they all relate and without which no sanctity is possible. Humility presents itself under two aspects: awareness of one’s metaphysical nothingness in the face of the Absolute and awareness of one’s personal imperfection; this second humility implies not only a relentless instinct for detecting one’s own limitations and weaknesses, but also a simultaneous capacity to discern the positive qualities in one’s neighbor, for a VIRTUE which is blind to VIRTUEs in others destroys itself thereby. Consciousness of one’s individual insufficiency springs from the necessarily fragmentary character of the ego; in other words, to say “ego” is to say partial imperfection in regard to other individuals. Humility is moreover owed to all creatures, since all of them manifest qualities and glorify God after their manner; the first relation goes from God to the thing, and the second from the thing to God; man has a right to the things of creation only on condition that he respect them, that is to say on condition that he discern in each one both its divine property and its spiritual language; man never has a right to destroy simply for the pleasure of destroying. Among VIRTUE the position of humility is a special one – like that of the apex in a triangle – because it conforms to God, not by “participation” but by “opposition,” in the sense that the attitude of humility, poverty or self-effacement, is analogically opposed to the divine Majesty; this opposition is however a relative one, since it rejoins the direct analogy through its intrinsic perfections which is, mutatis mutandis, the simplicity of the Essence. Humility, therefore, is distinguishable from the other VIRTUEs by the fact that it marks a relatively indirect participation in the Divine Prototype, or in other words by the fact that it is, depending on the point of view, either “more” or “less” than the other fundamental VIRTUEs. As for charity, it consists in abolishing the egocentric distinction between “ME” and the “other”: it is seeing the “I” in the “other” and the “other” in the “I.” Humility and charity are the two dimensions of self-effacement: they are, to use a Christian symbolism, like the vertical and horizontal branches of the Cross. The one can always be reduced to the other: humility is always to be found in charity, and conversely. To these two VIRTUEs must be added the VIRTUE of veracity: it is love of truth, objectivity, impartiality; it is a VIRTUE that situates intelligence in the framework of the will – to the extent that the nature of things allows of this or demands it – and its function consists in keeping away every passional element from the intelligence. Discernment must remain independent of love or hate: it must see things as they are, firstly according to universal Truth which assigns to each thing its degree in the hierarchy of values, and secondly according to the truth proper to things in their immediate nature; when the alternative presents itself, preference must be given to essential aspects, for which accidental aspects must not be substituted, and so forth. This serenity and this precision exclude neither love nor holy indignation, because these arise parallel to intellection and not within it: holy indignation, far from being opposed to truth, derives from truth as from its enabling cause. Truthfulness corrects any arbitrariness that might result from a humility or charity regarded in too subjective a way: it prevents humility from becoming an end in itself and thus sinning against intelligence and the nature of things; it likewise controls charity and determines its various modes. One has to be humble because the ego tends to think itself more than it is; and one has to be truthful because the ego tends to prefer its own tastes and habits to the truth. (GTUFS: HaveCenter, Intelligence and Character)
Virtue (essence): Virtue is the conformity of the soul to the divine Model and to the spiritual work; conformity or participation. The essence of the VIRTUEs is emptiness before God, which permits the divine Qualities to enter the heart and radiate in the soul. Virtue is the exteriorization of the pure heart. (GTUFS: EchPW, 15)
Virtue (natural / supernatural): It is important to understand that the natural VIRTUEs have no effective value save on condition of being integrated into the supernatural VIRTUEs, those precisely which presuppose a kind of death. Natural VIRTUE does not in fact exclude pride, that worst of illogicalities and that preeminent vice; supernatural VIRTUE alone – rooted in God – excludes that vice which, in the eyes of Heaven, cancels all the VIRTUEs. Supernatural VIRTUE – which alone is fully human – coincides therefore with humility; not necessarily with sentimental and individualistic humilitarianism, but with the sincere and well-grounded awareness of our nothingness before God and of our relativity in relation to others. To be concrete, we would say that a humble person is ready to accept even a partially unjust criticism if it comprises a grain of truth, and if it comes from a person who is, if not perfect, at least worthy of respect; a humble person is not interested in having his VIRTUE recognized, he is interested in surpassing himself; hence in pleasing God more than men. (GTUFS: HaveCenter, Survey of Integral Anthropology)
Virtue / Art: Virtue realizes in the human subject a conformity with the divine Object; spiritual art eliminates – or conjointly with knowledge contributes to eliminating – the human objectification that veils the divine Subject. (GTUFS: LSelf, A View on Yoga)
Virtue / Beauty: Virtue is the beauty of the soul as beauty is the VIRTUE of forms. (GTUFS: LogicT, Truths and Errors Concerning Beauty)
Virtue cut off from God becomes pride, as beauty cut off from God becomes idol; and
VIRTUE attached to God becomes sanctity, as beauty attached to God becomes sacrament.
(GTUFS: EchPW, 17)
Virtue / Grace: “Virtue” in this sense is not equivalent to the natural qualities which of necessity accompany a high degree of intellectuality and contemplativity, it is a conscious and permanent striving after perfection, and perfection is essentially self-effacement, generosity and love of truth; “grace” in this sense is the divine aid which man must implore and without which he can do nothing, whatever his gifts; for a gift serves no purpose if it be not blessed by God. (GTUFS: LightAW, In the Wake of the Fall)
Virtue / Union: God . . . is . . . One; the unity of the divine object demands – and logically involves – the totality of the human subject; and it demands it in the double respect of individual, and therefore horizontal, perfection, and universal, and therefore vertical perfection. This second perfection closes the circle since it opens onto the Divine Subject, which is immanent, while at the same time remaining transcendent in relation to the human subject. In other words, the discernment that allows the intelligence to distinguish between the absolute and the relative has, as a corollary, both moral VIRTUE and spiritual union. Virtue is the conformity of the soul to the divine nature; and union is extinctive concentration on the immanent Self. (GTUFS: EsoterismPW, The Way of Oneness)