Meekness in itself is nought else but a true knowing and feeling of a man’s self as he is. For surely, whoso might verily see and feel himself as he is, he should verily be meeked. Two things there be that be causes of this meekness, the which be these: One is the filth, the wretchedness, and the fraility of man, into the which he must always feel in some degree the whiles he liveth in this life, be he never so holy. Another is the over-abundant love and the worthiness of God in himself; in beholding of which all nature quaketh, all clerks be fools, and all saints and angels be blind. Insomuch, that were it not, through the wisdom of his Godhead, that he measured their beholding according to their ableness in nature and in grace, I cannot say what should befall them.
The Cloud of Unknowing.