The text below is taken from “The Writings of St Maximilian Maria Kolbe – Volume II: Various Writings” from section 1311. With a Marian accent St. Maximilian articulates the Franciscan school on the test of the Angels and the fall of Lucifer and his minions.

The Immaculata before Her Coming into the World
Niepokalanów, August 5–20, 1940
by St. Maximilian Kolbe

After creating the Angels, God willed that, in full consciousness and will, they should give proof that they would always and in everything desire to accomplish His Will. He showed them the mystery of the Incarnation, that is to say, that He would call into existence a human being, with body and soul, and that he would raise up such a creature to the dignity of Mother of God, so that she would become also their Queen and they would have to venerate her as well. Countless legions of angelic spirits joyfully greeted the one whom their Creator had decided to raise so sublimely and humbly paid homage to their Lady. Some of them, however, headed by Lucifer—forgetful of the fact that all they were and possessed they had received from God, while they alone were absolutely nothing—rebelled and refused to submit to God’s Will. For they considered themselves superior to a human being covered with flesh. Such an act of veneration seemed to them a debasement of their dignity. They allowed themselves to be carried away by pride and refused to do the Will of God.

Because of that, immediate, eternal punishment befell them: separation from God, Hell. Being pure spirits, they possessed penetrating intelligence, whereby their action was fully conscious and voluntary, and in their guilt the features of mortal sin, committed with absolute awareness, were most evident. That is why those angels immediately became demons, and forever.

Since then, the memory of the fact that this creature had become the affirmation of the good Angels and the assurance of their eternal happiness, while to the demons she was the cause of scandal and separation, filled the latter with hellish hatred toward her, a hatred like the hatred they harbored toward God, of whom she was supposed to be such a faithful image.

In the Garden of Eden, Satan saw a being like the one who was the object of his anger. He cannot reach God, he cannot reach her [Mary], but pours out his hatred onto her future mother, on the first mother of mankind [Eve]. He manages to persuade the woman to oppose the will of God and to seek perfection not in submission to God’s intentions, but in following one’s reason. He wins her over with pride. The human being, who knows with the help of the senses, is far from the clarity of knowledge that a purely spiritual being possesses. And it is for this very reason that man’s sin is much less severe. That is why God’s mercy promises [to our first parents] a Redeemer, while to Satan God predicts that the victory he has achieved over Eve, the mother of the foretold being, will not in any way alter the divine plan. Indeed, He predicts that “she will crush his head,” although he continuously “lies in wait” for “her heel,” as happens to this day”