With me, as I have told you, the Bible did its work and conscience did hers; but a passion for the unreal proved too strong for both. Undoubtedly God could have wrought, as afterwards he did, to the casting down of imaginations and every thing that exalteth itself against Christ. But how many years of sorrow might have been averted, or how greatly at least might those sorrows have been mitigated, had not the inveteracy of a long-cherished disease required such sharp discipline to bring it under. Pride was the master-sin of my corrupt nature, a pride that every child of Adam inherits, but which peculiarly beset me. It was not what usually goes by that name: no one ever accused me of an approach to haughtiness, neither was I boastful or forward, as far as I know; but I delighted to model my own character according to the standard set forth in my foolish books, and by the contemplation of them I hoped to succeed. I loved to mark in others a mean, ungenerous, selfish, or malicious trait, and to contrast with it my own high-flown notions of the opposite qualities. My memory was well stored with fine sentiments concerning human dignity, honor, virtue, and so forth; and while secretly applying them--for I was not inclined to make ill-natured remarks--in contrast to the failings of those around me, I naturally learned to identify myself with the aforesaid sentiments, and to take it for granted it was I who shone so brightly at other people's expense. This is the inevitable consequence of measuring ourselves by ourselves, as all will do who are not led betimes to the standard appointed of God.