Reader! have you recognised Pride as an evil, have you struggled with him as a foe? Look to your soul and see if it bear not the mark of his galling chain. If the fetter be on it still, oh! with the strength of faith and the energy of prayer, burst it, even as Samson burst the green withes with which a secret enemy had bound him! Or, to change the metaphor, if you feel the proud spirit within, like the inflated sphere of the æronaut, ready to bear you aloft to a cloudy and perilous height, whence you will look down on your fellow-creatures, stop not to dally with danger, persuade not yourself that the peril is unreal, but resolute as one who knows that life and more than life is at stake, clip the soaring wing of the _Eaglet_,—cut the cords of your balloon! Proud,—and of what? poor, vain, and helpless worm, Crawling in weakness through thy life’s brief term, Yet filled with thoughts presumptuous, bold, and high, As though thy grovelling soul could scan the sky,— As though thy wisdom, which cannot foreshow What _one_ day brings of coming weal or woe, Could pierce the depths of far futurity, And all the winged shafts of fate defy! Art proud of riches? of the glittering dust Each day _may_ rob thee of, and one day _must_; When mines of wealth will purchase no delay, When dust to dust must turn, and clay to clay, And nought remain to thee, of all possessed, Save one dark cell in earth’s unconscious breast? Or proud of power? on this little ball Some petty tract may thee its master call, Some fellow-mortals, bending lowly down, Bask in thy smile, or tremble at thy frown Great in the world’s eyes, in thine own more great, How swells thy breast with conscious pride elate! And art thou great? lift up—lift up thine eyes, Survey the heavens, gaze into the skies; View the fair worlds that glitter o’er thy head, Orb above orb in bright succession spread, Beyond the reach of sight, the power of thought:— Then turn thy gaze to earth, and thou art—nought? The globe itself a speck—an atom; thou— Oh! child of dust, shall pride exalt thee now? In one thing only thou mayst glory still, And let exulting joy thy bosom fill; Glory in this,—and what is all beside, That for this worm, this atom,—Jesus died.