My friends, do you think that if the publican, after he had said, ‘God be merciful to me a sinner!’ had said to himself, ‘There—how beautifully I have repented—how honest I have been to God—I am all right now’—he would have gone down to his house justified at all? Not he. No more will you and I, my friends. If we have sinned, what should we be but ashamed of it? Ay, utterly ashamed. And if we really know what sin is—if we really see the sinfulness of sin—if we really see ourselves as God sees us—we shall be too much shocked at the sight of our own hearts to have time to boast of our being able to see our own hearts. We shall be too full of loathing and hatred for our sins, too full of longing to get rid of our sins, and to become righteous and holy, even as God is righteous and holy, to give way to any pride in our own frames and feelings; and, instead of thinking ourselves better men than our neighbours because we see our sins, and fancy they do not see theirs, we shall be almost ready to think ourselves worse than our neighbours, to think that they cannot have so much to repent of as we; and as we grow in grace, we shall see more and more sin in ourselves, till we actually fancy at times that no one can be as bad as we are, and in lowliness of mind esteem others better than ourselves. We may carry that too far, too. Certainly there is no use in accusing ourselves of sins which we have not committed; we have all quite enough real sins to answer for without inventing more. But still that is a better frame of mind than the other; for no man can be too humble, while any man can be too proud. But let us all ask God to open our eyes, that we may see ourselves just as we are, let our sins be many or few. Let us ask God to convince us really of sin by his Holy Spirit, and show us what sin is, and its exceeding sinfulness; how ugly and foul sin is, how foolish and absurd, how mean and ungrateful toward that good God who wishes us nothing but good, and wishes us, therefore, to be good, because goodness is the only path to life and happiness; and then we shall be so ashamed of ourselves, so afraid of our own weakness, so shocked at the difference between ourselves and the spotless Lord Jesus, that we shall have no time to despise others, no time to admire our own frames, and feelings, and repentances. All we shall think of is our own sinfulness, and God’s mercy; and we shall come eagerly, if not boldly, to the throne of grace, to find grace and mercy to help us in the time of need; crying, ‘Purge thou me, O Lord, or I shall never be pure; wash thou me, and then alone shall I be clean. For thou requirest, not frames or feelings, not pride and self-conceit, but truth in the inward parts; and wilt make me to understand wisdom secretly.’