But I do not say that he cannot attain to that excellence.  To the goodness of God, of course, no man can; but to the goodness of man he may.  For what man has done, man may do; and the grace of God which gave power to one man to rise above sin, and weakness, and ignorance, will give power to others also.  But only to those who look upward, at better men than themselves:  not to those who look down, like the Pharisee, but to those who look up like the Publican; for, as the text says, ’God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace to the humble.’

And why does God resist and set himself against the proud?  To turn him out of his evil way, of course, if by any means he may be converted (that is, turned round) and live.  For the proud man has put himself into a wrong position; where no immortal soul ought to be.  He is looking away from God, and down upon men; and so he has turned his face and thoughts away from God, the fountain of light and life; and is trying to do without God, and to stand in his own strength, and not in God’s grace, and to be somebody in himself, instead of being only in God, in whom we live and move and have our being.  So he has set himself against God; and God will, in mercy to that foolish man’s soul, set himself against him.  God will humble him; God will overthrow him; God will bring his plans to nought; if by any means he may make that man ashamed of himself, and empty him of his self-conceit, that he may turn and repent in dust and ashes, when he finds out what those proud Laodicaean Christians of old had to find out—­that all the while that they were saying, ’I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing,’ they did not know that they were wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked.

And how does God give grace to the humble?  My friends, even the wise heathen knew that.  Listen to a heathen; {328} a good and a wise man, though; and one who was not far from the kingdom of God, or he would not have written such words as these,—­

‘It is our duty,’ he says, ’to turn our minds to the best of everything; so as not merely to enjoy what we read, but to be improved by it.  And we shall do that, by reading the histories of good and great men, which will, in our minds, produce an emulation and eagerness, which may stir us up to imitation.  We may be pleased with the work of a man’s hands, and yet set little store by the workman.  Perfumes and fine colours we may like well enough:  but that will not make us wish to be perfumers, or painters:  but goodness, which is the work, not of a man’s hands, but of his soul, makes us not only admire what is done, but long to do the like.  And therefore,’ he says, he thought it good to write the lives ’of famous and good men, and to set their examples before his countrymen.  And having begun to do this,’ he says in another place, ’for the sake of others, he found himself going on, and liking his labour, for his own sake:  for the virtues of those great