The Great Sin--Part III

In this blog, we conclude Chapter 8 in Mere Christianity by C. S. Lewis--with several additional comments.

Before leaving this subject I must guard against some possible misunderstandings.
(1) Please in being praised is not Pride. The child who is patted on the back for doing a lesson well, the women whose beauty is praise for her lover, the saved soul to whom Christ says "Well done!" are pleased and ought to be. For here the pleasure lies not in what you are but in fact that your have pleased someone you wanted (and rightly wanted) to please. The trouble begins when you pass from thinking, "I have pleased him; all is well," to thinking, "What a fine person I must be to have done it." The more you delight in yourself and the less you delight in the praise, the worse you are becoming. When you delight wholly in yourself and do not care about the praise at all, you have reached the bottom. That is why vanity, though it is the sort of Pride which shows most on the surface, is really the least bad and most partondable sort. The vain person wants praise, applause, admiration, too much and is always angling for it. It is a fault, but a childlike and even (in an odd way) a humble fault. It shows that you are not yet completely contented with you own admiration. You value other people enough to want them to look at you. You are, in fact, still human. The real black, diabolical Pride comes when you look down on others so much that you do not care what they think of you. Of course, it is very right, and often our duty, not to carewhat people think of us, if we do so forthe right reason; namely, because we care so incomparably more what God thinks. But the Proud man has a different reason for not caring. He says "Why should I care forthe applause of that rabble as if their opinion were worthy anything? And even if their opinions were of value, am I the sort of man to blush with pleasure at thecompliment like some chit of a girl at her first dance? No, I am an integrated, adult personality. All I have done has been doneto saiisfy my own ideals--or my artistic conscience--or the traditions of my family--or, ins a word, because I'm That Kind of Chap. Ifthe mob like it, let them. They're nothing to me. In this way real thoroughgoing Pride may act as a check on vanity; for, as I said a moment ago, the devil loves "curing" a small fault by givie you a great one. We must try not to be vain, but we must never call in our Pride to cure our vanity; better the frying-pan and the fire.
(2) We say in English that a man is "proud" of his son, or his father, or his school, or his regiment, and it may be asked whether "pride" in this sense is a sin. I think it depends on what, exactly, we mean by "proud of." Very often, in such sentences, the phrase of "is proud of" means "has a warm-hearted admiration for." Such an admiration is, of course, very far from being a sin. But it might, perhaps, mean that the person in question gives himself airs on the ground of his distinguished father, or because he belongs to a famous regiment. This would, clearly, be a fault; but even then, it would be better than being proud simply of himself. To love and admire anything outside yourself is to take one step away from utter spiritual ruin; though we shall not be well so long as we love and admire anything more than we love and admire God.
(3) We must not think Pride is something God forbids because He is offended at it, or that Humility is something He demands as due to His own dignity--as if God Himself was proud. He is not in the least worried about His dignity. The point is, He wants you to know Him: wants to give you Himself. And He and you are two things of such a kind that if you really get into any kind of touch with Him you will, in fact, be humble--delightedly humble, feeling the infinite relief of having for once got rid of all the silly nonsense about your own dignity which has made you restless and uphappy all your life. He is trying to make you humble in order to make this moment possible: trying to take off a lot of silly, ungly, fancy-dress in which we have all got ourselves up and are strutting about likethe little idiots we are I wish I had got a bit further with humility myself: if I had I could probably tell you more about the relief, the comfort, of taking the fancy-dress off--getting rid of the false self, with all its "Look at me" and "Aren't I a good boy?" and all its posing and posturing. To get even near it, even for a moment, is like a drink of cold water to a man in a desert.
(4) Do not imagine that if you meet a really humble man he will be what most people call "humble" nowadays: he will not be a sort of greasy, smarmy person, who is always telling you that, of course, he is nobody. Probably all you will think about him is that he seemed a cheerful, intelligent chap who took a real interest in what you said to him. If you do dislike him it will be because you feel a little envious of anyone who seems to enjoy life so easily. He will not be thinking about humility: he will not be thinking about himself at all.
If anyone would like to acquire humility, I can, I think, tell him the first step. The first step is to realise that one is proud. And a biggish step, too. At least, nothing whatever can be done before it. If you think you are conceited, it means you are very conceited indeed.

Obviously, a classic example of this principle appears in Jesus' Parable of the Pharisee and the Toll Collector in Luke 18:9-14:

"He [Jesus] also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous and regarded others with contempt. Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the oather a toll collector. The Pharisee, standing by himself, was praying thus, 'God, I thank you that I am not like other people: thieves, rogues, adulterers, or even this toll collector. I fast twice a week; I give a tenth of all myu income.' But the toll collector, standing far off, would not even look up to heaven, but was beating his breast and saying, 'God, be merciful to me a sinner!' I tell you, this man went down to his home justified rather than the other; for all who exalt themselves will be humbled, but all who humble themselves will be exalted."

We all struggle with THE GREAT SIN--PRIDE, SELF-CENTEREDNESS, INGRATITUDE. May God forgive us for who we really are.

Share YOUR understandings and emotions with others. Let me hear from YOU.

John Willis