of old, "does not tempt bad men, because he has got them already; he
tempts good men, because he has NOT got them, and wants to get them."

But how shall we know these temptations? God knows, my friends, better
than I; and I trust that He will teach you to know, according to what
each of you needs to know. But as far as my small experience goes, the
root of them all is pride and self-conceit. Whatsoever thoughts or
feelings tempt us to pride and self-conceit are of the devil, not of God.
The devil is specially the spirit of pride; and, therefore, whatever
tempts you to fancy yourself something different from your fellow-men,
superior to your fellow men, safer than them, more favoured by God than
them, that is a temptation of the spirit of pride. Whatever tempts you
to think that you can do without God's help and God's providence;
whatever tempts you to do anything extraordinary, and show yourself off,
that you may make a figure in the world; and above all, whatever tempts
you to antinomianism, that is, to fancy that God will overlook sins in
you which He will not overlook in other men--all these are temptations
from the spirit of pride. They are temptations like our Lord's
temptations. These temptations came on our Lord more terribly than they
ever can on you and me, just because He was the Son of Man, the perfect
Man, and, therefore, had more real reason for being proud (if such a
thing could be) than any man, or than all men put together. But He
conquered the temptations because He was perfect Man, led by the Spirit
of God; and, therefore, He knew that the only way to be a perfect man was
not to be proud, however powerful, wise, and glorious He might be; but to
submit Himself humbly and utterly, as every man should do, to the will of
His Father in Heaven, from whom alone His greatness came.

Now the spirit of pride cannot understand the beauty of humility, and the
spirit of self-will cannot understand the beauty of obedience; and,