Self is the gorgon. Vanity sees it in the mirror of other men and lives.
Pride studies it for itself and is turned to stone.

It is necessary to dwell on this defect in Mr. Moore, because it
is really the weakness of work which is not without its strength.
Mr. Moore's egoism is not merely a moral weakness, it is
a very constant and influential aesthetic weakness as well.
We should really be much more interested in Mr. Moore if he were
not quite so interested in himself. We feel as if we were being
shown through a gallery of really fine pictures, into each of which,
by some useless and discordant convention, the artist had represented
the same figure in the same attitude. "The Grand Canal with a distant
view of Mr. Moore," "Effect of Mr. Moore through a Scotch Mist,"
"Mr. Moore by Firelight," "Ruins of Mr. Moore by Moonlight,"
and so on, seems to be the endless series. He would no doubt
reply that in such a book as this he intended to reveal himself.
But the answer is that in such a book as this he does not succeed.
One of the thousand objections to the sin of pride lies
precisely in this, that self-consciousness of necessity destroys
self-revelation. A man who thinks a great deal about himself
will try to be many-sided, attempt a theatrical excellence at
all points, will try to be an encyclopaedia of culture, and his
own real personality will be lost in that false universalism.
Thinking about himself will lead to trying to be the universe;
trying to be the universe will lead to ceasing to be anything.
If, on the other hand, a man is sensible enough to think only about
the universe; he will think about it in his own individual way.
He will keep virgin the secret of God; he will see the grass as no
other man can see it, and look at a sun that no man has ever known.
This fact is very practically brought out in Mr. Moore's "Confessions."