to strengthen man for this combat, to arm and prepare him for the part which he has to perform. When a man rises in the morning, and goes forth to the work of the day, resting entirely on his own strength, and without having looked up to the Lord for protection, it is ten to one that he will fall before the day is through. For that very confidence in his own strength is the most certain proof of weakness: "He that thinketh he standeth, let him take heed lest he fall." Tor the self-love and pride from which such confidence proceeds, is essential evil, and, though he little thinks it, is in fact inspired into his heart by the evil spirits who are around him. Evil spirits desire nothing more burningly than to injure and destroy man; and they bolster him up in his self-conceit, and lift him up in proud self-elevation, to the very end that they may presently give him the greater fall. For they have a keen perception of all man's weaknesses; and the moment they get him upon the precipice of temptation, they will drop him—and the man is gone. Where is his self-confidence now? Before he knows it, he is overhead in the mud and mire of sin.
But now, on the other hand, when a man, before he goes forth from his chamber, kneels down in prayer to the Lord, and looking up, says, "Lord, deliver me from evil,"—at once his internals are opened towards the Lord and heaven, and into those interiors so opened, the Lord pours his Spirit, with its purifying and strengthening power. "He that humbleth himself, shall be exalted." Having humbled himself by the acknowledgment that he is evil, the infernal spirits
