The Puritans on PRIDE

"One of our most heinous and palable sins is PRIDE. This is a sin that hath too much interest in the best of us, but which is more hateful and inexcusable in us than in other men. Yet is it so prevelant in some of us, that it inditeth our discourses, it chooseth our company, it formeth our countenances, it putteth the accent and emphasis upon our words. ...But, alas! how frequently doth it go with us to our study, and there sit with us and do our work! ...God commandeth is to be as plain as we can, that we may inform the ignorant; and as convincing and serious as we are able, that we may melt and change their hardended hearts. p.137 The Reformed Pastor

...In short, the sum of all is this, it maketh men, both in studying and preaching , to seek themelves, and deny God, when they should seek God's glory, and deny themselves. When they should inquire, what shall I say, and how shall I say it, to please God best, and do most good? it makes them ask, What shall I say, and how shall I deliver it, to be thought a learned able preacher, and to be applauded by all that hear me? p.138

..and while we cry down papal infallibility, too many of us would be popes ourselves, and have all stand to our determination, as if we were infallible. p.140

The matter is come to pass, through our pride, that if an error or fallacious argument do fall under the patronage of a reverend name, (which is nothing rare,) we must either allow it the victory, and give away the truth, or else become injurious to that name that doth patronize it; for though you meddle not with their persons, yet do they put themselves under all the strokes which you give their arguments; and feel them as sensibly as if you had spoken of themselves, because they think it will follow in the eyes of others, that weak arguing is a sign of a weak man. If, therefore, you consider it your duty to shame their errors and false reasonings, by discovering their nakedness, they take it as if you shamed their persons; and so their names must be a garrison or fortress to their mistakes, and their reverence must defend all their sayings from attack. p.141