Children do not make Self-depreciatory Remarks––What is the secret of this absolute humility, humble alike towards higher or lower, and unaware of distinctions? Our notion of a humble person is one who thinks rather slightingly of himself, who says, deprecatingly, ‘Oh, I can’t do this or that, you know, I’m not clever’; ‘I’m not cut out for public work of any sort, I’ve no power or influence’; ‘Ah!
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well, I hope he’ll be a better man than his father, I don’t think much of myself anyway’; ‘Your children have great advantages; I wish mine had such a mother, but I’m not a bit wise.’ Such things are often said, in all sincerity, without the least soupçon of the ‘Uriah Heep’ sentiment. The thing we quarrel with is, that the speakers are apt to feel that they have, anyway, the saving grace of humility. It is worth while to reflect that there are no such self-depreciatory utterances ascribed to the Example of that ‘great humility’ which we are bound to follow; and if there is not the slightest evidence of humility in this kind in the divine life, which was all humility, we must re-cast our notions. Children, too, never make self-depreciatory remarks; that is because they are humble, and with the divine Example before us, and the example of our children, we may receive it that humility does not consist in thinking little of ourselves. It is a higher principle, a blessed state, only now and then attained by us elders, but in which the children perpetually dwell, and in which it is the will of God that we should keep them.