Life: The Great Sin

Have been reading C.S. Lewis' Mere Christianity.

The other day, came across the chapter with the title, "The Great Sin."

What do you think is the greatest sin?

Quoting Lewis:

I now come to that part of Christian morals where they differ most sharply from all other morals. There is one vice of which no man in the world is free; which every one in the world loathes when he sees it in someone else; and of which hardly any people, except Christians, ever imagine that they are guilty themselves. I have heard people admit that they are bad-tempered, or that they cannot keep their heads about girls or drink, or even that they are cowards.
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The vice I am talking of is Pride or Self-Conceit: and the virtue opposite to it, in Christian morals, is called Humility.
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It is the comparison that makes you proud: the pleasure of being above the rest.

[ed. note - Lewis then gives example of how pride works in day-to-day life in men trying to get the girl, the pursuit of money, girls collecting admirers and political leadership]

In God you come up against something which is in every respect immeasurably superior to yourself. Unless you know God as that - and, therefore, know yourself as nothing in comparison - you do not know God at all. As long as you are proud you cannot know God. A proud man is always looking down on things and people: and, of course, as long as you are looking down, you cannot see something that is above you.

Are you surprised by Lewis' answer to the question of what is the greatest sin?

I confess I was really hit over the head by this chapter. This is one of those sins you don't think you have but when confronted with it, it stares you in the face plain as day and you realize you have been fooling yourself all along.

Lord, have mercy on me, a prideful man!