At Toulon, Napoleon, looking out of the batteries, drew back a step to let some one take his place. The next moment the new arrived was killed. That step brought the French Empire, and made possible the bloody roll of its victories and defeats. The rout at Waterloo turned on a shower of rain hindering Grouchy's advance. The resolution of a moment, with some men, has been the turning-point of infinite issues to a world.
One of the best things in the gospel of Jesus is the stress it lays on small things. It ascribes more value to quality than to quantity; it teaches that God does not ask how much we do, but how we do it.
Let us be content to do little, if God sets us at little tasks. It is but pride and self-will which says, "Give me something huge to fight,—and I should enjoy that—but why make me sweep the dust?"
Most people would succeed in small things if they were not troubled with great ambitions.
The reason why those who are converted to Christ often make so poor a work of rectifying their old habits, is that they lay down their work in the very places where it needs to be prosecuted most carefully, that is, in their common employments. They do not live to God in that which is least.
All the mischiefs which befall Christian character, and destroy its growth, are such as lie in the ordinary humble duties of life.
