July 28

“And remember, in the second place, what would happen if all the little people in the world held up their littleness like a shield before them, as you hold up yours. Grant that you are as small as you think you are, you are the average size of moral and intellectual humanity. Let all the Merozes in the land be humble like you, and where shall be the army? Only when men like you wake up and shake the paralysis of their humility away, shall we begin to see the dawn of that glorious millennium for which we sigh; which will consist not in the transformation of men into angels, nor in the coming forth of a few colossal men to be the patterns and the champions of life, but simply in each man, through the length and breadth of the great world, doing his best.”

PHILLIPS BROOKS

“Do what lieth in thy power and God will assist thy good will.”

THOMAS à KEMPIS

“God only asks from you what He gives you power to do.”

Bishop WALSHAM HOW

July 27

“No man is so poor as to have nothing worth giving; as well might the mountain streamlets say they have nothing to give the sea because they are not rivers.
“Give what you have; to some one it may be better than you dare to think.”

LONGFELLOW

“Do not despond because your means of doing good appear trifling or insignificant; for though one soweth and another reapeth, yet it is God that giveth the increase; and who can tell whether He will not cause that which is sewn to bear fruit an hundred fold?”

JEAN INGELOW

“There must be a perpetual crusade carried on against small evils – very wearing sometimes. It is necessary to believe that in thus setting in order certain spots on God’s earth, still more in presenting to a few of His Children a somewhat higher standard of right, we are doing His work, and that He will not permit us to lose sight of His large laws, but will rather make them evident to us through small details.”

OCTAVIA HILL

July 26

“All work must be done very simply and quietly because God puts it into our hands to do, and then He will undoubtedly bless it. Do not allow yourself to become overwhelmed with work. You may be fully aware of your unfitness, and long for another to do it better, but if God has told you to do certain work for Him, then you must do it. Another might certainly do it better, but you have nothing to do with that. God has sent you to do it and no one else. He will give you all the strength you need to enable you to do it rightly. ‘My God shall supply all your need.’ Do not let self creep in. It is only self that makes you think about it at all, and say you cannot do it. You can do it perfectly well if He tells you to do it and it is not self-sought. Even if it be spiritual work, and you fear the souls of others may suffer through you, you need not fear. He has called you, and He will help you. Only trust to Him, and remember it is not you who do it, but He who works through you. Keep very quiet and calm, and rest in God, then He will not let you feel overwhelmed. Be as simple and natural as possible about everything. Try always to see clearly that right is right and wrong is wrong.”

H. MONSELL

“All our natural endowments, all our personal histories, all our contrasted circumstances, are so many opportunities for peculiar work.”

Bishop WESTCOTT

March 25

March 25

“If we measure our work for God by our own ability to do it, we must not be surprised if God takes us at our word, and the results are small; but if we are trustful enough to believe that it is God, and not we, by whom the work is done, we shall surely find the blessing to be according to His power, and out of all proportion to our strength.”

BRAITHWAITE

“Every man can help on the world’s work more than he knows of. What we want is the single eye, that we may see what our work is, the humility to accept it, however lowly, the faith to do it for God, the perseverance to go on till death.”

NORMAN MCLEOD

“Each man should live and work as if no one but himself could do the special work which lies to his hand, and in the full realisation that he has only a short time in which to do it.”

March 23

“Let no one say that he must be better before he can take a part, even a quiet and unobserved part, in making others better. On the contrary, there is no duty which may not be made the gate of the road to Christ. Begin here and you will find that this way leads, where all such ways lead, to your Master’s Presence. Do not fear that you are unworthy to serve Him, for serving Him in any way is the sure means to make you more worthy.”

Bishop TEMPLE

“You will never lead souls heavenward unless climbing yourself. You need not be very far up, but you must be climbing.”

Bishop WALSHAM HOW

“The best men doing their best
Know peradventure least of what they do:
Men usefullest in the world are simply used;
The nail that holds the wood must pierce it first,
And He alone Who wields the hammer sees
The work advanced by the earliest blow. Take heart.”

ELIZABETH B. BROWNING