n the {99}
suggestion is to be guilty of pride. Better a small and humble service
well performed, than great things poorly done. "Our advancement and
perfection consist not in the performance of very extraordinary things,
or in the being employed in the highest and most labourious offices of
religion, but only in doing our ordinary actions well, and in
acquitting ourselves well of whatsoever obedience employs us in, be it
ever so mean or easy."[6] So Christian perfection, against which all
temptation is directed, consists in doing ordinary things
extraordinarily well.

The conclusion of the matter is that we cannot be safe unless our whole
life is lived by definite, practical rule; a rule for rising in the
morning, for prayers, for our Bible reading, our Communions, our
Confessions, for the commonest details of our daily routine, leaving
nothing to be decided by chance or whim. A life thus ordered and
carried out with constancy of purpose and will, for the glory of God,
is a standing {100} menace to Satan's power. He fears it, because he
knows that it possesses a power against which his long experience and
consummate skill are as nothing.

V. _The Practice of Calmness_

A life lived as has been described above is one that will be dominated
by a spirit of calmness, a calmness born of strength. The strong man
is always the calm man. An agitated spirit is the evidence of a
conscious weakness. The soldier who has faith in his commander, who
knows he can rely on the weapons furnished him, and who is certain that
his strength is greater than that of his enemy, is not excited in the
face of attack. He receives it with serenity because he feels assured
of what the result will be. It is uncertainty that brings agitation;
it is the uncertainties of life that produce the worry that kills--and
worry means want of faith. But the Christian soldier is beset by no
uncertainties. If, in unswerving trust, he keeps his will firm for
God, knit up with the perfect human will of our Lord, he knows there
are no contingencies in the warfare he is waging. There can be but one
issue,--that of complete and glorious victory.

If this assurance concerning the issue produces calmness, the spirit of
calm will in its turn react {101} upon us for the greater certainty of
the victory.[7] The heart that is calm is the one that is capable of
seeing all things in their true nature and relation. Such a heart is
not easily deceived by