It is not necessary to have confidence in ourselves before we begin important work, especially work through which we hope to influence others; but the poor mind, conscious of innumerable weaknesses and defects, must stay itself somewhere; it cannot carry its burden alone without fainting under the load. Our heavenly Father knows this, and says to us—“Do not try to carry it. Cast thy burden upon me; I will deliver thee, and thou shalt glorify me.” How well that it should be so! This at once places both us and our work in the right position—glorify me, not ourselves. We do not praise the tool that has chiseled out the beautiful sculpture, but the hand that has wielded and directed that instrument.
I remember one evening, when entering the room where our meeting was held, feeling immediately conscious that something not quite pleasant was going on there. One of our members, a fine tall woman, was standing at the work-table, with her great baby, about six months old, in her arms. She was speaking in a loud angry tone, and as I approached the table I heard her say, “It’s of no use, it’ll never fit my baby; and so I tell ye I shan’t have it.” The lady, who that evening kindly superintended the cutting-out of the work, appealed to me, and said that the dimensions of the article had really been carefully attended to, and was the same in every respect as those generally received by the mothers with great satisfaction, I saw directly that this case differed from most contests, where both parties are usually wrong, for here both were right; the uncommon size of the baby accounted for it all. So turning to it I said, “Ah! baby, I wonder you are not ashamed of yourself to be so big, and thus to cause such a disturbance here; there’s no getting anything to fit you.” Then I said to the mother, “You should have observed that this article you have rejected is the usual size; but if you will let your baby be as big at six months as he ought to be at twelve, you must just take the consequences. I will give you some material that you must cut out for yourself, and try to fit your great boy if you can.” The baby crowed and laughed, and seemed delighted at being such an object of attention; the mother caught the infection, and laughed too, acknowledged her mistake, apologised to the lady, and walked off to her seat, by no means displeased at being convicted of having one of the finest babies in the world.