4. Immodesty of touch or look, effeminate softness of manner or language, imprudent familiarity. 5. Human respect, more anxiety to please men than to please the Lord, and therefore doing or saying what is unlawful or imprudent, or omitting to do what conscience dictates to be our duty. _Colloquy._ Earnestly beg pardon for faults committed and resolve to avoid the occasions of sin. MEDITATION III Fidelity in Little Things _1st Prelude._ Behold Christ occupied in simple manual labor. _2nd Prelude._ Ask the grace of understanding the value in God’s sight of perfect fidelity in even the least observances. _POINT I. What is meant by fidelity in little things?_ It means such fidelity in doing God’s will on all occasions as to neglect no details, even the least important. What is there in those details that makes them precious? It is their conformity to the will of God. That is what Christ valued in them. The greatest things on earth are insignificant trifles in the sight of God; but the least act of conformity to God’s will has a Divine worth, and therefore is more precious than any merely natural performance. Faith teaches us to appreciate this truth; Christ came to enforce it by the example of His private life. How do I act in this matter? Am I habitually faithful in observing all my rules, even those which seem to be of less importance? _POINT II. Consider the importance of such fidelity._ 1. This fidelity is a necessary precaution against the commission of great faults. For Ecclesiasticus tells us: “He that contemneth small things shall fall by little and little” (xix, 1). And our Blessed Saviour teaches: “He that is faithful in that which is least is faithful also in that which is greater; and he that is unjust in that which is little is unjust also in that which is greater” (St. Luke xvi, 10). Thus small faults in the matter of charity, poverty, sensuality, chastity, etc., gradually lead to grievous sins. No one becomes at once a great sinner or a great saint. _Nemo repente fit summus_, says the old proverb. Before Judas sold our Lord for thirty pieces of silver, he had accustomed himself to lesser acts of injustice, as St. John tells us, saying of him that “he was a thief, and having the purse, carried the things that were put therein” (xii, 6).