Why are small things important? People are preoccupied with size. Somehow, we associate size with significance. When something is small, we don’t make much of it. When something is big, we can’t help but make much of it.
In George MacDonald’s Phantastes, a young man named Anodos meets a fairy. She says she wants to give him a gift, but she is so tiny that he asks:
“How can such a very little creature as you grant or refuse anything?”
The fairy replies:
“Is that all the philosophy you have gained in one-and-twenty years?” said she. “Form is much, but size is nothing.”
To prove her point, “she leapt from the desk upon the floor, where she stood a tall, gracious lady, with pale face and large blue eyes.”
“Now,” said she, “you will believe me.”
He did. But what happened? She grew in size.
He didn’t recognize her form, so she had to change her size. Form is about recognition — it is a matter of the heart. Size is about measurement — it is a matter of the mind.
When something appears to us, the heart perceives the form and recognizes what it represents. The mind immediately begins to measure and calculate—and often miscalculates.
What appears small may one day turn out immense. Size is nothing; form is all that matters. Why else would God Almighty take the form of a baby? So that He might be recognized in that form.
The calculating mind passes over such forms because of their small size. We tend to mistake size for significance. Yet what is truly vast — things of cosmic value — come hidden in the smallest forms.
Only the heart can recognize true significance. The mind is deceived by size. For example, what is more important: to play with your child or to meet with the President? To donate a million dollars to a good cause or to chat with your grandmother over the phone?
When people brought little children to Jesus, the disciples rebuked them. They confused size with significance. Yet, Jesus said:
“Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.”
On the cosmic scale, preaching to the crowds was less significant than playing with the kids.
Peter Sloterdijk, a German philosopher and cultural theorist, argues that civilization is shaped by small groups — small circles of friends.
Jesus and the Twelve, Buddha and his disciples, the Inklings, St. Francis and his band of brothers, Einstein, Marcel Grossmann, Max Planck, and Niels Bohr — the list goes on and on.
Everything big started small — among two or three people gathered together in the name of the Fire they had encountered.
If we want to see true magic, we must learn to recognize the significance of small things — and to question what the mind hastily labels as important. The things that truly transform are never loud, noticeable, or flashy.
Magic hides in plain sight. We miss it because the mind expects a spectacle. But true magic is never a spectacle. It is quiet and ordinary — like a child in a manger or a butterfly fluttering over dandelions in my backyard.
