An infant’s breath might blow it out!

(Charles Spurgeon)
“He will not break a bruised reed, and He will not put out a smoldering wick.”

Matthew 12:20
What is weaker than the bruised reed–or the smoldering wick?

A reed that grows in the marsh–let but the wild duck land upon it, and it snaps; let but the foot of man brush against it, and it is bruised and broken; every wind that flits across the river–moves it to and fro. You can conceive of nothing more frail or brittle, or whose existence is more in jeopardy, than a bruised reed.

Then look at the smoldering wick–what is it? It has a spark within it, it is true–but it is almost smothered; an infant’s breath might blow it out; nothing has a more precarious existence than its flame.