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chapter, and no sabbath pass without a visit to the house of God, and yet have just as much of this world's vanity in their hearts, and gayety in their looks, and giddiness in their lives, as other people. Further, I have heard professors gravely reason in defence of worldly levities, and reason themselves into a persuasion that they are, to say the least, innocent; and with this persuasion, they have freely gone into them, and led their unthinking offspring along with them in the wildering path. But what if these persons would but seek in prayer to know the way of duty?-what if they would try, whether they could keep the spirit of levity at the throne of grace ?- -or get leave of Him, who sitteth thereon, to be guided by that spirit ?-What if they would go to our Father who is in secret, and ask His blessing upon their intended indulgencies ?-or what if, after leaving their gay companions and diversions, they would go and tell Him of the way in which their time and faculties had been employed, to see whether it would be sanctioned by the uplifted light of His countenance! How could levity endure such experiment? How manifestly must a man of true prayer be a man of pure and permanent sobriety; serene and settled, and cheerful without lightness.

Again, the world often fills the bosoms of men with avarice and ambition; under the former of which they make haste to be rich, and under the latter to be great; under either, or both, to be undone— since the love of money is a root of all evil; and since they have no heart to believe the gospel, who receive honour one of another.

Would you then regard that as a useless thing, which has a tendency to eradicate these base passions from the hearts of men? But if men would give themselves to prayer, they would soon cease to be the slaves of these passions. Prayer would quickly dethrone and banish these guilty usurpers of dominion over the immortal minds of men. If men would acknowledge God in all their ways, God himself would be their ruler and guide; and his Holy Spirit would hold the throne of their hearts. If, before they undertake their plans and enterprises, they would submit them, with the calmness and seriousness of pure devotion, for the approbation of Him, on whom they depend for success, how many of them would they relinquish, and with what moderation would they prosecute the rest! Seest thou a man hurrying, and scrambling, and scuffling for the pelf or the praise of this world? Assuredly thou seest a prayerless soul; professor or not, he is a prayerless soul : -one who, if he deals at all with God in prayer, deals with him only so far as to mock and insult him! A praying man knows too much concerning the true riches, and the honour which cometh from God,

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to discover such miserable infatuation for the things of an hour. such a man it matters little, whether he rank with this world's rich or poor, its mighty or its mean. Riches cannot exalt, nor poverty depress him; honours cannot elate him, nor reproaches break his heart. He dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High, abiding under the shadow of the Almighty-afraid neither for the terror by night, nor for the arrow that flieth by day.

Once more, the world is full of blinding and infatuating influences, whereby the ears of men are turned away from the truth and are turned unto fables; and some have one doctrine and some another; while the ungodliness of others takes occasion from the variance, to renounce all religious opinions, and to hold every thing pertaining to God and another world uncertain, unsettled, and incapable of ever being placed on any sure basis. Such confusion and doubt hath human depravity engendered in a world to which God's oracles have been given for a guide and directory in the way of truth! Nevertheless, men must be extricated from this labyrinth, as they would be either sanctified or saved. As salvation is inseparable from holiness, so is holiness from the belief of the truth. They have pleasure in unrighteousness who believe not the truth; and against all the ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, the everlasting wrath of God is revealed from heaven.

Yet they plead the impossibility of knowing what is truth. The Bible cannot satisfy them; books cannot satisfy them; sermons but multiply their difficulties; and what are they to do? The Eternal Source of truth hath informed them, that they would arrive at certainty, if they would but cease their rebellion against God. "If any man will do his will, he shall know of the doctrine." It is nothing but the spirit of disobedience that subjects any man to the domination of heresy and delusion. But not to enter on the proof of this, in its universal scope, I affirm, that obedience to God, in the single article of prayer, will prove a sure touchstone of truth, and an impregnable defence to the soul against all the innovations of ruinous opinions and dogmas. The soul in prayer stands too near the Fountain of light and truth to be invaded by the fatal infections of error. Her temper, in this exercise, is incongenial to every thing in error's likeness, and shrinks away from its polluting approach, as modesty recoils from the approach of impudence. Nothing certainly but pure truth is capable of being either relished or expressed by the spirit of genuine prayer. For the spirit of such prayer is the spirit of humility and submissiveness, of heavenly sincerity and holy love; and how with such a spirit can any falsehood

have agreement? On such a spirit light will be poured from all nature, as well as from the providence, and book, and Spirit of God. And hence the common observation, that good men always think alike in prayer. Nor is prayer an unthoughtful business. Much of intellect, as well as feeling, is breathed forth in true devotion; nay from almost every true prayer an epitome of the gospel might be extracted.

Wherefore nothing is more unfounded than the pretence of not being able to come to the knowledge of the truth in the midst of this world's jargon of opinions. There is a sure and an easy way; nor is the existence of that destructive jargon resolvable into any thing else, than the world's forgetfulness of God, and known character for prayerlessness. Let no one question it, that prayer universally tried, would unite the whole world, substantially, in the same mind and judgment, nor leave any man doubtful as to an essential article of faith. Thou, that hearest this announcement, art perhaps an unsettled, unhappy, skeptic; yet desirest not to be so, and hast long tried to convince thyself. Thou hast read; thou hast disputed; and thou hast listened, in hope that thy doubts might be dissipated. I will not question that thou hast done all this; but full well I know, there is one thing thou hast not done. Thou hast not disinterred thy heart out of this world's pollutions and vanities. Thou hast been living in the spirit and in the ways of them who fear not God. It hath not been thy daily delight to enter into thy closet and shut thyself in from all earthly society, and then bow down thy spirit before His presence who seeth in secret. Hadst thou done but this, thou wouldst not have been now a tired wanderer, near eternity's dread brink, with a mind full of doubt, void of fixed hope, aching with ungrateful desire, and anon shivering with apprehension of what may yet befall.

III. Thus have I considered the influence of prayer in counteracting the debasing and soul-destroying tendencies of the world. There are other tendencies favourable to the soul's welfare, and I now wish to show briefly the efficacious influence of prayer upon these.

I begin with the word of God. That word is, in its unresisted applications to the heart, quick and powerful, and as the fire and the hammer which breaketh the rock in pieces. It is perfect, converting the soul; sure, making wise the simple; right, rejoicing the heart; pure, enlightening the eyes--but the time would fail me to repeat a small part of what inspiration hath spoken in its praise. It is nevertheless powerless independently of prayer; for, however great its excellencies,

prayerlessness will either keep them out of view, or turn them into deformities and stumbling-blocks. What are the beauties of the rainbow, or the beams of the sun to the blind man? And who more blind, though voluntarily so, than the prayerless soul? What was the glory of the Only Begotten of the Father to the earthly-minded Jews, when He dwelt among them, full of grace and truth? And what, also, are the wonders of Truth and Wisdom in sacred scripture, to those who are so swayed by an obstinate will, that they cast off fear, and restrain prayer to God. Depravity can see no beauty in holiness; and who are depraved, if not the prayerless? When such persons have read the Bible, till they have it all in their memories, what are they better? Which hath the greater charms in their eye, God's truth or their riches? salvation or the pleasures of sin? I have known of such great readers, who seemed to have learned by their researches, how to cavil and blaspheme, or to play the bigot or the fanatic-such miserable fruit of their labour came of their not mixing prayer with it. Even the renewed find prayer still indispensable to a profitable meditation in scripture. Remaining pollution will blind their eye, if the anointing of the Holy One be not constantly sought; and therefore, though the sacred pages lie open before them, and though they have once been truly enlightened to understand them; they shall not, without unremitted prayer, continue to behold the wonders of God's law.

But the Bible is not the only book that may profit the soul of man. There are profound treatises on every subject of theology and morals, in which treasures of light and learning are contained for the edification of mankind; and here, where man speaks to man, what can hinder the acquisition of benefit by the diligent student? Without meaning to discourage deep study, let me rather ask, what can hinder its resulting fatally, if prayer be restrained? It matters not what the subjects of human thought are,—if intellect alone be conversant with them-if the other faculties of the soul-the conscience, the will, the affections-be not duly exercised-the reign of depravity, instead of being overthrown, is established. And the danger is not imaginary, that in deep and retired studies these other faculties will not be proportionately engaged. Those pastors know this, whose souls are kept in an almost constant stretch of thought, in order to get food, intellectual and spiritual, for their flocks, that else would starve for lack of knowledge. Many think their lives easy, and their labour well rewarded, if they are just kept out of want but these know little of mental travail; which, in our case, while it is all for the profit of others, greatly endangers our own spiritual state. We have to

think so much for them, that often we have hardly time for prayer; unless we think and pray at once; and yet nothing but prayer can keep our thinking from withering up the life of our personal godliness. Study, in short, will much advance the soul, if it be conducted with a prayerful spirit; but if prayer be slighted, while study accumulates knowledge, it also genders spiritual leanness and impotence; and it is well if it prove not a savour of death unto death at last.

Thus, also, as to the divine ordinance of public preaching-that ordinance by means of which more hath been done for man's spiritual interest than by all other means beside. A man may make his boast of having the ablest minister in the land, and of hearing habitually the most clear and pungent discourses that the human tongue hath ever pronounced; and yet the good of every sermon may be lost to that man, for want of the spirit of prayer in his hearing. For what though the seed be the best, and be sown with the greatest diligence, if it fall upon hard-beaten, or stony, or thorny ground? Now there is no other way of preparing the ground of the heart for the seed of the word, than prayer; and no other influence but that, which prayer draws down upon the soul, can make that seed vegetate and yield fruit. A church-going man, who is not also a man of prayer, has no better reason to expect spiritual benefit from the ordinances of grace, than a husbandman has to expect a harvest, who plants his grain and leaves his field an unfenced common. It is he who enters his closet before he comes to the house of God, and prays in secret before he takes his place in the public assembly, and keeps still praying while the word is sounding powerfully in his ear, and forgets not another retreat to his private chamber after dismission from the courts of the Lord-this is the man, who grows, and thrives, as every one ought, under the minis

trations of the word.

The same necessity is there for prayer, to make providential dispensations available to the advancement of man's salvation. For though adversities have a tendency to draw him away from the idolatry of the world, and mercies should lift his affections to their glorious Source, yet all experience testifies, that the former will only sink him into sullen melancholy or fretfulness, and the latter infatuate him with pride and self-sufficiency, unless he keep near to God in the exercise of

prayer.

Thus, besides ennobling man's soul, by its own proper and direct influence; and keeping other influences from injuring it, by resisting and overcoming them; prayer is of this further utility, that it makes all favourable influences secure of their end. And now, whether,

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