2

stood before ME, yet My mind could not be toward this people "." And now what is remarkable in the history of Samuel? It is this, that he was devoted to GOD from his birth; that from a child he served GOD in His temple: and that when God would reveal HIMSELF, it was not to the aged priest Eli, nor to any Prophet in the Holy Nation, but to the child Samuel that HE made HIMSELF known, and spake His will 3. We may be sure that the Prayer of a child has an especial power with God. It is the one great subject of our SAVIOUR'S rejoicing and thanksgiving, "I thank THEE, O FATHER, LORD of Heaven and earth, because Thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes 1."

Now we know that the world rings aloud with the noise of Education. And yet Education of itself is not a good, but an evil; of itself, I say, because "knowledge," which "puffeth up," is the contrary to that" charity" which "edifieth;" it is of itself, I repeat, a great evil; or, rather, it greatly increases the power of evil which is already too strong for us. It is religion alone, and Prayer, which can turn this evil into good; as it converts all other evils, such as money and the like, into good. Religion, such as is taught by parents and by pastors, by all good people, such as have a care for the souls of others, religion nourished by continual Prayer, this can turn what the world calls Education into a great blessing.

5

Nor is it only the case that what the world, and newspapers, and the Parliament mean by the word Education is an evil, but even more than this, the knowledge of religion itself will but add to our condemnation, unless this knowledge be accompanied with Prayer. For to him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin ";" that is to say, his very knowledge is sin. "If ye know these things," says our Blessed LORD, "happy are ye;" not if ye know them, but "happy are ye if ye do them." There is a knowledge in which is life, and blessed are they who attain unto it. To the world it is as darkness, but it is the light which dwelleth with GOD o.

2 Jer. xv. 1.

31 Sam. iii. 4. 11.

4 Matt. xi. 25.

5 James iv. 17.

6 Dan. ii. 22.

SERMON II.

FORMS OF PRAYER.

ECCLES. v. 2.

"Be not rash with thy mouth, and let not thine heart be hasty to utter any thing before GOD: for GOD is in Heaven, and thou upon earth."

WHEN the Catechism introduces the subject of prayer, and exhorts children to the practice of diligent prayer at all times, it does not proceed to teach them how to pray, nor what to pray for; but requires of them the LORD's Prayer, and the explanation of its meaning. This is remarkable; and the more so, because it is in such exact accordance with our LORD's own example.

For the occasion of our LORD's giving this Prayer, as we read in the Gospels, was the following. "It came to pass, that, as He was praying in a certain place, when HE ceased, one of His Disciples said unto HIM, LORD, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples. And He said unto them, When ye pray, say, Our FATHER which art in Heaven '," and the like. Here it is to be observed that our BLESSED SAVIOUR does not, as we might have expected, in answer to their request, give the Disciples directions how to pray, or what to pray for. He does not say, Pray your HEAVENLY FATHER'S Name may be hallowed; and pray that your sins may be forgiven you: but He gives them an exact form of words which they are to use, saying, When ye pray use these words. Now, the Catechism is in its method of teaching Prayer quite conformable to this, for it merely asks for this form

that

1 Luke xi. 1, 2.

of Prayer which our Lord gave. Thus would our Church feed His lambs in the same way that the Great SHEPHERD fed His sheep thus would she instruct us after our LORD's own example, that the great method of praying aright is by having good forms of prayer: and that of all prayers, infinitely the highest and the best is our LORD's own Prayer; that it is to be to us the very pattern of prayers; that our prayers are to be set forms of prayer, and, if it may be, according to some Divine sanction, holy and good. The Disciples had on this occasion asked our LORD to teach them to pray in like manner as John the Baptist had taught his disciples; and it is inferred from our LORD's answer, that there was a certain form of prayer which the disciples of John had been furnished with by their master for their use.

It is moreover very observable that, on another occasion, in the Sermon on the Mount, recorded as taking place long before, in St. Matthew, when our LORD teaches them to pray, HE gives them the same form of prayer. This, I say, is much to be observed, because our LORD might easily have given them a thousand forms of prayer, all equally excellent and good; but He has chosen to give us one prayer only and that one HE repeated on two occasions. Many parables, many precepts, many discourses, many miracles has HE afforded us for our learning, but one prayer only of His own; and that the same twice given. And why is this? Partly, perhaps, for this reason. The great objection to forms of prayer is that we have to use the same expressions over again and again so often; but yet this is the very thing which our LORD HIMSELF commends to us: it is good for us for HE exhorts us to pray with perseverance and without ceasing; and when we pray to use this prayer.

The same lesson He has also taught us by His own most perfect example, for when HE HIMSELF prayed with great earnestness and importunity in the garden of Gethsemane, He returned to pray, we are told, three times, "saying the same words'." As therefore it is needful for us very often to pray; so is it also right and necessary that we often use the LORD's Prayer.

This point brings us also to another circumstance in our

2 Matt. xxvi. 44.

Blessed SAVIOUR's own example: we read that He spent whole nights in Prayer; and often mention is made of His praying; and we may well suppose that, as the Son of Man, HE was always praying; what these His Prayers were must be for the most part a secret from us; yet thus much is given us to notice that He appears, in His earnest addresses to His FATHER, to be using forms of Prayer; those sacred forms which His Holy SPIRIT has given to us. For when He prayed aloud at the Crucifixion it was with the words which occur at the beginning of the Twenty-second Psalm : MY GOD, MY GOD, why hast THOU forsaken ME!" From which circumstance we reasonably infer that His silent Prayers throughout were more or less in the Divine words of the Psalms. And indeed His last dying words were also from another Psalm: "FATHER, into Thy hands I commend MY SPIRIT?" Moreover, if we refer to the Psalms, from whence these are taken, we find that not such words only spoken aloud, but the whole passage where they occur is in the highest degree applicable to our LORD HIMSELF, under those circumstances in which they were spoken.

Still more, on occasions of solemn worship, in company with others, may we reverently suppose that our LORD used sacred forms of Prayer, as in His worship in the Temple, that House of His FATHER which He would have to be called "the House of Prayer," intimating, no doubt, what He would have our Christian Churches to be. Thus, at the Last Supper, it is said that "when they had sung an hymn, they went forth to the mount of Olives1;" but the hymn which they then sung has always been said to have been one usual with the Jews on that occasion, called the "Great Hallel," consisting of certain Psalms ;-from the beginning of the 113th to the end of the 118th Psalm.

We shall find the same circumstance in others beside our LORD HIMSELF, who are set before us for examples in the Gospels. We are in the habit ourselves of using certain Divine songs or hymns taken from thence, as, for instance, that of the "Magnificat;" in which each of us, as baptized Christians, born again in Christ, take up and apply to ourselves that thanksgiving for our Redemption, which the Blessed Virgin herself made for God's

marvellous mercies to herself. But although the holy Mary then spake by the SPIRIT of GOD, and filled with the HOLY GHOST, yet she is not using words of her own; but the ancient form of an hymn to be found in the Scriptures. For it is throughout in substance the same hymn as Hannah, the mother of Samuel, spake, as we find it, in the Second Chapter of the First Book of Samuel. And yet if ever there was an occasion when we might have supposed that what we call an extemporary Thanksgiving, or Prayer, would have been poured forth by the HOLY GHOST, in words and sentences and thoughts altogether new, and flowing free and spontaneous—it would have been from the mouth of the Blessed Virgin at that time. Yet GOD is so great a lover of order, of unity and concord, that the thanksgiving, even for CHRIST's own Marvellous Birth into the world, is cast into that same form and mould of expression which had been familiar to them from of old. For nothing in the New Creation of GoD is "without form and void." The Psalms and the Hymns and Prayers of the Old Testament are all from the SPIRIT of GOD, Who is "the Same yesterday, and to-day, and for ever." His words, when once spoken, are "of no private interpretation," i. e. they do not apply merely to one single passing circumstance like man's words; they are the words of God, which are like those wheels in the vision of GoD, seen by the Prophet Ezekiel, which are said to have been full of eyes round about "," they look many ways; they mean at the same time many things: therefore, when they are the words of Prayer they serve to express the wants of us all, and at all times, however many and manifold those wants may be.

Further, it may be noticed that when our LORD was received by the Jews in a manner acceptable to HIM, it was with songs and thanksgivings which were taken from the Jewish Liturgy, and not by any words spoken at random by thoughtless man; for the multitude cried aloud, as more than one evangelist records it, saying, "Hosannah, Blessed is HE that cometh in the Name of the LORD;" words which are found in the Psalms 6: and, on the same occasion, the words of the children in the Temple, which displeased the chief priests, were "Hosannah to the Son of David"."

5 Ezek. x. 12.

6 Ps. cxviii. 25, 26.

7 Matt. xxi. 9. 15.