ance,

ON PRAYER.

If there be any duty which our Lord Jesus Christ seems to have considered as more indispensably necessary towards the formation of a true Christian, it is that of prayer. He has taken every opportunity of impressing on our minds the absolute need in which we stand of the divine assistboth to persist in the paths of righteousness, and to fly from the allurements of a fascinating, but dangerous life: and he has directed us to the only means of obtaining that assistance in constant and habitual appeals to the throne of Grace. Prayer is certainly the foundation stone of the superstructure of a religious life: for a man can neither arrive at true piety, nor persevere in its ways when attained, unless, with sincere and continued fervency, and with the most unaffected anxiety, he implore Almighty God to grant him his perpetual grace, to guard and restrain him from all those derelictions of heart, to which we are, by nature, but too prone. I should think it an insult to the understanding of a Christian to dwell on the necessity of prayer, and, before we can harangue an infidel on its efficacy, we must convince him not only that the Being to whom we address ourselves really exists, but that he condescends to hear and to answer our humble supplications. As these objects are foreign to my present purpose, I shall take my leave of the necessity of prayer, as acknowledged by all to whom this paper is addressed, and shall be content to expatiate on the strong inducements

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which we have to lift our souls to our Maker in the language of supplication and of praise; depict the happiness which results to the man of true piety from the exercise of this duty; and, lastly, to warn mankind, lest their fervency should carry them into the extreme of fanaticism, and their prayers, instead of being silent and unassuming expressions of gratitude to their Maker, and humble entreaties for his favouring grace, should degenerate into clamorous vociferations and insolent gesticulations, utterly repugnant to the true spirit of prayer, and to the language of a creature addressing his Creator.

There is such an exalted delight to a regenerate being in the act of prayer, and he anticipates with so much pleasure, amid the toils of business, and the crowds of the world, the moment when he shall be able to pour out his soul without interruption into the bosom of his Maker, that I am persuaded, that the degree of desire or repugnance which a man feels to the performance of this amiable duty, is an infallible criterion of his acceptance with God. Let the unhappy child of dissipation-let the impure voluptuary boast of his short hours of exquisite enjoyment; even in the degree of bliss they are infinitely inferior to the delight of which the righteous man participates in his private devotions; while in their opposite consequences they lead to a no less wide extreme than heaven and hell, a state of positive happiness, and a state of positive misery. If there were no other inducement to prayer, than the very gratification it imparts to the soul, it would deserve to be regarded as the most impor

tant object of a Christian; for no where else could he purchase so much calmness, so much resignation, and so much of that peace and repose of spirit in which consists the chief happiness of this otherwise dark and stormy being. But to prayer, besides the inducement of momentary gratification, the very self-love implanted in our bosoms would lead us to resort, as the chief good, for our Lord hath said, "Ask, and it shall be given to thee; knock, and it shall be opened to thee;" and not a supplication made in the true spirit of faith and humility, but shall be answered; not a request which is urged with unfeigned submission and lowliness of spirit, but shall be granted, if it be consistent with our happiness, either temporal or eternal. Of this happiness, however, the Lord God is the only judge; but this we do know, that whether our requests be granted, or whether they be refused, all is working together for our ultimate benefit.

When I say, that such of our requests and solicitations, as are urged in the true spirit of meekness, humility, and submission, will indubitably be answered, I would wish to draw a line between supplications so urged, and those violent and vehement declamations which, under the name of prayers, are sometimes heard to proceed from the lips of men professing to worship God in the spirit of meekness and truth. Surely I need not impress on any reasonable mind, how directly contrary these inflamed and bombastic harangues are to every precept of Christianity, and every idea of the deference due from a poor worm, like man, to the omnipotent and all great

God. Can we hesitate a moment as to which is more acceptable in his sight-the diffident, the lowly, the retiring, and yet solemn and impressive form of worship of our excellent church; and the wild and laboured exclamations, the authoritative and dictatory clamours of men, who, forgetting the immense distance at which they stand from the awful Being whom they address, boldly, and with unblushing front, speak to their God, as to an equal, and almost dare to prescribe to his infinite wisdom the steps it shall pursue? How often has the silent, yet eloquent eye of misery, wrung from the reluctant hand of charity that relief which has been denied to the loud and importunate beggar? And is Heaven to be taken by storm? Are we to wrest the Almighty from his purposes by vociferation and importunity? God forbid! It is a fair and a reasonable, though a melancholy inference, that the Lord shuts his ears against prayers like these, and leaves the deluded supplicants to follow the impulse of their own headstrong passions, without a guide, and destitute of every ray of his pure and holy light.

Those mock apostles, who thus disgrace the worship of the true God by their extravagance, are very fond of appearing to imitate the conduct of our Saviour, during his mortal peregrination; but how contrary were his habits to those of these deluded men! Did he teach his disciples to insult the ear of Heaven with noise and clamour? Were his precepts those of fanaticism and passion? Did he inflame the minds of his hearers with vehement and declamatory harangues? Did he pray with all this confidence-this arrogance -this assurance? How different was his con

duct? He divested wisdom of all its pomp and parade, in order to suit it to the capacities of the meanest of its auditors. He spake to them in the lowly language of parable and similitude; and when he prayed, did he instruct his hearers to attend to him with a loud chorus of Amens? Did he (participating as he did in the Godhead), did he assume the tone of sufficiency, and the language of assurance? Far from it! he prayed, and he instructed his disciples to pray, in lowliness and meekness of spirit; he instructed them to approach the throne of Grace with fear and trembling, silently, and with the deepest awe and veneration; and he evinced by his condemnation of the prayer of the self-sufficient Pharisee, opposed to that of the diffident publican, the light in which those were considered in the eyes of the Lord, who, setting the terrors of his Godhead at defiance, and boldly building on their own worthiness, approached him with confidence and pride.

KIRKE WHITE.

ON PRIDE.

WEALTH, rank, and genius are rich gifts, often ungratefully perverted into stimulants to pride. What, however, can be less secure? Riches make themselves wings, and flee away-the crowns of princes are torn from their brows-reason often totters on her throne-and the majesty of intellect lies prostrate in the dust. But supposing them to be less fluctuating and evanescent, and that they serve to throw a certain degree of splendour round a child of dust; his dependance