Now, the pi'omise contains this will of God. Be siu-e thou gatherest all thy flowers of prayei- out of this gai'den, and thoii canst not do amiss ; but take heed of mingling with them any wild gourd of thy own. Remember the check our Lord gave his disciples when they were giving vent to their vindictive passion in their prayer : ' Wilt thou that we command fire to come down from heaven to consume them ?' and he said, ' Ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of,' Luke ix. 54, 55. They had here an example to countenance their act, but that Aeroicw* impetus, that extraordinary spirit, by which Elijah and other of the prophets were actuated, is not our standing rule for prayer ; that came in them from the Spirit of God, which in us may proceed from the spirit of the devil, which is implied in our Saviour's question, — ' You know not what manner of spirit ye are of:' as if he had said, — You little think who stirred you up : you had your coal not from God's altar, but from Satan's furnace. Oh, let us beware that we be not the devil's messengers, in going to God upon his errand : which we do, when we pray against the rule, or without a warrant. Belch not out thy unruly passions of anger there, to have thine enemies confounded, (the disciples' case,) nor vent thy intemperate sorrow through impatience, as Job in the paroxysm of his trouble begs of God to take away his life in all haste. Take counsel of the word, and ' let not thy lip be hasty to utter a matter before the Lord.' Daniel's method was right, chap. ix. 2. First, He goes to the Scripture, and searches what the mind of God was con- cerning the time when he had promised his people a return out of captivity, which having found, and learned thereby how to lay his plea, away he goes to besiege the throne of grace, ver. 3 ; ' And I set my face unto the Lord God, to seek by prayer,' &c. Art thou sick or poor, — in want of any temporal mercy ? Go, and inquire upon what terms these are promised, that thy faith may not go beyond the foundation of the promise by a peremptory and absolute desire of them,, for then thy building will fall, and thou be put to shame, because thou askest more than God promises.
CHArTER XIX. '
THE SECOND THING THAT MAY HINDER THE WELCOME AND ACCEPTATION OF A saint's PRAYER.
Though the subject-matter of a saint's prayer be founded on the word, yet if tlie end he aims at be not levelled right, this is a scond door at which his prayer will be stopped, though it pass the former : ' Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that you may consume it upon your lusts.' Take, I confess, a Christian in his right temper, and he aims at the glory of God ; yet, as a needle that is touched with a loadstone may be removed from its point to which nature hath espoused it, though trembling till it again recovers it ; so a gracious soul may in a particular act and request vary from this end, being jogged by Satan, yea, disturbed by an enemy nearer home, — his own unmortified corrup- tion. Do you not think it possible for a saint, in distress of body and spirit, to pray for health in the one, and comfort in the other, with too selfish a respect to his own ease and quiet? Yes, surely ; and to pray for gifts and assistance in some eminent service, with an eye to his own credit and applause, to pray for a child with too inordinate a desire that the honour of his house may be built up in him. And this may be understood as the sense, in part, of that expression, Psa. Ixvi. 18 : ' If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me.' For though to desire our own health, peace, and reputation, be not an iniquity when contained within the limits that God hath set, yet, when they overflow to such a height, as to overtop the glory of God, yea, to stand but in a level with it, they are a great abomination. That which in the first or second degree is wholesome food, would be rank poison in the fourth or fifth ; therefore. Chris- tian, catechize thyself, before thou prayest : O, my soul, what sends thee on this errand ? Know but thy own mind what thou prayest for, and thou mayest soon know God's mind how thou shalt speed. Secure God his glorj^, and thou mayest carry away the mercy with thee. Had Adonijah asked Abishag out of love to her person, and not rather out of love to the crown, it is likely Solomon woidd not have denied the bans between them ; but this wise prince observed his drift to make her but a step to his getting into the throne, which he ambitiously
PKAYINU ALWAYS, ETC. g^fj