(4.) Fourthly, Because we take a delay for a denial, and so are dis- couraged ; that if we be not heard by and by, we throw down our armour and run away, or sit still astonished, so disabling ourselves.
(5.) Fifthly, The hardness and difficulty of the things we pray for hin- * Cf. note a, Vol. I. page 117.— G.
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ders our prayers ; as John xi, 38, when Christ came to Lazarus's grave, and called to take away the stone, that ho might raise him up, Martha cries out, ' Lord, by this time he stinketh, for he hath been dead four days.' This hinders our praj-ers, when we cry out it is too late, or the thing is so great, how can it be done ? She was reproved, you know, and so must we be in this case. Another instance we have, 2 Kings vii., where, after Elisha had prophesied of that sudden plenty should be in the gate of Samaria after so great a famine, a lord, on whose hand the king leaned, answered the prophet, ' Behold, if the Lord would make windows in heaven, could this thing be?' He had an answer suiting his unbelief, and lived to see his infidelity punished, being trodden under foot by the people in the gate, as they went forth into the forsaken camp of the Assyrians. So, I say, these and the like things stand in our way, because they seem hard to be done. As in the East India adventures, a time was when men were quick and ready to buy other men's shares, because the returns were good ; but when the business went in show backwards, many have been as busy in selling their parts again {d). So we seem rather to go back than forward in our prayers, because of the difficulty of the things we pray for. We are ready to leave all, and sell our adventure.
(6.) Lastly, The sixth impediment is Satan's opposition to our prayers, which he labours by all means to interrupt. For it stands him on it to bestir himself to quench our faith if he can, because it gives vigour, force, and life to prayer. It troubles not the devil the saying of a thousand Paternosters and Ave 2Iarias without faith. If a man know not what he says, or cares not whether he pray or no, all is one to him, if there be no faith in prayer. Satan knows if faith lay not hold on God, God does not lay hold on us, and therefore his policy is to deal with us as Scanderbeg is reported to have used his enemies in fight, still to aim at the general (e) ; or rather like that stratagem of the king of Syria, 2 Chron, xviii. 30, neither to fight against great or small, but against the king of Israel; so Satan's special charge is to fight against faith and prayer, the special man ; the which his subtile and cruel dealing towards us is much like unto that tyranny Pharaoh used toward the children of Israel in Egypt, Exod. iii. 18; he put them into extreme toiling servitude to make brick ; so he commanded to slay the childi-en ; but when none of these succeeded to his mind, he then determined to kill all. So, many times before prayer, the devil puts men to make brick, by filling their hearts with many cares or temptations, or by their own sins, deadness, dulness, hardness of heart, or other things to be done, with a world of discouraging, and confused thoughts of God, — • his mercy, justice, and the like ; and all this to keep a man from prayer. But if the mercy of God help a man through these difficulties, that because of the command of God, that knowledge he hath of his will, and his own necessities, he will yet break through all, and go to prayer, notwithstanding all impediments ; then, in the next place, he labours to make us kill the children in the birth ; that is, whenas our weaknesses, and many wants and imperfections that way, should be as fuel to our prayers, and induce- ments to make us hold on, and in reverence contain ourselves, still begging and waiting at the throne of grace for what we want or desire, he turns the same into horrors, fears, and flying away from God. Yet if this will not serve the turn, but that our God doth allure and draw us unto his presence again, and that we resolve to pray, though with many tremblings, fears, and weaknesses, because we know not whither to fly from his pre- Bence ; then, when our prayers aro done, and we have striven as we are
THE KNOT OF PRAYER LOOSED. 245
able, he persuades us to despair that our prayers are not heard, are nought, that our persons are abominable, that God loves us not, and that since Christ so turns us off still without comfort, we shall never, therefore, have any, &c.
The uses are.
Use 1. First, Ar/ainst the profaneness of such persons who make a mock of p>rayer. But some may object there are none such. I wish there were not. But we know there are too many of this strain. I speak not of prayer established by law ; none will, none dare meddle with that ; it is dangerous. But for praying in houses, it is strange to see the profaneness in this kind. You shall have some say, Lo now these hypocrites ; see what a stir they make ; and he that doth keep some form of prayer in his own house constantly, though it may be but coldly done, yet he cannot escape, but is branded with the name of Puritan, when it may be, of all others, he least deserves it. But I will pass by this.