Poor mortals! What is the one desire of your hearts? What is it that you call happiness, and matter of rejoicing? Is it not when every thing about you helps you to stand upon higher ground, and gratifies every pride of life? And yet life itself is the loss of every thing, unless pride be overcome. Oh stop awhile in contemplation of this great truth. It is a truth as unchangeable as God; it is written and spoken thro’ all nature; heaven and earth, fallen angels, and redeemed men, all bear witness to it. The truth is this: _Pride must die in you_, or _nothing of heaven can live in you_. Under the banner of this truth, give up yourselves to the meek and humble Spirit of the holy Jesus. This is the one way, the one truth, and the one life. There is no other door into the sheepfold of God. Every thing else is the working of the devil in the fallen nature of man. Humility must sow the seed, or there can be no reaping in heaven. Look not at pride only as an unbecoming temper; or humility only as a decent virtue; for the one is death, and the other is life; the one is all hell, and the other is all heaven.
So much as you have of pride, so much you have of the fallen angel in you: so much as you have of true humility, so much you have of the Lamb of God. Could you see with your eyes what every stirring of pride does to your soul, you would beg of every thing you meet to tear the viper from you; tho’ with the loss of an hand or an eye. Could you see what a sweet, divine, transforming power there is in humility, how it expels the poison of your fallen nature, and makes room for the Spirit of God to live in you; you would rather wish to be the _footstool_ of all the world, than to want the smallest degree of it. My friends, for this time, adieu!
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_The Second Dialogue._
_Theophilus._ FROM this view of things, we see ♦a _spirit of longing_ after the life of this world, made _Adam_ and us to be the poor pilgrims on earth that we are; so the _spirit of prayer_, or the longing desire of the heart after Christ, and God, and heaven, raises us out of the miseries of time into the riches of eternity. Thus seeing and knowing our first and our present state, every thing calls us to prayer; and the desire of our heart becomes the spirit of prayer. And when the spirit of prayer is in us, then prayer is no longer considered as only the business of this or that hour, but is the continual panting or breathing of the heart after God. Its petitions are not picked out of manuals of devotion; it loves its own language; it speaks most when it says least. If you ask what its words are, they are _spirit_, they are _life_, they are _love_, that unite with God.
♦ duplicate word “a” removed
_Academicus._ I apprehend, Sir, _that_ what you here say of the spirit of prayer, will be taken by some for a censure upon hours and forms of prayer; tho’ I know you have no such meaning.
_Rusticus._ Pray let me speak again to _Academicus_: His learning seems to be always upon the watch, to find out some excuse for not receiving the whole truth. Does not _Theophilus_ here speak of the _spirit of prayer_, as a _state_ of the _heart_, which is become the _governing_ principle of the soul? And if it is a living state of the heart, must it not have its life in itself, independent of every outward time and occasion? And yet must it not, at the same time, be that alone which disposes the heart to delight in hours, and times, and occasions of prayer? Suppose he had said, that _honesty is_ an inward living principle of the heart, a rectitude of the mind, that has all its life and strength within itself. Could this be thought to censure all times and occasions of performing outward acts of honesty? Now the _spirit_ of prayer differs from all outward acts and forms of prayer, just as the _honesty of the heart_, or a living rectitude of mind, differs from outward and occasional acts of honesty. And yet should a man disregard times and occasions of outward acts of honesty, on pretence that true honesty was an inward living principle; who would not see that such a one had as little of the inward spirit, as of the outward acts of honesty? St. _John_ saith, _If any man hath this world’s goods, and seeth his brother hath need, and shutteth up his bowels of compassion to him, how dwelleth the love of God in him?_ Just so, it may be said, if a man neglects times and hours of prayer, _how dwelleth the spirit of prayer_ in him? And yet, its own life and spirit is vastly superior to, and stays for no particular hours, or forms of words. And in this sense it is truly said, that it has its own language; that it wants not to pick words out of manuals of devotion, but is always speaking forth spirit and life, and love towards God. But pray, _Theophilus_, do you go on as you intended.