I feel nothing answering to it in my heart. Neither do I find, or
reckon, the most solemn faith in God as a real object, the most arduous act
of the reason and will. O no, my dear, it is _to pray, to pray_ as God
would have us; this is what at times makes me turn cold to my soul. Believe
me, to pray with all your heart and strength, with the reason and the will,
to believe vividly that God will listen to your voice through Christ, and
verily do the thing he pleaseth thereupon--this is the last, the greatest
achievement of the Christian's warfare upon earth. _Teach_ us to pray, O
Lord!" And then he burst into a flood of tears, and begged me to pray for
him. O what a sight was there!--ED.]
* * * * *
Hooker said,--That by looking for that in the Bible which it is impossible
that _any book_ can have, we lose the benefits which we might reap from its
being the best of all books.
* * * * *
You will observe, that even in dreams nothing is fancied without an
antecedent _quasi_ cause. It could not be otherwise.
_June_ 4. 1830.
JEREMY TAYLOR.--ENGLISH REFORMATION.
Taylor's was a great and lovely mind; yet how much and injuriously was it
perverted by his being a favourite and follower of Laud, and by his
intensely popish feelings of church authority.
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