he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened" (Luke 11. 9, 10).

This exhortation follows the parable of the unneighborly neighbor in which man's unresponsiveness is contrasted with God's responsiveness. We are heartened to ask that we may receive because we come to a friendly God, who is willing and ready to give us everything that we need. There is here an ascending climax. We are to "ask" in the sense of making formal request; we are to "seek" in the sense of prosecuting our quest; we are to "knock" in the sense of making urgent and repeated demands; and whether we pray for ourselves or for others, we are to keep on asking until we receive, and seeking until we find, and knocking until the door is opened.

In all these experiences there is more than aspiration, more than desire, more than "the continual disposition of prayer"-there is actual, formal, definite petition. What the soul strongly desires it strongly pleads for; its desire is kindled into a blaze of earnest intreaty. It is clamorously insistent, eagerly acquisitive, greedily appropriative.

The ground for confident asking is placed by Jesus in God's fatherly relation to the children of men. "Of which of you that is a father shall his son ask a loaf, and he give him a stone? or a fish, and he for a fish give him a serpent? Or, if he shall ask an egg, will he give him a scorpion? If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly

Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?" (Verses 11-13.) In the words "how much more" we have an argument from the less to the greater; from the limited knowledge of the earthly father to the unlimited knowledge of the heavenly Father. The one to whom we pray is one who knows us perfectly; he knows our needs; he knows all the circumstances of our lives; he knows what is the absolute best for us in any condition in which we can be placed.

Not only does he know, he also loves. His providential, foreseeing, fatherly care is over and around us. His hand is stretched to bless us, and to guide us in all the affairs of life. His responsiveness is the responsiveness of one who is sensitive to the slightest touch of appeal, and who is too good to keep back anything that he can safely bestow. He gives "good things," according to Matthew; or the best and highest thing, namely, "the Holy Spirit," according to Luke. To every suppliant he throws open the doors of the heavenly treasure house, saying, "My child, all that is mine is thine; for thee it is held, to thee will I minister it for thy good and not for thy hurt."

Does anyone want to know what the God to whom he prays is like? Then let him turn to Jesus, in whose life of gracious, tender ministry the fatherly heart of God is revealed. To every one who sought his help he responded at once. If a sufferer but touched the hem of his robe, power was emitted, and he was made perfectly whole. His

responsiveness to the demands made upon him was not merely an illustration of the responsiveness of God; it was the responsiveness of God. It was the response of a divine, personal Friend, touched with a feeling of human infirmity; a Friend who could not turn away the prayer of the weakest and the unworthiest from him, nor give a stone to anyone who asked for bread; a Friend who will always give what in his unerring wisdom he deems it best that any suppliant should receive.

CHAPTER III

GENERAL TEACHINGS

1. On Secret Prayer.

"When thou prayest, enter into thine inner chamber, and having shut thy door, pray to thy Father who is in secret, and thy Father who seest in secret shall recompense thee" (Matt. 6. 6). There is a social side to prayer; and there is also a solitary side. There is prayer in which spirits blend, and there is prayer in which God and the individual soul alone are concerned-a communion with heaven so close and intimate that the mystics have described it as "being alone with the Alone."

To attain this inner fellowship certain things are demanded. The first of these is separation from the world of external things, the breaking, as far as possible, connection with the outer world, the barring of the door of the senses, the silencing of the noises that drown the voice of God. In effecting this there should be an absence of all unseemly haste; every movement should be deliberate and leisurely; and ample time should be taken to hear God out. Commenting on this text, William Law remarks, "Now, here is, indeed, no mention of time that prayer is to be continued; but yet this preparation for prayer-of entering into the closet and shutting the door-seems to teach us that it is a

work of some time; that we are not hastily to open the door, but to allow ourselves time to continue to be importunate in prayer." And he reasons that by frequent and continued prayer the spirit of prayer is begotten and nourished; that what the mouth asks the heart may come to desire; that, in short, we can "pray ourselves into devotion," and that, as Jeremy Taylor remarks, "If we pray often, we shall pray oftener."

It is possible, however, to withdraw outwardly from the world, and take the world with us into our place of retirement. We may go apart with our little handful of cares, and fix our thoughts upon them; we may nurse our sorrows, brood over our real or fancied wrongs, and, forgetting the tryst we have promised to keep, overlook the presence of "the Father who seeth in secret," and who is waiting for us, that he may take away every burden from our hearts.

With separation from the world there must go concentration of the mind upon the object of worship. We are to enter into the silence leaving behind all that would divide the attention and distract the thought. Thomas Aquinas argues that "he prays in spirit and in truth, whoever goes to prayer with the spirit and intention of praying, though afterward through misery and frailty his thoughts may wander." That is true; yet everyone ought to endeavor to get the mastery of himself, and to keep his thoughts from wandering. He ought, by a strenuous effort of the will, to control his wayward,