necessary to interpose the Mediator, and to look through him, and to speak and petition by him; No man, says he, cometh to the Father but by me. As the Jews, when they prayed, looked toward the temple, where was the mercyseat and the peculiar presence of God, thus ought we in all our praying to look on Christ, who is our propitiatory, and in whom dwelleth the fulness of the Godhead bodily. The forgetting of this may be the cause of our many disappointments.

Fifthly; fervency; not to seek coldly; that presages refusal. There must be fire in the sacrifice otherwise it ascends not. There is no sacrifice without incense, and no incense without fire. Our remiss, dead hearts are not likely to do much for the church of God, nor for ourselves. Where are those strong cries that should pierce the heavens? His ear is open to their cry. He hears the faintest, coldest prayer, but not with that delight and readiness to grant it; he takes no pleasure in hearing it; but cries, heart-cries, O these take his ear, and move his bowels; for these are the voice, the cries of his own children. A strange word of encouragement to importunity is that, Give him no rest, Isa. lxii, 7, suffer him not to be in quiet, till he make Jerusalem a praise in the earth. A few such suitors in these times were worth thousands such as we are. Our prayers stick in our breasts, scarcely come forth; much less do they go up and ascend with that piercing force that would open the way for deliverances to come down.

But in this there must be some difference between temporal and spiritual things. That prayer which is in the right strain cannot be too fervent in any thing; but the desire of the thing in temporals may be too earnest. A feverish, distempered heat diseases the soul; therefore in these things a holy indifferency concerning the particular, may and should be joined with the fervency of prayer. But in spiritual things, there is no danger in vehemency of desire. Covet these, hunger and thirst for them, be incessantly ardent in the suit; yet even in these, in some particulars, as with respect to the degree and measure of grace, and some peculiar furtherances, they should be presented so with earnestness, as that withal it be with a

reference and resignation to the wisdom and love of our Father.

II. For the other point, the answer of our prayers, which is implied in this openness of the ear, it is a thing very needful to be considered and attended to. If we think that prayer is indeed a thing that God takes notice of and hath regard to in his dealings with his children, it is certainly a point of duty and wisdom in them, to observe how he takes notice of it, and bends his ear to it, and puts his hand to help, and so answers it. This both furnishes matter of praise, and stirs up the heart to render it. Therefore in the psalms, the hearing of prayer is so often observed and recorded, and made a part of the song of praise. And withal it endears both God and prayer unto the soul; I love the Lord because he hath heard my voice and my supplications. The transposition in the original is pathetical, I love, because the Lord hath heard my voice. I am in love, and particularly this causes it; I have found so much kindness in the Lord, I cannot but love. He hath heard my voice. And then it wins his esteem and affection to prayer. Seeing I find this virtue in it, we shall never part again; I will call upon him as long as I live. Seeing prayer draweth help and favors from heaven, I shall not need to seek for a way in any want or strait that can befal me.

In this there is need of direction; but too many rules may as much confuse a matter, as too few, and do many times perplex the mind and multiply doubts; as many laws do multiply pleading. Briefly then, 1, slothful minds do often neglect the answers of God, even when they are most legible in the grant of the very thing itself that was desired. It may be through a total inadvertence of this kind, through never thinking on things as answers of our requests; or possibly a continual eager pursuit of more turns away the mind from considering what it hath upon request obtained; we are still so bent upon what further we would have, that we never think what is already done for us, which is one of the most ordinary causes of ingratitude.

2. But though it be not in the same thing that we

desire, that our prayers are answered, yet when the Lord changes our petitions in his answers, it is always for the better. He regards our welfare more than our will. We beg deliverance; we are not unanswered, if he give pa tience and support; be it under a spiritual trial or temptation, My grace is sufficient for thee. And where the Lord doth thus, it is certainly better for the time, than the other would be. Observe here, His ears are open to the righteous, but his eyes are on them too. They have not so his ear as to induce him blindly to give them what they ask, whether it be fit or no; but his eye is on them, to see and consider their estate, and to know better than themselves what is best, and to answer accordingly. This is no injury, but a great privilege and the happiness of his children, that they have a Father who knows what is fit for them, and withholds no good from them. And a Christian observing this commutation and exchange of our requests may usually find out the particular answer of his prayers; and if sometimes he doth not, then his best way is not to subtilize and amuse himself much about the matter but rather to keep on in the exercise, knowing this for certain, that his labor shall not be in vain in the Lord; He hath not said unto the seed of Jacob, Seek ye me in vain.

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3. Only this we should always remember, not to set bounds and limits to the Lord in point of time, not to set him a day, that we will attend so long and no longer. How patiently will some men bestow long attendance on others, where they expect some very poor good or courtesy at their hands! Yet we are very brisk and hasty with him who never delays us but for our good, to ripen those mercies for us which we, as foolish children, would pluck while they are green and have neither that sweetness and goodness in them which they will have in his time. All his works are done in their season. Were there nothing to check our impatience, but his greatness and the greatness of those things we ask for, and our own unworthiness, these considerations might curb it, and persuade us how reasonable it is that we should wait. He is a King well worth waiting on; and there is in the very waiting on him, an honor and a happiness far above

us. And the things we seek are great, forgiveness of sins, evidence of sonship and heirship; heirship of a kingdom; and we condemned rebels, born beirs of the bottomless pit! And shall such as we be in such haste with such a Lord in so great requests? But, further, the attendance which this reason enforces, is sweetened by the considera. tion of his wisdom and love, that he hath foreseen and chosen the very hour for each mercy fit for us, and will not delay it a moment. Never any yet repented their waiting, but found it fully recompensed with the opportune answer in such a time as they were then forced to confess was the best. I waited patiently, says the psalmist, in waiting I waited, but it was all well bestowed; He inclined to me and heard my cry, brought me up, &c. Psal. xl, 1. And then he afterwards falls into admiration of the Lord's method, his wonderful workings and thoughts to us-ward.

When thou art in great affliction, outward or inward, thou thinkest, it may be, he regards thee not. Yea, but he doth. Thou art his gold; he knows the time of refining thee, and of then taking thee out of the furnace; he is versed and skilful in that work. Thou sayest-I have cried long for power against sin, and for some evidence of pardon, and find no answer to either-yet leave him not. He never yet cast away any that sought him, and staid by him, and resolved, whatsoever came of it, to lie at his footstool, and to wait, were it all their lifetime, for a good word or a good look from him. And they choose well who make that their great desire and expectation; for one of his good words or looks will make them happy for ever; and as he is truth itself, they are sure not to miss of it; Blessed are all they that wait for him. And thou that sayest, thou canst not find pardon of sin and power against it, yet consider whence are those desires of both, which thou once didst not care for. Why dost thou hate that sin which thou didst love, and art troubled and burdened with the guilt of it, under which thou wentest so easily, and which thou didst not feel before? Are not these something of his own work? Yes, surely. And know he will not leave it unfinished, nor forsake the work of his hands. His eye may be on thee though thou seest

him not, and his ear open to thy cry, though for the present he speaks not to thee as thou desirest. It is not said, that his children always see and hear him; but yet, when they do not, he is beholding them and hearing them graciously, and will show himself to them, and answer them seasonably. David says, Psal. xxii, 2., I cry in the day-time, and thou hearest not, and in the night season, and am not silent; yet will he not entertain hard thoughts of God, nor conclude against him; on the contrary, he acknowledges, ver 3, Thou art holy, where by holiness is meant his faithfulness to his own; as it follows, Thou that inhabitest the praises of Israel, to wit, for the favors he hath showed his people, as ver. 4, Our fathers trusted in thee.

Let the Lord's open ear persuade us to make much use of it. Be much in this sweet and fruitful exercise of prayer, together and apart, under the sense of these three considerations mentioned above-the duty, the dignity, and the utility of prayer.

Consider the duty of prayer. It is due to the Lord to be worshipped and acknowledged thus, as the fountain of good. How will men crouch and bow one to another upon small requests; and shall he only be neglected, from whom all have life and breath and all things!

Consider the dignity of this, to be admitted into so near converse with the highest Majesty. Were there nothing to follow, no answer at all, prayer pays itself in the excellency of its nature, and the sweetness that the soul finds in it. Poor wretched man, to be admitted into heaven while he is on earth, and there to come and speak his mind freely to the Lord of heaven and earth, as his friend, as his Father! to empty all his complaints into his bosom, when wearied with the follies and miseries of the world, to refresh his soul in his God! Where there is any thing of his love, this is a privilege of the highest sweetness; for they who love, find much delight in discoursing together, and count all hours short, and think the day runs too fast, that is so spent; and they who are much in this exercise, the Lord doth impart his secrets much to them.

Consider again, it is the most profitable exercise; no