WHEN one man defires to obtain any thing

of another, he betakes himfelf to intreaty: and this may be observed of mankind in all ages and countries of the world Now what is univerfal, may be called natural; and it seems probable, that God, as our fupreme governor, fhould expect that towards himself, which, by natural impulfe, or by the irrefiftible order of our conftitution, he has prompted us to pay to every other being on whom we depend.

The fame may be faid of thanksgiving.

Again, prayer is neceffary to keep up in the minds of mankind a sense of God's agency in the univerfe, and of their own dependency upon him.

But after all, the duty of prayer depends upon its efficacy: for I confefs myself unable to conceive, how any man can pray, or be obliged to pray, who expects nothing from his prayers; but who is perfuaded at the time he utters his request, that it cannot poffibly produce the fmalleft impreffion upon the Being to whom it is addreffed, or advantage to himself. Now the efficacy of prayer imports, that we obtain fomething in confequence of praying, which we fhould not have received without prayer; against all expectation of which, the following objection has been often and ferioufly alleged. "If it be most agreeable to perfect wifdom and justice, that we fhould receive what we de

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fire, God, as perfectly wife and juft, will give it to us without afking; if it be not agree"able to thefe attributes of his nature, our intrea"ties cannot move him to give it us; and it were impious to expect they fhould." In fewer words, thus; "If what we requeft be fit for us, we fhall "have it without praying; if it be not fit for us, "we cannot obtain it by praying." This objection admits but of one anfwer, namely, that it may be agreeable to perfect wisdom, to grant that to our prayers, which it would not have been agreeable to the fame wisdom to have given us without praying for. But what virtue, you will afk, is there in prayer, which fhould make a favour confiftent with wisdom, which would not have been fo without it? To this queftion, which contains the whole difficulty attending the fubject, the following poffibilities are offered in reply.

1. A favour granted to prayer may be more apt, on that very account, to produce good effects upon the perfon obliged. It may hold in the divine bounty, what experience has raifed into a proverb in the collation of human benefits, that what is obtained without afking, is oftentimes received without gratitude.

2. It may be confiftent with the wifdom of the Deity to withhold his favours till they be afked for, as an expedient to encourage devotion in his rational creation, in order thereby to keep up and circulate a knowledge and fenfe of their dependeacy, upon

him.

3. Prayer has a natural tendency to amend the petitioner himself; and thus to bring him within the rules, which the wisdom of the Deity has prescribed to the difpenfation of his favours.

If thefe, or any other affignable fuppofitions, ferve to remove the apparent repugnancy between the fuc. cefs of prayer and the character of the Deity, it is enough; for the question with the petitioner is not

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from which, out of many motives, God may grant his petition, or in what particular manner he is moved by the fupplications of his creatures; but whether it be confiftent with his nature to be moyed at all, and whether there be any conceivable motives, which may difpofe the divine will to grant the petitioner what he wants, in confequence of his praying for it. It is fufficient for the petitioner that he gain his end. It is not neceffary to devotion, perhaps not very confiftent with it, that the circuit of caufes, by which his prayers prevail, fhould be known to the petitioner, much lefs that they fhould be prefent to his imagination at the time. All that is neceffary is, that there be no impoffibility apprehended in the

matter.

Thus much must be conceded to the objection; that prayer cannot reasonably be offered to God with all the fame views, with which we oftentimes Vaddrefs our intreaties to men (views which are not commonly or eafily feparated from it), viz. to inform them of our wants or defires; to tease them out by importunity; to work upon their indolence or conpaffion, in order to perfuade them to do what they ought to have done before, or ought not to do at all.

But fuppofe there exifted a prince, who was known by his fubjects to act, of his own accord, always and invariably for the beft; the fituation of a petitioner, who folicited a favour or pardon from fuch a prince, would fufficiently resemble ours: and the queftion with him, as with us, would be, whether, the character of the prince being confidered, there remained any chance that he fhould obtain from him by prayer, what he fhould not have received without it. I do not conceive, that the character of fuch a prince would neceffarily exclude the effect of his fubjects' prayers; for when that prince reflected, that the earneftnefs and humility of the fupplication had generated in the fuppliant a frame of mind, upon which the pardon or favour afked, would

would produce a permanent and active sense of gratitude; that the granting of it to prayer would put others upon praying to him, and by that means preferve the love and fubmiffion of his fubjects, upon which love and fubmiffion, their own happiness, as well as his glory, depended; that, befide that the memory of the particular kindness would be heightened and prolonged by the anxiety with which it had been fued for, prayer had in other refpects fo difpofed and prepared the mind of the petitioner, as to render capable of future services him who before was unqualified for any; might not that prince, I fay, although, he proceeded upon no other confiderations than the ftrict rectitude and expediency of the measure, grant a favour or pardon to this man, which he did not grant to another, who was too proud, too lazy, or too bufy, too indifferent whe ther he received it or not, or too infenfible of the fovereign's abfolute power to give or to withhold it, ever to ask for it; or even to the philofopher, who, from an opinion of the fruitleffnefs of all addreffes to a prince of the character which he had formed to himself, refused in his own example, and difcouraged in others, all outward returns of gratitude, acknowledgments of duty, or application to the fovereign's mercy or bounty; the difufe of which (feeing affections do not long fubfift which are never expreffed) was followed by a decay of loyalty and zeal amongst his fubjeets, and threatened to end in a forgetfulncfs of his rights, and a contempt of his authority? Thefe, together with other affignable confiderations, and fome perhaps infcrutable, and even inconceivable by the perfons upon whom his will was to be exercifed, might pafs in the mind of the prince, and move his counfels; whilft nothing, in the mean time, dwelt in the petitioner's thoughts but a fenfe of his own grief and wants; of the power and goodness of which alone he was to look for relief; and of his obligation, to endeavour, by

future

future obedience, to render that perfon propitious to his happiness, in whofe hands, and at the difpofal of whofe mercy, he found himself to be.

The objection to prayer fuppofes, that a perfectly wife being muft neceffarily be inexorable: but where is the proof, that inexorability is any part of perfect wifdom; efpecially of that wifdom, which is explained to confift in bringing about the most beneficial ends by the wifeft means?

The objection likewife affumes another principle, which is attended with confiderable difficulty and obfcurity, namely, that upon every occafion, there is one, and only one mode of action for the beft; and that the divine will is neceffarily determined and confined to that mode: both which pofitions prefume a knowledge of human nature much beyond what we are capable of attaining. Indeed when we apply to the divine nature fuch expreffions as thefe, "God must always do what is right," "God cannot, "from the moral perfection and neceffity of his

nature, act otherwife than for the beft," we ought to apply them with much indeterminatenefs and referve; or rather, we ought to confefs, that there is fomething in the fubject out of the reach of our apprehenfion for in our apprehenfion, to be under a neceflity of acting according to any rule is inconfiftent with free agency; and it makes no difference, which we can understand, whether the neceffity be internal or external, or that the rule is the rule of perfect rectitude.

But efficacy is afcribed to prayer without the proof, we are told, which can alone in fuch a fubject produce conviction, the confirmation of experience. Concerning the appeal to experience, I fhall content myfelf with this remark, that if prayer were fuffered to difturb the order of fecond caufes appointed in the univerfe too much, or to produce its effect with the fame regularity that they do, it would introduce a change into human affairs, which in fome important refpects would be evidently for

the