Page:Science and Health.djvu/290

286 sense, and not Soul, produces these moods of feeling. If spiritual sense guided men at such times, there would grow out of those ecstatic desires, higher experiences and a better life; self-examination, and more purity. A self-satisfied ventilation of ecclesiastical fervor never made a Christian; verbal prayer embraces too much error to forward this great purpose. First, it supposes God a person influenced by man, making the divine ear a personal sense instead of the all-hearing and all-knowing Intelligence, to whom every want of man is understood, and by whom it will be supplied.

Again, what we desire, and ask to be given, is not always best for us to receive, in which case the infinite understanding will certainly not grant our request; therefore what avails it with God how much a man prays? When we pray aright, we shall “enter into the closet;” in other words, shut the door of the lips and in the silent sanctuary of earnest longings, deny sin and sense, and take up the cross, while we go forth with honest hearts laboring to reach Wisdom, Love, and Truth. This prayer will be answered, insomuch as we shall put in practice our desires. The Master's injunction was to pray in secret; to desire to be better, and let our lives attest the sincerity of that desire. Are we really grateful for the good we receive? then we shall have more, and never until then, and avail ourselves of the blessings we have, and this will thank God more than speech. From the Intelligence that numbers the very hairs of our heads, we cannot conceal the ingratitude of barren lives by thanking Omnipotence with our lips, while the heart is far from Truth. When we vainly imagine gratitude is a mere expression