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 Holy Spirit. "You that  are  mindful  of  the  Lord," says Isaias,  "hold  not  your  peace,  nor  give  Him silence." "Seven times  a  day  I  praised  the  Lord," says the  man  after  God's  own  heart. Christ's frequent retreats  to  solitude,  and  His  long  vigils  on  the mountain-side could  have  had  no  other  object  than to emphasize  this  truth. "Watch and  pray,"  He says,  and  by  diverse  parables  He  showed  that  we ought  to  pray  always  and  not  to  faint,  and  St.  Paul insists again  and  again  that  we  should  "continue  in supplications  and  prayers  night  and  day." A prayerful spirit,  in  fact,  is  an  essential  characteristic  of Christianity,  for,  says  the  prophet:  "By  all  the  nations shall  My  house  be  called  a  house  of  prayer." Nor will  it  do  to  say  that  for  the  virtuous  to  work  is to  pray,  and  that  thus  they  are  ever  fulfilling  this precept. The parables  of  the  troublesome  widow and the  importunate  friend  at  the  baker's  door  show that real  prayer  is  meant. The true  sense,  therefore, is  that  we  must  recognize  prayer  as  one  of  the greatest duties  of  life,  consecrate  to  it  every  day some time  with  which  lesser  concerns  should  never be allowed  to  interfere,  and  resume  it  at  all  times whenever possible. Did the  love-sick  youth  but  give to God  the  love  he  wastes  on  a  creature,  would  not his prayer  be  constant,  would  not  his  heart  be  ever where his  treasure  is? Could we  but  realize  our  beggarly destitution,  our  utter  helplessness  and  dependence on  God  in  all  our  temporal  and  spiritual  needs, would it  not  come  as  natural  to  us  to  lift  our  hands and voices  in  prayer  for  our  daily  bread  as  it  does  to