Page:TheYoungMansGuide.djvu/196

 Again we  are  admonished  to  pray  in  these words:

"We ought  always  to  pray  and  not  to faint"  (Luke  xviii.  i).

"Without Me  you  can  do  nothing"  (John xv.  5).

"Not that  we  are  sufficient  to  think  anything of  ourselves  as  of  ourselves,  but  our sufficiency  is  from  God"  (2  Cor.  iii.  5).

"Amen, Amen,  I  say  to  you,  if  you  ask  the Father  anything  in  My  name  He  will  give  it you"  (John  xvi.  23).

The Royal  Psalmist  tells  us:  "The  Lord  is nigh  unto  all  them  that  call  upon  Him;  to all  that  call  upon  Him  in  truth.  He  will  do the  will  of  them  that  fear  Him,  and  He  will hear  their  prayer  and  save  them"  (Ps.  cxliv. 18,  19).

3. And  what  do  the  saints  say? They call prayer  the  very  breath  of  the  soul,  and assert that  a  man  who  does  not  pray  is  a lamp  without  oil,  a  body  without  food,  a plant  without  water,  a  soldier  without  arms St. Alphonsus  writes  thus:  "It  is  by  means of  prayer  that  all  the  blessed  in  heaven  have attained  to  eternal  felicity.  All  the  damned have  been  lost  because  they  did  not  pray; if  they  had  prayed,  they  would  certainly  not have  been  lost."

The same  saint  urges  us  to  prayer  in  these words:

"Prayer is  a  sure  and  indispensable  means of  obtaining  salvation  and  all  the  graces  lead-