Page:Three Thousand Selected Quotations from Brilliant Writers.djvu/476

468 I have been driven many times to my knees, by the overwhelming conviction that I had nowhere else to go. My own wisdom, and that of all about me seemed insufficient for that day. —.

The Divine Wisdom has given us prayer, not as a means whereby to obtain the good things of earth, but as a means whereby we learn to do without them; not as a means whereby we escape evil, but as a means whereby we become strong to meet it. —.

Prayer will make a man cease from sin, or sin will entice a man to cease from prayer. —.

The church converteth the whole world by blood and prayer. —.

Happy are they who freely mingle prayer and toil till God responds to the one and rewards the other. —.

From the violence and rule of passion, from a servile will, and a commanding lust, from pride and vanity, from false opinion and ignorant confidence; from improvidence and prodigality, from envy and the spirit of slander; from sensuality, from presumption and from despair; from a state of temptation and a hardened spirit; from delaying of repentance and persevering in sin; from unthankfulness and irreligion, and from seducing others; from all infatuation of soul, folly, and madness; from willfulness, self-love, and vain ambition; from a vicious life and an unprovided death, good Lord, deliver us. —.