most loving father; may use the liberty of a child, telling his father what he stands in need of, and desires; and communing with him with humble confidence, while admitted so frequently into the presence of so great a king.

3. The utility of it. 1. Easing the soul in times of difficulty, when it is pressed with griefs and fears, by giving them vent, and that in so advantageous a way; emptying them into the bosom of God. The very vent, were it but into the air, gives ease; or speak it to a statue rather than smother it; much more ease then is found, when it is poured into the lap of a confident and sympathizing friend, though unable to help; yet much more of one that can help. And, of all friends, our God is, beyond all comparison the surest, and most affectionate, and most powerful. So, both compassion and effectual salvation are expressed, In all their affliction he was afflicted, and the angel of his presence saved thèm: in his love and in his pity he redeemed them; and he bare 、them, and carried them all the days of old. And so, resting on his love, power, and gracious promises, the soul quiets itself in God, upon this assurance, that it is not vain to seek him, and that he despiseth not the sighing of the poord.

2. The soul is more spiritually affected with its own condition, by laying it open before the Lord; more deeply sensible of sin, and ashamed in his sight, in confessing it before him; more dilated and enlarged to receive the mercies sued for; as the opening wide of the mouth of the soul that it may be filled; more disposed to observe the Lord in answering; and to bless him, and trust on him, upon the renewed experiences of his regard to its distresses and desires,

3. All the graces of the Spirit, in prayer, are stirred and exercised; and, by exercise, strengthened and increased. Faith, in applying the divine promises, which are the very ground that the soul b Isa. lxiii. 9.. d Psal. xii. 5.

e Psal. lxxxi. 10.

goes upon to God; and Hope looking out to their performance; and Love particularly expressing itself in that sweet converse, and delighting in it, as love doth in the company of the person loved; thinks all hours too short in speaking with him: Oh! how the soul is refreshed with freedom of speech with its beloved Lord! And as it delights in that, so it is continually advanced, and grows by each meeting and conference; beholding the excellency of God, and relishing the pure and sublime pleasures that are in near communion with him. 1. Looking upon the Father in the face of Christ, and using him as a mediator in prayer, as still it must, it is drawn to further admiration of that bottomless love, which found that way of agreement, that new and living way of our access, when all was shut up, and we to have been shut out for ever. And then the affectionate expressions of that reflex love, finding that vent in prayer, do kindle higher; and being as it were fanned and blown up, rise to a greater, and higher, and purer flame, and so tend upwards the more strongly. David, as he doth profess his love to God in prayer in his Psalms, so no doubt it grew in the expressing, I will love thee, O Lord my strength, Psal. xviii. 1; and Psal cxvi. 1. doth raise an incentive of love out of this very consideration of the correspondence of prayers; I love the Lord because he hath heard, and resolves thereafter upon persistance in that course, therefore will I call upon him as long as I live. And as the graces of the Spirit are advanced in prayer by their actings; so for this further reason, because prayer sets the soul particularly near unto God in Jesus Christ. It is then in his presence, and being much with God in this way, it is powerfully assimilated to him by converse with him; as we readily contract their habits with whom we have much intercourse, especially if they be such as we singularly love and respect. Thus the soul is moulded further to the likeness of God, is stamped with brighter characters of him, by being much with him; becomes liker God, more holy and

spiritual, and, like Moses, brings back a bright shining from the mount".

4. And not only thus, by a natural influence, doth prayer work this advantage, but even by a federal efficacy, suing for, and upon suit obtaining, supplies of grace, as the chief good; and besides all other needful mercies, it is a real means of receiving; Whatsoever you shall ask, that will I do, says our Saviour. God having established this intercourse, and engaged his truth and goodness in it, that if they call on him, they shall be heard and answered. If they prepare the heart to call, he will incline his ear to hear; and our Saviour hath assured us, that we may build upon his goodness, and the affection of a Father in him; that he will give good things to them that ask, says one Evangelist"; and the Holy Spirit to them that ask it says another, as being the good indeed, the highest of gifts, and the sum of all good things, and that for which his children are most earnest supplicants. Prayer for grace doth, as it were, set the mouth of the soul to the spring, draws from Jesus Christ, and is replenished out of his fulness, thirsting after it, and drawing from it that way.

And for this reason it is, that our Saviour, and from him, and according to his example, the Apostles recommend prayer so much; Watch and pray, says our Saviour'; and St. Paul, Pray continually. And our Apostle here particularly specifies this, as the grand mean of attaining that conformity with Christ which he presses; this is the highway to it, Be sober, and watch unto prayer. He that is much in prayer, shall grow rich in grace. He shall thrive and increase most that is busiest in this, which is our very traffic with heaven, and fetches the most precious commodities thence. He that sets oftenest out these ships of desire, that makes the most voyages to that land of spices and pearls, shall be sure to improve his stock most, and have most of heaven upon earth. But the true art of this trading is very rare. Every

b Exod. xxxiv. 29, 30. e 1 Luke xi. 13.

John xiv. 13.
Matt. xxvi. 41.

d Matt. vii. 11, 1 Thess. v. 17,

trade hath something wherein the skill of it lies; but this is deep and supernatural, is not reached by human industry. Industry is to be used in it, but we must know the faculty of it comes from above; that Spirit of prayer, without which learning, and wit, and religious breeding, can do nothing; Therefore, this is to be our prayer often, our great suit for the Spirit of prayer, that we may speak the language of the sons of God by the Spirit of God, which alone teaches the heart to pronounce aright those things, that the tongue of many hypocrites can articulate well to man's ear; and only the children in that right strain that takes him, call God their Father, and cry unto him as their Father. And therefore many poor unlettered Christians far outstrip your school-rabbies in this faculty, because it is not effectually taught in these lower academies; they must be in God's own school, children of his house, that speak this language, Men may give spiritual rules and directions in this, and such as may be useful, drawn from the word, that furnishes us with all needful precepts; but you are still to bring these into the seat of this faculty of prayer, the heart; and stamp them upon it, and so to teach it to pray, without which there is no prayer; this is the prerogative royal of Him that framed the heart of man within him.

But, for advancing in this, and growing more skilful in it, prayer is, with continual dependence on the Spirit, to be much used. Praying much thou shalt be blest with much faculty for it. So then, askest thou, what shall I do that I may learn to pray? ? There be things here to be considered, that are expressed as serving this end; but for present this, and chiefly this, "by praying thou shalt learn to pray. Thou shalt both obtain more of the Spirit, and find more the cheerful working of it in prayer, when thou puttest it often to that work for which it is received, and wherein it is delighed; and as both advantaging all graces, and the grace of prayer itself, this frequency and abounding in prayer is here very clearly intended, in that the Apostle makes it as the

main of our work, and would have us to keep our hearts in a constant aptness for it; Be sober and watch; to what end? unto prayer.

2. Sobriety is recommended; Be sober. They that have no better, must make the best they can of carnal delights. It is no wonder they take as large a share of them as they can bear, and sometimes more. But the Christian is called to a more excellent state, and higher pleasures; so that he may behold men glutting themselves with these base things, and be as little moved to share with them, as men are taken with the pleasure a swine hath in wallowing in the mire h

It becomes the heirs of heaven to be far above the love of the earth; and in the necessary use of any earthly things, still to keep within the due measure of their use, and to keep their heart wholly disengaged from an excessive affection to them. This is the sobriety to which we are here exhorted.

It is true, that, in the most common sense of the word, it is very commendable, and it is fit to be so considered by a Christian, that he fly gross intemperance, as a thing most contrary to his condition, and holy calling, and wholly inconsistent with the spiritual temper of a renewed mind, and those exercises to which it is called, and its progress in its way homewards. It is a most unseemly sight to behold one, simply by outward profession a Christian, overtaken with surfeiting and drunkenness, much more to be given to the vile custom of it: all sensual delights, even the filthy lust of uncleanness, go under the common name of insobriety, intemperance, axoraoía; and they all degrade and destroy the noble soul; are unworthy of man, much more of a Christian; and the contempt of them preserves the soul, and ele

vates it.

But the sobriety here recommended, though it takes in that too, yet reaches further than temperance in meat and drink. It is the spiritual temperance of a Christian mind in all earthly things, as our Saviour

h2 Pet. ii. 22.