selves to be entangled with a yoke of bondage:" for even a good action may become a snare to us, if we make it an occasion of scruple by a pretence of necessity, binding loads upon the conscience, not with the bands of God, but of men, and of fancy, or of opinion, or of tyranny. Whatsoever is laid upon us by the hands of man, must be acted and accounted of by the measures of a man: but our best measure is this, He keeps the Lord's day best, that keeps it with most religion and with most charity.

9. What the Church hath done in the article of the Resurrection, she hath in some measure done in the other articles of the Nativity, of the Ascension, and of the Descent of the Holy Ghost at Pentecost: and so great blessings deserve an anniversary solemnity; since he is a very unthankful person, that does not often record them in the whole year, and esteem them the ground of his hopes, the object of his faith, the comfort of his troubles, and the great effluxes of the Divine mercy, greater than all the victories over our temporal enemies, for which all glad persons usually give thanks. And if with great reason the memory of the resurrection does return solemnly every week, it is but reason the other should return once a year. To which I add, that the commemoration of the articles of our creed in solemn days and offices, is a very excellent instrument, to convey and imprint the sense and memory of it upon the spirits of the most ignorant persons. For as a picture may with more fancy convey a story to a man, than a plain narrative either in word or writing: so a real representment, and an office of remembrance, and a day to declare it, is far more impressive than a picture, or any other art of making and fixing imagery.

10. The memories of the saints are precious to God, and therefore they ought also to be so to us; and such persons who served God by holy living, industrious preaching, and religious dying, ought to have their names preserved in honour, and God be glorified

in them, and their holy doctrines and lives published and imitated and we by so doing give testimony to the article of "the communion of saints." But in these cases, as every church is to be sparing in the number of days, so also should she be temperate in her injunctions, not imposing them but upon voluntary and unbusied persons, without snare or burthen. But the holiday is best kept by giving God thanks for the excellent persons, apostles or martyrs, we then remember, and by imitating their lives: this all may do; and they that can also keep the solemnity, must do that too, when it is publicly enjoined.

The mixed Actions of Religion are, 1. Prayer. 2. Alms. 3. Repentance. 4. Receiving the blessed Sacrament.

SECTION VII,

Of Prayer.

THERE is no greater argument in the world of our spiritual danger and unwillingness to religion, than the backwardness, which most men have always, and all men have sometimes, to say their prayers: so weary of their length, so glad when they are done, so witty to excuse and frustrate an opportunity: and yet all is nothing, but a desiring of God to give us the greatest and the best things we can need, and which can make us happy it is a work so easy, so honourable, and to so great purpose, that in all the instances of religion and providence, except only the incarnation of his Son, God hath not given us a greater argument of his willingness to have us saved, and of our unwillingness to accept it, his goodness and our graceless

ness, his infinite condescension and our carelessness and folly, than by rewarding so easy a duty with so great blessings.

Motives to Prayer.

I cannot say any thing, beyond this very consideration and its appendages, to invite Christian people to pray often. But we may consider that 1. It is a duty commanded by God and his holy Son. 2. It is an act of grace and highest honour, that we dust and ashes are admitted to speak to the eternal God, to run to him as to a Father, to lay open our wants, to complain of our burthens, to explicate our scruples, to beg remedy and ease, support and counsel, health and safety, deliverance and salvation. And 3. God hath invited us to it by many gracious promises of hearing us. 4. He hath appointed his most glorious Son to be the president of prayer, and to make continual intercession for us to the throne of grace. 5. He hath appointed an angel to present the prayers of his servants. And 6. Christ unites them to his own, and sanctifies them, and makes them effective and prevalent; and 7. Hath put it into the hands of men to rescind or alter all the decrees of God which are of one kind (that is, conditional, and concerning ourselves and our final estate, and many instances of our intermedial or temporal,) by the power of prayers. 8. And the prayers of men have saved cities and kingdoms from ruin prayer hath raised dead men to life, hath stopped the violence of fire, shut the mouths of wild beasts, hath altered the course of nature, caused rain in Egypt, and drought in the sea; it made the sun to go from west to east, and the moon to stand still, and rocks and mountains to walk; and it cures diseases without physic, and makes physic to do the work of nature, and nature to do the work of grace, and grace to do the work of God, and it does miracles of accident and event and yet prayer, that does all this, is of itself nothing but an ascent of the mind to God, a

desiring things fit to be desired, and an expression of this desire to God as we can, and as becomes us. And our unwillingness to pray is nothing else, but a not desiring what we ought passionately to long for; or if we do desire it, it is a choosing rather to miss our satisfaction and felicity, than to ask for it.

There is no more to be said in this affair, but that we reduce it to practice according to the following Rules.

Rules for the Practice of Prayer.

1. We must be careful that we never ask any thing of God that is sinful, or that directly ministers to sin: for that is to ask of God to dishonour himself, and to undo us. We had need consider what we pray; for before it returns in blessing, it must be joined with Christ's intercession, and presented to God. Let us principally ask of God power and assistances to do our duty, to glorify God, to do good works, to live a good life, to die in the fear and favour of God, and eternal life: these things God delights to give, and commands that we shall ask, and we may with confidence expect to be answered graciously; for these things are promised without any reservation of a secret condition; if we ask them, and do our duty towards the obtaining them, we are sure never to miss them.

2. We may lawfully pray to God for the gifts of the Spirit, that minister to holy ends, such as are the gift of preaching, the spirit of prayer, good expression, a ready and unloosed tongue, good understanding, learning, opportunities to publish them, &c. with these only restraints. 1. That we cannot be so confident of the event of those prayers as of the former. 2. That we must be curious to secure our intention in these desires, that we may not ask them to serve our own ends, but only for God's glory; and then we shall have them, or a blessing for desiring them. In order to such purposes our intentions in the first

desires cannot be amiss; because they are able to sanctify other things, and therefore cannot be unhallowed themselves. 3. We must submit to God's will, desiring him to choose our employment, and to furnish our persons as he shall see expedient.

3. Whatsoever we may lawfully desire of temporal things, we may lawfully ask of God in prayer, and we may expect them as they are promised. 1. Whatsoever is necessary to our life and being is promised to us and therefore we may with certainty expect food and raiment; food to keep us alive, clothing to keep us from nakedness and shame: so long as our life is permitted to us, so long all things necessary to our life shall be ministered. We may be secure of maintenance, but not secure of our life; for that is promised, not this: only concerning food and raiment we are not to make accounts by the measure of our desires, but by the measure of our needs. 2. Whatsoever is convenient for us, pleasant, and modestly delectable, we may pray for: so we do it, 1. with submission to God's will; 2. without impatient desires; 3. that it be not a trifle and inconsiderable, but a matter so grave and concerning, as to be a fit matter to be treated on between God and our souls; 4. that we ask it not to spend upon our lusts, but for ends of justice, or charity, or religion, and that they be employed with sobriety.

4. He that would pray with effect, must live with care and piety1. For although God gives to sinners and evil persons the common blessings of life and chance; yet either they want the comfort and blessing of those blessings, or they become occasions of sadder accidents to them, or serve to upbraid them in their ingratitude or irreligion: and in all cases, they are not the effects of prayer, or the fruits of promise, or instances of a father's love; for they cannot be expected with confidence, or received with

1 1 John 3. 22. John 9. 31. Isai. 1. 15, & 58. 9. Mal. 3. 10. 1 Tim. 2. 8. Psal. 4. 6, & 66. 8.