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dantly sufficient for the exercising your Patience is the Evil and Trouble that happens to you every Day, and you need not encrease it by putting upon your Shoulders new Loads of that which is to come.

These are our Saviour's Reasonings upon this Argument; and admirable ones they are. I know nothing like them, nothing comparable to them, to be met with in the most refin'd Writings of the Philosophers. I leave them with you, and I pray God they may ever have a due Effect both upon you and me.

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SERMON

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SERMON II.

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PHIL. IV. 6.

Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by Prayer and Supplication, with Thanksgiving let your Requests be made known unto God.

Have done with the first Part of this
Text, which is a Caution against
the Sin of worldly Carefulness,
that I dispatched the last Time.

I now come to the other Branch of it, which is a Recommendation of the Duty of Prayer. In every thing (faith the Apostle) by Prayer and Supplication, &c.

Prayer then, you fee, is the Argument I have before me, and a very noble Argument it is, and withal a very useful one : For Prayer is, or ought to be, the continual

Exercife

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Exercise of our Life, for it is to our Souls what Meat and Drink is to our Bodies, their Repast, their Support, their Nourishment. Prayer is the great universal Instrument by which we fetch down Bleffings from Above, and get our selves possessed of whatever we want. Prayer is our Defence and Prefervative againft Sin and against Temptation, it is the Security of our Vertue, and the especial Means to advance it.

Prayer is the Wing of our Souls, whereby we raise up our selves above this lower World to the God above, and with whom while we therein converse, we become more and more transformed into his Nature.

Lastly; Whatever Anticipations of Heaven there be here upon Earth, whatever Foretaftes we Christians have in these Bodies of the Happiness of Eternity, they are all brought about by the Means of Prayer.

Fit therefore and just it is, that what is fo great a Duty and so great a Privilege, should be much in our Mouths, that it may be more in our Hearts, that we should be often called upon and stirr'd up to the Practice of it, and instructed how so to practise it as to obtain effectually all the great and glorious Benefits, which it is designed by God to derive upon us.

I do not think there is need of spending Time in giving an Account of the Terms of my Text, for they are all plain enough. As for the Phrafe here used, Let your Requests be made made known unto God. The Word is in the Original αιτήματα, that is, all those Things that you have need to ask of God, or to address your selves to him about; it is the general Word to comprehend all Kind of Things to be prayed for or againft.

Well, but are not all these Things known to God already? How then should we make them known to him? I answer, Yes certainly; our Heavenly Father knoweth what Things we have need of before we ask him, as our Saviour hath told us; all therefore that is meant by that Expression is, that we are to utter these Things, we are to express them or present them to God by the way of Prayer and Supplication. Well, but what is the Sense of these Terms, Prayer and Supplication, here used? Are they the fame, or do they mean different Things? I answer, In our Language we commonly put them for the fame thing. In the Greek they are often diftinguish'd, especially when they are join'd together: But then the Difference is no more than this, that the Word προσευχή, which we render Prayer, doth usually fignify such a Kind of Prayer as is put up for the good Things we need ; but the Word δεήσεις, whcih we render Supplication, signifies such a Prayer as is put up against the evil Things we fear. They both of them come under the Name and Notion of Prayer, but they have their different Objects; the one we properly call Petition,

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the other Deprecation: But thus much for the Critique on the Text.

I now come to my Business: In every thing, faith the Apostle, by Prayer and Supplication, with Thanksgiving, let your Requests be made known unto God.

These Words may be taken two Ways, either as commanding a Duty, or as propofing an Instrument or Means for the obtaining what we defire or stand in need of.

Prayer certainly falls under these two Confiderations, and we cannot have a true Notion of it without taking in both of them, that is to say, without confidering it both as it relates to God as due to him, and as it relates to us, as useful for the procuring of what we want. Under both these Notions therefore I shall now discourse of Prayer : And accordingly these Three Things I propose to do.

First, I shall discourse of the Nature and Obligation of Prayer, confider'd as a Religious Duty we owe to God.

Secondly, I shall discourse of the Efficacy and Successfulness of Prayer confider'd as an Inftrument for the procuring Bleffings to our selves: And,

Thirdly, I fhall discourse of the Requisites or Conditions of Prayer, which we must take care to observe, if we would have our Prayers either acceptable to God, or beneficial to our selves.

The two first of these Heads, I shall dif patch at this Time. First,