02 - Prayer in General

PRAYER IN GENERAL

PRAYER is to be regarded not only as a means L of effectual approach to our Father’s presence, and of rendering service, but also as an instrument capable of attaining definite results. As such it is imperatively necessary that we should learn to use it ourselves, and also to teach others to use it, for the capacity for turning to account this means of grace will not come of itself. Its acquisition demands careful study and diligent practice. The constituent elements of prayer may be stated as follows, (i) Confession and absolution, (2) Thanksgiving, (3) Self-oblation, (4) Praise, (5) Supplication for supply of needs, (6) Deprecation from evil, (7) Intercession. Its forms and methods are, of course, varied according to the character of the various occasions for which it is used. They may be roughly expressed as follows, 1. Stated daily prayer; twice or oftener, and certainly not less than three times a day for clergymen and candidates for Holy Orders.

2. Special or occasional prayers; in any of the above-mentioned forms, arising from any special needs, or from a call for any special object.

3. Ejaculatory or unpremeditated prayers; the result of momentary thought as in the cases of Nehemiah 1:1-11 and Jacob. 2 1 Nehemiah 2:4; perhaps Nehemiah 13:14, Nehemiah 13:22, Nehemiah 13:31? Genesis 32:9.

4. Meditation. (See special section dealing with this practice.), With regard to the allotment of periods for prayer, it is not my purpose to suggest any rules. These are best arranged by each man for himself, to fit into the plan of his daily duties. I would remark, however, that, in my view, the late evening is the least favourable time for prayer considered as active mental and spiritual effort. At the end of the work day (and for him every day is more or less a day of work) the priest ought to be too tired to be in a condition for giving his best energies to any such effort. The condition of mental activity and excitement of which the priest is often conscious at the close of Sunday, or any other day of unusual mental strain, is something abnormal, and indicative rather of an inflammatory condition than one of healthful vigour. What is needed at such times is rest, not work. The inclination towards the latter which is often present under these circum stances should, therefore, be restrained in the interests of health. The prayers used immediately before retiring for the night should be brief and comprehensive, otherwise they are apt to be looked forward to as a task. This is fatal. Note that the earlier in the day the hour chosen for devotion, the better for its life and effectiveness, and the better you will enjoy it. For although the pleasure to be derived from the practice of prayer and praise may not be regarded as a suitable motive for such actions, or as an object to be sought for its own sake; and although, again, much effectual prayer is doubtless offered under circum stances which render such offering a matter of almost painful effort, where any sense of pleasure is entirely absent yet there can be no doubt that where prayer is a reality its observance cannot but be accompanied with much of spiritual enjoyment. This is especially the case with reference to that department of worship which is known as Meditation. In fact, the reality of prayer as such may often be tested by its presence or absence, though it should be remarked that one great reason for the absence of sensible pleasure in the practice of prayer is that of the brevity of our ordinary acts of private worship. To be productive of spiritual enjoyment the act of prayer must be leisurely, so that the mind may dwell on each point as it comes up, and fully grasp its significance. Prayer, to produce a sensation of pleasure, need not be extemporaneous; the devout utterance of a psalm, with the soul fully alive to the poetry as well as to the inner significance, will often have the effect of an elevation of soul amounting almost to rapture. There can be no doubt that private prayers, as usually practised, are too hurried, although without the least consciousness that such is the case. The question may be asked: " How can time be found for such prolongation of the act of private worship as is here contemplated? " I would answer this by two suggestions, both of which I have found most effectual in the course of a very busy life. The first is that of the utilisation of odds and ends of time. We see the Roman clergy saying their Office as they sit in the railway carriage, hereby setting us an excellent example. Why should we not utilise the time occupied in our walks and drives, and even that which is spent in waiting for the train at the railway station? Of course, the objection will at once be raised of the distracting effect of external objects under such circumstances. The answer will be ex pressed in the second suggestion to which I refer, namely, that of acquiring the habit of concentration of mind. Until this habit has been acquired no doubt the difficulty referred to will appear insuperable; but I can, from my own experience, bear testimony to the fact that the habit of deliberately concentrating the mind upon any subject which may seem desirable may be acquired by patience and perseverance, so as to be effective under almost any ordinary circum stances that can be mentioned. The priest, therefore, should make the acquisition of the power to do this a definite object of effort, and should persevere until he has acquired it. Some men may attain their object more quickly than others, but there is no question that every man is capable of attaining it if he only gives sufficient time and degree of attention to the matter.

It will, in fact, be found, I think in all cases, that the exercise of devotional thought, prayer, and meditation is carried on more effectively, and with greater satisfaction to the worshipper, while walking whether to and fro in a church or other building, or continuously in the open air than in any other bodily position or attitude. I have, myself, found that when engaged in the exercise of meditation (or even ordinary prayer) in the attitude of kneeling, any new access from any cause of earnestness or fervour would invariably be accompanied by the impulse to rise and walk to and fro; and that the exercise resumed in this condition of movement would be carried on more effectively than in the attitude of kneeling or any other stationary position. Nothing is more conducive to spiritual activity, or to life in the practice of devotion, than a walk in the woods, or some quiet spot, where the worshipper feels his capacity for devotional activity enhanced by the companionship of nature.

EVENSONG IN THE WOODS. 1

" Hush, let us say Our Father, in this wood, And through bare boughs look up into the sky, Where fleecy clouds on autumn winds go by.

Here, by this fallen trunk, which long since stood And praised the Lord and Giver of all good, We ll sing Magnificat. With curious eye, A squirrel watches from a branch on high, As though he, too, would join us if he could.

" Now in our Nunc Dimittis/ soft and low, Strange woodland voices mingle, one by one;

Dead songs of vanished birds, the sad increase Of crumpled leaves on paths where rough winds go, The deepening shades, the low October sun Lord, let Thy servant now depart in peace. "

Another consideration which may be noticed as helping to meet the difficulty in respect of the time occupied by prolonged devotional exercises may be thus expressed. It will be found that the habit of mental concentration, the cultivation of which has been so strongly recommended, will have the effect of stimulating the capacity for thought in such a way as to enable the worshipper to follow out intelligently any train of thought or spiritual action with a rapidity which, before making the matter a subject of study, would be thought incredible. I have already referred to the injurious effect of hurrying our devotions, this being certainly one of the most serious of the dangers to be guarded against. But the term " hurrying "implies the lack of due and full consideration of the matter which is being dealt with. The persevering practitioner of the method here under consideration will find that there is such a thing as rapidity of thought without hurrying. The latter evil may be avoided if you make a practice of keeping in mind the necessity 1 "Poems," by Frederick George Scott (Constable & Co, 1910). for concentration of thought throughout the whole period of the devotional exercises. The effort to do this will soon become unnecessary, as it will be found that when once the mind has been definitely made up to the maintenance of this habit of concentration it will soon work itself automatically; to the effect that as soon as the thoughts begin to drift into another channel, the mind will recognise the fact instinctively, and bring the train of wandering thought to a stop.

Wandering thoughts are the great trouble in every form of devotion, and the tendency to them will never, I suppose, be wholly overcome. Yet it may be kept in great measure under control by simply making it a habit to stop short as soon as the drifting tendency is recognised, and to continue the act of devotion with renewed life. The rapidity with which thought can travel, while still maintaining a full grasp of the subject with which it is engaged, is certainly wonderful; and the acquisition of the capacity for this concentrated and rapid thought will, as has been remarked, form to a considerable extent the solution of the difficulty comprised in the amount of time necessarily occupied by effective private devotion.

Yet, with all this, it is certain that for the due performance of this duty, especially in the case of the priest, a considerable portion of time must necessarily be assigned to it. I suppose it will be universally admitted that the very sinews of spiritual war may be said to consist of prayer. Hence the cutting down of the period spent in prayer, for the sake of the claims of active work, below the limit of time which is really necessary for its effectual observance, will certainly be fatal to the satisfactory performance of that work, as well as most injurious to the spiritual life of the worker; and the apparent necessity for such cutting down will certainly vanish if only the practice of due economy of time be intelligently followed out. The amount of effective and energetic worship which may, by such measures, be compressed within the limits of, say, two hours per day, would certainly surprise the man who has never systematically set about the work of making his devotion in method as well as matter a thing of definite system. The duty of observing the practice of definite system must surely be recognised as almost the first requisite for the successful fulfilment of the course of duty which belongs to the priestly office. In other walks of life this duty is generally to a great extent forced upon a man; he has certain objects before him, the accomplishment of which is made absolutely necessary, and the systematic allotment of his time so as to ensure their successful performance is either arranged for him by those who have the direction of his work, or is demanded from him by the necessity of the case. While he is a curate this may be to a great extent the case with the young clergyman, and the multifarious requirements of a town parish may have a similar effect; l but the country clergy man, in the great majority of cases, has no such check upon the economical employment of his time. His duties, apart from the merest, official routine, are of his own devising and arrangement. His time is almost wholly at his own disposal, and it is usually possible for him to go through a course of occupation which may seem to himself, and to others, to represent fully the due employment of his time, when, as a matter of fact, the strict observance of definite system would 1 But this is by no means always the case. make it plain that the amount of time expended was altogether disproportionate to the amount of work done within its limits. I am writing from my own experience as a parish priest. I know what it is for a man to be, if I may so say, busily idle, and to have his time apparently full up, whereas the amount of work which is done within a certain period might easily have been compressed within a small fragment of it. I have already spoken of the importance of utilising odds and ends of time, especially that which is spent in travelling, driving, or walking. The time has been when, from the multiplicity of affairs in which I happened to be engaged, it became absolutely necessary for me to turn to such account all periods of this sort, including even the use of the time spent in waiting for the fulfilment of an engagement by some defaulter in this respect. It was by such experience as this that I became aware of the vast importance of economy in the use of time, and of system, as the only method of securing such economy. No doubt the best and most effective means of learning is that of a consideration of one’s own mistakes, and most of the suggestions which I am offering for the consideration of my brethren in this present little work have this as their foundation. Of course, the practice of private devotion, which is all that we have in view in this treatise, should be suitably distributed over the day’s course. Each individual clergyman no doubt is the best judge of the method to be observed in his own case. It should be remarked, however, that the period say of fifteen or, perhaps, twenty minutes immediately preceding the midday meal and thus easily borne in mind and set apart for the purpose naturally occupies a very important place in the day’s devotional system. Our manuals of devotion assign certain subjects for the period of Sext, with which the period we are now considering may roughly correspond. But, however this may be, it is surely manifest that this little period, dividing the day, as it were, into halves, should be turned to account by a brief act of retrospect which recalls to the mind the manner in which the day’s first half has been spent, and of prospect, seeking grace and guidance for the due use of that portion which still remains.