OF PRAYER. 309 ,should man, the only thinking, be the only disorderly work of Almighty power ? But whilst we are asserting the ne- cessity of seasons of prayer, let us. not be suspected of attaching undue import- ance to them ; for all these are but the frame-work, the scaffolding, the mere mechanical and subsidiaryadjuncts; they are but the preparation for Christianwor- ship ; they remind us, they intimate to us, that an important work is to be done, but are no part of the work itself. They, therefore, who most insist on the value ofstated devotions, must never lose sight of that grand, and universal prime truth, that wherever we are, still we are in God's presence ; whatever -we have is His gift ; whatever we hope is His pro- mise ; feelings which are commensurate with all time, all places, and limited to no particular scenes or seasons. There is in some, in many it is to be feared, a readiness to acknowledge this general doctrine, which miscalled natural religion teaches ; but who are far from
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