442 INTERCESSORY PRAYER. pray for ourselves. This, as it is a most pleasant and easy, so it is an indispensable obligation. It is a duty which brings the social affections into their highest exercise, and which may be reciprocally paid and received. The same Scriptures which expressly enjoin that supplication, prayers, inter- cession, and giving of thanks be made for all men, furnish also numerous exam- ples of the efficacy of intercessory prayer. We need not dwell on the instance of the rain obtained by the prayers of Elijah, or the earlier availing intercessionsofMoses, with other public deliverances effected in the same manner. Though the perseverance ofAbraham's prayer did not prevent the extermination of the polluted city, yet doubtless the blessing he solicited for it returned into his own bosom, and the successive pro- mises made by the Almighty Judge to the successively reduced number of the righteous, for whose sake the petition for preservation was offered, affords a proof
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