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of the subsequent pages may be simply epitomized thus 
“ Probably no one would pray that water might flow up 
bill; it is equally irrational to pray for smaller and to us 
more obscure deviations from laws of nature, such as are 
involved in expecting and praying for deliverances from 
apprehended calamities. The rain must fall, the sun must 
shine, the bodily economy must act with all its functions, be 
they sound or diseased. It is a balanced mechanism. At 
what point will you with your prayer intervene, and request 
that irregularity may take the place of regularity to ac- 
complish your desire ? ” This I believe to be a fair statement 
of the objection. I suppose that our answer would in the 
main be to the following purport. The exquisite balance of 
Nature’s laws we admit equally with yourself. But it speaks 
to us of the action of a Mind of infinite grasp and prevision, 
and of a Power the source of all that we call force.^ To that 
Mind and to that Power we are moved by considerations of the 
greatest weight to believe that we are in definite spiritual 
relations, and under a definite moral responsibility . . When we 
pray to that Mind and that Power, we also believe that a 
certain Fatherly relation exists there. When we speak of 
the laws of Nature we believe that they are never for a 
moment apart from the Will which guides that Mind and that 
Power. We do not believe that our will manifested in prayer 
can bend that Supreme Will contrary to its purpose. On the 
contrary, our own Scripture defines “ confidence ” in prayer 
to be simply this, “ that if we ask anything according to His 
will, He heareth us.”* How much is involved in that (C accord- 
ing to His will 93 as to manner and matter of request, belongs 
to Theology to discourse upon. We do not, therefore, pray, 
consciously or unconsciously, for a violation of the laws of 
Nature in so far as they are a manifestation of the Will of 
God. But our sense of His Personal Will operating always 
in those laws, and as the origin of all that is called Force, is 
so vivid, that we believe we may ask Him, and He may grant 
our petitions. And lastly, we do not think that we can justly 
be required to answer “ How can this be?” With, by, or 
through His own laws, behind which His presence is always 
to be conceived, He may accomplish our desire. The modus 
oyerandi of the Divine Will we simply do not expect to define 
beforehand. ff His way is in the sea, and His path in the 
great waters, and His footsteps are not known.” We cannot 
pretend to suppose that this will be very satisfactory to those 
# 1 J ohn v. 14. 
