encouragements of Holy Scripture, would supply abundant topics for prayer. The various patterns and forms of devotion adapted to different circumstances, which are contained in the book of Psalms and other parts of Scripture, would likewise assist our devotions. From these various sources the Christian might always derive abundant matter for prayer; and yet how often is he ignorant of what he should pray for! How weak is his memory! How confused are his perceptions! How difficult does he find it to employ these materials, though spread before him in the Scripture, according to the interchanging scene of his duties and trials! Nothing is so difficult as to bring God and his own heart together.

We

Besides our infirmities, however, as they relate to the matter of our prayers, we have infirmities also which regard the MANNER OF THEM —we know not how to pray AS WE OUGHT. ought to pray with the most solemn reverence and awe, as though in the immediate presence of God; but, alas, how prone are we to indulge a light and careless spirit! We ought to pray with holy fervour and importunity, as Jacob who wrestled with God, or the widow who supplicated the unjust judge, or the Syrophoenician woman who cried after our Lord; but how tame and lifeless at times are our devotions! We ought to pray with a deeply humble and contrite

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heart, as the royal Psalmist, or Jacob, or Daniel, or the lowly publican in the parable; but with how much of secret pride and self-consequence are we apt to approach God! We ought to pray with an entire resignation to the will of God, and humble faith in his promises; with a holy sincerity and uprightness of soul, with an ardent hunger for spiritual blessings, and a simple reliance on the mediation of our Saviour: but O, how often does a repining, unbelieving, insincere, cold, and selfish spirit steal upon us! How quickly do our hearts wander from God! How weak are our best prayers, and how polluted our most sacred offerings! How poor, how miserable, how impotent! We seem at

times to want every thing, we are able to ask for nothing, we do not even know, and are unworthy to know, how and what we ought to pray for.

Such are some of those infirmities in prayer, of which the Christian alone is conscious; and which, notwithstanding his efforts and his watchfulness, from time to time surprise and afflict him. For, small as all these defects may appear in the eyes of others, they are the subject of his deep and daily self-abasement before God; and on account of them he abhors himself, and repents in dust and ashes. Nothing more decidedly and painfully reveals to him the total depravity of his nature, than the imper

fection of those secret and retired duties. These, were it not for that depravity, would be the most easy and delightful of all duties: but they now seem to collect and draw to themselves, as the weaker parts of the human frame, the infirmities of every other. This depravity pursues him through them all, and too often converts what ought to be the occasion of his pleasure and gratitude, into the scenes of his conflict and discomfiture.

Let us then proceed to consider,

II. THE ASSISTANCE OF THE HOLY SPIRIT BY WHICH THE CHRISTIAN IS RELIEVED UNDER

THESE INFIRMITIES.

The blessed Spirit of God affords us the aid which our weakness requires. If we were left to ourselves, we should entirely fail; but by his powerful help we are enabled to resist our cor rupt affections, and to persevere in imperfect indeed, but humble and sincere prayer.

We are accordingly directed in the Holy Scriptures to this Divine Agent as to the great subject of promise in the New Testament dispensation, which is therefore called, by way of eminence, The ministration of the Spirit. We are commanded to pray in the Holy Ghost. We are said to have access by the Spirit unto the Father. We are to pray always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit. It is this eternal

Spirit who helps and supports us, as a nurse bears in her arms the tender and feeble infant.

The word rendered, help, in the text is one of peculiar strength. It implies that the Spirit takes upon himself a large part of the burden by which our infirmity is weighed down, and not only succours us in a slight degree, but effectually relieves us by dividing, as it were, the burden with us. The image is taken from one who sets his shoulder to another's, and lifts with him at the same load. Let this consideration then encourage us! What, if it is not said in Scripture that we shall be wholly delivered in this world from our moral sicknesses; is it not much that we are effectually assisted under them? Shall we despair, whilst we have such an helper?

The image here employed may also teach us that we are not to relax our, exertions, whilst looking for the gracious aid of the Spirit, but rather to increase them. The idea of help,' seems to imply that we are ourselves making all possible efforts, and that, whilst making them, the Spirit relieves us under our infirmities. It is true indeed, that all which is good in us is the fruit of the preventing grace of God; but it appears to be intimated in the expression before us, that, in the ordinary course of our duty in prayer, we are to put forth and stir up to the utmost the grace of God which is in us, in dependence on this almighty aid.

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The particular manner in which this help is afforded is by the Spirit MAKING INTERCESSION FOR US, that is, so sanctifying our affections and exciting our desires, that we are enabled to pour out our minds to God in fervent effectual intercession and prayer. This seems to be the meaning of the term Intercession in this place, as it is obviously explanatory of the previous general expression of helping our infirmities, and stands opposed to our not knowing what to pray for as we ought; and as it is connected with those unutterable desires in prayer which the text proceeds to describe.

The intercession of the Spirit, then, is not to be understood of his acting the part of a mediator between God and man on our account, before the throne of the Majesty on high, but of his relieving our infirmities, as the Illuminator and Comforter of the faithful, in our religious addresses and duties. Christ is the only Mediator and Advocate with the Father; the Spirit is our Sanctifier and the assister of our weaknesses here. The office of Christ is immediately before the throne of God, the agency of the Spirit is more directly with the church. The intercession of Christ is without us, that of the Holy Ghost is within us. The intercession of Christ is meritorious, the intercession of the Spirit is gracious and supporting. Christ intercedes, and the Spirit is given; the Holy Ghost intercedes, and we implore the benefits of the