My dear young Friend, LETTER LI. To the Same. Jan. 15, 1849. I write without waiting for any reply to my last; because, of the two, I would prefer letting you have my views in full without any answer from you whatever. Supposing that fact true on which I have so much insisted in my last letter, then, even if I were to admit all that your philosophy claims, what would follow? Why, that you could not, as you say, reconcile the "efficacy of prayer" with the "unvarying laws of nature." Now, as I contend that there are many other things in the coexistence of which you believe, though you cannot reconcile them,—as, for example, in the absolute prescience of God, and the responsibility of man-His infinite goodness, in spite of the permission of evil—and the connection of body and mind, though there seems to be utter dissimilarity of substance— (not to mention a hundred more),—I presume I grant you very little, if I concede in the present case your impotence to reconcile paradoxical truths; and that you take a great deal more than either I or any one else will give you, when you assume that because you cannot reconcile "prayer" with the "immutability" of God, and the unvarying operation of His laws, therefore the efficacy of prayer is an illusion. But now let me examine your philosophy itself, and see what it is worth. You say, first, that as "general laws" of unvarying uniformity have been enacted by divine wisdom, and the Deity is immutable, prayer can have no efficacy; it cannot avert the evil nor propitiate the good, which, in either case, will and must befall us, whether we pray or not; so that to "pray is to play the fool." I wish, when you talk of "general laws," you would not forget that they are perpetually modified and traversed by laws which have to us all the effect of special laws; which produce events to us contingent and fortuitous, and which may be, for aught you can prove, infinitely varied in operation, relatively to a number of conditions of which "prayer" may be one. A house is burned down: you say it is the law of fire to burn; very true — but when, of five men in it, one escapes and four perish, what is the general law which produces these opposite results? A vessel is wrecked, and goes down; but why seven are saved and twentyseven drowned, it might, in like manner, be difficult to show by any general law. The results to us are so fortuitous, and so little under the dominion of known law, that we never dare to speculate on them; and by the minutest difference in the arrangement of the most trivial circumstances, these results may be endlessly modified. Now it is out of these, to us, “fortuities," in which, as seen by an infinite intellect, there is "law," as everywhere else, though we can trace none, that God selects the instruments of that discipline which He exercises over each one of us, and which, for aught we can demonstrate, He may actually vary and modify, but, at all events, may have determined beforehand shall be "varied and modified," with reference to Prayer. Even if one were to suppose the results modified quite pro re natâ, in reference to the ever-shifting conditions of the individual mind, it would be impossible for you to disprove it, though I deem the notion unphilosophical; there would be no impossibility in it. The Infinite Wisdom that weaves "the whole web of our life" can, if He pleases, insert a thread or draw out a broken one; and yet the entire plan, except at the point of such "callida junctura," may remain as it was, and the general result be reached by a slightly varied road. All this would, if He pleased, be as easy to Him as for an old woman to mend a cabbage net. But not to insist on this. However foreseen and provided for, it is by the aforesaid endless intricacies in the operation of "general laws," - intricacies which we can never reduce to calculation, because they are the result of the intervention of a thousand secondary laws, more or less general, and of which the condition of " prayer” may be one, that God secures our absolute dependence on Him, — renders 66 that "Prevision on which proud science is so fond of counting as its ultimate triumph, an impossible vanity, -and effectually prevents us, and will ever prevent us, with all our wisdom, from knowing "what a day or an hour shall bring forth." And as by these contingent events- I mean contingent to us-He secures our perpetual dependence, so within these limits man instinctively feels is the sphere of prayer. When we have once ascertained a 66 general law," we never pray that that may cease to act: no sane man prays that gravitation may be suspended; that he may never die; that if his house catch fire, fire may not burn it; but only that things may be granted or averted, which, in millions of ways, he sees, by experience, admit of either alternative. I see your objection here; but, pardon me, I have already anticipated both it and the answer to it. You will object, of course, that though the events to which I have referred are "fortuities to us, they are not so to an infinite intellect (which not only I grant, but contend for); that they have been "pre-arranged," and will take effect, in due time and order, in the rigid concatenation of "antecedents and consequents." Very well; but not to content myself with what I have already said, I answer thus : Must you not grant that the phenomena of men's Minds, as well as all outward events, are among the things which enter into this concatenation of pre-arrangements? Must you not grant that they are among the most important "antecedents" of almost all human events? Now, can you show that "Prayer" is not one of these mental "conditions" and "antecedents" of certain effects? 66 Let us suppose, and I am confident I may defy you to disprove it (I indeed believe it is the absolute truth), that amongst other pre-arrangements" of Divine Wisdom, and to the maintenance of which, therefore, all that "immutability," on which you found so much, is pledged,—it has been decreed that "Prayer” shall be one of the indispensable conditions of the stable enjoyment of God's favour. Let us suppose He has decreed, that, since it is fit and right, in itself, that the creatures of His power, the sub jects of His law, the objects of His bounty, should express their homage; that since they can be fully happy (as He wills they should be) only in the continual recognition of their dependence on Him; — that since, whatever inferior good He may bestow upon them, they cannot (such is their nature) know what permanent and unalloyed felicity is but in His "favour which is life, and His loving-kindness which is better than life,”—let us suppose, I say, for these reasons, He has decreed that, as an act of fealty, as an expression of gratitude, as a symbol of dependence, as an utterance of want, prayer shall be an unvarying pre-requisite of all real permanent good ;- that though he may often refuse a petition for seeming temporal good, because it is but seeming, or refuse it because He intends yet greater good by denying, -He has decreed, and for ever, that in the end only he shall be truly happy, get what he hopes, and receive what he needs, who "seeks His face," let us suppose, I say, all this (and I am very certain you cannot show its improbability or absurdity), what then? Why just this, that if this be a condition of the Divine conduct towards us, if it be one of the "wise pre-arrangements". one of the "unvarying laws," — your " philosophy," my young friend, is still very true, but unluckily confutes your "conclusion!" I have introduced, you see, but another of your pleasant “antecedents," and your little syllogism holds no longer. If you say you cannot see the reasonableness of the condition itself, as you can of industry being a condition of success in life, or uprightness a condition of possessing the esteem of others,—I answer, that I neither know nor can conceive of any condition more reasonable than that a creature should express his dependence, a beggar appeal to a benefactor; nor anything more reasonable than that the Sovereign Beneficence should shed no bounties on those who, though in abject poverty, are too proud or too presumptuous to seek aid of Infinite Affluence! If you say that you see not how prayer should change the purpose of an Immutable Deity, I have replied, on the very scheme of your own philosophy, that prayer may be one of the antecedents fixed by that very Immutability; and if so, your argument is re torted with interest ;-for then not to pray is to expect that He will change His "immutable" purpose, and nullify His own conditions of our success ! If you say, you cannot see a causal connection between prayer and its fulfilment, I reply, that you know it is the boast of modern philosophy to have discovered that we know not the real causal connection between any antecedent and its consequent. I am sure, as I have above said, that this "antecedent and consequent" may be seen to be as reasonable as any in the world. -- - Finally I would ask you, why you ever address a prayer for aid to your fellow man? If you say, as doubtless you will, "Oh, but he is capable of being moved, of having his will changed," -I answer, very true; but go one step further back, and see whether you are not in the same dilemma as before; for these determinations of your neighbour's mind are among the "prearrangements," elements in the huge complications of "general laws," on which you lay so much stress! They are "prearranged," before you utter a syllable; and though whether they shall be in your favour or not, is unknown to you, it is all known by the Infinite Intellect, and the result has entered into His "pre-arrangements." If you say, as it is certain you will say,"But my appeal may be among the pre-arranged methods of operating that result," I answer. Exactly so. Stick to that argument; only remember that it may equally hold for the necessity and duty of prayer." - 66 In short, the mere concatenation of antecedents and consequents, even to the admission of the most rigid doctrine of "moral necessity," will not avail to prove the "inefficacy of prayer;" as, indeed, the immense majority of those who have advocated that doctrine have never pretended anything of the kind. You can only render your argument conclusive by turning your "general laws" into the Mahometan's "fate ;" and then you may dispense, with equal reason, with all conditions of "predestined" events. "What is to be is to be;" that will settle everything for you. You may, for that reason, dispense with industry as a condition of success in your profession, with |