Take, first, wandering thoughts. Very likely our thoughts wander at other times besides during our prayers. Very likely we find it difficult to fix them steadily upon anything we want to study or think about attentively. We have suffered ourselves to fall into a bad intellectual habit of inattention, and so have lost in a great measure the power of fixing the mind upon any subject. We are not likely to be able to fix the mind upon our prayers, if our ordinary habit of mind is thoughtless, vague, indolent, indifferent. “Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might” is a rule which may be applied with equal force to the mind and to that which it “findeth to do”. Those who can at all times fix the mind upon that which they are doing have a great advantage in their prayers.
1. The very act of controlling the thoughts, of composing and concentrating the mind, implies often a strenuous effort of the will It is one of the illusions with which it is common for men to flatter themselves that they are masters and rulers of their own minds. They fancy they can think about what they please, and when they please, not considering the curious independence and waywardness of that strange faculty of thought which belongs to them, and which seems to be an essential part of their moral being, but which may yet be said to have a life and, if one may go so far, even a will of its own. For the truth is that the mind works on of itself without asking leave of us, without our help and, what is more remarkable still, without our knowledge. That this is so in our dreams is apparent to everybody. Is it not a thing that is always surprising us afresh, that while we have been asleep our minds have been as busy as ever, working with amazing rapidity, and with a vigour and ingenuity that betrayed no symptom of weariness? Almost in a moment that fantastic story-teller has woven a romance out of the slenderest materials, a mere hint from a physical sensation, or a fancy that we left it to deal with as it chose, when we sank into unconsciousness, or a sound which never disturbed our slumber, but of which it failed not to take note, and which summoned, like a fairy horn, all the strange creatures that were to play their part on the mystic stage. We, as it seemed, had nothing to do with it all. We lay there impassive, at rest. It was not we who thought out those astonishing stories, who put this and that together in the laborious and deliberate fashion which is common to us in our waking hours, when we try to please a child by telling him a tale. It was the mind that built up that visionary fabric, not we ourselves.
And what happens when we are asleep happens also, in a measure, when we are awake. Is it we who control our thoughts all the day long? Is it not rather our thoughts that control us? The mind pursues its own course. It responds, not waiting for permission but through the operation of its own laws, to the stimulus which it is constantly receiving through the senses. It is drawn this way by some chance suggestion from without, or driven that way by some impulse from within. And the consequence is that often we have no idea what it is that we are thinking of until, suddenly, we become aware of the regions into which we are being carried, and are filled with shame that we should permit the mind to be occupying itself, as we express it, with such matters. So independent is the mind of man. And how stubborn it is, how rebellious. Let any one try to “fix his mind” on any subject lie may select; what hard work it is unless long practice has made it easy. The mind refuses to be fixed. It will not come when it is called, or if it comes it will not stay. It is busy painting pictures and does not like being disturbed. It has run far on into the future, and has no inclination to return, at its owner’s call, to the prosaic present. Or it has escaped again into some happy past, or it is indolent and languid, and does not wish to be roused. This is a familiar trouble, and it is easy to see how it makes it often very difficult for us to pray. We try to collect our thoughts, but they are scattered again as soon as they are collected. It is as though we were rolling a huge stone up a steep ascent. We can make it move a little by dint of great exertion, but it slips back the moment our efforts are relaxed. We try to follow the prayers in church. We try honestly, and we succeed—for how long? Alas! before ever we are aware, this restless mind has flitted away, and travelled far to some world with which we had no present concern, but in which it has promptly made itself at home. It is in the counting house; it is in the cricket field; it is anywhere but in the church. We try to pray in private. We begin with what may seem to be genuine prayer, that is, we begin by saying what we feel, or what we are really thinking. But how often the humiliating discovery is made that in some unguarded moment the mind has stolen off on some business of its own, and left us there on our knees repeating phrases that mean nothing, offering formal petitions that run glibly off the tongue from the force of habit, but have in them no life, no soul, no value, no significance whatever. As Faber sings:—
The world that looks so dull all day
Glows bright on me at prayer,
And plans that ask no thought but then
Wake up and meet me there.
Attention is an effect, and you cannot have an effect without its cause. Is it not sacrifice, then, that is to say, is it not love, that lies at the root of attention? Consider your own case: did you ever experience any difficulty in attending to what you loved? Is it not significant, for instance, that a person who loves another is said to pay attention? Think, too, of little children, how careless and inattentive they will sometimes be at their work one moment, and how devoted they will be to their play the next. [Note: Spencer Jones, Now and Then, 121.]
Truly then we pray well when we think of no other thing, but all our mind is dressed to heaven and our soul is enflamed with the fire of the Holy Ghost. Thus truly a marvellous plenteousness of God’s goodness is found in us; for from the innermost marrow of our hearts shall the love of God rise, and all our prayer shall be with desire and effect; so that we over-run not the words, but nearly every syllable with a great cry and desire we shall offer to our Lord, Our heart being kindled with hot fire our prayer is also kindled, and in the savour of sweetness is offered by our mouth in the sight of God, so that it is great joy to pray. For whiles in prayer a marvellous sweetness is given to the one praying, the prayer is changed to song. [Note: Richard Role, The Mending of Life (ed. Comper), 220.]
2. But thought can be controlled by will. If it were not so, St. Paul would never have written, “Whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honourable, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things”. Concentration of thought on prayer is hindered not only by careless thinking of God and eternal realities, but by inattentive habits in regard to any subject. Life is a whole, and the ordinary frame of the daily life will be, practically, the mood of the hour of prayer. “Learn to give your whole mind,” it has been truly said, “to whatever you are doing, to the book you are reading, the letter you are writing, nay, even to the sweeping of a room, or the making of a garment.”
When thou shalt have entered the church for prayer or praise, leave outside the tumult of wavering thoughts, and be inwardly forgetful of all care as to outer matters, so that thou mayest be free to devote thyself to God alone. For it is not possible that there should at any time talk with God one who at the same time is also silently chatting with the whole world. Give attention, therefore, to Him who giveth attention to thee. Listen to Him as He speaketh to thee, that He Himself may hear thee when thou speakest to Him. It will thus happen that if thou assistest at the utterance of Divine praises with due reverence and thoughtfulness, if thou hearkenest intently and diligently to every word of Holy Scripture, thou wilt hear God speak to thee. Not that I say that I do these things; but I wish to do them; I grieve at not having done them; I am vexed when I do them not. But do thou to whom greater grace is granted, with vows and devout prayer turn towards thyself the merciful ears of the Lord; with tears and sighs beseech Him to look with clemency on thy wanderings from faithfulness, and with spiritual beings praise and glorify Him in all His works. For nothing more pleaseth the citizens on high, nothing giveth more joy to the Heavenly King. [Note: St. Bernard.]
3. There are, no doubt, some people with whom the difficulty of any sustained effort in prayer rises from a natural and constitutional incapacity for any prolonged concentration of thought. Such need to be reminded that God “knoweth whereof we are made,” and that, as He does not ignore our natural temperament, so we do well in fully recognizing it. Where this is a trouble to us, it is well to shorten the actual time spent on any single occasion in devotional exercises, and, if possible, to multiply the occasions, and all the more frequently pour out our souls before God. Only a few minutes, or even moments, of really earnest and purposeful prayer are certainly of more spiritual value than a comparatively lengthy period consumed in listlessness. It is only self-deception when we quiet our conscience by trying to persuade ourselves that we have been praying, when really we have only been kneeling. Better far to recognize and admit our constitutional infirmity, and, without yielding to it, none the less take special measures to discount its adverse influence, rather than court discouragement by persistently attempting to accomplish what our natural disposition renders almost an impossibility.
If “the archers” disturb us as soon as we approach the well, so that we seem unable to slake our thirst, we may do well to think upon those words of St. Paul’s which embody something more valuable than a fanciful Hebrew tradition, “They drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them; and that Rock was Christ”. That the Rock followed the Hebrews on their wilderness journey is a poetical fiction, but that the spiritual Rock does follow us in our lifelong journey, ever there within our reach, is a supremely blessed fact; and where He is, even “in the wilderness shall waters break out and streams in the desert”. [Note: Canon Hay Aitken, The Divine Ordinance of Prayer, 299]
