On Prayer

Then a priestess said, Speak to usof Prayer.

And he answered, saying:

You pray in your distress and in yourneed; would that you might pray alsoin the fullness of your joy and in yourdays of abundance.

For what is prayer but the expansion ofyourself into the living ether?

And if it is for your comfort to pouryour darkness into space, it is also foryour delight to pour forth the dawningof your heart.

And if you cannot but weep when yoursoul summons you to prayer, she shouldspur you again and yet again, thoughweeping, until you shall come laughing.

When you pray you rise to meet in theair those who are praying at that veryhour, and whom save in prayer youmay not meet.

Therefore let your visit to that templeinvisible be for naught but ecstasy andsweet communion.

For if you should enter the temple forno other purpose than asking you shallnot receive:

And if you should enter into it tohumble yourself you shall not be lifted:

Or even if you should enter into it tobeg for the good of others you shall notbe heard.

It is enough that you enter the templeinvisible.

I cannot teach you how to pray in words.

God listens not to your words save whenHe Himself utters them through yourlips.

And I cannot teach you the prayer of theseas and the forests and the mountains.

But you who are born of themountains and the forests and the seascan find their prayer in your heart,

And if you but listen in the stillnessof the night you shall hear them sayingin silence,

“Our God, who art our winged self, it isthy will in us that willeth.

It is thy desire in us that desireth.

It is thy urge in us that would turn ournights, which are thine, into days whichare thine also.

We cannot ask thee for aught, for thouknowest our needs before they are bornin us:

Thou art our need; and in giving us moreof thyself thou givest us all.”