Secret Prayer E-Book

Hannah More

• Herausgeber: Darolt Books
• Kategorie: Religion und Spiritualität
• Serie: Hope messages for quarantine
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2020

Seitenzahl: 56

Beschreibung

Secret Prayer is a message of meditation based on the Bible and written by Hannah More (2 February 1745 – 7 September 1833) was an English religious writer and philanthropist, remembered as a poet and playwright in the circle of Johnson, Reynolds and Garrick, as a writer on moral and religious subjects, and as a practical philanthropist. Born in Bristol, she taught at a school established there by her father and began writing plays. She became involved with the London literary elite as a leading Bluestocking member. Her plays and poetry became more evangelical and she joined a group campaigning against the slave trade. In the 1790s she wrote several Cheap Repository Tracts on moral, religious and political topics, for distribution to the literate poor. Meanwhile, she did increasing philanthropic work in the Mendip area, encouraged by William Wilberforce. Born in 1745 at Fishponds in the parish of Stapleton, near Bristol, Hannah More was the fourth of five daughters of Jacob More (1700-1783), a schoolmaster originally from Harleston, Norfolk. He was from a strong Presbyterian family in Norfolk, but had become a member of the Church of England, and originally intended to pursue a career in the Church, but after the disappointment of losing a lawsuit over an estate he had hoped to inherit, he moved to Bristol, where he became an excise officer and was later appointed to teach at the Fishponds free school. They were a close family and the sisters were first educated by their father, learning Latin and mathematics: Hannah was also taught by her elder sisters, through whom she learned French. Her conversational French was improved by spending time with French prisoners of war in Frenchay during the Seven Years' War. She was keen to learn, and possessed a sharp intellect she was assiduous in studying, and according to family tradition, began writing at an early age.  In 1758 Jacob established his own girls' boarding school at Trinity Street in Bristol for the elder sisters, Mary and Elizabeth to run, while he and his wife moved to Stony Hill in the city to open a school for boys. Hannah More became a pupil when she was twelve years old, and taught at the school in her early adulthood. 

Leseprobe

PREFACE

Hannah More (2 February 1745 – 7 September 1833) was an English religious writer and philanthropist, remembered as a poet and playwright in the circle of Johnson, Reynolds and Garrick, as a writer on moral and religious subjects, and as a practical philanthropist. Born in Bristol, she taught at a school established there by her father and began writing plays. She became involved with the London literary elite as a leading Bluestocking member. Her plays and poetry became more evangelical and she joined a group campaigning against the slave trade. In the 1790s she wrote several Cheap Repository Tracts on moral, religious and political topics, for distribution to the literate poor. Meanwhile, she did increasing philanthropic work in the Mendip area, encouraged by William Wilberforce.

Born in 1745 at Fishponds in the parish of Stapleton, near Bristol, Hannah More was the fourth of five daughters of Jacob More (1700-1783), a schoolmaster originally from Harleston, Norfolk. He was from a strong Presbyterian family in Norfolk, but had become a member of the Church of England, and originally intended to pursue a career in the Church, but after the disappointment of losing a lawsuit over an estate he had hoped to inherit, he moved to Bristol, where he became an excise officer and was later appointed to teach at the Fishponds free school.

They were a close family and the sisters were first educated by their father, learning Latin and mathematics: Hannah was also taught by her elder sisters, through whom she learned French. Her conversational French was improved by spending time with French prisoners of war in Frenchay during the Seven Years' War. She was keen to learn, and possessed a sharp intellect she was assiduous in studying, and according to family tradition, began writing at an early age. 

In 1758 Jacob established his own girls' boarding school at Trinity Street in Bristol for the elder sisters, Mary and Elizabeth to run, while he and his wife moved to Stony Hill in the city to open a school for boys. Hannah More became a pupil when she was twelve years old, and taught at the school in her early adulthood. 

In 1767 More gave up her share in the school after becoming engaged to William Turner of Tyntesfield, Wraxall, Somerset, whom she had met when he began teaching her cousins. After six years the wedding had not taken place. Turner seemed reluctant to name a date and in 1773 the engagement was broken off. It seems that as a consequence, More suffered a nervous breakdown and spent some time recuperating in Uphill, near Weston-super-Mare. As compensation, Hannah More was induced to accept a £200 annuity from Turner. This set her free for literary pursuits, and in the winter of 1773 –74 she went to London in the company of her sisters, Sarah and Martha the first of many such trips she made at yearly intervals. Some verses that she had written on David Garrick's version of King Lear led to an acquaintance with the celebrated actor and playwright. 

Secret Prayer

"Lord, teach us to pray." Luke 11:1

 "He who has learned to pray as he ought, has learned the secret of a holy life!" Wilson

"When you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you." Matthew 6:6

Prayer is . . .

the application of need to Him who alone can relieve it,

the confession of sin to Him who alone can pardon it,

the urgency of poverty,

the prostration of humility,

the fervency of penitence,

the confidence of trust.

Prayer is . . .

not eloquence, but earnestness,

not the definition of helplessness, but the feeling of it,

the "Lord, save us  or we perish!" of drowning Peter,

the cry of faith to the ear of mercy.

Adoration is the noblest employment of created beings.

Confession is the natural language of guilty creatures.

Gratitude is the spontaneous expression of pardoned sinners.

Prayer is desire  it is . . .

not a mere conception of the mind,

not an effort of the intellect,

not an act of the memory.

Prayer is . . .

an elevation of the soul towards its Maker,

a pressing sense of our own ignorance and infirmity,

a consciousness . . .

  of the perfections of God,

  of his readiness to hear,

  of his power to help,

  of his willingness to save.

Prayer is not an emotion produced in the senses, nor an effect wrought by the imagination  but a determination of the will, an effusion of the heart.

Prayer is an act both of the understanding and of the heart. The understanding must apply itself to the knowledge of the Divine perfections, or the heart will not be led to the adoration of them. It would not be a reasonable service, if the mind were excluded. It must be rational worship, or the human worshiper will not bring to the service the distinguishing faculty of his nature, which is reason. It must be spiritual worship, or it will lack the distinctive quality to make it acceptable to Him who is a spirit, and who has declared that he will be worshiped "in spirit and in truth."

Man is not only a sinful being but also a helpless being, and therefore a dependant being. This offers new and powerful motives to prayer, and shows the necessity of looking continually to a higher power, to a better strength than our own. If God sustains us not, we fall; if He directs us not, we wander. His guidance is not only perfect freedom, but perfect safety.

Our greatest danger begins from the moment we imagine we are able to go alone. He who does not believe this fundamental truth, "the helplessness of man," on which the other doctrines of the Bible are built  or he who nominally professes to assent to it as a doctrine of Scripture, yet if he does not experimentally acknowledge it  if he does not feel it in the convictions of his own awakened conscience, in his discovery of the evil workings of his own heart, and the wrong propensities of his own nature, all bearing their testimony to its truth  such a one will not pray earnestly for its cure  will not pray with that feeling of his own helplessness, with that sense of dependence on Divine assistance  which alone makes prayer efficacious.