Chapter II
The Power of Prayer
by Saint Alphonsus Liguori
Doctor of the Church
1759
Excellence of Prayer and Its Power With God
Our prayers are so dear to
God, that He has appointed the
Angels to present them to
Him as soon as they come forth from our mouths.
"The angels", says Saint
Hilary, "preside over the prayers of the faithful, and offer them daily to God".
This is that smoke of the incense, which are the
prayers of saints, which Saint
John saw ascending up before God from the hand of
the angel - Apocalypse 8:4; and which he
saw in another place represented by golden phials full of sweet odors, very
acceptable to God. But in order to understand better the value of
prayers in
God's sight, it is sufficient to read both in the
Old and New Testaments the
innumerable promises which God makes to the
man that prays. "Call
upon Me in the day of trouble: I will deliver thee" - Psalm 49:15.
"Cry to Me and I will hear thee" - Jeremiah 33:3.
"Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it shall be
opened to you" - Matthew 7:7. "For
every one that asketh, receiveth; and he that seeketh, findeth; and to him that
knocketh, it shall be opened" - Luke 11:10. "If
you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, you shall ask whatever you will, and
it shall be done unto you" - John 15:7. "Again
I say to you, that if two of you shall consent upon earth, concerning any thing
whatsoever they shall ask, it shall be done to them by My Father Who is in
heaven" - Matthew 18:19. "If you ask
Me anything in My name, that will I do" - John 14:14. "And
in that day you shall not ask Me any thing. Amen, amen I say to you: if you ask
the Father any thing in My name, He will give it you" - John 16:23. There are a
thousand similar texts; but it would take too
long to quote them.
 God wills us to be
saved; but for our greater good,
He wills us to be saved
as conquerors. While, therefore, we remain here, we have to live in a
continual
warfare; and if we should be saved, we have to
fight and conquer. "No one can be
crowned without victory", says Saint Chrysostom. We are very
feeble, and our enemies are
many and mighty; how shall we be able to stand against
them, or to
defeat them? Let us take courage, and say with the Apostle,
"I can do all these things
in Him Who strengtheneth me" - Philipians 4:13. By
prayer we can do all things; for by
this means God will give us that strength which we want. Theodoret says, that
prayer is omnipotent;
it is but one, yet
it can do all things: "Though prayer is
one, it can do all things". And Saint Bonaventure asserts that by
prayer we obtain
every good, and escape
every evil: "By it is obtained the gain of every good,
and liberation from every evil". Saint Laurence Justinian says, that by means of
prayer we build for ourselves a strong tower, where we shall be secure from all
the snares and assaults of our
enemies: "By the exercise of prayer, man is able
to erect a citadel for himself". "The powers of
Hell are mighty", says Saint
Bernard; "but prayer is stronger than all the devils".
Yes; for by prayer the
soul obtains God's help, which is
stronger than any
created power. Thus David
encouraged himself in his alarms: "Praising I will call upon the Lord, and I
shall be saved from my enemies" - Psalm 17:4. For, as Saint Chrysostom says,
"Prayer
is a strong weapon, a defense, a port, and a treasure".
It is a weapon
sufficient to overcome every assault of the
Devil; it is a
defense to preserve
us in every danger;
it is a port where we may be
safe in every
tempest; and it
is at the same time a treasure which provides us with every
good.
Power of Prayer against Temptation
God knows the great
good which it does us to be obliged to pray, and
therefore permits us (as we have already shown in the previous chapter) to be
assaulted by our enemies, in order that we may ask
Him for the help which
He
offers and promises to us. But as He is pleased when we run to
Him in our
dangers, so is He
displeased when He sees us
neglectful of prayer.
"As the
king", says Saint Bonaventure, "would think it faithlessness if an officer, when
his post was attacked, not to ask him for reinforcements, he would be reputed a
traitor if he did not request help from the king"; so
God thinks Himself
betrayed by the man who, when he finds himself
surrounded by
temptations, does
not run to Him for
assistance. For
He desires to help us; and only waits to be
asked, and then gives abundant succor. This is strikingly shown by Isaiah, when,
on God's part, he told king Ahaz to ask some sign to assure himself of
God's
readiness to help him: "Ask thee a sign of the Lord thy God"
- Isaiah 7:11. The
faithless king answered: "I will not ask, and
I will not tempt the Lord"; for he
trusted in his own power to overcome his enemies without
God's aid. And for this
the Prophet reproved him: "Hear, therefore, O house of David; is it a small thing
for you to be grievous to men, that you are grievous to my God also"? because
that man is grievous and
offensive to God who will not ask him for the
graces
which He offers.
"Come to Me, all you that labor and are burdened, and I will refresh you"
- Matthew
11:28. My poor children, says Our Savior, though you find yourselves
assailed by enemies, and
oppressed with the weight of your
sins, do not
lose
heart but have recourse to Me in
prayer, and I will give you strength to resist,
and I will give you a
remedy for all your disasters. In another place
He says,
by the mouth of Isaiah, "Come and accuse Me, says the Lord; if your sins be as
scarlet, they shall be made white as snow" - Isaiah 1:18. O men, come to
Me; though
your consciences are
horribly defiled, yet come;
I even give you leave to
reproach Me (so to speak), if after you have had recourse to
Me, I do not give
you grace to become
white as snow.
What is prayer? It is, as
Saint Chrysostom says, "the anchor of those tossed on
the sea, the treasure of the poor, the cure of diseases, the safeguard of
health". It is a secure anchor for him who is in
peril of shipwreck;
it is a
treasury of immense wealth for him who is
poor; it is a most
efficacious
medicine for him who is sick; and
it is a certain preservative for him who would
keep himself well. What does prayer effect? Let us hear
Saint Laurence Justinian:
"It pleases God, it gets what it asks, it overcomes enemies, it changes men".
It
appeases the wrath of
God, Who pardons all who
pray with humility.
It obtains
every grace that is asked for; it vanquishes all the strength of the
tempter,
and it changes men from
blind into seeing, from
weak into strong, from
sinners
into saints. Let him who wants
light ask it of
God, and it
shall be given. As
soon as I had recourse to God, says Solomon,
He granted me wisdom:
"I called upon God,
and the Spirit of Wisdom came to me" - Wisdom 7:7. Let him who wants
fortitude ask
it of God, and
it shall be given. As soon as I opened my mouth to
pray, says
David, I received help from
God: "I opened my
mouth, and panted: because I longed for Thy commandments" - Psalm
118:131. And how in the world did the martyrs obtain
strength to resist
tyrants, except by prayer, which gave
them force to overcome
dangers and death?
"He who uses this great weapon", says Saint Chrysostom,
"knows not death,
leaves the earth, enters heaven, lives with God". He
falls not into
sin; he
loses affection for the earth; he makes his abode in heaven; and begins, even in
this life, to enjoy the
conversation of God. How then can you disquiet such a
man by saying: "How do you know that you are written in the book of life"? How
do you know whether God will give you
efficacious grace and the
gift of
perseverance? "Be nothing solicitous", says
Saint Paul; "but in every thing, by prayer and
supplication, with thanksgiving, let your petitions be made known to God" - Philippians 4:6.
What is the use, says the Apostle, of agitating yourselves with these
miseries
and fears? Drive from you all these
cares, which are of no use but to lessen
your confidence, and to make you more tepid and
slothful in walking along the
way of salvation. Pray and seek always, and make your
prayers sound in God's
ears, and thank Him for having promised to give you the
gifts which you desire
whenever you ask for them, namely
efficacious grace, perseverance,
salvation,
and everything that you desire. The Lord has given us
our post in the battle
against powerful foes; but
He is faithful in
His promises, and will never allow
us to be assaulted more
violently than we can resist: "God
is faithful, Who will not suffer you to be tempted above that which thou are
able" - 1Corinthians 10:13. He
is faithful, since
He instantly
succors the man who invokes
Him. The learned
Cardinal Gotti writes that God has bound
Himself not only to give us
grace
precisely balancing the temptation that
assails us, but that
He is obliged, when
we are tempted, and have recourse to
Him, to afford us, by means of that
grace
which is kept ready for and offered to all, sufficient strength for us actually
to resist the temptation. "God
is bound, when we are tempted, and fly to our
protection, to give us by the grace prepared and offered to all such strength as
will not only put us in the way of being able to resist, but will also make us
resist; 'for we can do all things in Him Who strengthens us' by His grace, if we
humbly ask for it". We can do all things with
God's help, which is granted to
everyone who humbly seeks it; so that we have
no excuse when we allow ourselves
to be overcome by a temptation. We are
conquered solely by our
own fault,
because we would not pray. By
prayer all the snares and
power of the devil are
easily overcome. "By prayer all hurtful things are chased away", says
Saint
Augustine.
God Is always Ready to Hear Us
Saint Bernardine of Sienna says that prayer is a
faithful ambassador,
well-known to the King of Heaven, and having access to
His private chamber, and
able by his importunity to induce the merciful heart of the King to grant every
aid to us His
wretched creatures,
groaning in the midst of our
conflicts and
miseries in this valley of tears.
"Prayer is a most faithful messenger, known to
the King, who is used to enter His chamber, and by his importunity to influence
the merciful mind of the King, and to obtain us assistance in our toils".
Isaiah
also assures us that as soon as the Lord hears our
prayers, He is moved with
compassion towards us; and does not leave us to
cry long to Him, but
instantly
replies, and grants us what we ask: "Weeping, thou shall not weep;
He will surely
have pity upon thee; at the voice of your cry as soon as He shall hear, He will
answer you" - Isaiah 30:19. In another place
He complains of us by the mouth of
Jeremiah: "Am I become a wilderness to Israel, or a lateward springing land? Why
then have My people said, we are revolted, and will come to Thee no more"!
- Jeremiah
2:31. Why do you say that you will no more have recourse to
Me? Has My mercy
become to you a barren land, which can yield you no
fruits of grace? or a cold
soil, which yields its fruit too late So has our loving Lord assured us that
He never neglects to hear us, and to hear us
instantly when we pray; and so does
He reproach those who
neglect to pray through distrust of being heard.
If God were to allow us to present our petitions to
Him once a month, even
this would be a great favor. The kings of the earth give audiences a
few times
in the year, but God gives a
continual audience. Saint Chrysostom writes that
God
is always waiting to hear our prayers, and that a case
never occurred when He
neglected to hear a petition offered to Him properly:
"God is always prepared
for the voice of His servants, nor did He ever, when called upon as He ought to
be, neglect to hear". And in another place he says that when we
pray to God,
before we have finished recounting to Him our supplications,
He has already
heard us: "It is always obtained, even while we are yet praying". We even have
the promise of God to do this: "As they are yet speaking, I will hear"
- Isaiah 65:24.
The Lord, says David, stands near to everyone who
prays, to console, to
hear,
and to save him: "The Lord is nigh to all them that call upon
Him; to all that
call upon Him in truth ( that is, as they ought to call). He will do the will of
them that fear Him; and He will hear their prayer and will save them"
- Psalm
144:18,19. This it was in which Moses gloried, when he said:
"Neither is there
any other nation so great, that has gods so nigh them, as our God is present to
all our petitions" - Deuteronomy 4:7. The gods of the Gentiles were
deaf to those who
invoked them, for they were wretched fabrications, which could do nothing. But
our God, Who is
Almighty, is not
deaf to our prayers,
but always stands near the
man who prays, ready to grant him all the
graces which he asks: "In what day soever I shall call upon
Thee, behold I shall know that Thou are my God" - Psalm
55:10. Lord, says the Psalmist, hereby do I know that you, my
God, are all
goodness and mercy, in that, whenever I have recourse to
You, You
instantly help
me.
We Should Not Limit Ourselves to Asking for Little Things
To pray is better than to meditate
We are so poor that we have nothing; but if we
pray we are no longer
poor. If
we are poor, God is
rich; and God, as the
Apostle says, is all liberality to him
that calls for His aid: "Rich
unto all that call upon Him" - Romans 10:12. Since,
therefore (as Saint Augustine exhorts us), we have to do with a
Lord of infinite
power and infinite riches, let us not go to
Him for little and valueless things,
but let us ask some great thing of Him:
"You seek from the Almighty -- seek
something great". If a man went to a king to ask some trumpery coin, like a
farthing, I think, that man would but insult his king. On the other hand, we
honor God, we honor
His mercy, and His liberality, when, though we see how
miserable we are, and how unworthy of any
kindness, we yet ask for great
graces,
trusting in the goodness of God, and in
His faithfulness to
His promises of
granting to the man who prays whatever
grace he asks: "Ask
whatever you will,
and it shall be done unto you" - John 15:7. Saint Mary Magdalene of Pazzi said,
"That
God feels Himself so honored and is so delighted when we ask for His grace, that
He is, in a certain sense, grateful to us; because when we do this we seem to
open to Him a way to do us a kindness, and to satisfy His nature, which is to do
good to all". And let us be sure that, when we seek
God's grace, He always gives
us more than we ask: "If any of you want wisdom, let him ask of God,
Who giveth to
all abundantly, and upbraideth not" - James 1:5. Thus speaks
Saint James, to show us
that God is not like men,
parsimonious of his goods; men, though rich and
liberal, when they give alms, are always somewhat close-handed, and generally
give less than is asked of them, because their wealth, however great it be, is
always finite; so that the more they give the less they have. But
God, when He
is asked, gives His good things 'abundantly', that is, with a generous hand,
always giving more than is asked, because His wealth is
infinite, and the more
He gives the more He has to give:
"For Thou, O Lord, are sweet and mild; and plenteous in
mercy to all that call upon Thee" - Psalm 85:5. You, O my
God, said
David, are but too liberal and
kind to him that invokes
You; the mercies which
You pour upon him are superabundant, above all he asks.
On this point, then, we have to fix all our attention, namely, to
pray with
confidence, feeling sure that by prayer all the
treasures of heaven are thrown
open to us. "Let us attend to this", says Saint Chrysostom,
"and we shall open
heaven to ourselves". Prayer is a
treasure; he who prays most, receives most.
Saint
Bonaventure says that every time a man has recourse to
God by fervent prayer, he
gains good things that are of more value than the whole world:
"Any day a man
gains more by devout prayer than the whole world is worth". Some
devout souls
spend a great deal of time in reading and in
meditating, but pay but little
attention to prayer. There is no doubt that
spiritual reading, and
meditation on
the eternal truths, are very useful things; 'but', says
Saint Augustine, "it is of
much more use to pray". By reading and meditating we learn our
duty; but by
prayer we obtain the
grace to do it. "It is better to pray than to read: by
reading we know what we ought to do; by prayer we receive what we ask". What is
the use of knowing our duty, and then not doing it, but to make us more
guilty
in God's sight? Read and meditate as we like, we shall never satisfy our
obligations, unless we ask of
God the grace to fulfill
them.
And, therefore, as Saint Isidore observes, the
Devil is never more busy to
distract us with the
thoughts of worldly cares than when he perceives us
praying
and asking God for grace:
"Then mostly does the Devil insinuate thoughts, when
he sees a man praying". And why? Because the
enemy sees that at no other time do
we gain so many treasures of heavenly goods as when we
pray. This is the chief
fruit of mental prayer, to ask God for the
graces which we need for
perseverance
and for eternal salvation; and chiefly for this reason it is that
mental prayer
is morally necessary for the soul, to enable
it to preserve itself in the
grace
of God. For if a person does not remember in the
time of meditation to ask for
the help necessary for
perseverance, he will not do so at any other time; for
without meditation he will not think of asking for
it, and will not even think of
the necessity for asking it. On the other hand, he who makes his
meditation every day will easily see the needs of his
soul, its
dangers, and the necessity
of his prayer; and so he will
pray, and will obtain the
graces which will
enable him to persevere and
save his soul.
Father Segneri said of himself, that
when he began to meditate, he aimed rather at
exciting affections than at making
prayers. But when he came to know the necessity and the immense utility of
prayer, he more and more applied himself, in his long
mental prayer, to making
petitions.
"I will cry like a young swallow", said the devout king
Hezekiah - Isaiah 38:14.
The young of the swallow does nothing but cry to its mother for help and for
food; so should we all do, if we would preserve our life of
grace. We should be
always crying to God for
aid to avoid the death of sin, and to advance in
His
holy love. Father Rodriguez relates that the ancient Fathers, who were our first
instructors in the spiritual life, held a conference to determine which was the
exercise most useful and most necessary for
eternal salvation; and that they
determined it was to repeat over and over again the short
prayer of David,
"O God, come to my assistance; O Lord, make haste to
help me"! - Psalm 69:2. "This", says
Cassian "is what
everyone ought to do who wishes to be saved; he ought to be always saying, My
God, help me! my God, help me"! We ought to do this the
first thing when we
awake in the morning; and then to continue doing it in all our needs, and when
attending to our business, whether spiritual or
temporal; and most especially
when we find ourselves troubled by any
temptation or passion.
Saint Bonaventure
says that at times we obtain a grace by a short
prayer sooner than by many other
good works: "Sometimes a man can sooner obtain by a short prayer what he would
be a long time obtaining by pious works". Saint Ambrose says that he who
prays,
while he is praying obtains what he asks, because the very
act of prayer is the
same as receiving : "He who asks of God, while he asks receives; for to ask is
to receive". Hence Saint Chrysostom wrote that "there is nothing more powerful
than a man who prays", because such a one is made partaker of the
power of God.
To arrive at perfection, says Saint Bernard, we must
meditate and pray; by
meditation we see what we want; by
prayer we receive what we want. "Let us mount
by meditation and prayer: the one teaches what is deficient, the other obtains
that there should be nothing deficient".
Conclusion - Chapter 2
In conclusion, to save one's soul without
prayer is most difficult, and even
(as we have seen) impossible, according to the ordinary course of
God's
providence. But by praying, our
salvation is made secure, and very easy. It is
not necessary in order to save our
souls to go among the heathen, and give up
our life. It is not necessary to retire into the desert, and eat nothing but
herbs. What does it cost us to say, My God, help me!
Lord, assist me! have mercy
on me! Is there anything more easy than this? and this little will suffice to
save us, if we will be diligent in doing it.
Saint Laurence Justinian specially
exhorts us to oblige ourselves to say a prayer at least when we begin any
action: "We must endeavor to offer a prayer at least in the beginning of every
work". Cassian attests that the principal advice of the
ancient Fathers was to
have recourse to God with short, but frequent
prayers. Let no one, says Saint
Bernard, think lightly of prayer, because
God values it, and then gives us
either what we ask, or what is still more useful to us: "Let no one undervalue
his prayer, for God does not undervalue it . . . He will give either what we
ask, or what He knows to be better". And let us understand, that if we do not
pray, we have no excuse, because the
grace of prayer is given to everyone. It is
in our power to pray whenever we will, as David says of himself:
"With me is
prayer to the God of my life; I will say to God, Thou art my support"
- Psalm 41:9-10.
God gives to all the
grace of prayer, in order that thereby they may obtain
every help, and even more than they need, for keeping the
divine law, and for
persevering till death. If we are not
saved, the whole fault will be
ours; and
we shall have our own failure to answer for, because we did
not pray.
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