But prayers offered in time of trouble, though they be, or if they be, the earliest, are not the only prayers that are offered by early man. Man's wishes are not, and never were, limited: escape from calamity is not, and never has been, the only thing for which man is capable of wishing. It certainly is not the only thing for which he has been capable of praying. Even early man wishes for material blessings: the kindly fruits of the earth and his daily food are things for which he not only works but also prays. The negro on the Gold Coast prays for his daily rice and yams, the Zulu for cattle and for corn, the Samoan for abundant food, the Finno-Ugrian for rain to make his crops grow; the Peruvian prayed for health and prosperity. And when man has attained his wish, when his prayers have been granted, he does not always forget to render thanks to the god who listened to his prayer. 'Thank you, gods'; says the Basuto, 'give us bread to-morrow also.'
Whether the prayer be for food, or for deliverance from calamity, the natural tendency is for gratitude and thanks to follow, when the prayer has been fulfilled; and the mental attitude, or mood of feeling, is then no longer one of hope or fear, but of thankfulness and praise. It is in its essence, potentially and, to varying degrees, actually, the mood of veneration and adoration.
'My lips shall praise thee,
So will I bless thee while I live:
I will lift up my hands in thy name,
And my mouth shall praise thee with joyful lips.'
From the prayers that are offered in early, if not primitive, religions we may draw with safety some conclusions as to the idea, which the worshippers had before their minds, of the being to whom they believed they had access in prayer. He was a being accessible in prayer; and he had it in his power, and, if properly approached, in his will, to deliver the community from material and external evils. The spirit in which he was to be properly approached was one of confession and repentance of offences committed against him: the calamities which fell upon the community were conceived to have fallen justly. He was not conceived to be offended without a cause. Doubtless the causes of offence, like the punishments with which they were visited, were external and visible, in the sense that they could be discovered and made plain to all who were concerned to recognise them. The offences were actions which not only provoked the wrath of the god, but were condemned by the community. They included offences which were purely formal and external; and, in the case of some peoples, the number of such offences probably increased rather than diminished as time went on. The Surpu tablets of the cuneiform inscriptions, which are directed towards the removal of the mamit, the ban or taboo, consequent upon such offences, are an example of this. Adultery, murder and theft are included amongst the offences, but the tablets include hundreds of other offences, which are purely ceremonial, and which probably took a long time to reach the luxuriant growth they have attained in the tablets. For ceremonial offences a ceremonial purification was felt to suffice. But there were others which, as the Babylonian Penitential Psalms testify, were felt to go deeper and to be sins, personal sins of the worshipper against his God. The penitent exclaims:
'Lord, my sins are many, great are my misdeeds.'
The spirit, in which he approaches his God, is expressed in the words:
'I thy servant, full of sighs, call upon thee.
Like the doves do I moan, I am o'ercome with sighing,
With lamentation and groaning my spirit is downcast.'
His prayer is that his trespasses may be forgiven:
'Rend my sins, like a garment!
My God, my sins are unto seven times seven.
Forgive my iniquities.'
And his hope is in God: