When Mrs. Dyke called a few evenings later, after a similar interview to the one with Grace, she left the battlefield a wiser soldier than when she entered it, for Kate had so beautifully proven her religious earnestness, and more than all had shown such a Christ-like spirit, that the "sword was beaten into a plowshare and the spear into a pruning hook."
CHAPTER XXIII.
"More things are wrought by prayer
Than this world dreams of. Wherefore let thy voice
Rise like a fountain for me night and day,
For what are men better than sheep or goats
That nourish a blind life within the brain,
If, knowing God, they lift not hands of prayer
Both for themselves and those who call them friend?
For so the whole round world is every way
Bound by gold chains about the feet of God."
—Tennyson.
"Marlow, September, ——.
"Dear Husband:
"Your letter was so full of interest. How glad, oh how rejoiced I am that we are privileged to know this beautiful truth. Don't you ever feel like stopping in the midst of your work and giving thanks that you were born in this age? As my eyes open more and more to God's goodness and love and power, I am so full of thanks, there is no room for petitions; indeed, I should feel as though I were begging, to ask God for what He has already given me, and of course He gives every child alike, being 'no respecter of persons.' Just think of it: 'Eye hath not seen nor ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man, to conceive the things which God hath prepared for them that love Him.' Negative thought, carnal mind can not know these things, but as we are cleansed and purified, the new baptism 'creates in us a new heart,' the loving child's heart turned to its father, and love shall teach us more and more to read the signs of love.
"Oh, divine mystery of childhood, of parenthood, that brings us into closer and sweeter knowledge of our Father whose love is infinite. Out of the deep silence around us, filled as it is with the all-abiding presence of God, may we ask for a manifestation of whatever gift we choose to have. These thoughts filled my mind as I went to class this afternoon, and what was my surprise and pleasure to find the lesson to be on the subject of prayer.
"There is no theme or word so constantly in the mind and on the lips of the Christ follower as prayer. The oft-repeated injunction of Jesus was, 'watch and pray lest ye enter into temptation.' 'Pray without ceasing.' As we study more closely into the life of the Master, we find him on all occasions communing with the Father in prayer. Thus we find that this is the most sacred and necessary of all branches of our daily work.
"Prayer is the natural turning of the better self to God, in the attitude of thankfulness, praise, supplication or voiceless desire. 'It must be the spontaneous and almost irrepressible outpouring of the thoughts and feelings of the soul into the listening ear of a present God,' said an earnest thinker.