1. His prayer you see is this, “God be merciful to me a sinner.”
His gestures in his prayer were in general three.
1. He “stood afar off.”
2. He “would not lift up so much as his eyes to heaven.”
3. He “smote upon his breast,” with his fist, saying, “God be merciful to me a sinner.”
To begin first with his prayer. In this prayer we have two things to consider of.
1. His confession: I am a sinner.
2. His imploring of help against this malady: “God be merciful to me a sinner.”
In his confession divers things are to be taken notice of. As—
1. The fairness and simplicity of his confession; “A sinner:” I am a sinner; “God be merciful to me a sinner.” This indeed he was, and this indeed he confesses; and this, I say, he doth of godly simplicity. For a man to confess himself a sinner, it is to speak all against himself that can be spoken. And man, as degenerate, is too much an hypocrite, and too much a self-flatterer, thus to confess against himself, unless made simple and honest through the power of conviction upon his heart. And it is worth your noting, that he doth not say he was, or had been, but that at that time his state was such, to wit, a sinner. “God be merciful to me a sinner,” or who am, and now stand before thee a sinner, in my sins.