WE are told in the Bible that the "effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much." Experience, observation, and reading seem to teach that, until very recently, only in exceptional cases has prayer availed at all. Reason tells us that one of two things must be true, either all true prayer will be answered, or none; for the power that hears and answers is not spasmodic and partial, but constant and eternal. The Christian Scientist knows that all real prayer is answered, not in some dim and far-off and non-understandable way, but directly and immediately and comprehensibly. It becomes, then, of the utmost importance to inquire into the nature of real prayer.
In the physical realm all things are recognized as subject to the same so-called material laws. A rope or plank or raft that will support one object will support any other of equal weight. As materialists, we accept these things without questioning or stopping to ask that an exception be made in any given case. We never think of denying the universality and continuity of these accepted material laws, or of trying to institute a new order of things. When we come to the plane of Spirit, however, everything is thought to be different. Whether any one ever did really believe so may be doubted, but the world has acted in the past as though it believed that beyond the purely material there is no law. Here all has been mystery and caprice, — one person's prayer heard, another's ignored, without explanation and without appeal; hence the blind, unreasoning prayers to an unknown God, with scarce a hope of answer.
Why is this so? Not for want of wisdom in the usual sense; some of the wisest men in the world have prayed long and fervently, unheard and unheeded so far as results go to show. What, then, is the prayer which will bear fruit? In view of the answer Christian Science makes to this question, it is surprising that there is so much misunderstanding among the people who oppose its teachings. One would think, from the criticism he hears, that Christian Scientists were trying to set the world topsy-turvy by thinking that things are as they are not, and by mere thinking, whereas absolute, uncompromising faith in unchangeable law is the key-note of the teachings of Christ Jesus and of Christian Science. Christ Jesus tells us why prayers are not answered; viz., because we ask amiss, and Mrs. Eddy tells us over and over and over again that it is because we are not good enough, and faithful enough, and loving enough, and wise enough in the true wisdom.
