The Collected Works of Theodore Parker/Volume 02/Theodore Parker's Prayers/Prayer 35
XXXV.
JULY 11, 1858.
O thou Infinite Spirit, who dwellest in houses made with hands, and everywhere not less hast thy dwelling-place, we flee unto thee to remember before thee the joys we delight in, the duties thou givest us to do, and the sorrows we needs must bear, and in the light of thy countenance we would be strengthened for every duty, and filled with gratitude for every joy thou givest. As thou feedest the ground with sunlight from on high, and waterest it, when it asketh not, from thy sacramental cup, out of the heavens, so we know that thou wilt feed and water us with thy bounty, and needest not that we should ask thee; but in our darkness we turn unto thee for light, and in our weakness, from thine infinitude we would fill our little urns with strength, and make ourselves beautiful in thy sight.
O thou who art our Father and our Mother, we thank thee for the loving-kindness and the tender mercy which are over all thy works. We bless thee for the harvests of bread which are growing out of the ground under the incessant heat of summer, and we thank thee for the exceeding beauty wherewith thou givest thy benediction on the daily bread not less of cattle than of men. We thank thee for the transient flowers which line the way-side, and clothe the hedges and adorn the fields with heavenly magnificence, and we thank thee for all that perennial beauty which thou enthronest in the stars on high. We bless thee for the moon's romantic story, every night told to us, and the glorious loveliness of day which the sun pours out from the golden urn of thy magnificence. We bless thee that thou hast lined the borders of the sea with green and purple beauty, and scarfed the mountains with savage loveliness, and with the morning's and the evening's two- fold ring of beauty thou marriest for ever the day and night, revealing in this material magnificence tokens and signs of thine own loving-kindness, which passeth knowledge, and the sovereign beauty of thy spirit, which steals into our souls.
Father, we thank thee that, creating this world so great and adorning it so fair, thou hast yet made our spirit vaster than the bounds of time and space, and givest us power to adorn it with magnificence that shames the green and purple lining of the sea, and to put the stars of heaven out of sight with its sweet glory and the bravery of its spiritual loveliness. We thank thee for the great nature thou hast given us; we bless thee for its power of ceaseless progress, of continually growing greater and nobler, and fairer decked with beauty springing from the innermost of our soul. We thank thee for every triumph which mankind has won, for all the great truths which have come sounding musical from past times, for all the noble men whom in distant days thou raisedst up out of humanity, to tell us of our power, and in their lives to reveal to us so much of thyself.
We thank thee for men and women in our own time not less gifted, nor less faithful, who also speak as thou inspirest them, telling words of truth and of justice and of love, and by street- side, and in lane, and house, and everywhere, pursuing the calm and beautiful gospel of their lives, wherein they publish humanity to all mankind.
We thank thee for all that has come to us from past times and our own day. We bless thee for the special gifts thou givest to us in our several families and homes and hearts. We thank thee for the new-born life we rejoice in, and for other lives that are spared, long familiar to our eyes and our heart.
We bless thee for the various seasons of life, thanking thee for the little bud of infancy, and for the great handsome flower of manly and womanly life, fragrant with hope, and prophetic in its beauty. And not less do we thank thee for the ripened fruit of humanity; yea, we bless thee for venerable age, crowned with silver, and rich with the recollections and the beatitudes of many deeds well done. We thank thee for all the joy thou givest in this manifold human life to child and parent, to lover and beloved, to husband and wife, kinsfolk and relative and friend, and the gladsome benediction which thus thou settest on thy children's head. Yea, we thank thee that when our mortal spring has bloomed out, when our earthly summer is ended and vanished, and the ripened fruit falls from our human tree, the seed thereof thou takest to thyself to be with thee for ever and for ever. Yea, we thank thee for that transcendent world where thou takest to thyself the souls of all thy children, having no son of perdition, and blessing all with thine infinite fatherly and motherly love.
Remembering all these things, we pray thee that we may live great and glorious lives, full of the strength of humanity, and enriched with benedictions from thyself. May we use our bodies wisely, counting them but as the earthen vessels to hold the spiritual treasure thou givest us. In the innermost of our soul may we dwell familiar with thee, knowing all of thine infinite perfections, and so loving thee that our love shall cast out every fear, and we shall keep the law thou writest on this world of matter, and with thy still small voice proclaimest within the innermost of our soul. Day by day may we grow to higher and higher heights, and as new-born blessings drop into our arms, as old familiar lives are spared to us, may we grow nobler and brighter by the blessings thou givest, till within us all shall be blameless, and outward everything shall be beautiful, and we shall pass from the glory of a good beginning to the greater glory of a triumphant end. So may thy kingdom come, and thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.