prayer

And good prayer is that which produces in the soul a clear thought of God.

Let prayers before food be made worthy of God's gifts, both those He gives now and those He has stored up for the future.

On the whole, I do not think that words suffice for comfort, but I hold that there is need of prayer for the present circumstances.

It seems to me, not that they supposed the divine could not hear those who speak softly, but that they wished the prayers to be just—such as one would not be ashamed to make with many witnesses.

After Barlaam had gone out, Josaphat gave himself to prayer and to the warmest tears, and said:

who prays with such eagerness and entreats God should not advance daily in the good and fly above all the snares of the enemy.

And for this reason the Fathers define prayer as the union of man with God, and they call it the work of angels and the prelude of the joy to come.

Why, that would seem, in truth, more like some sort of curse than a prayer!

For tell me, in Heaven’s name, do you not think that the gods sometimes grant in part, but in part refuse, what we ask of them in our private and public prayers, and gratify some people, but not others?

You see, then, how unsafe it is for you to approach the god with your prayers, for it may chance that when he hears your irreverent speech he will reject your sacrifice altogether, and you may perhaps be accorded some other bad thing as well.

If the spirit is guilty before itself of a blushing conscience, how will it dare to conduct prayer to the altar, at whose blushing the holy minister himself too is suffused?