d
when the soul cannot tell its thoughts.

Yet we all know, unless our thoughts and feelings are very shallow and
trivial, that even the wonderful faculty of language is inadequate to
express all that the soul can experience. No true orator ever finds
sentences majestic enough to interpret the sentiments that burn in his
soul. Deep, pure love is never able to put into words its most sacred
feelings and emotions. It is only the commonplace of the inner life
that can be uttered in even the finest language. There is always more
that lies back, unexpressed, than is spoken in any words.

It is specially true of prayer that we cannot utter its deepest
feelings and holiest desires. We have comfort, however, in the
assurance that God can hear thoughts. He knows what we want to say and
cannot express. Your dearest friend may stand close to you when your
mind is full of thoughts, but unless you speak or give some sign, he
cannot know one of your thoughts. He may lay his ear close to your
heart, and he will hear its throbbings; but he cannot hear your
feelings, your desires. Yet God knows all that goes on in your soul.
Every thought that flies through your brain is heard in heaven.

"O Lord, thou hast searched me, and known me.
Thou knowest my downsitting and mine uprising,
Thou understandest my thought afar off.
Thou searchest out my path and my lying down,
And art acquainted with all my ways.
For there is not a word in my tongue,
But, lo, O Lord, thou knowest it altogether."

We need not trouble ourselves, therefore, if we cannot get our wishes
into words when we pray, for God hears wishes, heart-longings, soul
hungerings and thirstings. The things we cannot say in speech of the
lips, we may ask God to take from our heart's speech. There is not the
feeblest, faintest glimmer of a desire rising on the far-away horizon
of our being, but God sees it. There is not a heart-hunger, not a wish
to be holier and better, not an aspiration to be more Christ-like, not
a craving to live for God and be a blessing to others, not the faintest
desire to be rid of sin's power, but God knows of it. St. Paul has a
wonderful word on this subject: God, he says, "is able to do exceeding
abundantly above all that we ask or think." When our heart is stirred
to its depths, what large, great things can we ask in words? Then, how
much can we put into thoughts of prayer, into longings, desires,
aspirations, beyond the po