Private prayer is like straw scattered here and there: If you set it on fire it makes a lot of little flames. But gather these straws into a bundle and light them, and you get a mighty fire, rising like a column into the sky; public prayer is like that.
Interpretation
Public prayer has greater power than individual prayer, just as bundled straw creates a larger fire.
This quote signifies the importance and strength of communal prayer over solitary practices. Just as individual straws provide little warmth or light when scattered alone, private prayers can seem weak. However, when gathered together in a collective effort, they can create a powerful force, symbolized by the mighty fire, representing the amplified energy and intent generated through public prayer and unity.
In practice
During a church service when encouraging the congregation to pray together.
We put pride into everything like salt. We like to see that our good works are known. If our virtues are seen, we are pleased; if our faults are perceived, we are sad. I remark that in a great many people; if one says anything to them, it disturbs them, it annoys them. The saints were not like that - they were vexed if their virtues were known, and pleased that their imperfections should be seen.
Oh, how I like those little mortifications that are seen by nobody, such as rising a quarter of an hour sooner, rising for a little while in the night to pray!
My land is bare of chattering folk; / the clouds are low along the ridges, / and sweet's the air with curly smoke / from all my burning bridges.
My sin, oh, the bliss of this glorious thought! _x000D_ My sin, not in part but the whole, _x000D_ Is nailed to the cross, and I bear it no more, _x000D_ Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, O my soul!
And as to the faculties of the mind, setting aside the arts grounded upon words, and especially that skill of proceeding upon generall, and infallible rules, called Science; which very few have, and but in few things; as being not a native faculty, born within us; nor attained, (as Prudence,) while we look after somewhat else.
God has put within our lives meanings and possibilities that quite outrun the limits of mortality.
A man who has not passed through the inferno of his passions has never overcome them. As far as we can discern, the sole purpose of human existence is to kindle a light in the darkness of mere being. Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves.
Every one must act according to the dictates of his own reason, and mine tells me that civil powers alone have been given to the President of the United States, and no authority to direct the religious exercises of his constituents.
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