PRAYERS I DON'T LIKE

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Nov 11, 1875

PRAYERS I DON'T LIKE.

[Republished in the REVIEW by request.]

I do not like to hear him pray Who loans at twenty-five per cent., For then I think the borrower may Be pressed to pay for food and rent. And in that Book we all should heed Which says the lender shall be blest, As sure as I have eyes to read, It does not say, “Take interest!”

I do not like to hear him pray, On bended knees about an hour, For grace to spend aright the day, Who knows his neighbor has no flour. I'd rather see him go to mill And buy the luckless brother bread, And see his children eat their fill, And laugh beneath their humble shed.

I do not like to hear him pray, “Let blessings on the widow be,” Who never seeks her home to say, “If want o’ertakes you, come to me.” I hate the prayer, so long and loud, That's offered for the orphan's weal, By him who sees him crushed by wrong, And only with his lips doth feel.

I do not like to hear her pray, With jeweled ears and silken dress, Whose washerwoman toils all day, And then is asked to “work for less.” Such pious shavers I despise! With folded arms and face demure, They lift to Heaven their “angel” eyes, Then steal the earnings of the poor.

I do not like such soulless prayers— If wrong, I hope to be forgiven; No angel's wing them upward bears, They're lost a million miles from Heaven!