Considering the relation in which we stand to God as His creatures and subjects, it is natural, fit, and proper that _we_ should make known our requests to Him, and supplicate the aids both of His providence and grace; and if it be _our duty_ to pray, it is reasonable to believe that God will have some respect to our prayers in His methods of dealing with us; in other words, that, as a righteous moral governor, he will make a difference between the godly and the ungodly, the men who do, and the men who do not, pray.
In this position it is assumed that there are certain relations, natural or revealed, subsisting betwixt us and God, in virtue of which it is our duty to acknowledge His dominion and our dependence, by supplicating the aids of His providence and grace.

That such relations do subsist between God and man, is evinced alike by the light of Nature and of Revelation; and they cannot be discerned or realized without immediately suggesting the idea of certain corresponding obligations and duties.

Every one whose conscience has not been utterly seared must instinctively feel the force of that appeal, "If I be a Father, where is mine honor?
and if I be a Master, where is my fear ?" For, considering God in the very simplest aspect of His character as the Creator and Governor of the world, He stands related to us as the Author and Preserver of our being, as our rightful Proprietor and constant Benefactor, as our supreme Lawgiver, Governor, and Judge; and these _natural relations_, apart altogether from the _supernatural_ which are revealed in Scripture, are sufficient to lay a solid groundwork for "the duty of prayer" in the case of every intelligent being who is capable of knowing God, and acknowledging his dependence on the Divine will.

In such a case, prayer is felt to be a natural, fit, and becoming expression of what is known to be true, and what _ought_, as a matter of duty, to be practically avowed.

Now, this is the grand design of prayer; and in its real design, when that is rightly apprehended, it finds its noblest vindication.