This is a fragment from a long poem
that I love very much, written by Christopher
Smart in the lunatic asylum, about 1755.
He says, "For the air is purified by prayer,
which is made aloud and with all our might.
For a loud prayer is good for weak lungs
and for a vitiated throat.
For sound is propagated in the spirit and in all directions.
For the voice of a figure is complete in all its parts.
For a man speaks himself from the crown of his head
to the soul of his feet.
For a lion roars himself complete from head to tail.
For all these things are seen in the spirit, which
makes the beauty of prayer, for all whispers and unmusical
sounds in general are of the adversary.
For I will hiss, saith the Lord, is God's denunciation of death.
For applause or the clapping of the hands
is the natural action of a man on the descent
of the glory of God.
For Earth, which is an intelligence,
hath a voice and a propensity to speak in all her parts.
For echo is the soul of the voice,
exerting itself in hollow places.
For echo is greatest in churches, and where
she can assist in prayer.
For a good voice hath its own echo with it,
and it is attainable by much supplication.
For the voice is from the body and from the spirit,
and it is a body and it is a spirit."