All Four Kinds, or One at a Time?

Of these four kinds, it is true that occasions sometimes arise for richer and fuller prayers. For we know that the most fervent and ardent prayers often come from the kind called supplication, which springs from sorrow for sin; from the kind called prayer, which flows from confidence in what we have offered and in the keeping of our vows with a pure conscience; from intercession, which comes from fervent love; and from thanksgiving, which is born of thinking on God’s blessings and his greatness and goodness. So it is clear that all these kinds of prayer we have spoken of are found to be useful and necessary for everyone, so that in one and the same person his changing feelings will give voice to pure and fervent petitions, now of supplications, now of prayers, now of intercessions. [a]

Yet the first seems to belong more especially to beginners, who are still troubled by the stings and the memory of their sins. The second belongs to those who have already reached some height of mind in their spiritual progress and their pursuit of virtue. The third belongs to those who complete their vows by their works, and so are moved to intercede for others too, as they consider their weakness and out of the earnestness of their love. The fourth belongs to those who have already torn the guilty thorns of conscience out of their hearts. Now free from care, they can contemplate with a pure mind the kindness of God and his mercies, which he has granted in the past, or is giving in the present, or is preparing for the future. So they are carried on with fervent hearts to that ardent prayer which the mouth of man cannot take in or express.

Sometimes, however, the mind that is advancing to that perfect state of purity, and is already beginning to be settled in it, will take in all of these at one and the same time. Like a flame that cannot be grasped and devours everything, it darts through them all and offers up to God prayers of the purest force, beyond words. The Spirit himself, interceding with groanings too deep for words while we ourselves do not understand, pours these out to God. In that hour it grasps such great things and pours them out in its supplications beyond all speaking, that they cannot be uttered by the mouth, nor even be recalled by the mind at any other time. So it comes about that whatever stage anyone stands at, he is found at times to offer up pure and devout prayers. Even in that first and lowly station, which has to do with remembering the judgment to come, the one who still lives under the punishment of terror and the fear of judgment is so struck with sorrow for the time being that he is filled with no less eagerness of spirit from the richness of his supplications than the one who, through the purity of his heart, gazes on and considers the blessings of God and is overcome with joy and delight beyond words. For, as the Lord himself says, the one who knows he has been forgiven more begins to love more.