Luke 11:2

When ye pray, say,... — The reproduction, with only a verbal variation here and there, which may well have been the work of the reporter, of what had been given in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 6:9), is every way significant. That which had been given to the multitude was enough for them. If they wanted to be taught to pray at all, if earnest desires did not spontaneously clothe themselves in words, then this simplest and shortest of all prayers expressed all that they should seek to ask. To utter each of those petitions from the heart, entering into its depth and fulness, was better than to indulge in any amplitude of rhetoric.