with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. Set your affections on things above, not on things on the earth. For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God." Col. iii. 1-3.

"O, COULD I find, from day to day,
A nearness to my God,

Then would my hours glide sweet away,
While leaning on his word.

Lord, I desire with thee to live

Anew from day to day,

In joys the world can never give,

Nor ever take away.

Blest Jesus, come, and rule my heart,
And make me wholly thine,
That I may never more depart,
Nor grieve thy love divine.

Thus, till my last, expiring breath,

Thy goodness I'll adore;

And when my frame dissolves in death,

My soul shall love thee more."

THE GOLDEN CENSER:

OR,

A VISIT TO THE HOUSE OF

PRAYER.

BY

JOHN HARRIS, D.D.

THE

GOLDEN CENSER.

MY HOUSE SHALL BE CALLED A HOUSE OF PRAYER FOR ALL PEOPLE.-Isa. lvi. 7.

In order to realize the glorious scene glanced at in the text, in which the world shall finally be seen prostrate before God in prayer, the first and the earliest step necessarily was a revelation of the divine exist

ence.

For he that cometh to God must believe that he is; and how shall they call on him of whom they have not heard?

This fact takes us back in thought to the time when the knowledge of God was lost from the earth; when the Lord, looking down from heaven, to see if there were any that understood and seek God, beheld the appalling spectacle of an entire race in apostacy with Him; and when, breaking the fearful silence which sin had produced, he called to his wandering creatures and proclaimed I That was an era in the moral history

AM.

of man, for it was, in effect, giving to a world of atheists a God. There the great object of prayer stood revealed before them. Had they known Him, the world would have flocked at once in adoration to his feet.

But does he take an interest in the affairs of the world? for if he does not, prayer to him is useless. In answer to this question, Sinai rises to view. Sinai, burning with fire, covered with the blackness and darkness of the tempest, and echoing with the sound of a trumpet, and the voice of words. God is there, legislating for sinful man. Can you question his deep interest in human affairs? Listen to his law as he proclaims it, and mark how much of it relates directly to your welfare. Mark how it denounces a curse against all who shall neglect the duties they owe to you; how tender it is for your life; how it denounces the man who shall even be angry with you without a cause; how jealously it guards your property, your reputation, and everything that is dear to you; how it throws its ample shield over you and all you have; how it constitutes itself the watchful guardian of all; how it kindles into a wall of fire around you; how it thunders forth "cursed is every one" that attempts to injure you, and requires all the people to say