ence. Wordsworth dwelt in the house of the Lord all the days of his
life. And if the wonder and beauty of the earth lift up our hearts unto our
God in praise and worship, we dwell there also.

Yes, but this world is a world of men. In city or on hillside the great
persistent fact for us, the real setting of our life, is not nature, but
humanity. Life is not a peaceful vision of earthly beauty. Our experience
is not a dreamy pastoral. There are shamed and broken lives. The world is
full of greed and hate and warfare and sorrow. Nature at its best cannot by
itself build for us a temple that humanity at its worst, or even at
something less than its worst, cannot pull down about our ears. For the
Psalmist, probably David himself, the temple was symbolic of all heavenly
realities. It stood for the holiness and the nearness and the mercy of God,
and for the sacredness and the possibility of human life. In the light and
power and perfect assurance of these things he desired to dwell all the
days of his life. For us there is the life and word of One greater than the
temple. Jesus of Nazareth dwelt in the house of the Lord. Between Him and
God the Father there was perfect union. And no one ever saw the worth of
human life as Jesus saw it. And no one ever measured the sacred values of
humanity as He measured them. And now, in the perfect mercy of God, there
is no man but may dwell in the house of God alway and feel life's
sacredness amidst a thousand desecrations, and know its preciousness amidst
all that seeks to obscure, defile, and cheapen it.

_To behold the beauty of the Lord._ It is only in the house of the Lord,
the unseen fane of reverence, trust, and communion, that a man can learn
what beauty is, and where to look for it. Out in the world beauty is held
to be a sporadic thing. It is like a flower growing where no one expected a
blossom. It is an unrelated and unexplained surprise. It is a green oasis
in the desert of unlovely and unpromising things. But for the dweller in
the house of the Lord beauty is not on this wise. Said one such dweller,
'The desert shall rejoice and blossom as the rose.' He looked across the
leagues of burning sand and saw the loveliness of Carmel by the sea, and of
Sharon where the lilies grow. To the artist beauty is an incident, to the
saint beauty is a law of life. It is the thing that is to be. It is the
positive purpose, throbbing and yearning and struggling in the whole
universe. When it em