The same clear expression of worship is found in another familiar and noble prayer, that of Johann Arndt.  Here, too, are phrases descriptive of a unified consciousness induced by reverent loyalty.

“Ah, Lord, to whom all hearts are open, Thou canst govern the vessel of my soul far better than can I. Arise, O Lord, and command the stormy wind and the troubled sea of my heart to be still, and at peace in Thee, that I may look up to Thee undisturbed and abide in union with Thee, my Lord.  Let me not be carried hither and thither by wandering thoughts, but forgetting all else let me see and hear Thee.  Renew my spirit, kindle in me Thy light that it may shine within me, and my heart burn in love and adoration for Thee.  Let Thy Holy Spirit dwell in me continually, and make me Thy temple and sanctuary, and fill me with divine love and life and light, with devout and heavenly thoughts, with comfort and strength, with joy and peace.”

Thus here one sees in the high contemplation of a transcendent God the subduing and elevating of the human will, the restoration and composure of the moral life.  Finally, in a prayer of St. Anselm’s there is a sort of analysis of the process of worship.

“O God, Thou art life, wisdom, truth, bounty and blessedness, the eternal, the only true Good.  My God and my Lord, Thou art my hope and my heart’s joy.  I confess with thanksgiving that Thou hast made me in Thine image, that I may direct all my thoughts to Thee and love Thee.  Lord, make me to know Thee aright that I may more and more love and enjoy and possess Thee.”

One cannot conclude these examples of worshipful expression without quoting a prayer of Augustine, which is, I suppose, the most perfect brief petition in all the Christian literature of devotion and which gives the great psychologist’s perception of the various steps in the unification of the soul with the eternal Spirit through sublime emotion.

“Grant, O God, that we may desire Thee, and desiring Thee, seek Thee, and seeking Thee, find Thee, and finding Thee, be satisfied with Thee forever.”

I think one may see, then, why worship as distinct from preaching, or the hearing of preaching, is the first necessity of the religious life.  It unites us as nothing else can do with God the whole and God the transcendent.  The conception of God is the sum total of human needs and desires harmonized, unified, concretely expressed.  It is the faith of the worshiper that this concept is derived from a real and objective Being in some way corresponding to it.  No one can measure the influence of such an idea when it dominates the consciousness of any given period.  It can create and set going new desires and habits, it can minish and repress old ones, because this idea carries, with its transcendent conception, the dynamic quality which belongs to the idea of perfect power.  But this transcendent conception, being essentially of something beyond, without and above ourselves can