We know just how they looked, for pictures of them, or at least of similar instruments, are found on Egyptian and Babylonian monuments.  The harp was probably like a large guitar, only it was played like a mandolin, with a plectrum.  The psaltery or lute was a larger-sized harp.  The cornet or trumpet was simply a curved ram’s horn blown with the lips like our cornets; there was also another form made out of brass, long and straight.  The Hebrews also used a wind instrument like our flute, a pipe with holes on the side for making the different notes.  They seem also to have been very fond of percussion instruments—­the timbal, a small drum, and the cymbals, metal plates clashed together.

It is impossible to know how far the Hebrews had developed the art of music.  It seems most likely that the best they ever learned to do with these various instruments would have sounded to us more like a loud banging, twanging noise than like our own melodies and harmonies.

=Influence of this worship of prayer and song.=—­Nevertheless the prayer-hymns of which we have told could not fail to wield an influence on the lives of those who sung them.  Boys and girls heard them week by week until they could not forget them.  When they were tempted to wrongdoing these melodies rang in their ears.  For in all these collections there were great hymns, written by men who had caught the spirit of God as had Amos and Hosea and their successors—­men whose souls were white, whose love was tender, and whose courage was unshakable.  Only such men could write such lines as these: 

="Lord, who shall sojourn in thy tabernacle?  Who shall dwell in thy holy hill?  He that walketh uprightly, and worketh righteousness, And speaketh truth in his heart.  He that slandereth not with his tongue, Nor doeth evil to his friend, Nor taketh up a reproach against his neighbor."=

Or these: 

="Thou delightest not in sacrifice; else would I give it:  Thou hast no pleasure in burnt-offering.  The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit:  A broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise."=

These words and scores of other passages just as great set to music long since forgotten but in those days sweet to the ear, helped untold multitudes to do justice and to love mercy, to confess their sins, and to find strength and hope in God.

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| [Illustration:  CANAANITE PIPE OR FIFE]                            |
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| [Illustration:  AN EGYPTIAN HARP]                                  |
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| [Illustration:  AN ASSYRIAN UPRIGHT HARP]                          |
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| [Illustration:  AN ASSYRIAN HORIZONTAL HARP]                       |