What is praise? First a song, second a prayer

What is praise? First a song, second a prayer. A song rising in the human heart, welling up from the depths of being; an expression of joy, gratitude, love, thanksgiving to the infinite Father, to the author of all harmony. From the measureless reservoir of Spirit the song hath been outpoured. We but reflect it back to the giver of "every good gift and every perfect gift." Was it not His promise that we should receive "the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness"? Lo! we trusted the promise, and it was so. Then, as the song rose higher, sweeter, clearer, as it was unfolded to our awestruck sense in all its fuller, deeper spiritual meaning, we knew it was not only song, but prayer—the "prayer of faith" that hath "the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen;" the prayer which demonstrates God's grace, which "heals sickness, and must destroy sin and death" (Science and Health, p. 16), and finally the prayer that the Spirit itself prayeth for us (for we know not of ourselves how to pray), while lovingly constraining us to lay our "earthly all on the altar of divine Science" (Ibid., p. 55).—Ethel G. Copp.