What did Moses care for the perils of the wilderness, when, from the storm-defying steep of Pisgah, he viewed the land of promise, imaging forth the green fields of heaven’s eternal spring! Look at Elijah, the immortal Tishbite, exchanging the sighs and solitude of his juniper shade, for wheels of fire and steeds of wind that bore him home to God! Look at Paul—poor, periled and weary, amid the journeyings and conflicts of his mission: the hand that once stretched the strong eastern tent, or wore the dungeon’s chain, now sweeps in boldest strain the harps of heaven.… Look at the Christian of apostolic and early times, exchanging the clanking of his chains and the curses of his jailor—the dungeon’s den and martyr’s stake—for the notes of gladness and lofty anthem pealing from lute and harp, bedecked with eternal amaranth! The load of chain with which he went out to meet the descending car of his triumph, with its angel escort, was a richer dowry than the jewels of empire! The taper that flickered in the dungeon of the sainted hero shot a ray more glorious than ever spoke the splendor of the full-orbed moon! What are the crowns or the diadems of all this world’s masters or Cæsars, compared with the prospects of such an expectant! * * * * * Christians! what need we care, although on earth we were so poor and low we had nor purse nor pillow; so few and trodden down we had no power; and hamlets, huts and grottoes were the places where we wept and prayed; if these are to be exchanged for a residence amid the jaspers and chrysolites, the emeralds and sapphires of the heavenly Jerusalem! What though soiled by the dust of toil or damp with the dungeon’s dew—struggling amid tattered want along our lone and periled path—when even here we find ourselves invested with glory in the night of our being, and sustained by hopes guiding and pointing us to the temple hymn and the heavenly harp above! …—_Bascom._[4] HOME STUDIES IN CHEMISTRY AND PHYSICS. BY PROF. J. T. EDWARDS, D.D. Director of the Chautauqua School of Experimental Science. CHEMISTRY OF FIRE.—ANCIENT FANCIES. In all ages, and among all nations, fire has been regarded with peculiar interest. Of the four great elements so essential to life—earth, air, water, fire—the last has often been considered as divine in its origin and influence. To the unscientific observer it seems more than matter, and little less than spirit. Contemplating a flame, he sees that while it has form, it lacks solidity. He may pass a sword through it, but like the ghost of the story, no wound is made in its ethereal substance. Its touch is softer than down, but it penetrates the hardest substances. The diamond carves glass, but flame destroys the diamond.