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 Apostles, and  on  the  cross,  just  before  He gave  up  the  Ghost,  He  cried  with  a  voice those words  of  the  Compline  psalm,  which  in His  sacred  childhood  He  had  heard  chanted  in the  Temple  of  Jerusalem,  "In  manus  tuas commendo  spiritum  meum  ";  "Into  Thy  hands I  commend  My  spirit."

It is  not,  therefore,  to  be  wondered  at, that the  Psalms  have,  first  in  the  Jewish Temple, and  then  around  the  Christian  altar, formed the  prayer  of  the  Chosen  People,  the " Prayer  of  the  Church,"  the  "Divine  Office," for now  nearly  three  thousand  years. — Crown of Jesus.

An excellent  daily  spiritual  reading  would be a  combination  of  extracts  from  Holy Scripture, "The  Imitation  of  Christ"  by Thomas  a  Kempis,  and  "he  Lives  of  the Saints"  (or  St.  Francis  de  Sales'  "Devout Life"). A very  serviceable  book  for  this purpose is  Le  Masson's  "Spiritual  Reading for  Every  Day,"  edited  by  Kenelm  Digby Best of  the  Oratory  of  St. Philip Neri.