singing as she did it a stanza from a favourite hymn Neither passion nor pride Thy cross can abide, But melt in the fountain that streams from Thy side. Her persecutors were silenced, and blushed as she sang out her hymn of submissive but triumphant faith. The same spirit of holy song is breathed by the men, who cheer the deep caverns in which they toil with heartfelt psalmody. The road-side and the cottage hearth, the engine-house, the stream works, the moorland, and the barren carn, the unpretending chapel and the quiet grave-yard, are all hallowed in turn by the melodies and harmonies of this hymn and anthem-loving race. Seldom have the hearts and voices of a race been more graciously blended in the service of Him who said, by the spirit of prophecy, "In the midst of the church will I sing praise unto Thee." The claims of Christianity as the religion of universal man, and its adaptation to all races and people, circumstances and times, are beautifully illustrated by the fact, that those happy features of character which it impressed upon the Cornish families are the same with those which distinguish the Christianized tribes of Southern Africa. On the testimony of a venerable missionary, who was the first to open the gospel to the Little Namacquas, that popular love of sacred song which is so peculiar to the Keltic masses in Western England, became the habitual feeling and distinctive pleasure of the converted African tribes. Hymn singing in both cases seemed to be the natural action of public religious life. Spiritual songs, says the African evangelist, were soon interwoven with their daily existence; all their movements seemed to be made to the music of hymns; and how many a time. I have listened to their voices of an evening, as they walked homeward from the field or the bush singing some favourite hymn, as a kind of spiritual march. I remember having my heart deeply touched once as I hearkened to the happy bands psalming it, and responding to one another while approaching the village. I caught the strain of an old Dutch hymn— Faith loves the Saviour, and beholds His sufferings, death, and pain; It was the song of Southern Africa's first love. The first-fruits of Ethiopia's praise to God; the tuneful earnest of what an ancient hymn foretold. "Princes shall come out of Egypt, Ethiopia shall soon stretch out her hands unto God. Sing unto God, ye kingdoms of the earth; O sing praises unto the Lord; Selah !" But what Christian psalmody has done for nations, and races, and tribes, it does for many an individual man and woman. What hymns have been to the multitude they have been to many a solitary Christian soul. To the gentle and to the simple, to the great and to the small, to the bond and to the free, to the strong and to the weak, to the cultured and to the rude, divine songs have served to brighten and bless the different stages and turns of personal history. Many of the ruling spirits of the world, men whose names will always be landmarks in history, have had tender fondness for psalmody and holy song. There have been royal psalmists, imperial songsters, and courtly hymnists. Many a great leader of his generation, while he has been guiding the world's mind and heart amidst the dangers of revolution, and through the deep and broad processes of moral and religious renewal, has cheered his own soul with favourite hymns. Hymns have been his chosen expressions of joy in success. Hymns have been his solace in moments of darkness and depression. Luther and his companions with all their bold readiness for danger and death in the cause of truth, had times when their feelings were akin to those of a divine singer who said, "Why art thou cast down, O my soul?" But in such hours the unflinching Reformer would cheerily say to his friend Melancthon, "Come, Phillip, let us sing the forty-sixth Psalm;" and they could sing it in Luther's own characteristic version. A sure stronghold our God is He, Later Reformers in our own land have been equally remarkable for their love of sacred music, and their aptness at using it for the encouragement of the multitude, and their own secret comfort amidst their sufferings and toils. Some of the noblest intellects, too, the most cultured and refined of their race; men whose thoughts and feelings are embalmed in an undying literature, have had each his own cherished psalm or tenderly loved hymn. And the psalm or hymn has been called up in every time of need; as if it had a comforting power which no other voice could bring. The great Niebuhr was lovingly attached to von Lowenstern's hymn Christ, Thou the champion of that war-worn host. And might be heard now and then refreshing his own soul amidst its intense labours and researches by murmuring the metrical prayer And give us peace; peace in the church and school, So shall Thy goodness here be still adored, And what was the solace of Niebuhr has been the consolation of many a commanding and highly cultured mind. The hymn of joy and the hymn of plaintive appeal have ministered strength and peace, in sweet alternation, through all the scenes of mental action. And how often has the master mind, the truly great soul finished its brilliant and successful course with a closing hymn! Saintly and useful men like Rowland Hill have died on consecrated ground with the music of a hymn in their souls. But minds of another class also have ended their course with songs. Walter Scott's last utterances were stanzas of favourite ancient hymns. It is stated that Cobden departed repeating that grand old strain, rendered from the German by John Wesley— Thee will I love, my joy, my crown, And our own Prince Albert "the good," breathed as his last song, while his spirit mounted— And how many Rock of Ages cleft for me, Let me hide myself in Thee! thousands after thousands in the more retired and obscure scenes of life have had psalms and hymns of victory on their dying lips. Indeed, the holiest and best of people, those who have done most to make the world happy, have hallowed every stage of life, every turn in their history, every relation which they have sustained, and every time and season of their mortal pilgrimage with thanksgiving and the voice of melody." Their record is above; but neither they nor their hymns can be forgotten below. Many of their names are recorded in the following pages; and some of their hymns are interwoven with the outlines of their character and the memorials of their history. And perhaps the lover of sacred melody will learn to love hymn-writers and their hymns more deeply, and to sing with more spiritual joy, while he spends an hour, now and then, over chapters about the first hymn-book; and hymns of the latter day morning, hymns of the fathers, and hymns of old England's Christian birth-time; hymns from old cloisters, songs in high places, and songs in prison. From these he may pass to chapters about psalms in English metre, hymn menders, and songs of creation. |