of music as a Christian art, is equally true of the other arts; of architecture, painting, eloquence, and poetry.

The elegant Horne has left a sermon on Church Music, which we have not been able to procure; but which we recommend to our readers. The finest thing, however, we have met with on this subject, is that magnificent passage of Hooker,* which may be readily turned to, but is too long for transcription.

Feltham, and Sir William Temple, have both hit upon the same quotation, a notion of the Fathers, that God loves not him who loves not music; and they taught, that a love of music was a species of predestinated assurance of a man's acceptance with heaven. Of music, and hymns, and lyres, and the trumpet, and golden harps, we read in Scripture; and that there are hallelujahs in heaven: and though some blaspheming wit sneeringly asked if heaven were a singing-school, we may affirm that, amidst the choicest incense offered to the adorable Trinity, may very reasonably be included a celestial harmony of voice and instrument, such as mortal ears have never heard, and such as human imaginations may not dare to conceive. But let us see what others, and great names too, have to say on this topic. We shall adduce only those instances occurring to us readily, and omit many fine passages from authors whose books we may not happen to have at hand.

Of Church Music, thus spoke that fine poet and true Christian, Dr. Donne: "And oh, the power of church music! that harmony, added to this hymn, has raised the affections of my heart, and quickened my graces of zeal and gratitude; and I observe, that I always return from paying

* Book v., § 38.

this public duty of prayer and praise to God, with an inexpressible tranquillity of mind, and a willingness to leave the world." Herbert truly loved church music. We are told by Izaak Walton, that "His chiefest recreation was music; in which heavenly Art he was a most excellent master; and did himself compose many divine hymns and anthems, which he set and sung to his lute or viol. And though he was a lover of retiredness, yet his love to music was such, that he went usually twice every week, on certain appointed days, to the cathedral church in Salisbury ; and at his return would say, 'That his time spent in prayer and cathedral music, elevated his soul, and was his heaven upon earth.""" Nor was he content with a mere conversational declaration of this feeling; but has given a permanent form to the feeling in a strain of pure, devotional harmony:

CHURCH MUSIC.

Sweetest of sweets, I thank you. When displeasure
Did through my body wound my mind,

You took me thence: and in your house of pleasure
A dainty lodging me assign'd.

Now I in you, without a body move,

Rising and falling with your wings.

We both together sweetly live and love,

Yet say sometimes, "God help poor kings."

Comfort, I'll die; for if you part from me,
Sure I shall do so, and much more;

But if I travel in your company,

You know the way to heaven's door.

The author of Paradise Lost, of Comus, and the Areopagitica, has left on record his admiration of church music.

He was a master of the art of music, and played daily on the organ; and one of the chief traits of his glorious epic is the admirable adaptation of sound to sense, an exquisite sense of harmony and rhythm. Who can forget that rich passage in Il Penseroso, rising like "a steam of rich distilled perfumes."

But let my due feet never fail,
To walk the studious cloisters pale,
And love the high embowered roof,
With antic pillars massy proof,
And storied windows richly dight,
Casting a dim religious light.
There let the pealing organ blow
To the full voic'd quire below,
In service high and anthems clear,
As may with sweetness, through mine ear,
Dissolve me into ecstasies,

And bring all heav'n before mine eyes.

Truly Milton, though in his creed a Puritan, or rather an Independent (of his own sort), and in his politics a Republican, was still, in his poetry, captivated by the romance and splendor of the Roman Catholic Church. Macaulay has, with great nicety, hit off the distinction. "The illusions," says that brilliant declaimer, "which captivated his imagination, never impaired his reasoning powers. The statesman was proof against the splendor, the solemnity, and the romance, which enchanted the poet. Any person who will contrast the sentiments expressed in his Treatises on Prelacy, with the exquisite lines (above quoted) on Ecclesiastical Architecture and Music, in the Penseroso, which was published about the same time, will understand our meaning. This is an inconsistency which,

more than anything else, raises his character in our estimation, because it shows how many private tastes and feelings he sacrificed in order to do what he considered his duty to mankind. It is the very struggle of the noble Othello. His heart relents; but his hand is firm. He does naught in hate, but all in honor. He kisses the beautiful deceiver before he destroys her." Four excellent witnesses, admirable as Poets and Christians, are enough to confirm the integrity of our proposition; and we have adduced the testimony of Hooker, of Donne, of Herbert, and of Milton.

Perhaps, after all, there is a nobler music than what is commonly recognized as such; we mean "the music of speech," the music of a rich, varied, and expressive elocution. Man has not been able to contrive any instrument of equal power and versatility, with that natural organ bestowed upon him by his Maker. The human voice is more complicated and exquisite than the great Harlæm Organ, or the finest Cremona Violin. It is the mastery of art to approach nature; but here we have nature above the imitation of art. We are old-fashioned enough to love good reading, which is much rarer than good singing. We have now-a-days few Duchets (the name of the clergyman of whom Wirt wrote with such enthusiasm): and it must be confessed that, to the generality of clergymen, however learned or eloquent, or amiable for private virtues, the censure of Addison still applies, which was levelled at the slovenly, careless, and irreverent performance of the most sacred duty of the priest-Prayer.

XI.

MR. BRAHAM.*

WHEN we first heard Mr. Braham in his opening Sacred Concert at the Tabernacle, we were sadly disappointed. We thought then, as we do now, that he overlaid the majestic simplicity of sacred music with a profusion of useless and unmeaning flourishes, mere tricks of voice and execution, cadences, trills, and absurd repetitions. Wonderful power, the more astonishing at his advanced age, and equally wonderful science we could not help acknowledging, but his pathos appeared labored and his enthusiasm mechanical. We did recognize a portion of the fine scorn Lamb spoke of in that magnificent piece, "Thou shalt dash them to pieces," wherein his contemptuous tones were jerked out with the same force that the fretted waves break and storm upon a rock in the raging sea. Afterwards at the theatre, on each occasion of our visits there, we were equally dissatisfied. The very indifferent acting was not relieved by any very extraordinary singing. It was the extravagance and (paradoxical, yet true) the constraint of the Italian opera. But a few evenings ago, at the Stuyvesant Institute, we at last discovered the secret of Braham's

* 1841.