PERKINS LIBRARY Dulce University RareB ooks OUR CHORAL SERVICES. A FEW WORDS PRESENT STATE OF CHURCH MUSIC IN ENGLAND. REV. H. W. PULLEN, M.A., MINOR CANON OF SALISBURY. LONDON: SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, k CO. SALISBURY : BROWN & CO. MDCCCLXV. SALISBURY : KKNXETT, PRINTKR, .TOPKNAL OFFICE. OUR CHORAL SERVICES. In spite of the alleged improvement which has lately taken place in our Parish Choirs, there probably never was a time when so much bad music was sung in our churches, or so much ignorance displayed on the whole subject of Ecclesiastical music, as at the present day. If any one doubts whether this be so, let him go to some church where " Full Choral Service" is sup- posed to be celebrated, and judge for himself. We can tell him beforehand with tolerable exactness what he will see and hear. Should the church be in the hands of a very de- cidedly High Churchman, the Psalms and Canticles will be sung in unison to a doleful strain called a " Gregorian Tone," lying within the compass of something like half an octave, and altogether more admirable for its supposed antiquity and Catholic associations than for any merit of its own. The Prayers (excepting in some rare instances, not to be calculated upon) will be chanted very indistinctly, very flat, and very much through the Chanter's nose ; more regard being paid, in this part of the Service also, to the supposed custom of antiquity than to present effect. There will probably be no Anthem, its place being supplied by a species of doggerel called by courtesy a hymn, and sung to a tune of which we may justly say that it is excellently well adapted to the words themselves. Here, as if to atone for past errors, antiquity is left far behind, and the go-a-head a 2 4 tendency of the age is allowed fair play. Such rhymes as none but the present century, and the latter half of it, has ventured to employ — such a metre as no poet ever yet conceived — such grammar as only nursemaids have hitherto delighted in — such ambiguous paraphrases and double-compound epithets as must have been intended to mystify rather than to instruct — this is what any body may fairly expect to find, who opens at random one of our modern hymn-books. As for the tune, it will be difficult to say whether it be an importation from a Dissenting meeting-house, or some third-rate Roman conventicle. Its vulgarity will suggest the one — its washy sentimentalism the other. Utterly un- English in character, and devoid both of dignity and vigour, it will unite the prettiness of some drawing- room melody with the rollicking levity of a jovial song. And this is what a majority, I fear, of our High Church parsons would call a thoroughly good Choral Service — a satisfactory result of the last thirty years' revival of ecclesiastical taste, and a pattern of musical propriety to those whited sepul- chres, the English Cathedrals. It is on this last account that I am provoked into coming forward with a word of expostulation. I cannot endure any longer to hear bad music called good, and good music abused as if it were bad, by persons who, often on their own confession, know nothing whatever of their subject, or who at best are followers of a theory which ignorance has invented, and which prejudice has established as a law. Heaven forbid that I should sneer at the results, however small, of anybody's best efforts to set on foot a Choral Service, or (short of that) to improve the singing in his church or choir. My grievance is just this — that scarcely anybody's best efforts are ever made — indeed, that many persons think it absolutely wrong to make them. It is the fashion now to condemn anything like elaborate music — 5 that is, music which involves an immense amount of hard work, and really good material to work upon, before it can be adequately rendered. In the treat- ment of a professedly musical Service, it has been practically ruled that the laws and principles of music are of very secondary importance. Other tests of excellence have been substituted, and English priests now require either that what we sing in church shall sound Ecclesiastical, and Catholic, and "Churchy;" or that it shall be Congregational. Unless it fulfil one or both of these conditions, it may be very good music, they will tell you, in its way, but it is not fit for an English Choral Service. Now, without denying that Church Music has, and ought to have, a character of its own, one may fairly pronounce the former of the above qualifica- tions to be somewhat indefinite, in the mouth of those persons by whom it is most commonly em- ployed. With them it probably means a certain strain which they have heard in some dark church where there is a surpliced choir and an illuminated organ, and plenty of stained glass and a rood-screen. They cannot describe such a strain, but they should know it again if they heard it ; and they profess themselves able, by a sort of intuition, to distinguish its characteristics from those of any other kind of music, if specimens of each might be played to them. Whereupon you may amuse yourself not a little at their expense, and prove the absurdity of the term employed, by playing slowly the first half- dozen bars of four-part music that may occur to you, introducing a fair proportion of minor chords. If you can invent one or two impossible progressions by the way, and pass abruptly through four or five different keys without modulating, the effect will be all the more " Churchy," and your performance will be declared to breathe a decidedly Catholic spirit. Some people even go so far as to believe that these 6 " Churchy" effusions have been employed by the faithful in all countries from the earliest times. It was discovered by certain industrious priests a few years ago that the Gregorian chants are the identical melodies to which David and the chief musician sang the Psalms. Whether they saw a vision, or found a very old MS. indeed, I am unable to say ; but, until their suppositions are strengthened by some attempt at evidence, they can scarcely expect reasonable people to entertain them. There is probably no melody or combination of sounds what- ever of which it can be said with any authority that it has been handed down to us by the ancient Church. Even the simple monotone itself cannot in this sense be claimed as a Catholic usage ; for, if the early Christians could chant their prayers on one unvarying note, it is more than our moderns can. I think, therefore, it may fairly be concluded that the Catholic or Churchy sound attributed to a certain class of music is for the most part a matter of pure imagination. As for the present popular theory of " Congrega- tional" worship, I confess that I do not clearly understand what it means, never having been fortunate enough to hear a rational or even in- telligible defence of it. If any one maintains that no singing is to be permitted in which every in- dividual worshipper cannot audibly join, I should like to ask him how many persons in an average half-dozen he supposes capable of singing two consecutive notes in tune if their life depended upon it. If it be meant that the music should be of such a character as to enable all the musical people present to join in it, then the difficulty is only removed one degree further off. You have still to explain what you mean by a musical person, and the definition is not a very satisfactory one. If you mean that the music employed shall so clearly and intelligibly express the words which it illustrates that 7 the simplest person present, who keeps his ears open, shall be able to follow them, I can only appeal to general experience, to say nothing of common sense, and ask whether such a condition is not absolutely unreasonable. Not one singer in a hundred has the gift of an utterance sufficiently clear ; certainly a hundred persons all singing together have no such gift ; nor twenty persons ; nor half-a-dozen. But if you mean by Congregational music such music as the musical members of the congregation may join in after much practice and painstaking, then you leave room for the most elaborate Service that any musician can desire. It then becomes a mere question how much trouble such persons are willing to take towards cultivating the talent which God has given them up to the necessary point for employ- ing it worthily in His honour. There are doctrines on various subjects, having had their origin no one knows when or where, which because there is something plausible about them are greedily accepted by such a multitude of persons that it seems almost treason to dispute them. Such a doctrine I believe to be that of Congregational worship. As a theory it is quite untenable; as a practical matter it does not and cannot work. Though upheld principally by High Churchmen, it is based upon the thoroughly Protestant position that the great end of Divine worship is the edifi- cation of the worshippers. It may, perhaps, be considered as a reaction from the parson and clerk system universal in the last generation, and not altogether unknown even now. Because in Puritan places of worship the people never open their mouths, it is assumed that in Christian churches they should never shut them. For my part, I believe the chief and only worthy object of our churches, whether cathedral or parochial, to be the offering of a magnificent Service, as grand as Christian art and Christian labour can make it, to Almighty God. I 8 believe that this Service must necessarily by the above conditions be a musical one. I believe that it cannot be so, unless it be treated from beginning to end on musical principles ; that is to say, unless music and musical effect (subject only to the technical requirements of the ritual) be made the very first con- sideration. And I believe in all reverence that such a service as this is an acceptable sacrifice to God for its own sake, because it is the best we can offer; independently altogether of the question whether it be edifying or even intelligible to certain members of the congregation. All good Churchmen, I suppose, will nominally assent to my theory of the object with which our churches are built and endowed. I say nominally, because I suspect that a large proportion of such persons have still, in spite of their principles, a lurking fondness for the old Protestant notion that a church is little better than a preaching house. It is quite impossible that they could permit such meagre, miserable services to be continually offered up if they thought otherwise. I wonder that it should never have occurred to our Low Church parsons (and to a good many High Church parsons also who are content to imitate them), that the act of worship paid to the Almighty in half our English churches might, in fine weather, at least, be paid equally well in the street. A Prayer-book apiece for the parson and clerk, with surplice, hood, and bands for the former ; a dozen or two of Hymn-books for the children, and a barrel organ to play " Cambridge New;" an inverted tub for the minister, and a policeman to see that nobody knocks him off from it : positively I cannot understand what more }^ou want for the celebration of an ordinary Protestant Service with ordinary decorum. Pews and cushions may add materially to the comfort of the worshippers, but can scarcely be judged essential to their devo- tions ; and it does appear to me (on Protestant principles) a monstrous waste of money to spend sixty or seventy thousand pounds on a building like S. Pancras, when the bare ground it stands upon would answer almost every purpose to which such a church is commonly applied. An ill-performed Ser- vice in a costly church is as great an absurdity as a gorgeous painted window at the east end of a barn. Few persons, probably, will hesitate to admit my second position — namely, that the highest class of Service which we can offer is a musical one. It is in the deduction drawn from this that I expect to shock most violently the prejudices of my High Church friends. To say that in a musical sendee music should be the chief consideration is an unheard of thing. In common practice it is often the last consideration of all. The organist, in many cases, is the last man in the parish who is consulted either in the choice of the music, or in its per- formance when chosen. If he venture to make a suggestion he is extinguished then and there. Either he is ignorant, and has no opinion to give, or else he is a prejudiced professional, and his opinion is not worth having. The real musical despot is the unmusical parson — or more frequently, perhaps, the unmusical parson's wife — encouraged by a few self- taught amateurs from among his flock, with just enough learning to gloss over their unfathomed ig- norance, and just as much conceit as you please. The contemptuous tone in which many clerical dabblers speak of professional men is as foolish as it is unjust. " Oh, of course/ ' they will say, " Dr. So-and-so does not approve of Gregorians ; but then, you know, he is only an organist and a professor, and can't be expected to know anything about Church music." The plain fact being that some of the High Church clergy have put forward theories which no musician will accept, and now they propose to get out of their difficulty by snubbing the whole profession, a 3 10 and coolly telling you that all the leading musicians of the last three hundred years did not know or do not know what Ecclesiastical music means. And even among those Priests who think very differently from this, and who have, perhaps, some real knowledge of music, there are many who object on principle to having anything sung in Church which takes some trouble to learn and some delicacy to execute. Sim- plicity, they think, is the one thing to be gained, and any approach to intricate music is out of place in an English choir. If you ask them why, they will say because the people cannot folloiv it, and so you are driven back to the fallacy which lies at the root of the whole popular theory, that the Service is mainly intended for the edification of the worshippers. No doubt people are edified by the very act of worship, more than by anything else that they can do. It has pleased God of His goodness to ordain that every gift we offer up to Him shall be multiplied a thou- sand fold upon ourselves. But our duty is clearly to see how w^e may best glorify God ; and if any one thinks that He is glorified by a Service so simple that anybody may join in it without any trouble, he is welcome to his opinion. I should rather have imagined that the Almighty is insulted by such a Service every time it is offered. And if I should here be met with the objection that in certain London churches the experiment of congregational singing has been made, and found to answer, and that in the simple music there employed the people do join heartily and successfully, I will first ask leave to deny the fact altogether, and secondly to observe that, if it were true, it would prove nothing in favour of the general principle. For it must not be forgotten that the congregation of these churches is composed of would-be musical people, who go there from choice, because they like the music — people gathered from all parts of London, and in the season from all parts of the country be- 11 sides. You cannot argue from the case of a picked assemblage like this to the case of an ordinary parish or district, where people keep to their own church. Besides, it is not true that they join in the singing to the extent supposed : much less is it true that they join successfully. I speak as one who for two years attended the Service in one or another of the churches alluded to twice every day ; and I have no hesitation in declaring my firm persuasion that the congregational singing in all of them is (even upon their own principles) a downright failure. Without doubt, there is plenty of noise. After the dull, sleepy devotions of ordinary congregations, the Babel of voices at S. Barnabas' and All Saints' is a new sensation altogether. About half the people present are singing at full scream; and very delightful it must be to hear them, if you could only manage to creep into a corner, and get out of their way. Otherwise your own acts of worship, unless you are destitute both of nerve and ear, are likely to be somewhat disturbed. Without being unduly fas- tidious one may surely feel that to be squeezed in between two gruff uncultivated basses, who are roaring out hoarse octaves with the trebles, just about a semitone flat, is not a desirable position. The little man behind you, who persists in jerking out his notes with a spasmodic action, a trifle later than anybody else, though he appears by his ener- getic manner to enjoy the whole thing immensely, can scarcely be said to contribute to the general good effect of the music. And if at some little distance you now and then catch the sound of a really fine voice, " putting in a harmony" in some impossible place, you can only think what a valuable member of any choir such a man might be if he would but go home and work hard for ten or twelve months and learn to sing. So much for practical effect : and now, what is it which is supposed to be worth upholding in the 12 principle ? Is it an absolute condition of a Christian service that all the people offering it should audibly sing ? It may be : but one should certainly suppose that the Great and Wise Creator, if he had intended such a service to be rendered to Him by all His people, would have made all His people capable of rendering it. The question is, has He seen fit to do so ? Now, it is not very easy to obtain statistics upon a matter of this kind ; but I should say, after some years of careful observation, that about one-third of the educated and church-going popu- lation are literally unmusical ; about another third doubtful : so that, although capable of instruc- tion by immense diligence up to a certain point, you can never be sure whether they will sing right or wrong. The remaining third I should set down as musical, and endowed with gifts, by the cultivation of which they may become accurate, and even ac- complished singers. I do not expect my calculation to be taken for more than it is worth. The propor- tions vary considerably in different places, and there are some districts in which an unmusical person appears to be almost the exception. But if only one or two in every hundred be found physically unable to sing, this is quite enough to upset the theory that every body ought to sing. There is something very grand, no doubt, in the idea of a whole congregation singing praises to GrOD : but I do not know that the grandeur of the effect would be lessened, if such praises could by any means be sung in tune. And this is a manifest impossibility, unless those only will attempt to sing who have learned to sing, and the rest will reverently listen. In this way you may have a thoroughly Congregational Service, in the truest sense of the word, even though scarcely one member of the congregation should open his lips. For cannot people lift up their hearts to heaven, and join silently, but not the less earnestly, in the highest 13 acts of Christian worship ?* And which is the more likely to raise their hearts — the confused babbling of an ill-assorted body of voices, regardless of time and tune, and everything else, but noise ; or the nicely balanced harmony of a well-trained choir, singing the best music that can be found in the best possible way, each individual having cultivated his talent to the highest point before presuming to con- secrate it to God's honour and glory ? The truth is that both the practical benefit and the theoretical propriety of the docrine in question are mere assumptions from beginning to end. There is not the shadow of an apology to be made for either. If you insist that the congregation shall join in the service, you must give them a service in which they are able to join : that is to say, you must have it read throughout, and allow no singing at all. But if you do allow singing, it must surely be in all respects the very best singing possible, just as the architecture of your church is the best you can afford, and its ornaments the most costly which you can prevail upon your people to offer. Indeed the ana- logy between the material fabric and the Service itself is a very close one. Whenever I have been at All Saints, Margaret- street, I have been painfully struck with the contrast of an uncouth boisterous Service (whose chief merit even in the estimation of its advocates is its supposed heartiness), with a mag- nificent church, every detail of which is elaborated to the last degree. If a stone or a carving be * Dr. Jebb has some most admirable remarks on this subject, to which I would specially refer the reader. They occur in section xli. of his excellent work on the Choral Service. And he quotes a verse from Keble, which every upholder of the congregational theory ought to learn by heart : — We the while, of meaner birth, Who in that divinest spell Dare not hope to join on earth, — Give us grace to listen well. a4 14 thought unworthy of being dedicated to God until it has been polished and wrought with all the pains that skilful hands can bestow, why should the human voice be treated on a totally different principle ? Why should any body who has a natural gift of music be thought to do the Giver of it honour, when he has never taken any real trouble to improve his gift, but is content to stand up in church day after day and week after week and roar like a young bull ? Why should a priest, who would not have an inferior window or a shabby Altar-cloth in his chancel for any consideration, tell his people, as you may constantly hear him telling them, to sing out heartily, and never mind a few discordant voices ? And as for the gratuitous assumption that every body ought to join whether he can sing or not, and that any Service in which he cannot join is (so far) an un- Christian one, you might as well require that every body shall have had a hand in the building of the church itself ; as well deny that any body's heart is capable of being lifted up by the beauty of a painted window, unless his hands have helped to paint it. Most of us, over and above the ordinary faculties of every day use, have received some special gift which we are bound first to cultivate and then to employ in the service of God. The architect dedicates his gift when he designs the church ; the workman when he carves the stone ; the painter when he colours the walls ; the embroiderer when she works the Altar- cloth; the musician when he takes his part in the choir ; the rich man when he supplies the means of carrying on these good works to perfection ; while the ordinary worshipper may bring that which is no less acceptable than all — his offering of earnest though silent praise. But the ignorance which prevails, and the non- sense which is talked, upon these subjects would be the more astonishing if they were not the inevitable result of causes easily ascertained. People have 15 chosen to think either that church music is not an art at all, and need not be treated as such ; or else that in the treatment of it they can dispense with professional aid. Priests have taken it into their heads that so long as they are zealous and Catholic minded they are quite competent to establish and carry on a Choral Service, though in the midst of their most energetic efforts they rather take a pride in confessing to you that they do not know one note from another. How then can we wonder that so much trash should be sung in church, and so much nonsense talked out of it ? What should we expect to happen, if a number of the clergy, on the strength of being earnest High-Churchmen, were to undertake with their own hands to build a Cathedral ? And yet they have made equally ridiculous attempts in dealing with Church Music. They have compiled hymn books, and, alas ! written tunes ; they have formed choral associations, and "got up" monster festivals ; they have tyrannized over and worried their choirs, and forced their own private theories upon men and boys who knew ten times more about music than themselves ; they have done their best to degrade educated musicians into mere machines for playing the organ, and in all other matters have either negatively dispensed with them, or positively snubbed them. While professing to be sound Churchmen they have acted on principles of genuine Protestantism and Dissent. One should have thought that they had been above the miserably Radical position that a handful of nineteenth century amateurs can possibly know more about Church music than all the greatest musicians of the last three hundred years. And if people will invent foolish theories, impracticable results must naturally be expected to follow. The true principle of Christian worship appears to me undeniably to be this — that from every Christian Temple there should rise up every day the most magnificent song of praise that Christian men can 16 offer. Just as no trouble or expense has been spared in rearing and adorning the church itself, so should no efforts be grudged, and no outlay of time or money be thought too great, in offering up to Him Who is the Giver of all art and the Author of all beauty the most glorious Services that we are able to conceive. Every art which He has taught us should be given back to Him ; every faculty which He has bestowed upon us for the improvement of our talents and the more profitable employment of our labour is His by right, and should be spent in His honour. And the celebration of this Service ought to be the great business of every day. It is a miserable error to take for granted, as most of us have practically done, however indignantly we might repudiate the idea, that the ordinary business of our calling (whether secular or sacred) is the first consideration, and that God is to be worshipped at any odd time, when we have nothing more important to do. The business of Christ's Church is to sing Christ's praises, and no Christian man has any right to go to his daily work until he has paid, or has arranged his hours for paying, his daily act of homage, the most splendid he can offer. And those who would call this a mere impracticable theory have need to be reminded that, however necessary it may be to make money and to provide for our own, these are but temporal duties — done only upon sufferance, for as long or as short a time as God may see fit to spare us. But the duty of Divine Worship is eternal ; it has been offered up from everlasting, and it shall never cease : we have been created for the very purpose of rendering it : it is to be, as far as any- thing certain is revealed to us, our incessant occupa- tion in heaven. Death may put an end to all our schemes of usefulness and deeds of love towards men this very day ; but it never can touch our acts of praise to God. From Paradise itself shall rise up the song of Holy, Holy, Holy; and even on 17 earth, in spite of Protestant theories to the contrary, so long as we have ancient churches to remind us of the faithful dead, and loving hearts to thank God for their examples ; nay, so long as the Church herself is Catholic, and the Communion of Saints an Article of her Creed, shall those who have fallen asleep be remembered before our altars, and share with us in our songs of praise. It is no mere form of words, therefore, but it is emphatically true, that the daily worship of Almighty God is the most important work of every Christian's life; and this not only, or even chiefly, as a means towards an end, but for its own sake, because it is due from Man to his Creator, from the Church to her Divine Head. You may say, if you like, that such a Service might degene- rate into a mere form. That would depend upon those who offered it. The Holy Eucharist itself is a mere form on the part of those who offer it un- worthily. One thing is plain enough — it is a form which would utterly put to shame the coldness of our love and the selfishness of our lives. Just as a costly church is a witness against those who are niggardly in their offerings to God, so would a magnificent Service be a perpetual protest against that stinginess of labour and false economy of time which grudges even an hour or two in the day for the simple duty of Divine Worship. And, looking for a moment at their practical effect, apart from their value for their own sake, there can be no doubt that such Services as these, multiplied throughout the country, would do more to Christianize our heathen, and rouse up our torpid Christians, than any number of sermons. Preaching was quite another thing in the days of the Apostles, when the preacher had something new to tell, and his listeners had something new to hear. But it is vain to suppose that people can be particularly interested, much less permanently impressed, by sermons now. There are cases here and there where a preacher of extra- 18 ordinary powers may attract, and for a short time influence, a large congregation ; but it must be remembered that in nine churches out of ten the people are doomed to listen to the same instructor, or the same pair of instructors, every Sunday in the year. It is too much to expect that they shall listen very eagerly. We may doubt whether even the Gentiles of Antioch would have listened if S. Paul had preached to them every Sabbath for a twelve- month. I do not take into consideration the ex- ceedingly low average of merit among preachers of the present day, because it might obviously be replied that such faults are capable of being mended ; but, estimating sermons at their very best, I say that people are not half so likely to be influenced by them as by the beauty and dignity of a well-rendered Choral Service. The parson who, at the close of a slovenly hymn, exhorts his people to be more diligent in prayer and praise, will not make many converts by his eloquence. Where is your God, said the Hindoo to the missionary, in Whose honour you build no stately temples, and to Whom you offer up a Service which could not glorify the lowest of His creatures ? I would not for the world be thought to disparage preaching. It is far too sacred in its appointment, and far too powerful an instrument in the hands of the very few who know how to use it, to be spoken of otherwise than in terms of deep respect. But I submit that, in ordinary cases, preaching will not arrest, much less enchain, the attention of one listener in a hundred. Preachers of average ability have not the means either of converting the multi- tude, or of permanently influencing the lives even of their own flock, by any of the arts legitimately open to them. Their only chance of making any parti- cular impression is to propound some startling- paradox, and call in question some well-known truth, or else to divert their admirers with the tricks of a 19 mountebank, and the attitude of a chimpansee. But give your people a Service which they may take a pride in offering — which may be to them an object of daily interest, and in preparation for which they may spend many a half-hour which might otherwise be wasted ; teach them to concentrate all their appreciation of the beautiful and all their love for Art on their daily act of worship, and tell them that they need not say good-bye to all that is winning and lovely because they are going to church ; show them that the God whom they worship is the same God who painted the lily and the rose, and not a different God altogether — not a God of shabbiness and uproar and discord, but One who, in all His works, from the loftiest to the lowliest, has revealed Himself as the lover of beauty and order and grace : teach your people this, and then, but not before, you may reasonably hope that they will begin to value their privileges as Churchmen, and that their fre- quent devotions in God's house will be reflected in their lives. I claim, then, for the Choral Service of the English Church a higher dignity and a more vast importance than the very warmest of its advocates have yet assigned to it. I claim for the act of public praise and prayer a precedence over every other act of the Christian's day. I claim for Church music, no less than for Church architecture, that it shall be pre-eminent among arts — the most brilliant in exe- cution and the noblest in design. I claim for Christ and for His Church all the choicest resources of that Divine art now offered up to the public at the Crystal Palace and Exeter Hall. I protest against those miserable Services which are judged good enough for God, by persons who think no amount of time or money too great to be spent upon a concert or an oratorio. I say that we Christians have no more right to offer up to Christ a meagre song of praise, than the Israelites had to sacrifice a maimed 20 heifer or a cake of unsavoury flour. I say that our shabby unmusical Services are at once a disgrace to us as guardians of Christian art — a contrast only more painful than ludicrous to the magnificence of the churches in which we worship — and nothing short of a positive insult to Him whose Name we profess to glorify. What then shall we do towards making our Ser- vices such as they ought to be ? Why, obviously enough, we must banish once for all those foolish theories which we have conceived nobody knows when or how, and put to flight our misbegotten prejudices and private fancies, and set to work in a spirit of self-sacrifice and on principles of good common sense and honesty, and dedicate our very best to God. As we set apart in His honour the most beautiful churches we can build, following out the principles of that period when architecture was at its highest point ; as we fill these churches, or would fill them if we dared, with costly paintings and gorgeous frescoes, taking as models the works of the greatest masters of colour and design ; so in our Choral Services we must make choice of the best examples which Church musicians have left us, and carry these examples out in the best possible way. The best writers of every school, whether ancient or modern, must be cultivated, and the worthless ones rejected at whatever cost to the prejudices of individuals. All sacred music, if good in itself, must be enlisted into the service of the Church ; secular music alone must be reserved for the amusement of the people. Oratorios and Handel festivals, as a means of money getting, must be banished altogether, and the orchestra be removed into the Cathedral or the Abbey ; and there, in its legitimate sphere, must the noble chorus be given; not as a speculation of some enterprising company ; not as an entertainment to the million at a shilling a head ; but as a solemn sacrifice to God. Here, too. 21 must the most accomplished artistes and professors be invited to consecrate their gift to Him who gave it, before turning it into a means of livelihood at the concert room or the opera. And even in the humblest village Church the standard must be proportionately raised. The music employed must at any rate be good of its kind; and if its execution should be somewhat rough, this must not be for want of pains to make it smooth. Rugged simplicity may some- times be unavoidable ; but it must always be lamented as a fault, and not extolled as a virtue. Professors must be permitted to take the lead, and well-meaning amateurs must retire into private life and learn. It must no longer be suffered that any clerical dabbler who has picked up a little small talk about plain song, or any High Church layman who is not very strong in the head and has nothing particular to do, should come forward as a proficient in the most difficult of all the arts, set the whole professional world at defiance, and coolly maintain that the bald unmusical strains associated with the names of S. Gregory and S. Ambrose are better than all the greatest works of the best musicians who have ever lived. The test of antiquity, real or supposed, must be set aside, and that of intrinsic merit must take its place. We must hear no more of Catholic tunes and " Churchy" harmonies; but all that is at once solemn and musician-like and lovely must find expression in our anthem and our psalm. If all this were done — and it is no mere impracticable theory — our Choral Services would be magnificent indeed. The reproach that we are the most slovenly Church in Christendom would no longer be deserved. The coldness of our devotions would no longer disgust and alienate the very Dissenters themselves. The Church would see that we in England are Catholic, and the world would see — what it can scarcely be expected to gather from our present mode of worship — that we really do believe in God. 22 I should be sorry that any one who may read these pages should view them as the work of a mere enthusiast, who has adopted some exaggerated theories upon the points under discussion. I write under the deliberate conviction that the question of Church music is to us English Churchmen the most important question of the day. I fail altogether to understand how any one duty or combination of duties can be considered of higher moment than the duty of offering up to God, either with diligently cultivated voices, or by assisting in humble and fer- vent silence, the most glorious burst of song within our power. What less can we do for Him ? Has He not given us talent, and opportunity, and time ? Did not He inspire the great masters of the art — and shall not the first fruits of their labour be given back to Him ? To my mind there is something unspeak- ably revolting in the ungainly ritual, the coarse irreverent response, the flippant hymn, the unmelo- dious chant — in short, the thoroughly cheap Ser- vice rendered up to the Almighty in almost every Church in England. Such devotions suggest to me the unmeaning orgies of a savage, rather than the reasonable service of a civilized, not to say a Christian, people. And when I see that these things are not only tolerated but approved ; that the people are content to have it so, and that the clergy them- selves set up no higher standard : when I see many of my clerical brethren looking upon the Choral Service with absolute indifference, as if it were all a matter of taste — a dilettante amusement to be taken up or laid aside at the caprice of individuals : when I see, worse than this, the contempt displayed on the part of some of the older clergy for Church music and all things and persons associated therewith — as if the very ignorance of the art were a mark of dignity, and "intoning" (as they call it) were a questionable accomplishment, suited only to the curate or some other of the "inferior clergy:" when 2-3 I see, as I do see to my infinite cost continually, some clerical tourist coming into our own cathedral, and there, on the strength of a mere facility for picking up a tune, daring to join in a chant, or a response, or a chorus, after a fashion which would ensure his being summarily ejected from any country glee- club ; when I see and hear all this, can I do other- wise than protest against those principles which are daily fostering, as I believe they are, such glaring abuses ? And the most unsatisfactory part of the matter is that those among the clergy whom one would natu- rally expect to appreciate the Choral Service as it deserves — those learned, zealous, honest, self-denying men to whom we owe the restoration not of our churches only but of the Catholic Faith itself — even these have been led away, by plausible and popular theories, to do the cause of Church music an incal- culable amount of harm. On what principle they have done so must remain an enigma. That men should be conservative to the death on all points of doctrine and ceremonial, and suddenly turn down- right radicals the moment they handle questions of musical services, is a mystery which ordinary capa- bilities cannot fathom. The entire doctrine of congre- gational singing, as maintained by our High Church clergy, is as radical as it can be. It is a mere sacri- fice of sound principle to expediency — of intrinsic excellence to the capacities of a mob. People dearly love to hear themselves sing ; and because they will not take the trouble to learn to sing properly, the clergy provide them with a Service toned down to the level of the most unmusical worshipper, and invent a theory to justify it. And I should like to ask those of my High Church brethren who are pur- suing most conscientiously this phantom of a hearty Congregational Service — are they satisfied, after years and years of labour, with the result obtained ? Do their people all sing ? Have they yet disco vered am 24 system of music so simple that the whole congrega- tion can join in it ? And if they have, is the effect thus produced a desirable one ? Or is it an effect which one would rather not hear produced after all ? Are they contented, as a mere matter of education and good taste, that a body of intelligent worshippers should stand up Sunday after Sunday in their parish church, or even in a Cathedral, and drawl out such mild effusions as those dignified with the name of Troyte No. 1 and No. 2 ? The present rage among the High Church clergy for Gregorian Tones is another sign of radical ten- dencies. The whole body of musicians, past and present, have either openly or tacitly condemned them ; and that any number of amateurs should still uphold them is a mere repetition of the genuine radical croak that nobody understands his own business. The theory on this subject appears to be that, because the Mediaeval Church has handed down to us certain melodies, professing to have been received through S. Gregory the Great from some period of fabulous antiquity, therefore such are the only strains to which we nineteenth century Christians have any right to sing the Psalms. This is so ex- ceedingly childish as to be scarcely worth refuting. It ignores altogether the truth that Church music is an art, subject to small beginnings and gradual growth and perfect development just as any other art, and that, as a matter of fact, the fullest develop- ment of Church music took place not in the time of David, nor of the Jewish Rabbis, nor yet in that of S. Gregory the Great, but many centuries after these worthies were dead and buried. At any rate, if there was a prior development of the art, we have no records left to point to it. I suppose that the warmest admirer of the 2nd Tone would scarcely venture to attribute to it any great depth of musical feeling, or any tokens of a very masterly conception. And I cannot help thinking that S. Gregory of 25 blessed memory would hardly thank his friends for coupling his name with such remarkably primitive compositions, and handing him down to posterity as a giant among pigmies — as the genius of an age which knew nothing at all. The very sight of a Gregorian Tone tells us its history. Given the infancy of the art, and a clear, unoccupied field for cultivating it, and I cannot see what other com- mencement its pioneers could be expected to make than just that simple combination of tones and semi- tones which these melodies present to us. They are venerable and interesting as the first beginnings of a glorious art, but they are nothing more. They served their purpose in their day, and now we have done with them. All honour to S. Gregory for ad- vancing beyond his age, and doing the best he could with the means at his command. But when you claim for these strains the title of Catholic, and invest them with a sacred if not an inspired dignity, you appear to me to set common sense at defiance, and to uphold a theory which would cripple the re- sources and stunt the growth of every art and science under the sun. And the inconsistency with which these opinions are maintained is really too absurd. The very same persons who insist, on peril of your Churchmanship, upon a rigid use of Grego- rian Tones, and sneer at Anglican music for being " pretty," will sing you a hymn tune, by the side of which " New Sabbath" becomes severe, and Jones's Double Chant appears a highly classical composition. Once more, the reckless abuse lavished upon our Cathedrals and their Services is unmistakeably radical. No doubt these institutions are not all as they should be. No doubt there is a great deal of good music inadequately performed, and a still greater amount of bad music which never ought to be per- formed at all. There may also be much irreverence and slovenly behaviour, and apparent coldness of devotion ; but I do not know that there is more of 20 this in a cathedral than in other churches. Pos- sibly there might be less, in both cases, if the music were raised to a standard more worthy of the sacred building, more suggestive of solemn thoughts, and more nearly adapted to the capabilities of an educated Choir. All these are points in which improvement is needed, and the sooner it comes the better. But these are not the points singled out by those who abuse Cathedrals. On the contrary, the particular fault attacked is the very point in which our Cathedrals are doing a good and noble work. For with all their faults they are the only churches which have never trimmed to meet the popular clamour for Congregational music. Their ' ' Services' ' * and Anthems, if not always of the highest class one could desire, are beyond the reach of conceited dabblers, who think that they can do by the mere light of nature what others can do only after hard practice and painstaking. This is the real grievance, and long may it continue ! What our Cathedral * I use this word here in its technical sense, to denote a species of composition peculiar, for the most part, to Cathedrals, and especially distasteful to those High Churchmen who take a selfish rather thau a Catholic view of the design of Christian worship. Such persons, having made themselves conspicuous* by con- fessing their sins as if they were rather proud of them, and (in defiance of all musical propriety) by singing octaves with the trebles throughout the Psalms, are naturally annoyed on being considerably reduced in importance at the commencement of the Te Deum or Magnificat. This feeling is not confined to High Churchmen. The same impatience of decency and order — the same jealousy of the superior accomplishments of others, has in- duced many persons to attach themselves to the sect of the Ranters, or some other congregation in which one man has no more right to speak than another, but each one takes his turn as the spirit moves him. People who parade their devotions in the manner above alluded to can hardly be aware how ridiculous they are making themselves appear, how painfully they are distressing their neighbours, and how, in short, they are doing all that any man could do, who had come to church with the deliberate purpose of interrupting the music, aud bringing contempt upon the ordi- nances of religion. 27 Services might become, if their importance were duly recognised, and thousands of pounds were spent upon their improvement, a generation of money- getters like ourselves may scarcely hope to see. But it may be said of them even now, that they are with- out doubt the noblest Services in England, if not in all Christendom. With all their " Catholic strains, 5 ' and all their Congregational theories, our High Church amateurs have never yet produced a ritual which can be compared, either for beauty, or grandeur, or true devotional spirit, with a fair ordinary specimen of an English Cathedral Service. Our Cathedrals must not be abused. They are the guardians of all that is worth preserving in the English Eitual. Along with much that is valueless they have handed down to us works of priceless value — works which will survive, to the eternal praise of God, when " Hymns Ancient and Modern," and Congregational Tune Books, and all other such devices for popularizing what was never meant to be popular, shall have passed away. Bennett, Printer, Journal Office, Salisbury. 9