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Rh of the splendid service which Bohemian hymnody performed for Schwenkfeldianism. Indeed, of the bequest left to Christendom by the Bohemian hymn-writers, most of the Protestant churches of Germany and Great Britain have in some measure been beneficiaries. The German hymn-book of the followers of John Huss was a manual of devotions in hundreds of Schwenkfelder families during the weary years of unyielding persecution. The copies brought to America include all the editions issued from Schwenkfeld's death (1561) to the end of the Seventeenth Century. According to a Schwenkfelder chronicle written in Silesia in the Seventeenth Century by Hans Seibt, and supplemented and extended in America, Melchior Dehnst, a pious Schwenkfelder writer and transcriber was occupied (1660 ca. ) with the revision of a number of hymns in the Bohemian hymnal—his aim being to adapt them to Schwenkfeld's Confession of Faith. Balthaser Hoffmann also records, in a document which we shall quote in our next chapter, that this hymn-book was still in common use among the Schwenkfelders at the opening of the Eighteenth Century. Indeed, in the matter of arrangement, the hymn-books of the Schwenkfelders printed in America all retain the stamp of the quarto editions of the Bohemian hymnal.

We list here the various editions of the German hymn-book of the Bohemian Brethren since it served as an important source for the Schwenkfelder collections discussed in the remaining chapters of this work:

1531. Ein New Gcseng buchlen. Jungen Buntzel durch Georgen Wylmschwerer. 1531. 6to. Was the largest collection of German church hymns yet published. Contained 162 hymns, of which 143 were translations from the Bohemian, by Michael Weiss (e). Other editions: Ulm, 1538, and Ulm, 1539 (two editions').

1544. Ein Gesangbuch der Brüder in Behemen und Merherrn. Nürnberg, 1544. 8vo. Contained 181 hymns: 149 hymns of Michael Weiss and 32 hymns added by Johann Horn. Of these, 26 had been translated into German by Horn, who edited this hymn book.

1566. Kirchengeseng. First quarto edition of Bohemian hymn book (German). Contained 343 hymns. Of the hymns of the edition