Page:The Methodist Hymn-Book Illustrated.djvu/30

 II

THE HYMNS OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH

facts concerning the Church's praise will be of interest in such a volume as this. The subject may be pursued with growing delight in the pages of Dr. Julian's monumental Dictionary of Hymnology. The vastness of the subject can be gauged when we remember that we have above 400,000 hymns, in more than two hundred different languages and dialects.

Augustine says a hymn 'is a song with praise of God. If thou singest and praisest not God, thou utterest no hymn. A hymn, then, containeth these three things: song, and praise, and that of God. Praise, then, of God in song is called a hymn'. Gregory Nazianzen put it thus: Modidata laus est hymnus A definition in the Cottonian MS. says a hymn must be praise of God or of His saints, be capable of being sung, and be metrical. Lord Selborne, in his Book of Praise, holds that 'a good hymn should have simplicity, freshness, and reality of feeling; a consistent elevation of tone, and a rhythm easy and harmonious, but not jingling or trivial. Its language may be homely, but should not be slovenly or mean. Affectation or visible artifice is worse than excess of homeliness; a hymn is easily spoilt by a single falsetto note. Nor will the most exemplary soundness of doctrine atone for doggerel, or redeem from failure a prosaic, didactic style.'

If that standard were strictly applied, all our hymn-books would shrink in size, and many of her cherished treasures would lose their place In the Church's praise. Happily for us all, it is not possible to apply it.

Lord Byron's tribute to the first great leader of church music gains new meaning as we trace his influence in succeeding ages. 'David's lyre grew mightier than his throne,' conveys after all but a faint expression of the ever-growing influence of that