Gibson Public Worship VII.

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CHAPTER VII.

Human Hymns—Instrumental Music.

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IN a previous chapter on this subject we brought down, in a brief review, the historical argument to the Reformation period in Europe, not because we deemed it necessary to our argument, but to expose the utter want of any proof from it of any authority for the use of human hymns in the public worship of God, in our own or any other church. Except for the necessity of consulting brevity, we might have given most interesting additional information as to the history of psalmody, both on the continent of Europe, in England, and in Scotland, where, at a very early period of the history of the Reformation, the Psalms of David, in the mother tongues, were introduced into the public worship of the Church, and largely sung publicly, and even privately, by all ranks, from the prince down to the peasant, and the artizan. But we have not the slightest proof that human hymns were ever used for this purpose. Much most valuable information on this head will be found in two numbers of Blackwood’s Magazine for April and May, 1818. The writer, whoever he was, had a complete knowledge of the subject; and the articles show great learning and research, and a much higher and much juster appreciation of the Psalms of David, and our several versions of them in England and Scotland, than some of our

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modern advocates for human hymns in the public worship of the sanctuary.

We may finish this part of the subject by the following summary:—

“It appears from these statements, 1st, That nothing but inspired songs were sung in the Church in the earliest times. 2d, That the introduction of hymns of human composition was an innovation introduced into the Christian Church after she had entered on a course of declension, which not only met with opposition, but was condemned by a Council of the Church so late as the year 561. 3d, That it was by the abettors of error that this was most practised, and that one reason why this was dreaded by the orthodox, was the use which was made of it for diffusing heretical opinions. 4th, That it was not till so late a Council as that of Toledo in 633, when it is generally admitted that Popery had become full blown, that it came to be approved of. 5th, That even then it was not defended by an appeal to apostolic authority, or as sanctioned by the practice of the early fathers of the Church; on the contrary, it is admitted that it had no countenance from antiquity, and the poetical compositions recommended are of no earlier date than the fourth century, in which Ambrose and Hilary flourished. Moreover, it is by an appeal to other innovations, such as forms of prayer and liturgies, that the new practice is sought to be vindicated, and by such a trifling argument as that the hymns and doxologies taken from Scripture were not wholly free from human additions, which they could scarcely be, unless they were sung in Hebrew. The question now at issue, or which is practically agitated, is not whether other poetical parts of Scripture, as well as the Psalms of David, may be sung in the public worship of God, but whether in public praise the Church is to employ only the inspired songs with which we are furnished in the Scriptures, or hymns of human composition or loose paraphrases of Scripture, which, if things progress as they are doing, threaten to supplant the Psalms or put them in the shade in most of the churches. Where, then, do the abettors of the practice of employing hymns of human composition in the public praise of God find their warrant for this? In the Bible? No, it is not to be found there. In the practice of the Christian Church in the days of her greatest purity? No; the evidence of anything of this kind in her best days is wanting; yea, the opposite, we find, is furnished. Where, then, is it found? In the same source to which

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Puseyites have gone to find stepping-stones to carry them back to Popery.”

In the conclusion of our first chapter on this subject, we said that we hoped in some succeeding pages to apply the principles above discussed and laid down to the questions of human hymns and instrumental music in the public worship of God, and to examine the alleged Scriptural and historical arguments in their favour, both in earlier and later times. This we have now done in relation to human hymns; and shall proceed, in a few remarks, to apply the principles and facts to the question of instrumental music in the public worship of God.

All Presbyterians who acknowledge the Westminster Confession of Faith as the confession of their faith, must receive the canon already so often adduced in these pages, viz., that nothing is to be introduced into the public worship of God but what “is prescribed in the Holy Scriptures.” We have applied this principle to the question of human hymns, and have proved that it excludes them from the public worship of God, as having neither authority nor warrant, either by express words, by necessary inference, or approved example. Does the same principle exclude the use of instrumental music in the public worship of God?

The answer to this question involves a slight modification in the application of the canon of the Westminster Confession of Faith, from that of its application to the question of human hymns, inasmuch as there is no shadow of Scripture warrant for the use of the latter in the Church of Christ, either Old Testament or New; though there is an apparent Scripture authority for the use of instrumental music; we say apparent, because we can show that though sanctioned in the worship of the Old Testament, under the

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then existing dispensation, in a system that was never intended to “remain,” but to “pass away,” and involving no moral perennial principle applicable, or even practicable to all churches, and nations, and all states and duties of the Church, whether missionary or fully gathered and organized, it is no authority to us under the now existing Christian dispensation. Before entering on this, we are willing to make the following admission, viz.:—that if human hymns be sanctioned in the public worship of God, those who sanction them cannot on any Scriptural ground object to the same use of organs, or any kind of instrumental music. Though both we hold to be contrary to the principles we have laid down, yet we believe that the use of human hymns is more objectionable than that of mere mechanical instruments; and if you allow the former, you cannot refuse the latter. The desire for both we believe to be very much humanistic and æsthetic, rather than divine, and dictated by the love—we do not say of the sensuous, but of the musical. The use of mechanical instruments in the worship of God, though not prescribed in Holy Scripture, and therefore contrary to the canon we have laid down, and manifestly conveying no tribute of rational praise to the Almighty, nor divine instruction to the worshipper, yet can convey no dangerous, sectarian, or heretical instruction.

Instead, therefore, of allowing any force to the allegation made in the outset of this hymn controversy in the Free Church, that the introduction of hymns had nothing to do with the question of instrumental music, and the introduction of organs to the Free Church, we hold, on the contrary, independently of the fact, that those who adopt the one almost always contend for the other; that instrumental music has some show of Scripture authority, while

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human hymns have none; and once admitted, you cannot, on any ground of principle, resist the introduction of the organ, harmonium, sackbut, dulcimer, or psaltery, and, as is frequent in England, flute, fife, or fiddle. In fact, the use of human hymns in the public worship of the sanctuary may be most pernicious. They have been so, may be so, and are so in numerous instances; and in their very nature are sectarian—injurious to the communion of saints—as necessarily conveying the sentiments of those who compose and adopt them, and not necessarily the truths or sentiments of the Inspired Record. This we have already demonstrated.

We venture to quote the following additional specimen of what may be done, and is done, by the use of human hymns, and which never could be done if the principles we advocate were maintained and acted upon:—

PERNICIOUS NONSENSE.

(To the Editor of the Times.)

Sir,—Mr G. F. Lee, of Directorium Anglicanum celebrity, writes to disclaim any connection with the Haydock Pig’s Head and Pat of Butter “Function.”

Perhaps your readers would be glad to know what connection the service described in the annexed extract has with that book to which Mr Lee has, I presume, sworn to conform—the Book of Common Prayer.

Sept. 17.

F. G. B.

“ELEVENTH ANNIVERSARY OF THE A.P.U.C.

“The Annual Commemoration commenced with Even-song at All Saints’ Church (Mr Lee’s), Lambeth, on the Eve of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary.” Here follows a most extraordinary farago of Popish puerility, and then the following hymn was sung as the processional:—

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“‘Hail! of light and joy the day,

Told of yore by sages;

Clouds of doubt have passed away,

After darkest ages.

Wave the censer! chant the song,

Loudly swell its chorus;

Mary’s banner, borne along,

Floats in triumph o’er us.

“‘Type to fact hath given place,

Gifts for every station;

Ave! Lady, full of grace,

Mother of salvation!

This her natal-day, who came,

Sun of Justice bringing,

Praise her work and love her name,

Rend’ring God thanksgiving.

“‘Fairest Pearl of Time’s broad sea,

Brightest Star of even,

More and better love we Thee,

Queen of earth and heaven!

Lead Thou to Thy Son and God,

Drear the way before us;

He Himself that path hath trod,

And His love is o’er us.

“‘Intercede when sin is strong,

Christ thy voice is heeding;

Desert tracks are parch’d and long,

Our desires misleading:

Pray a prayer that rise we may

When we fall or stumble;

So we wait the break of day,

Trusting, patient, humble.

“‘As times festal come and go,

Autumn’s tints are warning,

Faith, and love, and hope must grow

For great Easter’s dawning.

Thy sweet smile is for us still,

Victors homeward wending,

Then stand round God’s holy hill—

Share the song unending.’”

But while holding this opinion, we do not admit that the use of instrumental music in the public worship of God is authorised, much less “prescribed” to us in the Holy Scripture. No more can be pleaded for it than for the ceremonial worship of the Old Testament, now done away in Christ, and by our Lord’s direct authority in his interview with the woman of Samaria in these words: “Woman, believe me, the hour cometh when ye shall neither in this

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mountain, nor yet at Jerusalem, worship the Father. . . But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship Him in spirit and in truth; for the Father seeketh such to worship Him,”—words which are as applicable to organs as to the temple worship, as neither the one nor the other can be carried and planted and set up in every place, and at all times at which the heralds of salvation obey the command, “Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature, baptising them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, teaching them to observe all things, whatsoever I command you.”

An answer to alleged Scripture authority for instruments is well expressed by Dr Candlish. He says:—“I believe that it is a question which touches some of the highest and deepest points of Christian theology. Is the temple destroyed? Is the temple worship wholly superseded? Have we, or have we not, priests and sacrifices among us now? Is the temple or the synagogue the model on which the Church of the New Testament is formed? Does the Old Testament itself point to anything but ‘the fruit of the lips’ as the peace-offering or the thank-offering of gospel times? Is there a trace in the New Testament of any other mode of praise? For my part, I am persuaded that if the organ be admitted, there is no barrier, in principle, against the sacerdotal system in all its fulness—against the substitution again, in our whole religion, of the formal for the spiritual, the symbolical for the real.”

At all times, and in all places, you carry the psalms as easily as the gospels, and can sing the psalms as easily as you can read the gospels. This is all in the spirit of a religion fitted and intended to be universal, for the glory of God, and the salvation of man in every clime, in every age, whether in relation to savage or to sage.

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We do not think it necessary to enter at large into the argument against the use of organs or instrumental music in the worship of God. We have already shown that no Presbyterian adopting in sincerity, and above all, no minister of any church who in good faith has signed the Westminster Confession as the confession of his faith, can run in the teeth of the canon which declares that nothing is to be introduced into the public worship of God which is “not prescribed in Holy Scripture.”

Our views on this subject will be found stated pretty fully in an article in the Watchword for August, 1866, and which we beg here to insert. It is headed, “The Use of Organs and other Instruments of Music in Christian Worship Indefensible,” and is written in connection with a notice of a work of Dr Begg of Edinburgh, republishing a very valuable “Treatise on the Organ Question,” by Dr Begg’s father, the late venerable and able Dr James Begg, of Newmonkland, written at the time of the Organ Controversy in the West of Scotland, in 1808:—

Our limited space prevents our giving a notice of this important work suited to its merits. It discusses the subject of instrumental music in Christian worship in its various bearings—Scriptural, historical, practical, and constitutional—as well as in its existing relations to the Churches of the Reformation. It establishes on a clear ground what no Presbyterian can directly deny, viz., the great principle, that nothing is to be introduced into the worship of God, but what God Himself has “prescribed in Holy Scripture.” Any other principle in a matter affecting our immediate approach to the throne of the Eternal, and our communion with the Majesty of heaven and earth, the God of salvation, and the Judge of all, whether in the matter of praise or

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prayer, seems to us as contrary to all right notions even of natural religion and common sense, as of spiritual Christianity. That God should be supposed to be pleased with the frivolous æsthetics of frivolous men, (and the more gravely put forth and pompously practised, the more frivolous and puerile they are,) seems to us one of the strangest vagaries into which men of piety and intelligence have ever fallen. This is one among a multitude of other proofs, that in matters affecting the Most High God, His worship and service, and the way of acceptance with Him, the most highly cultivated, and the most superstitious and barbarous, are much on a level—viz., the mere subjects of the sensuous more or less refined, or more or less rude and barbarous. We shall, in the sequel, briefly advert to the way in which this portion of Dr Begg’s volume has been attempted to be dealt with. The whole volume is pervaded with the sound theology, fulness of Scripture knowledge, strong sense, shrewd sagacity, calm unruffled temper; but withal, when occasion requires, racy humour and keen satire, so characteristic of the pen of its esteemed author.

We cannot forbear singling out of this interesting volume for special recommendation, the admirable “Treatise on the Organ Question,” by Dr Begg’s father, the late venerable Dr James Begg of Newmonkland, written at the time of the organ controversy in the West of Scotland in 1808. It is an able and learned discussion of the whole question, in the clear, vigorous, terse, and manly style of that eminent minister, to whose ministrations we had in early youth the privilege of listening, glad to escape by a walk of four miles from the dreamy essays of the Moderate in whose district it was our lot to reside.

We cannot close this brief notice without calling atten-

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tion to an article professing to be a review of “The Organ Question, Pro and Con,” in the British and Foreign Evangelical Review for July, 1866.

We deeply regret that of late this periodical, so powerful in the hands of Dr Cunningham, has in a variety of articles assumed a tone of easy-going liberalism on certain questions, which to our minds is neither Scottish nor Presbyterian, and, what is more serious, not always very high toned in Scriptural argument. We fear that certain offshoots of Scottish Presbyterianism in England are not making good progress. We should like to see how they would look before the shades of John Knox and Thomas M‘Crie. We do not, however, affirm, because we believe the reverse, that the writer of the article in question is domiciled in England. It bears the marks of a certain school, who profess to be intimately acquainted with Pliny’s letter and Paul of Samosata, and to whom the discovery of a hymn or an organ in any so-called Christian congregation, orthodox or heretical, in the second or third century, would be as great a windfall as the remains of a wreck to some starving islanders. The writer professes to give the pros and cons of the question of organs as an impartial critic; and as the most outstanding proof of the impartiality of this self-constituted umpire, he devotes nine pages to the statement of Dr Begg’s arguments and illustrations, and eighteen pages to his own percontras. We have no faith in such impartiality, even when maintained “intact” by “inverted commas,” and no reliance on the arguments of any writer who does not openly and honestly declare his own convictions.

This candid critic endeavours to lay on Dr Begg the blame of raising a controversy on the subject, whilst his own review

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is headed by two other publications issued in 1856, ten years ago; whilst he cannot also fail to know that since that period, organs have been tolerated in the English Presbyterian Church, amidst periodical controversies on the subject; whilst the United Presbyterian presbyteries of London and Carlisle lately overtured in favour of organs; whilst the Church of Scotland is now ringing with organs; whilst we are told by him that a party in the Free Church are determined to have organs introduced. He does not tell us of what elements this latter party consists, whether any ministers or professors are in its ranks—men who have solemnly sworn that they will “follow no divisive courses from the worship as presently practised,” but will, “to the utmost of their power,” defend and maintain it. Had these particulars been given, we should have been better able to estimate the moral position and consistency of the party in question, if it does exist. But meantime it is clear that the controversy did not require to be raised, and was not raised by Dr Begg, but that a volume in defence of sound Christian principles of worship, however distasteful to this “impartial” critic, was highly seasonable and necessary.*

The following, in reference to this Free Church party, is the language of a partisan, whose “wish is father to the thought.” We have been much accustomed of late to this kind of thunder, by the advocates of change, and account it a slander on the Free Church. The writer says—“Anyhow,

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* The device of the reviewer is an old one on the part of the organ innovators. Dr Munro, of Manchester, complains of it in his speech, published in 1857. His words are—“It is certainly a bold species of tactics for the advocates of those parties who have introduced a new element into our worship, and thus thrown into our courts and congregations a bone of contention, to charge us who are resisting the admission and retention of this novel element, with disturbing the peace of the Church.”

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it is the beginning within the Free Church of Scotland of a strife of which we may not see the end. A challenge thus boldly given to all, and every one within her pale—and their number is notoriously not small—who conscientiously deem instrumental aids in worship neither unscriptural nor unlawful, can scarcely fail, we fear, (we hope?) to be ere long taken up by some like eager, and better furnished combatant on the other side.” And yet this is the language of a writer who can follow it up with the words, “We would desire to be considered as taking our place, not at the bar, but on the judicial bench.” We fear the writer desires in this more than sensible men will grant.

His very first statement of the argument of Dr Begg, and those who hold his views, is a mis-statement. Their thesis is not as he affirms. “1. That the use of instrumental aids in Christian worship is unauthorised by the Word of God.” Stating it thus he has a very easy task in hand, as easy as to show that animal sacrifices were authorised by the Word of God. But their thesis is that instrumental music is not “prescribed in Holy Scripture,” in Christian worship. If he maintains the propriety of the use of instrumental music in the worship of God, he is, as a Christian and Presbyterian, bound to show that it is “prescribed in Holy Scripture” to the New Testament Church. This he will not attempt. But he should, as sitting on the “judicial bench,” have declared that this Dr Begg’s opponents were bound to prove.

The article has one advantage, that it shows how very little the most eager and painstaking criticism can do to make out an argument for the use of organs in Christian worship:—

1st. It admits and cannot deny that there was no organ in the synagogue worship.

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2d. It admits and cannot deny that there was no such thing as an organ heard of, in Christian worship, for six or seven hundred years after the birth of Christ.

3d. It admits and cannot deny that the use of organs in Christian worship was condemned by the early Christian fathers, even down to the time of Augustine.

4th. It admits and cannot deny that the organ was condemned by the divines of the Reformation, and even denounced in the homilies of the Church of England. It tries to turn the edge of these outstanding facts by a special pleading addressed to men’s æsthetic tastes and imaginings, and couched in high sounding language, fit for the latitude of Rome or Vienna? We think the writer might offer his next contribution to the Dublin Review. We promise him a cordial welcome—we could almost point out an easy channel of access.

There is only one part of his defence of organs which we shall notice, viz., the attempt to turn aside the Scriptural argument as maintained by Dr Begg and others. In truth, the attempt has been anticipated in substance already. The writer says on the “con” to Dr Begg, but the “conamore” to his opponents—“1. As to the question of Scriptural authority. It is so far at least satisfactory, that by the admission alike of all, instrumental aid in the worship of God had once at least a divine sanction.” An umpire on the “judicial bench” should be impassable to “satisfaction” or “dissatisfaction.” But we meet this statement as a pleading for such “aid” by the fact that Abel’s sacrifice of a firstling of the flock had a divine sanction. May similar sacrifices now be lawfully regarded as having divine sanction in the Christian congregation? The same answer meets all that is said about the use of musical instruments

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in the psalms;—organs, timbrels, loud cymbals in the dance—for the same psalms say, (Psal. lxvi. 13, 15,) “I will go into thy house with burnt-offerings. . . . I will offer unto thee burnt-offerings of fatlings, with the incense of rams; I will offer bullocks with goats.” If the argument be good, go through with it. We demur to the definition by the writer of the word psalm, but have not space to refute it. One curiosity in this line we must notice. The writer says:—

“Without it (aid of instruments) you cannot sing one of the longer psalms through at all, the 18th or the 89th, for instance, not to speak of that grand and impressive utterance, which alone can do those matchless productions of the Divine Spirit justice. In point of fact, they never are thus sung—sung continuously to the end, sung as their divine Author gave them, without such aid.”

Did the Reviewer ever hear them thus sung even with such aid? And does he seriously believe that any Christian congregation, even as a musical treat, would listen from day to day while the great organ of Haarlem itself played through the 119th Psalm? Yet this is the argument that is to settle the question of organs in the Christian congregation! The writer says again:—

“The argument from the Confession of Faith must stand or fall with that from Holy Scripture. The prohibition of any form or mode of worship not appointed in the Word, manifestly can have no bearing on a practice which, as we have shown, has the express recognition in the Divine Scriptures. It is explicitly sanctioned in the Old Testament, and it is not forbidden in the New.”

On this we can only remark briefly, in addition to what we have already stated—

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The Confession of Faith says nothing on the subject directly; although, as Dr Begg has proved, it condemns, and was intended to condemn, the use of instruments by implication, as well as all other Popish corruptions of Christian worship. It states on ground of Scripture, the great principle that to make anything lawful, the organ or anything else, it must be “prescribed in Holy Scripture.” Is this admitted? If so, and if organs were authorised and prescribed, and must so continue, then the Christian Church for 800 years openly resisted the direct command of God. Our Church has done so since the Reformation, and our ministers all swear that they will defend this. Our missionaries do the same, and the Church must now no more send forth her missionary army without a band of well-appointed organists, and a train of noble organs, than our armies must go forth against our enemies without their trained bands of artillerymen, and guns of scientific size and form.

We may make one remark on the averment that the use of musical instruments in the worship of God is not condemned in the doctrinal creeds of the Reformation, not even in Scotland. “Doctrinal creeds” deal with matters of doctrine; and the Confession of Faith lays down the doctrine that nothing is to be introduced into the worship of God but what is “prescribed in Holy Scripture.” Does the writer expect “doctrine” to be illustrated by every detail of musical instruments, crosses, incense, dancing, etc., etc.? Does he really believe, in opposition to the clearest facts, that the Reformed Church of Scotland had neither opinion nor feeling on the subject of instrumental music in worship? It is painful to have to expose this small sophistry.

We are sorry we have not space to expose the fallacies

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involved in the attempt to drag in the authority of recent proceedings in the Free Presbytery of Glasgow, as sanctioning the writer’s perverted use of Old Testament authority. Because that Presbytery asserted some use of the Old Testament, and especially its authority in the ten commandments of the moral law—since most of its members hold that all moral principles therein divinely enjoined, and all moral social duties therein divinely approved—are binding still, and refused to admit that every jot and tittle of it is annulled, abrogated, abolished, therefore they must be held to the proposition that all, even outward and ceremonial things, in every point and particular, not excepting, we suppose, “blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine linen, and goat’s hair, and ram’s skins dyed red, and badgers’ skins,” etc., etc., not specially forbidden in the New Testament, are lawful and authorised in the worship of God in the Christian Church!! We doubt if they will unanimously agree to such a use of their views. God in His providence determined the whole question by destroying Jerusalem and its temple, scattering its people, and making it impossible for the followers of Christ to continue a sectarian worship, depending on any mere material accompaniments, and practically demonstrating that His people may and ought to “worship Him in spirit and in truth,” in every place, and at all times, where two or three can meet together. We would humbly advise the proper occupier of the “judicial” chair of the British and Foreign Evangelical Review to put in his protest against doctrines that open the way clear, broad, and unentangled—we do not say to all the pomp of Prelacy, but to the whole ritual of Rome itself. Its outward paraphernalia are not expressly prohibited in the New Testament. The way

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to Rome is open if the doctrines of this article can be maintained; and however subversive of our whole Presbyterian principles this theory may be, it is at all times most agreeable to corrupt human nature, and especially, to the musical fraternity of this self-gratifying age, vastly inviting. Rome will not come to us, but we can go to her.

The article winds up by giving under five heads what it calls the status questionis, which is preceded by a disclaimer of giving “any decided judgment in the case, either for or against.” Yet with strange self-deception, every statement plainly indicates the leanings of the writer, rather than the actual state of the question; and that, too, with tolerable bitterness. One question he has not raised, viz., Does God command, or demand, of all men, poor or rich, to worship Him with such instruments of music as they can procure—organs, fiddles, flutes, bagpipe, or Jews-harps, as the case may be; for no man can tell what was the actual form of the musical instruments of the Jews? Unless the advocates for instrumental music in the worship of God take up the ground that the rich and poor must worship separately, and that the gratification of using organs is for the rich alone, they cannot suppose our words a caricature.

Finally, if the state of the question be, What is most likely to minister gratification to the mere love of pleasant sounds, common to man with beasts and birds? then the organists must carry the day. But if the question with a human soul be, Is my communion with God in praise best maintained by raising my spirit with my own voice to God, or in being distracted by the sound of an instrument played, it may be, and generally is, by a godless hand? we shall leave our readers to decide it. We strongly advise Presbyterians to study Dr Begg’s volume. We should like to see a deliberate

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and detailed attempt to answer it on Scriptural grounds; but inasmuch as honesty is better than æsthetics, we should like to see this attempt made by one who shall make it plain that he has the courage and honesty to follow out his conviction, and who shall, at least, come into court with clean hands.

In connection with this, we beg also strongly to recommend a publication entitled: “The Organ Question: Statements by Dr Ritchie and Dr Porteous for and against the use of the Organ in Public Worship, in the proceedings of the Presbytery of Glasgow, 1807-8; with an Introductory Notice by Robert S. Candlish, D.D., Edinburgh. Edinburgh: Johnstone & Hunter. London: Groombridge & Sons; J. Nisbet & Co. 1856.”

From the “Introductory Notice by Dr Candlish,” we beg leave to make the following additional extracts:—

“I wish I had for a little the quiet ear of our friends who are occasioning, if I may not say causing, the discussion of this subject in Presbyterian Church Courts. I would like to point out to them the very serious responsibility which they unwittingly incur. I am not easily frightened by the name of schism, nor would I frighten others, but there can be no harm in a timely warning; and the warning is timely, at any rate, for as yet no one, I believe, is irrevocably committed.

“In the first place, let the peculiar constitution of Presbyterian Churches be kept in view. Where Congregationalism prevails, either avowedly, as among the great body of English Nonconformists, or virtually, as in the English Establishment, uniformity of worship is not necessarily a condition of union. Among our Independent brethren great diversity may be tolerated, for no one is responsible for what another does; and in the Church of England all sorts of hymns are allowed, and the service is conducted in all sorts of styles, from the richest ritualism to the baldest and barest routine. On the Congregational system, every pastor with his people may take his own way—one using instrumental music, and another condemning the use of it—and yet the harmony of any association they form among themselves

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may remain unbroken. This may or may not be a recommendation of that system. That is not now the question. It is enough to say that it is inconsistent with Presbyterianism. Those Presbyterians who disapprove, on conscientious and Scriptural grounds, of a particular mode of worship—as, for instance, of the organ—cannot divest themselves of responsibility by merely excluding it from their own congregations. They are bound to resist the introduction of it in all the other congregations of the Church as well as in their own.

“Hence I would suggest, in the second place, the impossibility of the question, if it be once raised, being left to the decision of individual kirk-sessions or congregations. It is easy, of course, for those who are ready to sanction the use of instrumental music, or who reckon it a matter of indifference, to consent to its being left as an open question, on which congregations may agree to differ from one another. But if there be any, as there undoubtedly are many, in all the British Presbyterian Churches, who, rightly or wrongly, have come to entertain strong convictions against the lawfulness of the practice, it is impossible for them to acquiesce in the introduction of it, even into congregations to which they do not themselves belong. On Presbyterian principles, it is unreasonable to ask them to do so. A controversy in the Courts of the Church becomes in these circumstances inevitable; and if it is an unnecessary controversy—if it is a controversy which on either side might be compromised or avoided without violence to conscience—it involves more or less the guilt of schism, or at least of what tends to schism.”

“All who are conscientiously opposed to it, who regard it as inexpedient and unlawful, unauthorised and unscriptural, must feel themselves bound, as Presbyterians, to do their utmost against a proposal to have it even tolerated. In their own judgment it is an act of will-worship; and there is no plea of conscience on the other side to which they might be bound to let their own judgment defer. Nay, were it ultimately settled by a majority of the Church collective, that the question should be left an open one, still, in the face of a minority holding a decided opinion on the subject, peace would be impossible. The controversy would be handed down to kirk-sessions and congregations, disputes would be interminable, and, in all probability, almost as often as a party of strong-minded instrumentists succeeded in erecting an organ-loft, and displaying the ‘kist o’ whistles,’ some unmanageable handful of impracticable psalm-singers would be driven away in sore disgust, to set up a taber-

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nacle of their own, where they might lift up their unaided voices in the praise of God, after the good old fashion of their fathers.”

Again—

“Surely, if we must fall out among ourselves, we might find some worthier cause, in a day of rebuke and blasphemy, than a wrangle about such a poor innovation on our hereditary mode of worship as our organic friends are for introducing. That it is an innovation, no intelligent man can deny; for I will not condescend to recognise intelligence in any man who at this time of day would quibble about pitch-pipes and tuning-forks, or who could make game of the whole affair by some abstract and recondite disquisition on the identity of wind instruments, whether living or dead.”

Without determining whether the “kist o’ whistles” men or the “psalm-singers” are the “strong-minded men,” in any other sense than the wilful men, we remark that these statements of Dr Candlish are as applicable to the question of hymns now raised in the Free Church as to the question of organs. We do not think it out of place here to call, and to press upon the attention of those throughout our country, whether in the Highlands or Lowlands, who object to both, what they must expect if once the United Presbyterians are joined to the Free Church, carrying with them their book of 468 hymns, and some doxologies, and their organ party, Dr Cairns at the head of them, as the following facts will show, viz., that when the organ question was discussed at the meeting of Synod, May, 1867, as reported in the Daily Review, May 15, 136 members voted for immediate permission to set up organs, and 232 voted it was inexpedient in present circumstances (during Union negotiations); Dr Cairns being in the majority, declared that, as he had voted with those who held the views

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of the minority nine years ago, but he held them still, and added, “And which, if I were on the floor of any united church, I would state afresh, and endeavour, to the best of my ability, to defend.” We ask, what confidence can be placed in men conducting negotiations for union, avowing one set of principles at one time, putting them aside at another, and resuming them again when a “more convenient season arises?” and that, too, after avowing, as they did in the Union Committee, their acceptance of the words of the Confession of Faith, that nothing was to be introduced into the public worship of God but what is “PRESCRIBED in Holy Scripture.” In the course of the debate, Dr M‘Ewan of Glasgow, who proposed the motion to grant the prayer of certain memorialists for liberty to set up organs, censured the policy of delay, and most pertinently counselled “outspoken candour,” intimating that their “policy” would not shut the mouths of “Dr Begg and Dr Gibson.” This witness is true. We wish we could say that it was true of certain other Free Church men who seem willing to act on the “policy” of Dr Cairns.

Dr R. Buchanan has expressed similar views to those of Dr Candlish. It is with deep grief we are forced, however, to say, from the ease with which some of our friends have consented to make “open questions,” and to find no difficulty with differences in matters of faith and doctrine, which we deem fundamental, and which they once strenuously maintained and contended for, that we hardly expect they will make any stand, either on the question of human hymns, or instrumental music, in the public worship of God, which they will assert, as they have done of the doctrine of the civil magistrate, and as some

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occupying no inferior position have asserted of the doctrine of the Extent of the Atonement, that it is “outside the Confession of Faith.”*

It is unnecessary here to enter on the historical argument on this subject. It is universally admitted that organs were not introduced into the worship of the Christian Church earlier than the eighth century. There is no instrumental music employed even on the highest occasions, and there is no organ in the Pope’s own chapel, for one, among other reasons, that it would be an innovation—a reason which has not weighed with them in matters of much higher importance.

Those who wish to see this part of the subject discussed and settled with great ability and learning, both as respects the Church of God in general, and in our own country in particular, cannot do better than consult the writings of Dr Porteous, and of the two Drs Begg, father and son, to which reference has already been made.

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* Since writing the above, we have seen an article on “Instrumental Music in Public Worship,” in the “Presbyterian,” for October. Its object seems to be to “deprecate a discussion” (on the subject) “so likely to produce irritation and distrust,” and “to indicate some reasons, in consideration of which, apart from the strict merits, men of all opinions might unite in maintaining the status quo.” The article is characterised by the spirit now so common with those who support it, and whose views it supports, viz., the low tone of expediency in church questions, rather than by any indication to maintain them on the ground of Scripture, of constitutional principle, and personal pledged obligation. But we would suggest to Dr Rainy, that if his views on the Union question be carried out as soon as he and his coadjutors desire, he may save himself the trouble, as far as the United Church is concerned, of deprecating “discussion” either “on the merits” or on its expediency. The facts which we have previously stated show that it will then be a foregone conclusion. It must, at the least, be left an “open question,” if a question at all. We venture to hint to our “large-minded” friends that they will neither build up, nor hold up, nor shut out the enemy from “the walls of Jerusalem” by such halting and temporising counsels,

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We earnestly pray that our own Church may yet prove a faithful witness against all unscriptural innovation, and latitudinarian opinion and practice, whether in doctrine, worship, or discipline—and that no desire to “lengthen her cords,” and no professions of wider love, will seduce her to be a party in reality to paving the way to Popish or Prelatic ritualism, if not bold rationalism, by admitting either into her creed or practice anything not “prescribed in Holy Scripture,” or by rejecting anything that is taught and prescribed by the same great authority—the only ark of safety or charter of freedom, “Ye shall know the truth, and the TRUTH shall make you free.”

We may conclude this chapter by an extract from the September Number of the Benefactor. It details the tactics of Dr Pusey and his party for bringing about union with the Church of Rome. We may give it as a caution to our hymnologists, and our scarcely concealed apologists for organs, or rather as a warning to true Free Church men, clerical or lay, to beware of the first inlets to ritualism in the admission of anything into the public worship of God not “prescribed in the Holy Scriptures.”

The following is what the Benefactor gives as the summing up of Dr Pusey’s advice to his friends to hold what they have already gained:—

“This, then, is the thing to do. Let the advanced posts remain as they are. Let each of those which is a little behind, and only a little, gradually take up the same position, and let this process be carried on (only without haste or wavering) down to the last in the chain. A story is told of a dishonest baker who kept himself and his family at a nominal cost by purchasing the very smallest leg of mutton to be had, and exchanging this for the next in size sent him by his customers, and repeating the process until he had succeeded in obtaining nearly twenty pounds of meat for his original six or seven, without any one customer

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being able to detect the fraud in his own case. The cheating baker may point a parable as the unjust steward has done, where there is only the ordinary parish routine, but, where the preaching is honest and sound, let a gradual change be brought in. A choral service, so far as Psalms and Canticles are concerned, on some week-day evening, will train people to like a more ornate worship, and that which began as an occasional luxury will be felt a regular want. Where there is monthly communion, let it be fortnightly; where it is fortnightly, let it be weekly; where it is weekly let a Thursday office be added. Where all this is already existing, candlesticks with unlighted candles may be introduced. Where these are already found, they might be lighted at even-song. Where so much is attained, the step to lightening them for the Eucharistic office is not a long one. Where the black gown is in use in the pulpit on Sundays, let it disappear in the week. The surplice will soon be preferred, and will oust its rival. It is easy for each reader to see how some advance, all in the same direction, can be made, and that without any offence taken. Only two things should be most carefully observed as a rule. First of all, nothing should be introduced without a plain and frank statement to the people. Secondly, the innovations ought to be confined at first to extra services put on for this very purpose.”

How exactly do some Presbyterians, English and Scotch, United and Free, follow this sage counsel in the matters of hymns, harmoniums, and some even of organs. It is more sage, however, than Christian.