well known that they have been denounced by Southey in terms of righteous reprehension. In his life of Wesley he says, "Madness never gave birth to combinations of more monstrous and blasphemous obscenity than they did in their fantastic allegories and spiritualizations. In such freaks of perverted fancy the abominations of the Phallus and the Lingam have unquestionably originated; and in some such abominations Moravianism might have ended had it been instituted among the Mingrelian or Malabar Christians, where there was no antiseptic influence of surrounding circumstances to preserve it from putrescence. Fortunately for themselves, and for that part of the heathen world among whom they have laboured, and still are labouring with exemplary devotion, the Moravians were taught by their assailants to correct this perilous error in time" (vol. i., 173). It may be said that this does not allude to the hymns, nor does it directly; but it shews that the language and ideas current in the hymnology of the Moravians were familiar to them in more sober prose. However, Southey has something to say about the hymns:-"The most characteristic parts of the Moravian hymns are too shocking to be inserted here; even in the humours and extravagances of the Spanish religious poets, there is nothing which approaches to the monstrous perversion of religious feeling in these astonishing productions. The copy which I possess is of the third edition printed for James Hutton, 1746." Southey's authority then was the very book now in our hands. What would he have said if he had seen the Third Part, or the fourth on our list? We cannot tell: but it is quite certain that it goes very far beyond anything in the volume which he consulted. Southey gave much offence to some of the brethren by his remarks, but very unnecessarily as we think. In the performance of a literary labour, he came into contact with these monstrosities, and as a faithful historian he records their existence, gives specimens of their character, and adds an opinion of their tendency. He never intended to throw obloquy upon his own generation by what he did, any more than we do. It is a simple fact that the hymns exist, and that for a number of years the books in which we find them appear to have been the only hymn books used by the English Moravians. James Hutton, who published most of them, was what we may call the authorized Moravian publisher, as any one will see who looks at the lists of his books. Not then to reproach modern Moravians, but to shew to what unlicensed spiritual enthusiasm may lead; in a word, to teach this age by the follies of the past, is our motive in reviving the memory of these hymns. The profanity, indelicacy, and absurdity which abound in these pages are re ferred to by us, not to point a satire, but in sober sadness as humiliating evidences of the lengths to which even piety itself may go when not under proper restraints. To our minds, such conceptions and language appear neither fitted to refine the heart, nor to elevate the mind. Incessant and fervid allusions to gross material images may work powerfully upon the feelings and imagination, but can hardly inform the understanding or regulate the life. We do not believe such things consistent with the dignity of Christian worship, and we do not imagine that such coarse familiarity would be acceptable to the great head of the Church. The fault which we have in view is more or less common to the hymn writers of the first half of the last century, but to call it a vice of the age is not to justify it, but to condemn the age. There are plenty of hymns in Dr. Watts which none of his most ardent admirers would venture to propose for public worship, because the sensuous imagery of Solomon's Song is not throughout fitted to the taste of our times. But Dr. Watts is harmless compared with the Moravian writers, who veil nothing and say everything which can be said. Our quotations are unfortunately confined to specimens of the silly doggerel with which the books are full, or to passages which may serve to illustrate what we teach, one point excepted. Therefore, although very unbecoming, we may cite it as an example of language which in our judgment is beneath the dignity of a solemn hymn, these lines, "I'm now his dear sinner, and love him who came On raggs in the stable in mean Bethlehem, Who liv'd a poor beggar, and died as a thief: By his wounds in all things I meet with relief."-p. 506. Of course men may call themselves "Christ's dear sinners" if they will, or "happy sinners," as in the next example, but we do not recommend such epithets : "Immanuel! thy blood-stream red The flock thy torments purchas'd: Thy willing slave I will abide, Take me to thee, Thy blood cover Me all over, My heart's lover! I'm thy ransom'd, happy sinner."-p. 508. Take another specimen : "My Jesus is my love, I am his little dove Which flies upon his hands, Which wants herself to hide In that his bleeding side."-p. 548. Figures are even drawn from the process of digestion : "This orphan-flocks both heart and head Was like the pasture they did use; But when Lamb's blood and life once fill The heart, this soon gives other chyle!"-p. 623. [We have a similar version of the same hymn in No. 7, part ii., p. 13.] The hymn commencing Whene'er Him I can eat, It is for me most wholesome,' -p. 700. seems to point in the same direction, but is, in some places, worthy of all the censures of Southey. This curious hymn reappears with modifications in the large authorized book of 1754, and again in the small authorized book of 1769. It contains a sort of biography of Christ, but some of its epithets are very much softened down in the second and third impressions. Perhaps a specimen or two of its naïvetes common to all the three books, may be not unacceptable: Ver. 7.-"Methinks I see him there In Joseph's tabernacle, As lab'ring people are ; Now he works with the sickle: Or walks and drives the plough. Ver. 9-" And now comes to my sight Some honey, bread, milk, fishes, With an uncommon grace!" But not to stay too long in these old pastures, we shall dismiss the volume, with an example of the beautiful simplicity of some of these compositions, only omitting the notes: "Isroel! to thy Husband turn again; He will deliver thee from curse and ban. Out of the Golus and from sin set free. And Boruch habbo b'schem Adonai sing!"-p. 805. We can hardly say of such hymns, what the poet says of the virgins, confessors, martyrs, and widows, more particularly the latter: "Hence virgins, confessors, And martyrs so scorned, True widows, like flowers Thy church have adorned So prettily, dear Lamb, for thee."-p. 809. [This strange hymn is reproduced, but a little altered, in No. 7, part i., p. 122]. We now come to No. 4 on our list, or Part iii. of the collection. The others are smaller books, scarcely four inches high by two and three quarters wide, whereas a rebound copy of this measures about six inches and a quarter by three inches and three quarters. There is another difference; the former are numbered and paged consecutively, but the latter is numbered and paged independently. Finally, the former parts are printed as poetry, but this, like many German and Swedish hymn books, as prose. This book contains a preface, a rhyming version of twenty-two articles from the Augsburg confession, 119 other pieces, an index at p. 114, and a second index at the end. The last page of the hymns is 168. We are thus particular in describing the book because of its extreme rarity, and to distinguish it from the second edition. The editor seems to feel that some explanation is necessary, and among other things says, "As the English tongue has scarce any diminutives, and yet they have a certain elegance and effect, both in language in general, and in the German particularly, as implying not so much the littleness as the dearness, etc., of a thing: therefore we have ventured, in some instances, to introduce the German termination-lein. That our translation, as well as the original, has words now and then from the Latin, Greek, and Hebrew, needs no apology, since as it is obvious, that the conciseness and neatness of the expression was the inducement thereto, so they are at the same time explained underneath” At the commencement of this article we gave a specimen or two from the book before us, and on this account, as well as not to sicken the reader, we shall quote but little more. Blood, and wounds, side-holes, and nail-holes, are constantly recurring expressions, and the tone throughout is as rapturous and extravagant as can well be imagined, e.g. : "When is she quite to thy heart's wish, Swim on, as in the sea a fish! When lost in thee for ever!"-p. 19. This ad aperturam libri; and on the next page, "What! who is God? a carpenter, As th' whole world's reconciler." In a paraphrastic summary of the second chapter of Acts, we are informed, "Astonish'd each his neighbour view'd, Do they the Parthians' language know? Nay Median, they of Media cry'd; Some, we have Cappadocish heard. "Tis (said the Proselytes of Rome) Pure Latin; No, 'tis Cretish, some. Arabs affirmed, 'tis Arabick; Others, 'tis what the Jews now speak."-p. 24. And a few verses further on, Peter says, NEW SERIES.-VOL. V., NO. X. T |