Against Musical Instruments in Public Worship
by R. L. Dabney
Transcribed and slightly edited by Chris Coldwell—for The Blue Banner Web site, home of the Blue Banner Newsletter; The First Presbyterian Church of Rowlett, TX; and The Westminster Forum, moderated by Pastor Richard Bacon. This article is © 1996 by The Blue Banner.
- Letter to the editor, Watchman And Observer, Richmond VA, February 22, 1849.
- Review of Dr. John L. Girardeau's Instrumental Music in Public Worship.
ORGANS
From the Watchman And Observer, Richmond VA
February 22, 1849, Volume IV, No. 28.
It has always been
common among the advocates of this Popish mode of worship, to meet the
objections of simple minded Protestants to the organ, with the retort that
their scruples were the relics of fanatical prejudice, and rustic ignorance.
Such objections have been treated almost with levity and ridicule, as if they
were contrary to taste, refinement and light, although the reading world
knows, that they decided the minds of the wisest and most learned
Reformers; the fathers of Protestantism. The sensible and just remarks of
"Inquirer," in a late number of your paper, under the modest
form of doubts, have presented objections to the organ, too solid, too
rational, and pious to be thus lightly treated. They cannot fail of having
some effect on every evangelical mind. It is not my purpose to attempt to
do again, what Inquirer has done so well, by stating the scriptural
and historical objections to the use of this instruments, in Protestant
worship. But my object is to vindicate the great body of the Protestant
church, and the Fathers of Protestantism, from the charge of ill taste,
rudeness and blind prejudice, in their opposition. It is not strange that men,
such as the present advocates of the organ in Presbyterian churches in
America, should bring such a charge against such men; many of them
educated amidst the richest specimens of the fine arts in the old world,
their youth imbued with the spirit of a gorgeous and poetic age? Is it not
rather queer, that the ephemeral aristocracy of our trading towns, whose
high life took its rise between the stilts of the plough, or behind the
tradesman's counter, only a generation or two back, who perhaps, never
saw or heard an instrument that deserved to be called an organ,
and whose taste would not suffice to distinguish a painting of the greatest
masters, from the efforts of our peripatetic portrait-takers in these
backwoods, or to discern between the eccentric voluntaries of one of our
boarding-school misses, elevated into a temporary organist, and a symphony
of Handel, should be charging rusticity on such men as the
Reformers and founders of Protestant churches. Men educated amidst the
splendors of the fine arts, in the Augustan age of Popery, and accomplished
with all the polite learning of their age? My purpose is to retort the charge
of bad taste on the advocates of organs, and to show that their introduction
into Protestant worship is incongruous with its spirit, and contrary to the
true principles of musical science, and musical taste.The music of an organ
may be appropriate to Popish worship, and may be in good taste in a
Popish cathedral; and yet may be in wretchedly ill taste, when applied to
Protestant worship. All will admit, that to imitate blindly, the
fashions of the higher classes, without regard to those considerations of
fitness, which render them appropriate and tasteful in those whom we
follow, is the plainest mark of false taste and vulgarity. For example; we
may be informed that Queen Victoria wears, with her evening dress, the
thinnest slippers of white Satin. The young miss who should therefore
conclude, that her feet would be appropriately arrayed in similar
shoes, for a ride on horseback, through our country mud, to one of our
country churches, would display a ludicrous instance of false taste. We may
be told that Prince Albert sports no boots but those radiant with patent
varnish, in St. James' Park. To adopt a similar article for hunting or
walking boots, to traverse the mud of Virginia, would be a piece of vulgar
imitation, unworthy of any one, above the sable beaux, who, in
the streets of Richmond, so successfully ape, and even out-do, the
distinguishing characteristics of the "Distingues."Now these are just
illustrations of the false taste shown by the Protestant church, when she
apes Popery, in the use of the organ. The instrument is appropriate to the
spirit of papal worship; but there is an essential difference between that
worship and ours, which makes our blind use of their favorite instrument, a
most unfortunate instance of vulgar imitation. Popish worship is addressed
to the senses, and the imagination through the senses. According to the
Papists' own theory of his worship, the mass is a grand Action. It is all in
an unknown tongue; but this matters not: he asserts that even though there
were not an articulate word pronounced in any language, the solemn drama
would convey its instructions to the heart, through the genuflections, the
pantomime, the adoration of the priests, and the varying harmonies of the
music. Their theory of church music is just the same. The hymns are in an
unknown language: if the worshipper heard every syllable articulated, he
would not understand the ideas that are sung, nor does it matter that he
should. The sentiment of devotion is conveyed sufficiently, by the character
of the music.But the theory of
Protestant religious music is, or ought to be, essentially different. We
appeal to the understanding and to those intelligent emotions, which are
produced by the understanding on the heart. We sing articulate, intelligent
words, in a familiar language, conveying to every hearer, instructive ideas
and elevating sentiments. The articulation of words sung, is the
very essence and soul of our musical worship. We recognize the music only
as an accessory, to aid in impressing the ideas it accompanies; for we do
not believe there is any more religion in the sensations of melody and
harmony, separately considered, than in the posture of the declaimer. We
conceive that it is only by accompanying intelligent religious ideas, that they
can produce any religious effect. The scripture represents religious music as
the vehicle of religious instruction, and imply the necessity of distinct
articulation. "I will sing with the spirit, and I will sing with the
understanding also, else when thou shall bless with the spirit, how
shall he that occupieth the room of the unlearned, say Amen at they giving
of thanks—seeing he understandeth not what thou sayest:" lst Corinthians
14; 15 and 16. "Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom,
teaching and admonishing one another in psalms, and hymns, and
spiritual songs"—Col. 3:16. These passages fully sustain the assertion that
religious music, to be scriptural, must contain intelligible articulate
words, conveying some pious instruction or emotion.Now then, we assert that
this essential difference between the theory and spirit of Popish church
music and Protestant, makes the organ an unfit and ill-judged
accompaniment for our vocal religious songs: although it is appropriate and
well chosen for the purpose of Papists. —Those who advocate the use of the
organ must submit to the charge of blind, unscientific imitation; or they
must adopt the kind of music which Rome uses, appealing only to the ear,
inarticulate, and uninstructive, and utterly foreign to the intention of the
scriptures. The latter thing is, indeed, partly done, in practice, in all
Protestant churches, where this instrument is used.To evince the justice of
the charge of false taste, just made, it remains to point out, in what
respects, the organ is inconsistent with the spirit and character of scriptural
church music. And first; none who are familiar with the use of the organ,
can be so hardy as to deny, that it is unfavorable to distinct
articulation, which is the very essential of religious music. It is the
most overpowering of all accompaniments to vocal music, and most
effectually obliterates the distinctions of articulate sound. For himself the
writer would affirm that he never, in a single instance, heard an organ used,
when he could catch a single connected sentiment of what was sung, except
so far as reading of the hymn before the singing, assisted his memory. And
it may be fearlessly asserted, that the use of an organ utterly disappoints
that, which is the grand purpose of religious music, the comprehension of
the sentences sung, with the majority of hearers. Is not this a fatal objection
to its use, with any man who values sense more than sound, the kernel
more than the shell?Second: The organ is
incapable of accentuation. The alternate notes played upon it
cannot receive any variety of ictus or force, as should be the case
in all music. The rhythm of English poetry depends entirely on the
occurrence of accented and unaccented syllables, in a certain order. In
reading it, the emphasis, or ictus of the voice must fall on the alternate
syllables, intended to receive it. To neglect this rule, and to pronounce the
syllables indiscriminately with equal force, would convert the most spirited
lines of Scott or Burns, into an intolerable drawl. Now, this rhythm is
equally essential in poetry, when sung. The alternate notes,
corresponding with the accented syllables of the metre, must receive a
heavier or stronger tone. To neglect this, in singing, is as insufferable to a
cultivated musical ear, as the neglect of the accentuation in reading poetry,
would be to the elocutionists. These are assertions which no man can dare
to dispute, without condemning himself, as the crudest of sciolists in
musical knowledge. And it is equally undeniable, that the organ is utterly
incapable of giving any expression to this ictus or accent; for the
plain reason, that the force of the tone depends on the operations of the
bellows-blower, or the character of the stop used, and not on the
force of the performer's touch upon the key. Hence the music of an organ,
although it may have a certain kind of solemnity, can never be spirited. It is
only rescued from the character of drawling, by the power and fullness of
its tones. To use it as an accompaniment to vocal music, is death
to the spirit and expression of the poetry which is sung.Third: The organ, like all
other instruments with fixed stops to mark off the tones of the scale, gives
those tones inaccurately; and when used along with that perfect instrument
of God's own make, the human voice, must fail in producing a perfect
accord, and perfect harmonies. This will be confirmed by any scientific
organist.The long drawn peals of
harmony which proceed from this instrument echoing through lofty arches,
and the fullness and volume of its sound, may render it suitable to the
purpose of Popish ecclesiastical theatricals. But we assert, for the reasons
above, that it is utterly unsuited, ill judged, and in ill taste, as an
accompaniment for vocal music, intended to be articulate, and expressive of
intelligible ideas. We assert it purely on principles of musical taste, apart
from historical or theological objections. We retort the charge of rusticity
on the advocates of organs in Protestant worship, and assert that this
application of this accompaniment, regardless of the difference of
circumstances, and the natural incongruities of the things, is the true breach
of enlightened taste, and the true exhibition of prejudice.There is a fact in the
musical world, to which we can appeal for practical confirmation of the
principles of taste laid down. The modern Opera is more of an Action and
a Pantomime, than the religious music of Protestants was intended to be;
though less so than the Mass. —The plot of the play is exhibited, partly by
scenery and pantomimes, and partly by words set to music and sung
articulately. Its nature is, therefore, not so totally foreign to that of the
organ, as the nature of Protestant sacred music which depends wholly on
articulation to convey its sentiments. And yet, although I would not claim
as much familiarity with the theatricals as some of the admirers of organs
in churches, I feel authorized to assert, that such a thing as an organ in the
orchestra of an Opera, is never heard of; and that its introduction would be
regarded by the whole musical world, as a ludicrous anomaly. All men of
taste would feel, that the character of the instrument is unsuitable to the
expression, emphasis, and flexibility of articulate, vocal music. The same
principles of taste should expel it from our churches.The manner in which this
instrument is almost universally used in our Protestant churches, makes it
doubly grievous to devotional feeling, and offensive to good taste. The
organs obtained are frequently of inferior construction; and are out of tune,
and ill-played. The volume of sound is often utterly disproportioned to the
number of voices. Sometimes we see a little, feeble, starveling choir, to
which the "accompaniment" has proved almost a fatal incubus, with a dozen
voices, and an organ pouring forth tones strong enough to guide a thousand
singers. In this connection, it may be remarked, that the use of organs in
the Protestant churches of Holland, and in other places in Europe, where
the congregational singing is noted as very fine, is no precedent whatever
for the manner in which they are used in this country. There, the spirit of
the people is generally imbued with a taste for music. All sing; and where a
thousand voices are united in a song of praise, the peculiar faults of the
instrument are hidden in the vast volume of sound; and its leading chords
subserve some slightly useful purpose, in keeping the air up to the proper
pitch. But in a church where the vocal music is confined to thirty or forty
voices, the organ is dominant, and all its vices becomes glaring.The testimony of all
concurs in proving, that the use of organs in this country is unfavorable to
congregational singing. Unless their introduction can be guarded from this
ill effect, more effectually than it has hitherto, let them be kept out forever.
Another effect equally general, is to render the choir weak and remiss. Not
only do we never see spirited congregational singing in this part of the
country in churches where there are organs, we do not often find, in such
churches, good choir singing. And surely, it is no slight objection, that an
inexperienced private individual must be employed as organist, or some
teacher of music, or theatrical musician must be hired. And thus one of the
most solemn parts of the worship of a spiritual God, is committed chiefly to
the guidance of a professional hireling, commonly a wicked man!One of the most
outrageous sins against good taste and devotional feeling committed by
these windy machines, consists of the preludes and symphonies, with which
they usually introduce and intersperse the praise of God. These seem to be
thrown in, by some arithmetical or mechanical rule, between every two
verses, in utter disregard of taste and sense. The nature of scriptural
singing should teach us, that there should be nothing of the sort. The only
use of the musical sounds, is to accompany and enforce the words
expressing pious sentiments. What religious use or sense is there then, in
that part of the music which is accompanied by no words? None. It has no
business in the church. Just as reasonably might the preacher preface each
impressive paragraph with a minute or two of pantomimic gesture. And
then, the symphonies are thrown in blindly, after every verse, whether the
sentiment of the poetry justifies any pause or not. It may be, that the
burning thoughts of the hymn would hurry the devout soul along, without
pause, from verse to verse. It may be that the end of a verse leaves a
sentence unfinished, the nominative in the former verse waiting for its verb
in the latter. Good taste and good sense would dictate, that an unbroken
tide of song should bear the wrapt soul along to the climax of the
sentiment, before it is required to pause. But no: the glowing thought must
hang in it mid flight, or the widowed subject must stand bereaved of its
predicate, until the "Performer" has had time to distinguish himself to his
hearts content in a "voluntary." But the most nauseating thing about the
whole exhibition, is to see performers presuming to detain a whole
congregation, with their "extemporized voluntaries," when their inventive
talent does not extend far enough to justify them in undertaking an original
nursery song, and their operative skill does not suffice to perform the air of
a common hymn, with sufficient fluency and spirit. —The manner in which
these wondrous performances are thrown off, would seem to indicate,
sometimes, that they are intended to realize the description of the great
English poet of
Of linked sweetness, long drawn out,
With wanton heed and giddy cunning,
The melting voice through mazes running,
Untwisting all the chains that tie
The hidden soul of harmony.
But their afflicted hearers
doubtless found about as much resemblance between their effusions and
the conceptions of a true master, as you, Mr. Editor, would discover
between the eccentric bombast of an Arkansas stump orator, and the
speeches of Demosthenes. Long may it be, ere I am again subjected to such
inflictions. Give me rather, for ever more, the hearty singing of the whole
congregation, uniting their voices in some of those solemn strains, sung by
sainted parents over our cradles, and linked with all the sweet and solemn
recollections of the dreamy past! When all together rise up, "making
melody in their hearts unto God," and mingling their voices in one tide of
expressive, living, gushing melody, how does the delicious horror send the
blood thrilling through the heart? How does the billowy harmony bear the
enraptured soul towards heaven? Such were the strains with which the
Presbyterian church in our land honored God in earlier days. Such was the
songs that swept on the wailing winds, over the moors of Scotland, when
the purest of God's people there, braved death to worship him. Such were
the strains with which the Republicans of England shook the hearts of their
foes, when they drew nigh to the battle, with "the high praises of God in
their mouths, and a two edged sword in their hands," to execute vengeance
upon the heath and judgments upon the people." Such we believe were the
songs of praise sent up to God from that upper chamber, where the
primitive church met to worship. —And wherever they shall be heard, they
will elevate the devout, convince the sinful, and make the careless solemn,
more effectually than any of the borrowed artifices of a worldly
church.There is one fact
connected with the introduction of organs into those of our churches which
have adopted them, which is exceedingly distressful. It is the
reason which we always hear assigned, among other reasons, for their
introduction, and which we believe has been in every case the most
operative one. It is always urged: "we must have an organ to keep pace
with other churches in attracting a congregation, and in retaining the young
and thoughtless." Has it come then to this, that the chaste spouse of
Christ is reduced to borrow the meretricious adornment of the "scarlet
whore," in order to catch the unholy admiration of the ungodly? Not thus
did the Apostles devise to bring sinners to the church. They were taught to
go after them, into the highways and hedges, with the wooings of mercy
and love; to allure them by the beauty of holiness; to urge them by the
terrors of the law. If we are authorized to add to God's worship, forms
purely of human device, in order to make it more palatable to sinners, to
what corruptions shall we not give entrance? The Popish church of South
America attracts multitudes of worshippers, by gross theatrical
representations. According to this mode of operations, which has
introduced organs into our churches, a Presbyterian Church in South
American might find it necessary to imitate idolatrous Papists, and convert
God's house into a play-house. An excuse which will justify such an
enormity as this under different circumstances, is surely no valid excuse for
any thing. We believe that all such artifices, of human device, to catch
popularity, are inconsistent with the genius of the Presbyterian Church,
derogatory of her honor, and blasting to her interests. It was her glory and
her strength, that she aimed to commend herself by her firm devotion to
truth, by the purity of her discipline, the pre-eminence of her ministry, and
the justice of her polity. If she will cleave to these traits and rest upon them
in humble faith in her divine Head, she will prosper. But when once she
descends from the high vantage ground of intellectual, theological, and
moral superiority, to chaffer [barter] for popularity by human devices, and
doubtful arts, her prestige will be gone. Other churches are better
adapted to win in that race, and will surely outrun her.
Chorepiscopus. [Robert L. Dabney]
REVIEW by Robert L. Dabney
Dr. John
L. Girardeau's Instrumental Music in Public Worship.
Instrumental Music in the
Public Worship of the Church. By John L. Girardeau, D. D., LL.D.,
Professor in Columbia Theological Seminary, South Carolina.
Richmond: Whittet & Shepperson. 1888. The Presbyterian
Quarterly, July 1889.
The author in his
eloquent conclusion anticipates that some will meet his arguments with
sneers rather than serious discussion, which he proposes to endure with
Christian composure. It is a reproach to our church, which fills us with
grief, to find this prediction fulfilled in some quarters. Surely persons
calling themselves Presbyterians should remember that the truths they
profess to hold sacred have usually been in small minorities sneered at by
the arrogant majorities. So it was in the days of the Reformers, of
Athanasius, of the Apostles, and of Jesus himself.The resort to this species
of reply appears the more ill-considered, when we remember that Dr.
Girardeau is supporting the identical position held by all the early fathers,
by all the Presbyterian reformers, by a Chalmers, a Mason, a Breckinridge,
a Thornwell, and by a Spurgeon. Why is not the position as respectable in
our author as in all this noble galaxy of true Presbyterians? Will the
innovators claim that all these great men are so inferior to themselves? The
ideal seems to be that the opposition of all these great men to organs arose
simply out of their ignorant old-fogyism and lack of culture; while our
advocacy of the change is the result of our superior intelligence, learning
and refinement. The ignorance of this overweening conceit makes it simply
vulgar. These great men surpassed all who have succeeded them in elegant
classical scholarship, in logical ability, and in theological learning. Their
deprecators should know that they surpassed them just as far in all elegant
culture. The era of the Reformation was the Augustan age of church art in
architecture, painting and music. These reformed divines were graduates of
the first Universities, most of them gentlemen by birth, many of them
noblemen, denizens of courts, of elegant accomplishments and manners,
not a few of them exquisite poets and musicians. But they unanimously
rejected the Popish Church music; not because they were fusty old pedants
without taste, but because a refined taste concurred with their learning and
logic to condemn it.Dr. Girardeau has
defended the old usage of our church with a moral courage, loyalty to
truth, clearness of reasoning and wealth of learning which should make
every true Presbyterian proud of him, whether he adopts his conclusions or
not. The framework of his arguments is this: it begins with that vital truth
which no Presbyterian can discard without a square desertion of our
principles. The man who contests this first premise had better set out at
once for Rome: God is to be worshipped only in the ways appointed in his
word. Every act of public cultus not positively enjoined by him is thereby
forbidden. Christ and his apostles ordained the musical worship of the New
Dispensation without any sort of musical instrument, enjoining only the
singing with the voice of psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs. Hence such
instruments are excluded from Christian worship. Such has been the creed
of all churches, and in all ages, except of the Popish communion after it
had reached the nadir of its corruption at the end of the thirteenth century,
and of its prelatic imitators. But the pretext is raised that instrumental
music was authorized by Scripture in the Old Testament. This evasion dr.
Girardeau ruins by showing that God set up in the Hebrew Church two
distinct forms of worship; the one moral, didactic, spiritual and universal,
and therefore perpetual in all places and ages that of the synagogues; the
other peculiar, local, typical, foreshadowing in outward forms the more
spiritual dispensation, and therefore destined to be utterly abrogated by
Christ's coming. Now we find instrumental music, like human priests and
their vestments, show-bread, incense, and bloody sacrifice, absolutely
limited to this local and temporary worship. But the Christian churches
were modeled upon the synagogues and inherited their form of government
and worship because it was permanently didactic, moral and spiritual, and
included nothing typical. This reply is impregnably fortified by the word of
God himself: that when the Antitype has come the types must be abolished.
For as the temple-priests and animal sacrifices typified Christ and his
sacrifice on Calvary, so the musical instruments of David in the
temple-service only typified the joy of the Holy Ghost in his pentecostal
effusions.Hence when the
advocates of innovation quote such words as those of the Psalmist, "Praise
the Lord with the harp," etc., these shallow reasoners are reminded that the
same sort of plea would draw back human priests and bloody sacrifices into
our Christian churches. For these Psalms exclaim with the same emphasis,
"Bind your sacrifice with cords, even unto the horns of the altar." Why do
not our Christian æsthetics feel equally authorized and bound to build
altars in front of their pulpits, and to drag the struggling lambs up their
nicely carpeted aisles, and have their throats cut there for the edification of
the refined audience? "Oh, the sacrifices, being types and peculiar to the
temple service, were necessarily abolished by the coming of the Antitype."
Very good. So were the horns, cymbals, harps and organs only peculiar to
the temple-service, a part of its types, and so necessarily abolished when
the temple was removed.If any addition can be
made to this perfectly compact argument, it is contained in this suggestion
of an undoubted historical truth: that the temple-worship had a national
theocratic quality about it, which cannot now be realized in Christ's purely
spiritual kingdom. Israel was both a commonwealth and a church. Her
political government was a theocracy. Her human king was the viceroy
representing on earth her true sovereign, God. Hence, in the special acts of
worship in the temple, in which the high priest, Messiah's type, and the
king, God's viceroy, combined, they represented the State Church, the
collective nation in a national act of homage. This species of worship could
not lawfully exist except at one place; only one set of officials could
celebrate it. It was representatively the nation's act. It is to be noted that,
when at last musical instruments were attached to those national acts of
homage to Israel's political king, Jehovah, it was not by the authority or
intervention of the high priest, the religious head of the nation, but by that
of the political viceroy. David's horns, harps and organs were therefore the
appointed instruments of the national acts of homage to Jehovah. The
church now is not a nation, but purely a spiritual kingdom, which is not of
this world. Hence there is no longer room in her worship for the horns,
harps and organs, any more than for swords and stonings in her
government, or human kings and high priests in her institutions.Let the true inference
from this partial use of instruments of music in the typical, national worship
be fairly and perspicuously stated. It is but this: since God saw fit to ordain
such an adjunct to divine worship for a special object, it proves the use of it
not to be sin per se, like lying or theft, for a holy God would not ordain an
unholy expedient for any object, however temporary. The same argument
shows that incense, show-bread and bloody sacrifices in worship cannot be
sin per se. But how far short is this admission from justifying the use of any
of them in worship now? Just here is the pitiable confusion of thought. It is
not enough for the advocate of a given member of the church's cultus to
show that it is not essentially criminal. He must show that God ordained it
positively for our dispensation.Dr. Girardeau's
opponents stubbornly forget that the burden of proof rests on them; he is
not bound to prove that these instruments are per se criminal or that they
are mischievous or dangerous, although he is abundantly able to prove the
latter. It is they who must prove affirmatively that God has appointed and
required their use in his New Testament worship, or they are transgressors.
Doubtless the objection in every opponent's mind is this: That, after all, Dr.
Girardeau is making a conscientious point on too trivial and non-essential a
matter. I am not surprised to meet this impression in the popular mind,
aware as I am that this age of universal education is really a very ignorant
one. But it is a matter of grief to find ministers so oblivious of the first
lessons of their church history. They seem totally blind to the historical fact
that it was just thus every damnable corruption which has cursed the church
took its beginning; in the addition to the modes of worship ordained by
Christ for the New dispensation, of human devices, which seemed ever so
pretty and appropriate, made by the best of men and women and ministers
with the very best of motives, and borrowed mostly from the temple cultus
of the Jews. Thus came vestments, pictures in churches, incense, the
observances of the martyrs' anniversary days in a word, that whole
apparatus of will-worship and superstition which bloomed into popery and
idolatry. "Why, all these pretty inventions were innocent. The very best of
people used them. They were so appropriate, so æsthetic! Where
could the harm be?" History answers the question: They disobeyed God
and introduced popery, a result quite unforeseen by the good souls who
began the mischief! Yes, but those who have begun the parallel mischief in
our Presbyterian Church cannot plead the same excuse, for they are
forewarned by a tremendous history, and prefer Mrs. Grundy's taste to the
convincing light of experience. [Mrs. Grundy, The surname of an
imaginary personage who is proverbially referred to as a personification of
the tyranny of social opinion in matters of conventional propriety.
OED]That a denomination,
professing like ours to be anti-prelatic and anti-ritualistic, should throw
down the bulwarks of their argument against these errors by this recent
innovation appears little short of lunacy. Prelatists undertake every step of
the argument which these Presbyterians use for their organ, and advance
them in a parallel manner to defend the re-introduction of the Passover or
Easter, of Whitsuntide, of human priests and priestly vestments, and of
chrism, into the gospel church. "God's appointment of them in the Old
Dispensation proves them to be innocent. Christians have a right to add to
the cultus ordained for the New Testament whatever they think
appropriate, provided it is innocent; and especially are such additions lawful
if borrowed from the Old Dispensation." I should like to see the
Presbyterian who has refuted Dr. Girardeau in argument meet a prelatist,
who justifies these other additions by that Presbyterian's own logic. Would
not his consistency be something like that pictured by the old proverb of
"Satan reproving sin"? Again, if the New Testament church has priests,
these priests must have sacrifice. Thus, consistency will finally lead that
Presbyterian to the real corporeal presence and the mass.To rebut further the
charge that Dr. Girardeau is stickling for an unimportant point, I shall now
proceed to assert the prudential and the doctrino-psychological arguments
against the present organ worship.1st. Sound prudence and
discretion decide against it. The money cost of these instruments, with the
damaging debts incurred for them, is a sufficient objection. The money they
cost, if expended in mission work, would do infinitely more good to souls
and honor to God. In our poor church, how many congregations are there
which are today mocking Dr. Craig with a merely nominal contribution to
missions on the plea of an organ debt of $1,800 to $3,600! This latter says it
is able to spare $3,600 for a Christian's use (or does it propose to cheat the
organ builder?). I ask solemnly, Is it right to expend so much of God's
money, which is needed to rescue perishing souls, upon an object merely
non-essential, at best only a luxury? Does the Christian conscience, in
measuring the worth of souls and God's glory, deliberately prefer the little
to the much?Again, instruments in
churches are integral parts of a system which is fruitful of choir quarrels
and church feuds. How many pastoral relations have they helped to
disrupt? They tend usually to choke congregational singing, and thus to rob
the body of God's people of their God-given right to praise him in his
sanctuary. They almost always help to foster anti-scriptural styles of church
music, debauching to the taste, and obstructive, instead of assisting, to true
devotional feelings. Whereas the advocates of organs usually defend them
on grounds of musical culture and æsthetic refinement, I now attack
them on those very grounds. I assert that the organ is peculiarly inimical to
lyrical taste, good music, and every result which a cultivated taste pursues,
apart from conscientious regard for God. The instrument, by its very
structure, is incapable of adaptation to the true purposes of lyrical music. It
cannot have any arsis or thesis, any rhythm or expression of emphasis, such
as the pulsatile instruments have. Its tones are too loud, brassy and
dominant; all syllabication is drowned. Thus the church music is degraded
from that didactic, lyrical eloquence, which is its scriptural conception , to
those senseless sounds expressly condemned by the apostle in 1 Corinthians
12-14. In truth, the selection of this particular instrument as the preferred
accompaniment of our lyrical worship betrays artistic ignorance in
Protestants, or else a species of superfluity of naughtiness in choosing
precisely the instrument specially suited to popish worship.It so happens that the
artistic world has an amusement the Italian opera whose aim is very
non-religious indeed, but whose art-theory and method are precisely the
same with those of scriptural church music. Both are strictly lyrical. The
whole conception in each is this: to use articulate, rational words and
sentences as vehicles for intelligible thoughts, by which the sentiments are
to be affected, and to give them the aid of metre, rhythm and musical
sounds to make the thoughts impressive. Therefore, all the world's artists
select, for the opera-orchestras, only the pulsatile and chiefly the stringed
instruments.An organ has never been
seen in a theater in Europe; only those instruments are admitted which can
express arsis and thesis. I presume the proposal to introduce an organ into
the Italian opera would be received by every musical artist in Europe as a
piece of bad taste, which would produce a guffaw of contempt. This
machine, thus fatally unfit for all the true purposes of musical worship and
lyrical expression, has, indeed, a special adaptation to the idolatrous
purposes of Rome, to which purposes all Protestants profess to be expressly
hostile. So that, in selecting so regularly Rome's special instrument of
idolatry, these Protestants either countenance their own enemies or betray
an artistic ignorance positively vulgar. Consequently, one is not surprised to
find this incorrect taste offending every cultivated Christian ear by every
imaginable perversity, under the pretext of divine worship. The selections
made are the most bizarre and unsuitable. The execution is over-loud,
inarticulate, brassy, fitted only "to split the ears of the groundlings, capable,
for the most part, of naught but inexplicable noise and dumb shows." The
pious taste is outraged by the monopolizing of sacred time, and the
indecent thrusting aside of God's holy worship to make room for "solos,"
which are unfit in composition, and still more so in execution, where the
accompaniment is so hopelessly out of relation to the voice that if the one
had the small-pox (as apparently it often has St. Vitus' dance) the other
would be in no danger of catching the disease, and the words, probably
senseless at best, are so mouthed as to convey no more ideas to the hearers
than the noise of Chinese tom-toms. Worshippers of true taste and
intelligence, who know what the finest music in Europe really is, are so
wearied by these impertinences that they almost shiver at the thought of
the infliction. The holy places of our God are practically turned into
fifth-rate Sunday theaters.I shall be reminded that
there are some Presbyterian churches with organs where these abuses do
not follow. "They need not follow in any." I reply that they are the
customary result of the unscriptural plans. If there should be some sedate
boys who are allowed to play with fire-arms, but do not shoo their little
sisters through the brain, yet that result follows so often as to ground the
rule that no parent should allow this species of plaything to his children.
The innovation is in itself unhealthy; and hence, when committed to the
management of young people, who have but a slim modicum of cultivation,
such as prevails in this country at large, has a regular tendency to all these
offensive abuses.2nd. I find a
still more serious objection to instrumental music in churches, when I
connect the doctrine of God's word concerning worship with the facts of
human psychology. Worship must be an act of personal homage
to God, or it is a hypocrisy and offense. The rule is that we must "glorify
God in our bodies and spirits, which are his." The whole human person,
with all its faculties, appropriately takes part in this worship; for they are all
redeemed by him and consecrated to him. Hence our voices should, at
suitable times, accompany our minds and hearts. Again, all true worship is
rational. The truth intelligently known and intelligibly uttered is the only
instrument and language of true worship. Hence all social public worship
must be didactic. The apostle has settled this beyond possible
dispute in 1st Corinthians. Speaking in an unknown tongue, when there is
not one to interpret, he declares can have no possible religious use, except
to be a testimony for converting pagan unbelievers. If none such are
present, Paul expressly orders the speaker in unknown tongues to be
silent in the congregations; and this although the speaker could
correctly claim the afflatus of the Holy Ghost. This strict
prohibition Paul grounds on the fact that such a tongue, even though a
miraculous charism, was not an articulate vehicle of sanctifying truth. And,
as though he designed to clinch the application of this rule upon these very
instruments of music, he selects them as the illustration of what he means.
I beg the reader to examine 1 Corinthians 14:7-9.Once more: man's animal
nature is sensitive, through the ear, to certain sensuous, æsthetic
impressions from melody, harmony and rhythm. There is, on the one hand,
a certain analogy between the sensuous excitements of the acoustic nerves
and sensorium and the rational sensibilities of the soul. (It is precisely this
psychologic fact which grounds the whole power and pleasure of lyrical
compositions.) Now, the critical points are these: That, while these
sensuous excitements are purely animal and are no more essentially
promotive of faith, holiness, or light in the conscience than the quiver of
the fox-hunting horses' ears at the sound of the bugle or the howl of the
hound whelp at the sound of his master's piano, sinful men, fallen and
blinded, are ever ready to abuse this faint analogy by mistaking the
sensuous impressions for, and confounding them with, spiritual affections.
Blinded men are ever prone to imagine that they have religious feelings,
because they have sensuous, animal feelings, in accidental juxtaposition
with religious places, words, or sights. This the pernicious mistake which
has sealed up millions of self-deceived souls for hell.Rome encourages the
delusion continually. She does this with a certain consistency between her
policy and her false creed. She holds that, no matter by what motive men
are induced to receive her sacraments, these convey saving grace, ex
opere operato. Hence she consistently seduces men, in every way
she can, to receive her sacraments by any spectacular arts or sensuous
thrills of harmony. Now, Protestants ought to know that (as the apostle
says) there is no more spiritual affection in these excitements of the
sensorium than in sounding brass or in tinkling cymbal.Protestants cannot plead
the miserable consistency of Rome in aiding men to befool themselves to
their own perdition by these confusions, for they profess to reject all
opus operatum effects of sacraments, and to recognize no other
instrument of sanctification than the one Christ assigned, THE TRUTH.
But these organ-grinding Protestant churches are aiding and encouraging
tens of thousands of their members to adopt this pagan mistake. Like the
besotted Papist, they are deluded into the fancy that their hearts are better
because certain sensuous, animal emotions are aroused by a mechanical
machine, in a place called a church, and in a proceeding called
worship.Here, then, is the
rationale of God's policy in limiting his musical worship to
melodies of the human voice. It is a faculty of the redeemed
person, and not the noise of a dead machine. The human voice, while it
can produce melodious tones, can also articulate the words which are
intelligible vehicles of divine truths. The hymns sung by the human voice
can utter didactic truth with the impressiveness of right articulation and
emphasis, and thus the pious singers can do what God commands teach
one another in psalms, hymns and spiritual songs. For his Christian church,
the non-appointment of mechanical accompaniment was its
prohibition. Time will prove, we fear by a second corruption of
evangelical religion and by the ruin of myriads more of nominally Christian
souls, how much wiser is the psychology of the Bible than that of Mrs.
Grundy.The reader has by this
time seen that I ascribe this recent departure of our Presbyterian churches
from the rule of their fathers in no degree to more liberal views or
enlightened spirit. I know, by an intuition which I believe every sensible
observer shares, that the innovation is merely the result of an advancing
wave of worldliness and ritualism in the evangelical bodies. These
Christians are not wiser but simply more flesh-pleasing and fashionable.
That is exactly the dimension of the strange problem. Other ritualistic
adjuncts concur from time to time. Nothing is needed but the lapse of years
enough for this drift, of which this music is a part, to send back great
masses of our people, a material well prepared for the delusion, into the
bosom of Rome and her kindred connections.This melancholy opinion
is combined, in our minds, with a full belief in the piety, good intentions
and general soundness of many ministers and laymen who are now aiding
the innovations. No doubt the advocates of instrumental music regard this
as the sting of Dr. Girardeau's argument, that it seems to claim all the
fidelity and piety for the anti-organ party. No doubt many hearts are now
exclaiming, "This unjust, and thousands of our saintliest women are in the
organ loft; our soundest ministers have organs," etc., etc. All this is
perfectly true. It simply means that the best of people err and
unintentionally do mischief when they begin to lean to their own
understandings. The first organ I ever knew of in a Virginian Presbyterian
church was introduced by one of the wisest and most saintly of pastors, a
paragon of old school doctrinal rigor. But he avowedly introduced it on an
argument the most unsound and perilous possible for a good man to adopt
that it would be advantageous to prevent his young people from leaving his
church to run after the Episcopal organ in the city. Of course such an
argument would equally justify every other sensational and spectacular
adjunct to God's ordinances, which is not criminal per se. Now
this father's general soundness prevented his carrying out the pernicious
argument to other applications. A very bad organ remained the only
unscriptural feature in a church otherwise well-ordered. But after the
church authorizes such policy, what guarantee remains that one and
another less sound and staid will not carry the improper principle to
disastrous results? The conclusion of this matter is, then, that neither the
piety nor the good intention of our respectable opponents is disparaged by
us; but that the teachers and rulers of our church, learning from the great
reformers and the warning lights of church history, should take the safer
position alongside of Dr. Girardeau. Their united advice would easily and
pleasantly lead back to the Bible ground all the zealous and pious laymen
and the saintly ladies who have been misled by fashion and incipient
ritualism.
These files were obtained
from The Blue Banner BBS, a ministry of First Presbyterian Church of Rowlett, TX.
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