The enterprise. [volume] (Wellington, Ohio) 188?-1899, 1893-06-28
aTHE SONG OF BIRDS"
Theme OF a Discourse by Rev. T.
Dewitt Talmage, D. D.
The Feathered Songsters Learned All Their
Music Direct from Coda Hymnology
Suggested for All Changes of
Conditions - An Out-of-
Doors Religion.

tabernacle Rev. DIR. Talmage chose for
his subject 1.-THE Song of Birds" F"
taking for his text Psalms CIV, 10:
"By them shall the fowls Of heaven have
their habitation, which sing among the
branches"
There is an important and improving
subject to which most people have
given no thought, and concerning which
this is the first pulpit discussion, name
ly, the Song of Birds. II all that has
been written concerning music by hui
man voice or about music sounded on
instrument by finger or breath were
put together, volume by the side. Of
volume, it would fill hundred alcoves
of the national libraries. But about
the song Of birds there is as much ST.
lence as though thousand years ago
the lark had, with his wing, swept the
door-latch of heaven, and as though
never whippoorwill had sung its lul-
laby to slumbering forest at night
fall. We give passing smile to the
call of bobolink or the chirp of ca
nary, but about the origin, about the
fiber, about the meaning, about the
mirth, about the pathos, about the in
spiration, about the religion in the
song of birds, the most of us are either
ignorant or Indifferent. A caveat ]
this morning file in the High Court OF
Heaven against that almost universal
irreligion.
First, / remark that which will sur
prise many, that the song of birds is a
regulated and systematic song, capa-
BILE of being written out in note, and
staff and bar and clef as much as any
thing that Wagner or Schumann or
Handel ever put on paper. AS we pass
the grove where the flocks are holding
matin or vespe- service, we are apt to
think that the sounds are extemporized,
the rising or falling tone is mere acci.
dent, it is flung up and down by hap.
hazard, the bird did not know what II
was doing, it did not care whether II
was long meter psalm or madri-
gal. What q mistake! The musi-
clan never put on the music
rack before him Mendelssohn's ELI.
jah" or Beethoven's Concerto" in
G or Spohr's b fat symphony with
more definite idea as to what he was
doing than every bird that can sing al
all confines himself to accurate and
predetermined rendering. The ora.
torios, the chants, the carols, the over
lures, the interludes, the ballads, the
canticles, that this morning were heard
or will this evening be heard in the
forest have rolled down through the
ages without a variation. Even the
chipmunk's song was ordained clear
back in the eternities. At the gates Of
paradise, it sang in sounds like the
syllables "Kukr' "Kukr' "Kukr
just as the morning in Long Island
orchard it sang "Kukr' "Kukr' "KulSr
The thrush at the creation uttered
sounds like the word "Teacherr
"Teacher!" "Teacherr' as now it utter,
sounds like "Teacherl' "Teacherp
''Teacherr' In the summer of the yeal
one, the yel.owhammer trilled that
which sounded like the word "Ifr
"Ifr' ''Ifr" as in this summer
Il trills "Ifr' "Ifr' "Tfr' TIL,
Maryland yellow throat inherit,
and bequeaths the tune sounding lik,
the words "Pity me, pity me, pity me. y
The white sparrow's "tseep, tseep,'
woke our great grandfathers as it will
awaken our great grandchildren. The
"Tee-ka-tee-ka-tee-ka" of the birds in
the first century was the same as the
'Tee-ka-tee-ka-tee-ka OF the nine
teenth century.
The goldfnch has for six Thousand
years been singing "De-ree dee-ee-ree. ;
But these sounds, which we put il
harsh words, they put in cadences
rhythmic, soulful and enrapturing
Now, If there is this order and system
atization and rhythm all through God'i
creation, does it not imply that W.
should have the same characteristics II
the music we make or try TO make? Il
it not wickedness that so many par
ents give no opportunity for the cul
ture of their children in the art o.
sweet sound? II God stoops to educat,
every bluebird, oriole and grosbeak il
song, how can parents be so Indifferent
about the musical development Of tn,
immortals in their household? While
God will accept our attempts to sing
though it be only hum or drone, i
we can do no better, what shame
that, in this last decade of the
Nineteeth century, when so many
orchestral batons are waving and sc
many academies of music are in full
concert and so many skilled men ant
women are waiting to offer Instructions
there are so many people who cannot
sing with any confidence in the house
OF God, because they have had no cul
ture in this sacred art, or, while they
are able to sing fantasia at piano
amid the fluttering fans Of social ad
mirers, nevertheless feel utterly help
less, when, in church the surges OF an
Ariel or an Antioch roll over them
The old-fashioned country singing.
school, now much derided and carica
tured land indeed sometimes 1t was di
verted from the real design into the
culture of the soft emotions rather
than the voice., nevertheless did ad
mirable work, and in our churches we
need singing schools to prepare ouI
Sabbath audiences for prompt and
spontaneous and multipotent psalmo-
dy. This world needs TO be stormed
with hallelujahs. We want hemis-
phere campaign of hosannahs. From
hearing blind beggar sing, Martin
Luther went home at forty years Of
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