Shenandoah herald. [volume] (Woodstock, Va.) 1865-1974, 1896-11-06

concert pitch and the dlscords melt INTO
one great symphony, and the curtain
boists, and the baton taps and audiences
are raptured with Schumann's Para
disc and the Peri" or Rossini's "Stabat
Mater" or Bach's "Magniticat" in D.
Now, our world can never be attuned
by an imperfect instrument Even a
CremOna would not do. Heaven has
ordained the only instrument, and it is
made out of the wood Of the cross, and
the voices that accompany it are i'm
ported voices, cantatrices OF the first
Christmas night, when heaven serenad-
ed the earth with "Glory to God in the
highest, and on earth peace, good will
to men," Lest we start too far of and
get lost in generalities, we had better
begin with ourselves, get our own hearts
and lives in harmony with the eternal
Christ Oh for his Almighty Spirit to
attune us, to chord our will with his
will, to modulate our life with his life,
and bring US into unison with all that
is pure and self sacrificing and heavenly
The strings of our nature are all broken
and twisted, and the bow is so slack 1t
cannot evoke anything mellifiuous. The
instrument made for heaven to play on
has been roughly twanged and struck by
influences worldly and demoniac. o
master hand of Christ, restore this split
and fractured and despoiled and un-
strung nature until first it shall vail
out for our sin and then thrill with di-
vine pardon
Complete Harmony.
The whole world must also be attuned
by the same power. l was in the Fair
banks weighing scale manufactory OF
Vermont. Six hundred hands, and they
have never had strike. Complete har-
mony between labor and capital, the
operatives of scores Of years in their
beautiful homes near by the mansions
of the manufacturers, whose invention
and Christian behavior made the great
enterprise. So all the world over labor
and capital will be brought into eu-
phony. You may have heard what IS
called the "Anvil Chorus" composed
by Verdi, tune played by hammers,
great and small, now with mighty
stroke, and now with heavy stroke,
beating a great iron anvil. That is
what the world has got to come to--an-
vii chorus, yardstick chorus, shuttle
chorus, trowel chorus, crowbar chorus,
pickax chorus, gold mine chorus, rail
track chorus, locomotive chorus. 1t
can be done, and it will be done. So all
social life will be attuned by the gospel
harp. There will be as many classes IN
society as now, but the classes will not
be regulated by birth or wealth or acci-
dent, but by the scale Of virtue and be-
nevolence, and people will be assigned
to their places as good, or very good, OF
most excellent. So also commercial life
will be attuned, and there will be IL III
every dozen, and 10 ounces in every
pound, and apples at the bottom OF the
barrel will be as sound as those on the
top, and silk goods will not be cotton,
and sellers will not have to charge hon
est people more than the right price be-
| cause others will not pay, and goods
will come to you corresponding with
the sample by which you purchased
Them. and coffee will not be chicorled,
and sugar will not be sanded, and milk
will not be chalked, and adulteration Of
food will be a state prison otfense-aye,
all things shall be attunedl Elections II
England and the United States will nc
more be grand carnival Of defamation
and scurrility, but the elevation Of
righteous men in a righteous way.
In the sixteenth century the singers
called the Fischer brothers reached the
lowest bass ever recorded, and the high
EST note ever trilled was by La Bastar-
della, and Catalini's voice had COM
pass of 80 octaves. But Christianity Is
more wonderful, for it runs all up and
down the greatest heights and the deep
sst depths of the worlds necessity, and
it will compass everything aud bring II
in accord with the song which the morn
ing stars sang at the laying OF the
worlds cornerstone. All the sacred mu'
,ic in homes and concert halls and
churches tends toward this consumma'
hon. Make it more and more hearty.
Sing in your families. Sing in your
nlaces of business. If We with proper
spirit use these faculties, we are re-
hearsing for the skies.
Heaven is to have new song, an en-
hrely new song. But should not won
der if, as sometimes on earth tune il
fashioned cut of many tunes, or 1t Is one
tune with the varintions, so some OF the
longs of the redeemed may have play
ing through them the songs OF earth
And how thrilling, as coming through
the great anthem Of the saved, accom-
sanied by harpers with their harps and
rumpeters with their trumpets, II We
,hould hear some of the strains OF Anti
och" and mount Pisgah" and Corona
lion" and "Lenox" and "St. Martins
and Fountain" and ariel" and "OlC
Hundredp'
How they would bring to mind tn
orayinQ circles and communion days, and
ihe Christmas festivals, and the church
Worship in which on earth we mingled
II have no idea that when we bid fare
we'll to earth we are to bid farewell Il
lll these grand old gospel hymns which
melted and raptured our souls for 8
many years. Now, if sin is discord, an
righteousness is harmony, let US get on
of the one and enter the other. Aftt
our dreadful civil war was over, IN tn
summer Of 1869, a great national peaC
Jubilee was held in Boston, and as a
elder Of my church had been honored D
the selection Of some Of his music
be rendered ON that occasion | accom-
panied him to the jubilee. Forty tho'
sand people sat and stood in the gre'
coliseum erected for that purpos'
Thousands Of wind and stringed instr
ments. Twelve thousand trained voice
The masterpieces OF all ages rendered
hour after hour and day after day-Hal
del's Judas Maccab@us, Spohr
Last Judgment Beethoven's "Moui
of Olives" Haydn's Creation, " Mel
delssohn's Elijah, Meyerbeer's Go
onation March" rolling on and up
surges that billowed against the heaven