The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1899-09-08
MUSIC In WORSHIP
DIR. TALMAGE THINKS MUSIC WAS
BORN IN III SOUL.
fstfnctio Between Music as an Art
aud Music as an Aid to Devotion.
National Airs OF the Kingdom of
Heaven.


Copyright, Louis Klopsch, 1899.
DR.. Talmage today discusses a most
attractive department of religious wor-
ship-the service Of song. His idea will
be received with interest by all who
love to lift their voices in praise in the
vii, 81, And they had two hundred
forty and five singing men and sing
ing women"
The best music has been rendered
under trouble. The first duet that l
know anything Of was given by Paul
n Silas when they sang praises to
God and the prisoners heard them.
The Scotch Covenanters, bounded by
the dogs Of persecution, mi the
psalms of David with more spirit than
they have ever since been rendered.
The captives in the ext had music
left in them, and 1 declare that if they
could find amid all their trials two
hundred and forty and five singing
men and singing women then in this
day of gospel sunlight and free from
all persecution there ought 10 De q
great HuILlLuOc OIL IlCH dIlo nolllCil
willing to sing the praises OF COD. Ali
our churches need arousal on this sub
ject. Thos who can sing must throw
their souls into the exercise, n those
who cannot sing must learn how, n
it shall be heart to heart, voice to
voice, hymn to hymn, anthem to an
them, and the music shall swell jubi-
liant with thanksgiving and tremulous
with pardon.
Have you ever noticed the construc-
ton of the human throat as indicative
of what God means uA 90 do with it?
II only an ordinary throat and lungs
there are IA direct muscles and 80 in
direct muscles that can produce a very
great variety Of sounds. What does
that mean? It means that you should
sing! Do yOu suppose that God, who
gives us such a musical instrument as
that, intends us to keep it shut? Sup
pose some great tyrant should get pos
session of the musical instruments of
the world and should lock up the
organ of Westminster abbey, n the
organ of Lucerne, and the organ at
Harlem, and the organ at Freiburg,
and all the other great musical inStru-
ments of the world. You would call
such a man as that a monster, and yet
you are more wicked if, with the hu-
man voice, a musical nstrumen of
more wonderful adaptation han all the
musical instruments that man ever
created, you shut it against the praise
Of God.
Let those refuse to sing
Who never knew our God,
But children of the heavenly King
Should speak their joys abroad.
MUSIC BORN IN THE SOUL.
Music seems to have been born in the
soul of the natural world. The omnipo-
tent voice with which Goo commanded
the vrAr11 iptn hninn onaroc tn lin0a
yet with it's majesty and sweetness,
and you neal it in the grainfield, in the
sWoop of the wind amid the m%ountain
Businesses, in the canary's MARBLE and
the thunder shock, in the brooks tinkle
and the oceans paean. There are soft
cadences in nature, and loud notes,
some of which we cannot hear at all,
and others that are so terrific that we
cannot appreciate them.
The ~animalculae have their music,
and the spicula of hay and the globule
of water are as certainly resonant
with the voice of God as the highest
heavens in which the armies of the re-
deemed celebrate their victories. When
the breath of the flower strikes the air
and the wing of the FREELY cleaves it,
there is sound and there is melody.
And, as to those utteranceS of nature
which seem harsh and overwhelming,
it is as when you stand in the midst of
a great orchestra and the sound almost
rends your ear because you are too
near to catch the blending Of the mu-
sic. So, my friends, we stand too near
the desolating storm and the frightful
whirlwind to catch the blending of the
music; but when that music rises tC
where God is, and the invisible beings
who float above us, then ] suppose the
harmony is as sweet as 1t is tremen-
dous. In the judgment day, that day
~ ~ ND nVrnr r~rva will he. rr
d~issonance to those who can appreciate
the music 1t will be as when some
times a great Organist, in executing
some great piece, breaks down the in
strument upon which he is playing the
music. So when the great march Of the
judgment day is played under the hand
of earthquake and storm and CONTRA
grafton the world itself will break dowT
with the music that is played or it
The fact is, we are all deaf, or we
should understand that the whole uni.
verse is but one harmony-the stars OF
the night only the ivory keys Of
great instrument on which Gods fin
gers play the music of the spheres.
Music seems dependent on the law OF
acoustics and mathematics, and We
Rwhere these laws are not understood
at all the art is practiced. There are
today 500 musical journals in China
W thousand years before Christ thu
Egyptians practlced this art. Pythag
oras learned it. Lasus of Hermion.
wrote essay on it. Plato and Aristo
tie introduced it into their schools. Blu
I have not much interest in that. M,
chef interest is in the music of tn,
Bible.
MUSIC OF THE BIBLE.
The Bible, like a great harp with in
Vulnerable strings, swept by the fin
gers Of inspiration, trembles with it
So far back as the fourth chapter o
Genesis you find the first organist an
harper-Jubal. So far back as tn
~thirty-first chapter OF Geneses yo1
find the first choir. All up n dow
the Bible you find sacred music-a
weddings, at ina~ugurations, at tn
treading Of The wine press. The He
brews understood how to make mu
steal signs above the musical text
When the Jews came from their dis
tant homes to the great festivals a
Jerusalem, they brought harp an
timbrel and trumpet and poured alon
h great Judaean highways a river O
harmony until in and around the tenn
pie the wealth of a nations song an