Music in the History of the Western Church / With an Introduction on Religious Music Among Primitive and Ancient Peoples

WITH AN INTRODUCTION ON RELIGIOUS MUSIC AMONG PRIMITIVE AND ANCIENT PEOPLES
BY EDWARD DICKINSON Professor of the History of Music, in the Conservatory of Music, Oberlin College
HASKELL HOUSE PUBLISHERS Ltd. Publishers of Scarce Scholarly Books NEW YORK. N.Y. 20012 1969
First Published 1902
HASKELL HOUSE PUBLISHERS Ltd. Publishers of Scarce Scholarly Books 280 LAFAYETTE STREET NEW YORK. N.Y. 10012
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 68-25286 Standard Book Number 8383-0301-3 Printed in the United States of America
The practical administration of music in public worship is one of the most interesting of the secondary problems with which the Christian Church has been called upon to deal. Song has proved such a universal necessity in worship that it may almost be said, no music no Church. The endless diversity of musical forms and styles involves the perennial question, How shall music contribute most effectually to the ends which church worship has in view without renouncing those attributes upon which its freedom as fine art depends?
A few of the chapters in this work have appeared in somewhat modified form in the American Catholic Quarterly Review , the Bibliotheca Sacra , and Music . The author acknowledges the permission given by the editors of these magazines to use this material in its present form.
Leon Gautier, in opening his history of the epic poetry of France, ascribes the primitive poetic utterance of mankind to a religious impulse. “Represent to yourselves,” he says, “the first man at the moment when he issues from the hand of God, when his vision rests for the first time upon his new empire. Imagine, if it be possible, the exceeding vividness of his impressions when the magnificence of the world is reflected in the mirror of his soul. Intoxicated, almost mad with admiration, gratitude, and love, he raises his eyes to heaven, not satisfied with the spectacle of the earth; then discovering God in the heavens, and attributing to him all the honor of this magnificence and of the harmonies of creation, he opens his mouth, the first stammerings of speech escape his lips—he speaks; ah, no, he sings, and the first song of the lord of creation will be a hymn to God his creator.”