This will include methods of using hymns for specific purposes. Is his congregation indifferent with regard to some particular line of work that he wishes to present—missions, for instance: what hymns, and methods of using them, will stimulate their minds and prepossess them for this as yet unappealing topic? Are they careless or irreverent in mood as they gather: can he sober their minds and awe their souls with a consciousness of God’s actual presence with a solemn hymn and its impressive tune? How shall he use the singing of the hymns to affect and win the unsaved whom he plans to invite to accept Jesus Christ as Saviour and Master? In a thousand ways the intelligent and adroit minister can make his hymns count largely in accomplishing his beneficent purposes.
VI. A STUDY OF THE TUNES
One of the most important lines of study will be that of the tunes to which the hymns are to be sung.[7] To use a botanical figure, a hymn will not bear fruit unless it is pollenized by a vital tune. Who would be even aware of Cardinal Newman’s “Lead, Kindly Light,” if it were not for Dykes’ tune? Without Lowry and Doane’s music what recognition would the modest lyrics of Fanny Crosby have won? Wesley’s “Hark, the herald angels sing” owes the wideness of its Christmas use to Mendelssohn’s tune. Tennyson’s “Sunset and Evening Star” and “Sweet and Low” were brought to wide public attention by Barnby’s two settings. Without the wings of melody few hymns would get very far in place or time. A mediocre hymn with a good singable tune will do vastly more good than a great hymn with an impracticable one.
Hence it is the minister’s business to study the tunes. Not the notes, not the harmony: he can leave them to his musical experts, if he has them. He must study the singability of the tune, its appeal to his particular people, its adaptation to the sentiment of the hymn with which it is associated. Its age, its traditional or conventional use, its style, its composer, its elaboration of harmony—all these are merely incidental. That it is singable, fitted to express and intensify the sentiment of the hymn, to give it access to the hearts of the congregation, to create the contagion of feeling in the assembly—these are the essentials of a good tune.
Just as the sales departments of our great manufacturing establishments make an intensive study of the psychology of salesmanship in all its phases, so the ministry of the church, in its schools of preparation and in its several organizations, should increase its efficiency as salesman of vital religion by a like study of the psychology of the hymn and of its use.
Chapter XX
THE PRACTICAL USE OF HYMNS
I. THE HYMN AS A MEANS TO AN END
While our discussion attempts to consider every phase of the Christian hymn, its chief interest to us lies in it as a means to an end. It may be a work of literary art, the expression of a noble genius admirable in itself; it may be an interesting epitome of some noble doctrine that calls for appreciation of its lucidity and comprehensiveness; but for us its primary quality must be its adaptation to meet spiritual needs, in other words, its usefulness in religious work. In some way it must help in the work of the church, if it is to come within the sweep of our present horizon.
II. ANALYSIS OF PRACTICAL APPLICATION OF HYMNS
There are two values in the singing of hymns that must needs be taken into consideration: one is the sheerly musical or nervous value; the other is the message or burden of the hymn. The two must co-operate for the best results.