E'en now the throng to welcome Him prepare;
Join all and sing.—
Jean Baptiste Faure, author of the words and music, was born at Moulins, France, Jan. 15, 1830. As a boy he was gifted with a beautiful voice, and crowds used to gather wherever he sang in the 531 / 471 streets of Paris. Little is known of his parentage, and apparently the sweet voice of the wandering lad was his only fortune. He found wealthy friends who sent him to the Conservatoire, but when his voice matured it ceased to serve him as a singer. He went on with his study of instrumental music, but mourned for his lost vocal triumphs, and his longing became a subject of prayer. He promised God that if his power to sing were given back to him he would use it for charity and the good of mankind. By degrees he recovered his voice, and became known as a great baritone. As professional singer and composer at the Paris Grand Opera, he had been employed largely in dramatic work, but his “Ode to Charity” is one of his enduring and celebrated pieces, and his songs written for benevolent and religious services have found their way into all Christian lands.
His “Palm-Branches” has come to be a sine qua non on its calendar Sunday wherever church worship is planned with any regard to the Feasts of the Christian year.
EASTER.
Perhaps the most notable feature in the early hymnology of the Oriental Church was its Resurrection songs. Being hymns of joy, they called forth all the ceremony and spectacle of ecclesiastical 532 / 472 pomp. Among them—and the most ancient one of those preserved—is the hymn of John of Damascus, quoted in the second chapter ([p. 54]). This was the proclamation-song in the watch-assemblies, when exactly on the midnight moment at the shout of “Christos egerthe!” (Χριστὸς ἠγέρθη.) “Christ is risen!” thousands of torches were lit, bells and trumpets pealed, and (in the later centuries) salvos of cannon shook the air.
Another favorite hymn of the Eastern Church was the “Salve, Beate Mane,” “Welcome, Happy Morning,” of Fortunatus. (Chap. 10, [p. 357].) This poem furnished cantos for Easter hymns of the Middle Ages. Jerome of Prague sang stanzas of it on his way to the stake.
An anonymous hymn, “Poneluctum, Magdelena,” in medieval Latin rhyme, is addressed to Mary Magdelene weeping at the empty sepulchre. The following are the 3d and 4th stanzas, with a translation by Prof. C.S. Harrington of Wesleyan University: