PSALMS AND HYMNS.
There was possibly a tendency to apply to present circumstances what suited other and often all times; at all events, the psalms were sung with intense feeling. To specify the favourites would be to copy a great part of the Book of Psalms. If anything, the nineties had the palm, but the forty-sixth—“God is our refuge and our strength,” Luther’s “Ein Feste Burg”—became as popular with us as it had been in Germany.
Perhaps this may account for the slow progress which hymns made for many years in Scotland. Many of these noble compositions of Christian genius are now used as vehicles of praise, and they unquestionably have their place and power in the service of song; but the older folks still maintain that they want “grup;” and the early Scottish Church found ample material for expressing its aspirations or presenting its tribute of grave sweet melody in the old Psalms of David.
For Mr. Barrie the summer was one of special excitement. He was much occupied with his own congregation, and with the affairs of the Free Church of Scotland generally. He had always been a studious man, was a fair scholar, and had given conscientious attention to his preparations for the pulpit, and to the visitation of the sick. But he now appeared to have got new life, and an increased power of penetration into many parts of the Christian’s duty. Instead of relaxing what is called in Scotland discipline, or lowering the terms of communion, he was more emphatic than ever in pressing on all, especially on advanced young persons, not to profess what they did not feel. He seemed a man absorbed in his Master’s work, and his former reading experience and observation became a magazine whence he could draw for his ready service illustration, incentive, or appeal.
He not only surprised others, but he was a wonder to himself. Thoughts flowed in on him as he prepared himself in the study for pulpit work; light broke in so as to surprise and refresh him; parts of Scripture that seemed barren before, were now bristling with meaning and practical lessons. What surprised him most was that he hardly ever looked into commentaries or books of systematic theology. The circumstances of himself and his people became so real to him, that nearly every verse he read seemed to suggest a good text for a sermon; and his difficulty was in arranging his ministrations so as to give to each part its proportionate share of attention.
“I seem to myself to be,” said he to a brother minister, “like the lame man at the Beautiful gate of the temple. Up till now I have been lame from my mother’s womb; but I feel as if my feet and ankle bones had received strength, and now it is with me more like walking, and leaping, and praising God.”
His fears as to the support of his family, which had been so very trying to him, were now gone; and although he did little in the way of directly stimulating congregational liberality, he in the course of his preaching showed, what few of us had noticed before, the great prominence that giving to God’s cause has both in the Old and New Testaments, and its reflex influence on the Church. This went to the hearts of the people, and they offered willingly. During the first year the congregation raised more than had been collected in the Established church of the parish for fifty years.
“OVER AGAINST THE TREASURY.”
Over Scotland much of the same spirit existed. The continuous rain of £1000 a-day, as Dr. Chalmers called it, kept pouring on,—so much so that those who were looked on as martyrs in ’43, were spoken of as heroes in ’44. Indeed, their heroism, like all other heroism, was by many considered rashness; and when they undertook to erect schools as well as churches, it was thought that the “ship would soon get over-freighted and go to the bottom;” but it seemed as if the more they attempted, the more they prospered, until, like the Israelites in Egypt, the people multiplied and waxed very mighty.
Well do I remember the evening of our first annual soiree. The treasurer’s report told of some £400 paid, and other £300 promised. As soon as it was finished, Mr. Barrie stood up, and without book, without even giving out the number of the psalm, repeated with great vigour: