This is our sole plea for reform in our music, it being, without doubt, also the "mind" of the Church. She is in no sense opposed to secular music, any more than she is to secular painting, sculpture, and architecture, unless they be debased and made to minister to base passions. She who sanctifies all that is true and noble in human nature is far from discouraging or condemning the legitimate expression of those arts which can exert so much power in the instruction, elevation, and refinement of the intellect and heart. But none so wise as she to detect their weakness, and warn society against the moral evils which result from their prostitution to the service of the devil. One of the destructive faults justly charged against modern art, and notably of music, is its misapplication. A want of harmony in the relation of an art to the nature and object of the thing to be expressed or illustrated by it, is the signal for its own enervation and the corruption of what it should purify and strengthen; which is the teaching alike of philosophy and experience.
"A tale out of time," says the wise man, "is like music in mourning;" and the converse of the proverb, is equally true—
"The sweetest strains of music
Do but jar upon the soul, and set
The very teeth on edge, if but the heart
Hath not a mind to hear it."
Whence our conclusion. In the house of God, whose "house shall be called the house of prayer," no other song must be heard but the song of prayer, that melody consecrated to all that we have that is highest and holiest, which lifts the soul above the frivolities and sensualities of this world and of time, and transports it in spirit into the regions of the heavenly, and before the throne of the majesty of the Eternal.
THE IRON MASK.
This subject, so inexhaustible, so interesting on account of the unfathomable mystery that surrounds it, has again been brought to our notice by some recent discoveries. Whether they amount to any thing or not, remains to be seen; but they are at least singular, and may stimulate the curiosity of the erudite, and even that of simple amateurs.
A young writer, M. Maurice Topin, so says a contemporary French paper, who has obtained a prize of six hundred dollars from the French Academy for his beautiful book, entitled, L'Europe et les Bourbons sous Louis XIV., has been diving into old papers among the public archives, and says he has at last found out the true name of the unfortunate prisoner of the Iron Mask.
Following the advice of his uncle, M. Mignet, he has addressed a letter to the President of the Academy of Moral and Political Science, in which he incloses his secret—sealed, however—and says it must not be unsealed without his order.
So some day soon, perhaps, we shall solve the enigma that has perplexed the world for over two centuries.