German Hymnology [pp. 574-602]

German Hymnology.
died in 1554. On hearing his hymn.Es ist das Heil uns
kommen her, once sung under his window, Luther is said
to have been deeply affected and to have thanked God for the
wonderful diffusion of the truth. His hymns are remarkable
for condensed doctrine: this was indeed strikingly true of the
compositions of the day, to a degree which we regard as not
to be imitated; but it was inseparable from the great religious
movement, as pre-eminently a doctrinal reformation. The people sang themselves into a gospel creed.
JUSTUS JONAS, the bosom friend of Luther, imitated him in
this work: his pieces are versified psalms. There were numerous contributions from Agricola, Spangenberg, Paul Eber,
Mathesius, Herman the Cantor, and Decius. But an accumulation of names is unsatisfactory, and the curious reader
must be referred to the exhaustive repository of Wackernagel.
A goodly number of these venerable hymns, with some alterations, is found in modern evangelical selections. They are
rude but impressive, giving no uncertain sound as to protestant testimony, and contributing incalculable help to the forces
of the reformation. A version of the twenty-third psalm, by
Musculus, (Wackernagel 269) is an exquisite pastoral. Many
of the hymns were in the soft Low German, and several are
extant in both dialects.* Some had all the graces of the
proper ballad, as for example No. 276, by von Wortheim.
Some contained the full history of our Lord's passion. A
truly poetic hymn by Henry Muiller was composed in gaol.
Some were quaint and ludicrous to a degree unknown among
ourselves: as No. 295, by Erasmus Alberus.
Turning aside for a little to the progress of Christian poetry
in the other branch of the Reformation, we naturally expect
less of German nationality and less of musical enthusiasm.
Zwingle was the declared opponent of all instrumental music
* We subjoin a specimen fr?m the first psalm in Niederdeutsch:
"Wol dem, de neene gemeinschop hat
Mit der Godtlosen Rade und dadt.
Noch up den wech der Siunders tritt,
Dar spotters sitten ock nicht sitt.
Wol dem, de thom Gesett des Herrn
Heft lust und de syn wordt hurt gernm,
Der sulfft mit vlite und ernst betracht."
1850.]
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