We are familiar with the echo of life’s unfinished songs. The
unfinished songs of confidence, sung by the martyrs as they stood upon
the yellow sands of the Coliseum, looking upward beyond the soft blue
of the Italian sky to heights hitherto unseen, have never ceased to
vibrate through the centuries. The unfinished songs of sacrifice and
patriotism which were sung by our soldiers and sailors who perished in
the world-wide war are still echoing in the music of every wave that
laves the shores of every sea. We are all familiar with the lingering
music of life’s unfinished songs, but it is well for us to consider
also the echo of the songs that have never found expression in word or
tune.
Each soul is a minstrel whether he wills it or no, for God has
fashioned a harp for every heart. There is a tradition that above the
head of David’s couch there hung his favorite harp. The mountain winds
coming through the midnight silence would stir its strings, awaken the
sleeping lover of song, and bid him weave words of love to fit the
wind-wrought music. Thus were the Psalms created. To each individual
God has intrusted a priceless harp, tight drawn with silver chords of
love, and sensitive to every touch of passing wind and falling sunbeam.
So delicate are these heart-strings that every event of life awakens
the dormant music and fills the soul with harmonies divine. Behold how
sensitive they are.
The day has been dull and gloomy and you have not cared to go abroad.
After a while you become reminiscent. As though led by an unseen
hand you enter a quiet, unused room and lift the lid of a quaint,
old-fashioned chest. You know not why your followed impulses led you
there, but you are glad that you obeyed the leading, for there, resting
quietly amid fragrant lavender, is a treasured gift that came from a
mother’s hand. It has been lying there for many years, untouched and
unseen, but how beautiful its faded colors, how lovely its wrinkled
folds placed there by the hands so long since turned to dust! and how,
out of the dim mists of the past, it brings the soft colors and clear
outlines of a dear, sweet face! There are tears in your eyes, but more
and better than that, there is music in your soul. Every string of your
heart is vibrant with melody.
One morning you were ill and did not care to go to the office. You were
indisposed just enough to enjoy the rich luxury of being waited upon,
when, suddenly and unexpectedly, your eyes rested upon an old-fashioned
picture that strangely and wondrously stirred your heart. For years it
had been hanging there with its treasured memories, but you had been
too busy to notice it. How charming its exquisite beauty as it greeted
you from out its odd, old-styled frame. Its colors, mellowed with the
passing years, carried you back triumphantly to the sun-bright days of
the long ago, and the soul was stirred with music that charmed, and
soothed, and inspired.
The harp-strings of the heart are very sensitive. A finger-print or
tear-stain upon the leaves of the old family Bible, the frail petals
of a faded blossom, the sight of a tiny yellow garment or baby shoe, a
package of letters tied with ribbon, or a scrap of paper scrawled by
unskilled childish fingers, just little things that no one else admires
or notices, is all that is required to start the music ringing in our
hearts.
To this music the soul always responds with a song. This is true even
when one’s musical education has been neglected. The ear may not be
able to distinguish one note from another, or discern the difference
between “Old Hundred” and “The Star-Spangled Banner”; the individual
may know nothing about harmony, time, or measure, when listening to
the music that others have given to the world, but his own soul can
always sing its own melodies. There is no note so high in the scale
that the soul cannot reach it. I have heard the English lark lift
its silver notes until they melted into sunshine and fell in great
billows of joy upon the listening earth. Every soul can sing like that.
As above the couch of David hung the harp awaiting the touch of the
passing winds, so each heart is a stringed harp awaiting the touch
of some common event to awaken music and set the soul to singing its
minstrelsies.
However beautiful these songs, they never pass the threshold of the
lips. Their sweetness surpasses the power of expression. That must
have been the reason why Mendelssohn wept so bitterly at times. With
all his marvelous power in weaving tones he could not give expression
to the rapturous melodies which were surging through his soul. This
also explains why Michael Angelo so often gave way to the dreariest
despondency. Though he try never so hard, he could not express upon
canvas or in marble form the heavenly symphonies that were thrilling
his soul. The reason that Lord Tennyson stood for such long periods
upon the cliffs, overlooking the sea, not hearing the call of an
approaching friend, was that his soul was searching through earth and
sea and sky, for words with which to express the songs his soul was
ever singing.
The deepest and most valuable emotions of life are always
inexpressible. How useless is human speech in the presence of the
deep feelings of awe and reverence! I stood with a friend upon one of
the great heights of the Catskills. He was a genial man, and the day
had been filled with merriment. Rounding a curve, we came suddenly to
the edge of a great cliff overlooking the Hudson valley. At our feet
were many miles of forest trees mantling the hills and valleys with
the brilliant coloring of Autumn foliage. We could count a score of
villages nestled peacefully among the meadows and fields of ripened
grain. The Hudson River rolled its silver length in the distance,
while, far, far beyond us, draped in blue, we saw the hills and
mountains of another State. Beholding what, in many respects, was the
most soul-entrancing revelation of nature’s glory I had ever witnessed,
neither of us spoke. The moments slipped by with slippered feet and the
mid-afternoon became evening, before either of us broke the silence.
It is sacrilegious for one to undertake to express the holy sentiments
of awe and reverence in the clumsy garb of human speech. This is true
of all deep feeling. Standing in the presence of a bereaved friend,
shallow souls can chatter idle phrases, but deep, healing, tender
sympathy is expressed in the silence of a handclasp and unspoken word.
Looking into the deep, expressive eyes of one whom we love, our lips
are silent and only the tear-filled eye tells of the song the soul is
singing. Have you ever been able to tell your mother how much you loved
her? The real songs of the soul are of necessity the unsung songs.
These songs are the real songs, for the soul life is the real life.
They may never be heard by others, but you hear them, and their words
never die. They echo through the years. There is never a moment of
thoughtful meditation, never a season of seclusion; never a period of
sickness when the things of the world are shut out and one is left
alone with the things of the soul; never a season of disappointment, or
sorrow, or bereavement, or heartache, but that the hour is made blessed
and hallowed with the memory of these songs, and lo, while one listens,
all earth and heaven become vibrant with music and one is charmed and
soothed with the echo of life’s unsung songs. While exiled upon the
lonely heights of Patmos John heard a song that thrilled the heaven of
heavens, but none save the multitude before the throne could learn the
song. That is easily understood. It was not a song blending the varied
experiences of earth together into one mighty outburst of love; it was
the soul weaving all the unsung songs which no one on earth had ever
heard or could ever understand into one great symphony with which to
praise the God of its salvation. Life’s unsung songs shall never cease
to live in earth and heaven. Their echoes are our comfort here, our joy
forever.