A MYTHOLOGICAL STORY MORALIZED.
_Il faut mettre les fables en presse pour en tirer quelque suc de
verité._
GARASSE.
It is related of the great mythological personage Baly, that Veeshnoo,
when he dispossessed him of his impious power, allowed him in
mitigation of his lot, to make his choice, whether he would go to the
Swerga, and take five ignorant persons with him who were to be his
everlasting companions there, or to Padalon and have five Pundits in
his company. Baly preferred the good company with the bad quarters.
That that which is called good company has led many a man to a place
which it is not considered decorous to mention before “ears polite,”
is a common and, therefore, the more an awful truth. The Swerga and
Padalon are the Hindoo Heaven and Hell; and if the Hindoo fable were
not obviously intended to extol the merits of their Pundits, or
learned men, as the missionary Ward explains the title, it might with
much seeming likelihood bear this moral interpretation; that Baly
retained the pride of knowledge even when convinced by the deprivation
of his power that the pride of power was vanity, and in consequence
drew upon himself a further punishment by his choice.
For although Baly, because of the righteousness with which he had used
his power, was so far favoured by the Divinity whom he had offended,
that he was not condemned to undergo any of those torments of which
there was as rich an assortment and as choice a variety in Padalon, as
ever monkish imagination revelled in devising, it was at the best a
dreadful place of abode: and so it would appear if Turner were to
paint a picture of its Diamond City from Southey's description. I say
Turner, because though the subject might seem more adapted to Martin's
cast of mind, Turner's colouring would well represent the fiery
streams and the sulphureous atmosphere; and that colouring being
transferred from earthly landscapes to its proper place his rich
genius would have full scope for its appropriate display. Baly no
doubt, as a state prisoner who was to be treated with the highest
consideration as well as with the utmost indulgence, would have all
the accommodations that Yamen could afford him. There he and the
Pundits might
reason high
Of Providence, foreknowledge, will and fate,
Fix'd fate, free will, foreknowledge absolute,
And find no end, in wandering mazes lost.
They might argue there of good and evil,
Of happiness and final misery,
Passion and apathy, and glory and shame;
and such discourses possibly
—with a pleasing sorcery might charm
Pain for awhile and anguish, and excite
Fallacious hope, or arm the obdured breast
With stubborn patience as with triple steel.
But it would only be _for awhile_ that they could be thus beguiled by
it, for it is
Vain wisdom all, and false philosophy!
it would be only for a while, and they were there for a time which in
prospect must appear all but endless. The Pundits would not thank him
for bringing them there; Baly himself must continually wish he were
breathing the heavenly air of the Swerga in the company of ignorant
but happy associates, and he would regret his unwise choice even more
bitterly than he remembered the glorious city wherein he had reigned
in his magnificence.
He made a great mistake. If he had gone with the ignorant to Heaven he
would have seen them happy there, and partaken their happiness, though
they might not have been able to derive any gratification from his
wisdom;—which said wisdom, peradventure, he himself when he was there
might have discovered to be but foolishness. It is only in the company
of the good that real enjoyment is to be found; any other society is
hollow and heartless. You may be excited by the play of wit, by the
collision of ambitious spirits, and by the brilliant exhibition of
self-confident power; but the satisfaction ends with the scene. Far
unlike this is the quiet confiding intercourse of sincere minds and
friendly hearts, knowing and loving and esteeming each other; and such
intercourse our philosopher enjoyed in Doncaster.
Edward Miller the Organist was a person very much after Daniel Dove's
own heart. He was a warm-hearted, simple-hearted, right-hearted man;
an enthusiast in his profession, yet not undervaluing, much less
despising, other pursuits. The one Doctor knew as little of music as
the other did of medicine; but Dr. Dove listened to Miller's
performance with great pleasure, and Dr. Miller when he was indisposed
took Dove's physic with perfect faith.
This musician was brother to William Miller, the bookseller, well
known in the early part of the present century as a publisher of
splendid works, to whose flourishing business in Albemarle Street the
more flourishing John Murray succeeded. In the worldly sense of the
word the musician was far less fortunate than the bibliopole, a
doctorate in his own science, being the height of the honours to which
he attained, and the place of organist at Doncaster the height of the
preferment. A higher station was once presented to his hopes. The
Marquis of Rockingham applied in his behalf for the place of Master of
his Majesty's band of musicians, then vacated by the death of Dr.
Boyce; and the Duke of Manchester, who was at that time Lord
Chamberlain, would have given it him if the King had not particularly
desired him to bestow it on Mr. Stanley, the celebrated blind
performer on the organ. Dr. Miller was more gratified by this proof of
the Marquis's good will towards him than disappointed at its failure.
Had the application succeeded he would not have written the History of
Doncaster; nor would he have borne a part in a well-intended and
judicious attempt at reforming our church psalmody, in which part of
our church service reformation is greatly needed. This meritorious
attempt was made when George Hay Drummond, whose father had been
Archbishop of York, was Vicar of Doncaster, having been presented to
that vicarage in 1785, on the demise of Mr. Hatfield.
At that time the Parish Clerk used there as in all other parish
churches to chuse what psalm should be sung “to the praise and glory
of God,” and what portions of it; and considering himself as a much
more important person in this department of his office than the
organist, the only communication upon the subject which he held with
Dr. Miller, was to let him know what tune he must play, and how often
he was to repeat it. “Strange absurdity!” says Miller. “How could the
organist placed in this degrading situation, properly perform his part
of the church service? Not knowing the words, it was impossible for
him to accommodate his music to the various sentiments contained in
different stanzas; consequently his must be a mere random performance,
and frequently producing improper effects.” This however is what only
a musician would feel; but it happened one Sunday that the clerk gave
out some verses which were either ridiculously inapplicable to the
day, or bore some accidental and ludicrous application, so that many
of the congregation did not refrain from laughter. Mr. Drummond upon
this, for he was zealously attentive to all the duties of his calling,
said to Miller, “that in order to prevent any such occurrence in
future he would make a selection of the best verses in each psalm,
from the authorized version of Tate and Brady, and arrange them for
every Sunday and festival throughout the year, provided he, the
organist, who was perfectly qualified for such a task, would adapt
them to proper music.” To such a man as Miller this was the greatest
gratification that could have been afforded; and it proved also to be
the greatest service that was ever rendered to him in the course of
his life; for through Mr. Drummond's interest, the King and the Bishop
patronized the work, and nearly five thousand copies were subscribed
for, the list of subscribers being, it is believed, longer than had
ever been obtained for any musical publication in this kingdom.
Strange to say, nothing of this kind had been attempted before; for
the use of psalmody in our churches was originally no part of the
service; but having as it were, crept in, and been at first rather
suffered than encouraged, and afterwards allowed and permitted only,
not enjoined, no provision seems ever to have been made for its
proper, or even decent performance. And when an arrangement like this
of Mr. Drummond's had been prepared, and Dr. Miller, with sound
judgement, had adapted it where that could be done, to the most
popular of the old and venerable melodies which had been so long in
possession, it may seem more strange that it should not have been
brought into general use. This I say might be thought strange, if any
instance of that supine and sinful negligence which permits the
continuance of old and acknowledged defects in the church
establishment, and church service, could be thought so.
Mr. Drummond had probably been led to think upon this subject by
Mason's conversation, and by his Essays, historical and critical, on
English Church Music. Mason who had a poet's ear and eye was ambitious
of becoming both a musician and a painter. According to Miller he
succeeded better in his musical than in his pictorial attempts, for he
performed decently on the harpsichord; but in painting he never
arrived even at a degree of mediocrity, and in music it was not
possible to teach him the principles of composition, Miller and others
having at his own desire attempted in vain to instruct him.
Nevertheless, such a man, however superficial his knowledge of the
art, could not but feel and reason justly upon its use and abuse in
our Church Service; and he was for restricting the organist much in
the same way that Drummond and Miller were for restraining the clerk.
For after observing that what is called the voluntary requires an
innate inventive faculty, which is certainly not the lot of many; and
that the happy few who possess it will not at all times be able to
restrain it within the bounds which reason and, in this case, religion
would prescribe, he said, “it was to be wished therefore that in our
established church extempore playing were as much discountenanced as
extempore praying; and that the organist were as closely obliged in
this solo and separate part of his office to keep to set forms, as the
officiating minister; or as he himself is when accompanying the choir
in an anthem, or a parochial congregation in a psalm.” He would have
indulged him however with a considerable quantity of these set forms,
and have allowed him, if he approached in some degree to Rousseau's
high character of a Preluder, “to descant on certain single grave
texts which Tartini, Geminiani, Corelli or Handel would abundantly
furnish, and which may be found at least of equal elegance and
propriety in the Largo and Adagio movements of Haydn or Pleyel.”
Whatever Miller may have thought of this proposal, there was a passage
in Mason's Essay in favour of voluntaries which was in perfect accord
with Dr. Dove's notions. “Prompt and as it were casual strains,” says
the Poet, “which do not fix the attention of the hearer, provided they
are the produce of an original fancy, which scorns to debase itself by
imitating common and trivial melodies, are of all others the best
adapted to induce mental serenity. We in some sort listen to such
music as we do to the pleasing murmur of a neighbouring brook, the
whisper of the passing breeze, or the distant warblings of the lark
and nightingale; and if agreeable natural voices have the power of
soothing the contemplative mind, without interrupting its
contemplations, simple musical effusions must assuredly have that
power in a superior degree. All that is to be attended to by the
organist is to preserve such pleasing simplicity; and this musical
measures will ever have, if they are neither strongly accented, nor
too regularly rhythmical. But when this is the case, they cease to
soothe us, because they begin to affect us. Add to this that an air
replete with short cadences and similar passages is apt to fix itself
too strongly on the memory; whereas a merely melodious or harmonical
movement glides, as it were, through the ear, awakens a transient
pleasing sensation, but leaves behind it no lasting impression. Its
effect ceases, when its impulse on the auditory nerve ceases;—an
impulse strong enough to dispel from the mind _all eating care_ (to
use our great Poet's own expression) but in no sort to rouze or ruffle
any of its faculties, save those only which attend truly devotional
duty.”
This passage agreed with some of the Doctor's peculiar notions. He
felt the power of devotional music both in such preparatory strains as
Mason has here described, and in the more exciting emotions of
congregational psalmody. And being thus sensible of the religious uses
which may be drawn from music, he was the more easily led to entertain
certain speculations concerning its application in the treatment of
diseases, as will be related hereafter.