outrageous banter which he hu: Is against virtue, religion, and truth. Hence his very presence excites a feeling of horror in all serious bosoms. Not that they have any dread of his power to undermine their principles, or their expectations of immortal felicity; but they loathe his foul, poisonous breath, streaming forth in bitter revilings against whatever they esteem most dear and venerable. By the side of his infidel works he has crammed an arm-load of inflammatory pamphlets, written by the scribblers of his own sect in politics. These also, though he does not comprehend above one half of their contents, he devours with gluttonous rapacity. For they are the nutriment of that party venom and rancorous animosity which find a congenial soil in minds such as his; minds given up to the tempests of passion, narrow and factious in their range of inquiry, not softened by benevolence, and altogether destitute of the expanded liberality of those generous spirits who do not cease to love à brother because he cannot bring his political opinions to a coincidence with their own.

Lewis is both a wholesale and retail dealer in scandal. He is a prince among whisperers and backbiters; the most eager of the crew to give currency to defamatory tales concerning the wise and the virtuous. He takes a malicious pleasure in frequenting those places where slanderous reports are most copiously fabricated and set in motion; and never fails, in his repetition of them, to strengthen them by the most artful exaggerations, when this is deemed necessary to their success in the demolition of the character against which they are directed. And when the full cry of persecution is up, and the hunted, bleeding reputation is straining for life, he is sure to be the headmost of the pack, and the first that inflicts the wound intended to be fatal. Not even the pure snows of vestal fame are left unstained by the ferocious prowler. Several times has he been made to stand before, the tribunals of his country, to atone for these diabolical

practices; but by his own craftiness, and by those hoary fees for which some ingenious lawyers will plead any cause whatever, he has hitherto escaped the severe punishment due to his crimes.

This cruel being,-let it not be thought incredible, for it is easily explained,-is sometimes an attendant on religious worship. For what purpose? Not to influence others to what is right by his example. Not to catch from the holy altar the flame of devotion, Not to expose, unarmed, the base propensities of his heart to the thunders and lightnings of divine eloquence for all his energies are shamelessly and obstinately reared up as a rampart against the shafts of truth. His object is to deride the offices of the sanctuary. Every look, gesture, and expression of him who is wielding the armour of heaven to reach and reform the soul of the impenitent sinner is watched, with malignant scrutiny, for something which may be turned to the injury of the preacher, and of the sacred cause in which his zeal is enlisted.

Many more features might be transferred to my canvass from the original. But it is needless; and the employment is become so irksome to me that I will continue at it no longer. I shall lay aside my brush and colours, after dropping a word of advice to those who honour my performance with their inspection; namely, that they do not identify themselves with the picture, nor with any part of it, unless they be conscious that it presents their own similitude.. C.. JACK DAUBER.

No. 35. JUNE 29, 1815.

On Sacred Music.

AS I am a lover of music, and convinced that it is in no other way so appropriately used as in the praises of our Creator and our Redeemer, I cannot without pleasure observe the extensive cultivation of psalmo

dy in this valley. Some relish for sweet sounds, and some capacity for singing, are the common gifts of nature to mankind; but it is of great importance, especially for producing good harmony, that the voice be well disciplined, and that a habit be acquired of performing with accuracy of time. These qualifications are to be obtained by a little study, with a course of practice under the guidance of a skilful teacher.

The pleasure, however, which I have expressed is much diminished when I consider the kind of music now generally taught in our schools. My pretensions to musical taste, I freely acknowledge, are not very high; and if I err, I wish to be convinced of my errors. In the mean time, I shall take the liber-ty to lay my notions upon the subject, such as they are, before the learners, and particularly the teachers, of sacred music.

I avow myself an admirer of the ancient sort of psalmody in preference, nay, I am obliged to say, in opposition to the new. In many other cases our inventions are improvements; but in this I believe we are going deplorably backward. Those for whom I write will readily understand what I mean by ancient psalmody when I mention, as specimens of it, the Old Hundredth Psalm, Coleshill, Mear, and St. Martin's. If there is any other composition, for the voice or the organ, equal in sublimity to the Old Hundredth, I shall rejoice to be made acquainted with it The new psalmody may be sufficiently characterized by naming Ocean, Montgomery, Sherburne; with a general reference to the ballad tunes, vamped up with accompanying parts, and applied as the vehicles of religious sentiment. Things of this kind have nearly banished the venerable, heart affecting psalmody of our forefathers from our places of instruction, and are aiming to expel it even from our worshiping assemblies.

The first requisite to a good piece of music is a' good air, or leading part. Now it seems to me that

most of the airs so fashionable in our schools betray no less than a most egregious poverty of genius. They have some variety of movement, but no energy. I hear a wild, flashy series of sounds, which express nothing, and excite in my mind no feeling but that of weariness or disgust. And when I think of the com-* posers of so much unmeaning noise, I am apt to be reminded of the poet mentioned by Horace, who wrote two hundred careless verses while he stood upon one foot; or of Bayes in the Rehearsal, who played many a fantastic trick in order to "elevate and surprise." But I have other objections, and such as are more capable of being reduced to a specific form.

There is a superficiality, a levity in much of the new music, quite unsuitable to the grand purpose of psalmody, which is the excitation of a devotional spirit. Many people say that they are vastly entertained by these tunes, and call them pretty, very pretty. But I appeal to experience when I assert that they are far from promoting that lowly prostration of soul, and those pure affections, with which we ought to approach the throne of the Deity. I have known this ranting sort of music to produce a very presumptuous familiarity with the Almighty, and other objects the most awful; but this I call fanaticism, and not devotion.

My strongest objection, however, is leveled against the fugue. I take the term as it is commonly used amongst us, and need not explain it. In performing music with instruments, or in singing it for recreation without words, a fugue may be unobjectionable. But a vocal concert, especially a sacred one, in which two, three, or four different sets of words are to be sung together at the same time is truly such a farrago of confusion and absurdity, that I can only gaze with astonishment at the vogue which it has obtained. You tell me, perhaps, as I have often been told, that the harmony of the music is charming. Be it so; what is this to the purpose? I observe, by the way, that the placing of notes above one another so as to make to

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lerable harmony of sounds is a very mechanical and easy task. But in the name of sense, what becomes of the desirable harmony of thought and feeling in those who execute or those who hear this newfangled jum ble? I once asked a little fellow who was humining his crotchets as he marched to the school, how many parts of music they carried on there? He replied shrewdly, let me try to recollect how many scholars we have; for we carry on about that many parts; I think, not less than twenty." This, no doubt, created a horrid jargon of sound; but as to the intellectual and moral part of the business,. it was only advancing the principle of the fugue to its utmost perfection..

I would not be understood as condemning every thing besides the grave, plain tunes. These, indeed, I prize as the best; and I should hardly give my consent to the introduction of any others in the ordinary course of public worship, But there are many pieces, not so simple, yet composed in something of the same spirit, productions of real talent,, and free from the tormenting fugue, which afford me much pleasure. Such are the works of Madan, and many of those of Billings..

Since the days when I learned to sing, the angular notes have been generally introduced into our books of sacred music. These notes, at first view, present an uncouth and disagreeable appearance to the eye; but habit soon renders it familiar: and I am satisfied that by this scheme the labour both of the teacher and the scholar is very considerably lessened.. Still it is questionable whether the scheme has, on the whole, been productive of good. It has been made to operate unfavourably, as I apprehend, upon the taste of the community. As it increases very much the difficulty of transcribing music, the printing of it has been proportionally called for, and has extended abundantly be yond its former amount. Almost every year, some little singing master throws out his husky, insipid collection from the press; containing, as a matter of course, some of his own miserable compositions. By