§ 113. CHUKCH rOETJJY AND MDSIC. 575
A peculiar variety of such gifts, namely, memorials of miraculous cures,' appeared in the fifth century ; at least they are first mentioned by Theodoret, who said of them in his eighth discourse on the martyrs : " That those who ask with the confidence of faith, receive what the}^ ask, is plainly proved by their sacred gifts in testimony of their healing. Some ofier feet, others hands, of gold or silver, and these gifts show their deliverance from those evils, as tokens of which they have been offered by the restored." "With the worship of saints this custom gained strongly, aiid became in the middle age quite universal. AVhoover recovered from a sickness, considered him self bound first to testify by a gift his gratitude to the saint whose aid he had invoked in his distress. Parents, whose children fortunately survived the teething-fever, ofi'ered to St. ApoUonia (all whose teeth, according to the legend, had been broken out with pincers by a hangman's servant) gifts of jawbones in wax. In like manner St. Julian, for happily accomplished journeys, and St. Hubert, for safe return from the perils of the chase, were very richly endowed ; but the Yirgin Mary more than all. Almost every church or chapel which has a miracle-working image of the mother of God, possesses even now a multitude of golden and silver acknowledgments of fortunate returns and recoveries.
§ 113. Church Poetry and Music.
Kambaoh: Anthologie christl. Gesange aus alien Jahrh. der christl. Kirche. Altona, ISIT-'SS. H.A.Daniel: Thesaurus liymuologicus. Hal. 184:l-'56, 5 vols. Edelestand dtj Meril: Poesies populairea Ifttines anterieures an douzleme siecle. Paris, 1843. 0. Forti-age: Gesange der christl. Vorzeit. Berlin, 1844. G. A. Konigsfeld u. A. W, V. Schlegel: Altchristliche Hymnen u. Gesange lateinisch n. deutscli. Bonn, 1847. Second collection by Konigsfeld, Bonn, 1865. E. E. Kooii : Geschiclite des Kirchenlieds u. Kircliengesangs der christl., insbesondere der deutschen evangel. Kircho. 2d ed. Stuttgart, 1852 f. 4 vols. (i. 10-30). F. J. Mone: Latein. Hymnen des Mittelalters v'trom MSS.), Freiburg, 1853-55. (Vol. i., hymns of God and angels; u., h. of Mary ; Ui., h. of saints.) Bassleb: Auswahl alt-christl. Liedeii
570 THIRD PEEIOD. A.D. 311-590.
vom 2-16ten Jalirh. Berlin, 1858. R. On. Trench: Sacred Latin I'oetiy, cliietly lyrical, selected and arranged for use; with Notes and Introduction (1849), 2d ed. improved, Lond. and Cambr. 1864. The valuable hynmological works of Dr. J. M. Neale (of Sackville College, Oxford): The Ecclesiastical Latin Poetry of the Middle Ages (iu Henry Thompsoii'ii History of Roman Literature, Loud, and Glasgow, 1852, p. 213 ff.) ; Mediaeval Hymns and Sequences, Lond. 1851; Sequentiaj ex Missalibus, 1852; Hymns of the Eastern Church, 1862, several articles in the Ecclesiologist ; and a Latin dissertation, De Sequentiis, in the Essays on Lilurgiology^ etc., p. 359 sqq. (Corap. also J. Chandler: The Hymns of the Primitive Church, now first collected, translated, and arranged, Lond. 1837.)
Poetry, and its twin sister music, are the most sublime and spiritual arts, and are much more akin to the genius of Christianity, and minister far more copiously to tlie purposes of devotion and edification than architecture, painting, and sculpture. They emplo}^ word and tone, and can speak thereby more directly to the S])irit than the plastic arts by stone and color, and give more adequate expression to the whole wealth of the world of thought and feeling. In the Old Testament, as is well known, they were essential parts of divine worship* and so they have been in all ages and almost all branches of the Christian church.
Of the various species of religions poetry, the hymn is the earliest and most important. It has a rich history, in which the deepest experiences of Christian life are stored. But it attains full bloom in the Evaugelical church of the German and English tongue, where it, like the Bible, becomes for the first time truly the possession of the people, instead of being restricted to priest or clioir.
Tlie hymn, in the narrower sense, belongs to lyrical poetry, or the poetry of feeling, in distinction from the ei)ic and dramatic. It differs also from tlie other forms of the lyric (ode, elegy, sonnet, cantata, &c.) in its devotional nature, its popular form, and its adaptation to singing. The hymn is a popular spiritual song, presenting a healthful Christian sentiment in a noble, simple, and universally intelligible form, and adapted to be read and sung with edification by the whole congregation of the faitiiful. It nmst therefore contain nothing