The Hymns and Small Cathechism | Page 6

stones, or a moonbeam gleaming
amid dark clouds. Luther loved music; indeed, he wrote treatises on the
art. Accordingly his versification is highly harmonious, so that he may
be called the Swan of Eisleben. Not that he is by any means gentle or
swan-like in the songs which he composed for the purpose of exciting
the courage of the people. In these he is fervent, fierce. The hymn
which he composed on his way to Worms, and which he and his
companion chanted as they entered that city, 2 is a regular war-song.
The old cathedral trembled when it heard these novel sounds. The very
rooks flew from their nests in the towers. That hymn, the Marseillaise
of the Reformation, has preserved to this day its potent spell over
German hearts."
The words of Thomas Carlyle are not less emphatic, while they
penetrate deeper into the secret of the power of Luther's hymns:
"The great Reformer's love of music and poetry, it has often been
remarked, is one of the most significant features in his character. But
indeed if every great man is intrinsically a poet, an idealist, with more
or less completeness of utterance, which of all our great men, in these
modern ages, had such an endowment in that kind as Luther? He it was,
emphatically, who stood based on the spiritual world of man, and only
by the footing and power he had obtained there, could work such
changes on the material world. As a participant and dispenser of divine
influence, he shows himself among human affairs a true connecting

medium and visible messenger between heaven and earth, a man,
therefore, not only permitted to enter the sphere of poetry, but to dwell
in the purest centre thereof, perhaps the most inspired of all teachers
since the Apostles. Unhappily or happily, Luther's poetic feeling did
not so much learn to express itself in fit words, that take captive every
ear, as in fit actions, wherein, truly under still more impressive
manifestations, the spirit of spheral melody resides and still audibly
addresses us. In his written poems, we find little save that strength of
on 'whose words,' it has been said, 'were half-battles'3- little of that still
harmony and blending softness of union which is the last perfection of
strength - less of it than even his conduct manifested. With words he
had not learned to make music - it was by deeds of love or heroic valor
that he spoke freely. Nevertheless, though in imperfect articulation, the
same voice, if we listen well, is to be heard also in his writings, in his
poems. The one entitled Ein' Feste Burg, universally regarded as the
best, jars upon our ears; yet there is something in it like the sound of
Alpine avalanches, or the first murmur of earthquakes, in the very
vastness of which dissonance a higher unison is revealed to us. Luther
wrote this song in times of blackest threatenings, which, however,
could in no sense become a time of despair. In these tones, rugged and
broken as they are, do we hear the accents of that summoned man, who
answered his friends' warning not to enter Worms, in this wise: - 'Were
there as many devils in Worms as these tile roofs, I would on'; of him
who, alone in that assemblage before all emperors and principalities
and powers, spoke forth these final and forever memorable words, - 'It
is neither safe nor prudent to do aught against conscience. Till such
time as either by proofs from holy Scripture, or by fair reason or
argument, I have been confuted and convicted, I cannot and will not
recant. Here I stand - I cannot do otherwise - God be my help, Amen.' It
is evident enough that to this man all popes, cardinals, emperors, devils,
all hosts and nations were but weak, weak as the forest with all its
strong trees might be to the smallest spark of electric fire."
In a very different style of language, but in a like strain of eulogy,
writes Dr. Merle d'Aubigne, in the third volume of his History of the
Reformation: "The church was no longer composed of priests and
monks; it was now the congregation of believers. All were to take part

in worship, and the chanting of the clergy was to be succeeded by the
psalmody of the people. Luther, accordingly, in translating the psalms,
thought of adapting them to be sung by the church. Thus a taste for
music was diffused throughout the nation. From Luther's time, the
people sang; the Bible inspired their songs. Poetry received the same
impulse. In celebrating the praises of God, the people could not confine
themselves to mere translations of ancient anthems. The souls of Luther
and of several of his contemporaries, elevated