The Text of a Lecture given as one of the "Exeter Hall Lectures" for the season 1861-2 (transcribed from a copy in the Congregational Library, London).
[ Advertisement of the Exeter Hall Lectures, printed on the inside cover of the booklet ]
[ Programme of the music illustrations sung during Henry Allon's lecture. (The music notation of all these is printed, generally in open score, in the body of the lecture script as it was (presumably)delivered.) ]
[ ** "Die Ehre Gottes aus der Natur", from Sechs Lieder, op.48. It is given, with an English translation, in (among others) CoH 1906 No.898 (in C), transposed to B flat in the Church Anthem Book 1933, No.81, and further transposed to A in HCS 1964, No.8. At Henry Allon's lecture the music was sung to words by Edward Cooper, "Father of heaven, whose love profound" (see AMR-64, AMNS-97, EH-387, NEH-358, RCH-5, 3CH-77, MHB-38, HPs-519, BHB-39, WOV-60, HTC-359 &c., but none of the main Congregationist books after 1887: CCH-225.) ]
[ Henry Allon's Introduction. (An additional paragraph break inserted) ]
I cannot address you to-night without first alluding to the mysterious dispensation of God's providence which has quenched in a moment the joy of an entire nation, and has brought us hither as with the sorrow of a domestic bereavement upon every heart. God has taken from us a Prince who came to us as a stranger - commended only as the chosen husband of the Queen - but whose personal wisdom and goodness soon won for him, for his own sake, a universal esteem and affection. No man ever lived amongst us in more exalted respect - in more spotless reputation - in more exemplary goodness. Of noble and modest worth - of intellectual breadth and culture - he was a wise and patriotic counsellor of the Queen, in whom all men had perfect confidence: he was a virtuous and exemplary husband and father, making the highest home in the land its brightest example of conjugal happiness and domestic virtue, and constituting it a home of most precious teachings and influences for those who are now our princes, and may be our rulers.
In accomplishments, wisdom, and patriotism - in all that was virtuous, religious, and affectionate, the Prince whom we mourn to-day was everything that the people of England could wish in the husband of their Queen and the father of their princes. Nor after twenty-two years' experience of him would there be so much as a qualifying wish or suggestion, had the choiceto be ratified to-day. Next to the Queen herself he commanded the respect and love of a nation. Happy is the people to whom God gives such Princes. Generations hence our national obligations to Prince Albert will still be felt.
The personal loss and sorrow of our beloved Queen are too sacred for me to speak of here. May the God of pity comfort and strengthen her! Could human sympathy avail for her consolation, she may feel assured that no such sorrow has touched the heart of this generation - making strong men bow their heads and weep, and turning Sabbath congregations into scenes of lamentation that could not be repressed. Throughout this broad realm of England, is there a heart that has not felt a tender reverence for her great sorrow, or a knee that has not bowed in earnest prayer that the "Husband of the widow and the Father of the fatherless" will be her Almighty help?
As a tribute of respect to the Prince, whom we all so deeply and sincerely mourn, the chorus "Happy and blest are they," from Mendelssohn's St.Paul, will now be sung. -
( Sung by the Choir.)
[ Final paragraphs of Henry Allon's lecture. (An additional paragraph break inserted) ]
. . . In conclusion, I have but one canon of church song to insist upon. I would not prescribe either its form or its character, further than to require that it be reverent and devotional, "fit for a seraph to sing, and an angel to hear." But I do demand that it be, not a choir-song to which people must listen, but a congregational-song in which people may join, - a worship not of priests, but of the whole church. For this end I regard that as the best worship-music, which in the greatest degree combines simplicity and beauty, devoutness and fervour.
"Psalms and hymns, and spiritual songs." are the chief medium of worship; from the beginning they have filled the Church on earth, and throughout eternity they will fill the Church in heaven; from every place they have ascended to God; - from the shores of the Red Sea; from the tabernacle in the wilderness; from the gorgeous temple in Jerusalem; from the upper room in which Christ and the eleven partook of the last supper; from little companies of the early Christians, furtively worshipping "in dens and caves of the earth;" from the cathedral of Ambrose, and the deserts of Syria; from imperial palaces, and from peasants' cottages; from gorgeous churches, and from nonconformist meeting-houses; from the Waldenses in their fastnesses, the Huguenots in the desert, the Covenanters upon the mountain side; from family altars, and from dying beds; now a solitary note of song, and now the mighty shout of rejoicing thousands.
They have been the utterance to God of all that is highest in Christian thought; of all that is holiest in Christian life; of all that is tenderest and most rapturous in Christian love. That which John was permitted to hear in the assemblies of the redeemed in heaven, the ministering angels of God have often heard in the assemblies of the redeemed on earth - a rapturous song of worshipping praise and love, and this scarcely less high, less pure, less fervent, than that; nay, so identical is the praise of salvation, that the first great song of the Christian Church on earth can hardly be distinguished from the last song of the redeemed in heaven.
"Glory be to God on high, and in earth peace, ... "
[ the rest of the "Gloria in excelsis" followed, concluding the lecture. ]
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(The Rejoice & Sing Enchiridion:edited by David Goodall; last amended 17/7/01)