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 ST. JOHN, N. B., 
 
 ANU 
 
 REV. J. R. LAWSON. 
 
 BARNESVILLE, N. B. 
 
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 ST. JOHN, N. B. : 
 
 DAILY TELEOBAFH 3TKAM JOB I'RIKT, CANTERBURY STREET 
 
 1880. 
 
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PREFATORY NOTE. 
 
 The following pages are a reprint of a recent correspondence published 
 in the columns of the' Daily Telegraph, St. John, N. B. There is also 
 added a letter, for which, it is presumed, the Editor could not find room 
 in his crowded sheets, and which he c'id not think proper to notice. 
 Although the discussion has no claim to be considered exhaustive of the 
 subject of Psalmody, it is hoped that, in this consolidated form, it may 
 serve to awaken a deeper interest in the question, and assist unprejudiced 
 inquirers in the investigation of it. Confident that truth is mighty, and 
 must ultimately prevail, the whole correspondence is submitted to the 
 calm, unprejudiced, and prayerful consideration of every reader, who 
 desires to know the truth that he may walk in conformity with it. 
 
 J. R. Lawson. 
 
THE SONGS OF ZION. 
 
 The Daily Telegraph 23rd Oct., 1879. 
 
 "The Songs of Zion the only Manual of Pr-aise" is the title of a neat 
 little pamphlet from the pen of the Rev. J. R. Lawson, printed at this 
 office, and published by R. A. H. Morrow, Charlotte street, St. John. 
 The author thinks that we ought only to sing the Psalms of David in 
 public worship. The thesis which he proposes to maintain is: — "The 
 Psalms of David in the best metrical translation available or chanted in 
 prose, should be used in the service of praise to the exclusion of all other 
 compositions, whatever may be their literary, poetical or doctrinal excel- 
 lencies." His fii-st ai'gument is: "The inspired psalms are quite sufficient 
 for all the purposes for which a manual of praise is required." In sup- 
 port of this i^osition, he makes quotations from several eminent writers, 
 which go to show that the psalms are excellent, as expressing the senti- 
 ments of the human heart; and which, Mr. Lawson thinks, justify the 
 conclusion that they are "a perfect medium through which to express 
 our sorrows, joys, aspirations, hopes, and that no other vehicle of praise 
 to God is needed." Now, while agreeing with the eulogies of the authors 
 quoted, we demur to the conclusion. A very good thing does not imply 
 that even a less worthy thing in the same line may not be useful. Let 
 us eulogize a peach never so much, we are not to be supposed to be in- 
 sensible to the qualities of a pear. Home, Luther, Calvin, Edwards 
 and Gladstone, who are quoted by Mr. L., would, we believe, each of 
 them think, or have thought, it strange that their words should be held 
 to imply that no other songs than those of David and his co-psalmists 
 should ever be used in the church. But let us hear Mr. Lawson's sec- 
 ond argument: "The Psalms of David have the Divine appointment," 
 by which the author means that "they were given by inspiration of God 
 to be the subject matter of the church's praise." If he had said the 
 Jewish Church's praise, the position might be admitted. There is just 
 the same authority for the use of the Psalms that there is for the Temple 
 itself, its sacrifices and instruments of service, including the cymbals, 
 psalteries, etc., and no more. That they are used in the praise of God 
 now is because of the adaptedness of many of them for that purpose; 
 because of their imperishable worth as expressive of the attributes and 
 character of God, and of the hopes, fears, aspirations and penitence of 
 the human heart. Others of the Psalms are by most people felt not to 
 be so adapted, in view of the changed circumstances of the church, and 
 are, as a rule, not sung. When they are sung by Mr. Lawson it is only 
 when he has by his "explanations" adapted them to the sentiments of 
 his people — translated them out of history into figure, giving them some- 
 times a meaning, we fear, which was never contemplated by the sweet 
 singer who composed them — a fallible meaning certainly, in which case 
 the congregation would be called on to sing not merely an uninspired but 
 
O CORRESPOXDENXE ON PSALMODY. 
 
 possibly a fictitious i)salm, and so become guilty of woi-so than tliat will 
 worehip which is frequently charged on those who sing hynms or para- 
 phitises in public service. 
 
 The third argument of Mr. Lawson is that "No other book of spiritual 
 songs has the same Divine authority. There is no book of Psalms in 
 the New Testament, nor any raised up to write psalms as to write Gos- 
 pels and Epistles, and no intimation that the Redeenier would raise up 
 such." And then it is further affirmed that "Ascension gifts did not 
 include hymn-makers." 
 
 Now, first, we say there is the genn of a hymn book in the New 
 Testament. The songs of Mary, Simeon, Zacharius and of John, are at 
 least a beginning of such hymn book. Second, the Jewish worship was 
 instituted and conducted for several hundreds of years before any regular 
 service of song was instituted at all, it having been first introduced by 
 David and practised in front of the tabernacle, and there was no "inti- 
 mation" given that any would be raised up for the purpose of giving to 
 the Jewish church the service of song, and instrumental music as well, 
 till it was about to become an accomplished fact. Third, ascension gifts 
 included prophecy, (in the broad sense of that, term) which, in men 
 naturally endowed with the poetic faculty, frequently tokes the rhythmic 
 form, and in the tnily spiritual man becomes inspiration, though not in 
 the sense of becoming authoritative. It is the i)rovince of the discerners 
 of spuits in the church to separate the wheat from the chaff here; and 
 in this way the hymns of tke ages have been, and are being, prepared 
 for the use of the church. God has not left this great want of a vehicle 
 of Christian praise unprovided for. Hymns of mere himian composition 
 we object to, but hymns, which have proceeded from a spiritual prophetic 
 man, upon and into whom the Spiiit of God has breathed, and whom 
 He has anointed and sealed, are not merely human. They have in them 
 a divine element, which makes them worthy to be sung by the multitudes 
 of one heart and one mind, with their sentiments, because they have all 
 been baptized by and into the one spirit. 
 
 Mr. L. next considera objections to the exclusive use of the Psalms in 
 Christian worship. One of these is that the name of Jesus is not to be 
 found in them. This objection he calls frivolous, as Christ is in them 
 under other names. We consider it fatal, not to the use of the Psalms, 
 but to the exclusion of all other hymns. Is it not a strange fact that in 
 exclusively psalm-singing congregations, met for the purpose of worship- 
 ing God through Christ, His proper name, so expressive of His office 
 and sweet to the believer's ear, cannot be heard once in their songs of 
 praisel This one fact shows how untenable is the thesis Mr. L. proposes 
 to establish. 
 
 Mr. L. thinks that an objection grounded on the Jewish phraseology 
 of the P&alms does not hold good, as the objection would be equally 
 strong against reading them. This is a mistake. What is good for 
 instruction may yet be inappropiiate for song. The want of simplicity 
 and the need of explication are quite opposed to the true exercise of 
 praise. It is needless to dwell on a distinction so palpable. 
 
 Passing by the objection against the imprecatory psalms, and also the 
 questionable criticism about "the psalms, hymns and spiritual songs," 
 
CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. . T 
 
 we come to the objection made against the exclusive use of the psalms, 
 that if we are authorized to make our own prayers we are surely at lib- 
 erty to make our own songs of praise. "This objection," Mr. L. says, 
 "arises from confusion of thought. . . These ordinances, he says, 
 are essentially distinct in their nature. In prayer we make known our 
 wants, these are ever varying and our petitions must vary also. . . . 
 In praise, however, the case is different. The gieat Object of praise is 
 continually the same. The praises that are suitable at one time are suit- 
 able at another, etc." Now if prayer were always restricted to the 
 making known our wants and praise always to ascriptions of honor and 
 glory to the great Object of our worship there would be at least some 
 appearance of point in Mr. Lawson's reply. Mr. L., however, knows 
 that in our prayers we adore, confess, and ascribe glory to the hearer of 
 prayer, as well as express our wants and, on the other hand, he as well 
 knows that praise, so far from being confined to ascriptions of glory to 
 the unchangeable God, takes quite as wide a range as prayer and fre- 
 quently includes the petition itself. The Object of praise is the same, 
 but the subjects of praise are as various and multitudinous as the sub- 
 jects of prayei'. Each day may present a varied theme of song as it 
 presents various causes of thankfulness, or of jcy, or of hope, from the 
 believer's experience. Mr. Lawson, by his arbitrary distinction, utterly 
 contrary to the real facts, finds confusion which he himself has caused. 
 We need not further criticise this little work or notice further objections 
 and replies. We have said enough to show the utter baselessness of the 
 argument for the "exclusive" use of the Psalms in public worship. If 
 it were possible to maintain the argument, we may be sure that vastly 
 better reasons would have been adduced by the gifted author than are 
 to be found in "The Songs of Zion; the only Manual of Praise." 
 
 To the Editor of the Daily TdegrcqTli. 
 
 Baenesville, Nov. S, 1879. 
 Sir: — A late issue of the Telegraph contains a review of my little 
 pamphlet on Psalmody. Will you be so kind as to allow me space for a 
 brief reply? Whilst acknowledging the superior excellency of the 
 Psalms, as testified to by such writers as Home, Luther, Calvin, etc., 
 the reviewer demurs to the conclusion, that they ought to be exclusively 
 used in praise. He says : "A very good thing does not imply that even 
 a less worthy thing in the same line may not be useful." Now, whilst 
 that is a mere truism in many applications of it; in the case before us 
 it will not hold good. The question on hand is not one of mere taste. 
 It is not one concerning the use of such things as peaches and pears. 
 It is a question of acceptance with God in the sublimest devotional ser- 
 vice in which one can engage. In its application to such a question, the 
 principle is unscriptural. It is subversive of the great principle of the 
 Bible, that God is always to have the best. In the olden time, every- 
 thing offered to Him was to be the best of its kind. For any one to 
 admit, then, that the Psalms are the best in the line of Sacred songs, 
 and yet to affiim, that an inferior article in the same line may be used 
 
8 CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. 
 
 in woi'ship, either in lieu of them or supplementary to them, is in nttor 
 antagonism both to reason and scripture. 
 
 In refex'ence to my second proi)08ition, the reviewer says; "There ia 
 just the same authority for the use of the Psalms that there is for the 
 Temple itself, its sacnfices and instniments of sei'vice, including the cym- 
 bals, j)salteries, t-tc, and no more." Now, if the writer be thoroughly 
 honest in that conviction he must clamor to have that old Jewish Psalm 
 Book cast out of the Sanctuaiy entirely. All will admit that there is 
 now no authority for the temi)le and the temi)le service; and for any 
 one to attempt to restore it, in the Christian church, would be an anti- 
 chi'istian return to Judaism. If the use of the Psalms, then, lias no 
 more authority than the "beggarly elements" of a superannuated econ- 
 omy, why does not the reviewer, consistently with his convictions, con- 
 tend not moi'ely ngainst theii" exclusive use but any use of them, more 
 especially as it is an established principle of the Bible, that what is not 
 authorised in the worship of God is forbidden, and is sinful. Is the 
 reviewer prepared to take up that position? If not, then he is not tnie 
 to his thesis. But is it so that the Bible Psalms are Jewish and there- 
 fore now abrogated? I most emphatically deny it. They fonned no 
 peculiarity of the Jewish ritual. They were intended for the church of 
 God in eveiy age and dispensation succeeding the time of David. Ac- 
 cording to the testimony of Edwards — endorsed too by the reviewer in 
 sti*ange inconsistency with his position — "they were penned for the use 
 of the church of God in its public worship not only in that age but in 
 other ages, as being fitted to express the religion of all saints, in all 
 ages." By divine direction they were collected into volumes and labelled 
 "The Book of Psalms," at the time when the Jewish economy was near 
 its close, demonstrating that they were not intended solely for the dis- 
 pensation that was so soon to end, but also for that which was about to 
 be inaugurated. The Redeemer when He came to set up the Christian 
 church gave no hint that the ancient Psalms would be abrogated. On 
 the contrary, He honored the Psalms by quoting from them, by singing 
 portions of six of them at the last Passover; ^nd His soul passed away 
 to glory on the wings of a portion of David's Psalms — "Father into thy 
 hands I commend my spirit." Paul was as much opposed as any one 
 could be, to the introduction of Jewish rites into the Christian church, 
 and yet by his apostolic authority, he enjoined the use of the Psalms. 
 The early Christians, under the very eye of the apostle, used the Psalms 
 and, as far as the evidence goes, exclusively. According to the testi- 
 mony of the most reliable historians, the Psalms of the Sjniagogue passed 
 over to the Christian church, and if the reviewer can trace a single un- 
 inspired h3Tnn in use in the church farther back than the close of the 
 2nd century, he will have accomplished a rich feat in archaeology. 
 
 In his attempt to set aside my third proposition, the reviewer is pecn 
 liarly fanciful. He speaks of what he calls "the songs of Mary, Simeon, 
 Zacharias, and of John," as the beginning of a Christian hymn book. 
 Strange reasoning! "Mary said." "Simeon blessed God and said." 
 "Zacharias * * * prophesied saying." The reviewer has dis- 
 covered that all this means singing hymns ! His reference to prophesy- 
 ing, as including hymn-making, is nothing but a fancy. There is but 
 
CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. 9 
 
 one thing lacking to make the argument convincing, viz. : proof. I could 
 scarcely conceive of any mode of reasoning more unfortiniato for the 
 cause of the reviewer than his definition of a divine composition as con- 
 trasted with that which is merely hnvian. According to his theory, the 
 only thing that is essential to constitute a hymn divine is that it proceed 
 from a "spiritual prophetic man." Such a hymn is divine, and may be 
 sung, whilst eveiy other poetic composition is merely human, and should 
 not be sung. The spiritual character of the composer is that which 
 detei-mines the character of the composition. Now, according to that 
 theory, before that one can sing any hymn with confidence, he must 
 infallibly know the moral state of the composer, and have infiiUible evi- 
 dence that ho was a "sinritual prophetic man." But is it possible for 
 one to attain to that certainty'? Most assuredly not. Therefore, accord- 
 ing to that definition, there is no hymn-singer in existence, who can have 
 any certainty that ho is not singing a merely human composition, which 
 even the reviewer would not use in praise. There is only one book that 
 he can uso confidently, as meeting the requisite condition of a divine 
 composition. It is the Book of Psalms. In singing these Psalms we 
 are assured that they have proceeded from "a spiritual prophetic man, 
 upon and into whom the Spirit of God breathed, and whom He anointed 
 and sealed." In singing those Psalms, we are assured that we are not 
 using the utterances of fallible man, but the words of the Holy Ghost. 
 
 I have only fui-ther to remark that the reviewer's reference to Mr. 
 Lawson and his "explanations" is a misrepresentation. Mr. L., in his 
 "explanation" of the Psalms, does not adapt them to "the sentiments of 
 his people;" he tries to adapt the sentiments of his people to them. He 
 does not try to fit the Psalms for the i>eople, but the people for the 
 Psalms. Mr. L. never arbitrarily calls the people to sing according ^o 
 his "explanations," but according to the evident meaning of the inspired 
 words, to the right apprehension of which, his "explanations" may pos- 
 sibly assist them, by the blessing of the Great Teacher. 
 
 J. E. Lawson. 
 
 The Daily Telegraph 19th Nov., 1879. 
 
 Mr. Lawson thinks that our illustration of the comparative merits of 
 the Psalms and Hymns, as peach and pear, will not hold. Why noti 
 Because several good men spoke liighly of the psalms, and Mr. Lawsou 
 drew the conclusion that they would have nothing to do with any other 
 poetical compositions as matter of praise, and to show the absurdity of 
 such a conclusion we affirmed, under a similitude that such a conclusion 
 was unwarranted. The praise of the peach does not prevent one from 
 acknowledging the excellent qualities of the pear. No more does the 
 high meed of approbation of the authoi-s quoted imply Mr. Lawson's 
 conclusion that they would have nothing else sung in public Christian 
 worship. 
 
 What Mr. Lawson says a,bout giving to God the best we heartily 
 endorse. To use the former illustration, we would that He should have 
 the best peaches and the best pears too. Give us all the best psalms, 
 
10 CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. 
 
 and the very best liynms from the i>en8 of spiritual men, selected by 
 "disconiei-s of spirits" in the church, full of fervor and piety and sound 
 doctrine, and whicli will not need Mr. Lawson's "explanations" to fit 
 either them to his audience or his audience to them. This we think 
 woxild be an improvement on the singing of such psalms as require a 
 quarter or half an hour to get the hearers "insensed" into their meaning. 
 Mr. Lawson is, we think, mistaken .vhen he says that he does "not 
 adapt the psalms to the sentiments of the people but trios to adapt the 
 sentiments of the people to them." Here is i, verse: — 
 
 Yea happy surely shall he be, 
 
 Thy tender little ones, 
 Who shall lay hold upon and them 
 
 Shall dash against the stones. 
 
 Now, however much the sentiment of this verso was in accord with 
 the Jewish captives' mind, initated and maddened by the treatment of 
 Jerusalem by the Babylonians, it is not in accord, we humbly submit, 
 with the Cliristian sentiment of tlie people of Barnesville, and needs 
 adaptation as their song to the better spirit which Christians ought to 
 cherish to tliose who have done them great wrong. 
 
 Mr. Lawson does not seem to have noted our reason for the continu- 
 ance of many of the Psalms — their own excellence and imperishable 
 worth. If Mr. Lawson can prove to us that any part of the old Jewish 
 service is of such worth — say the musical instruments — we shall take 
 them in along with the psalms. As to the "blood of bulls and of goats," 
 the church had enough of that. It is lawful and right to disciiminate 
 between what is and is not of moral obligation. 
 
 Mr. Lawson says: "By divine direction they were collected into vol- 
 umes and labelled "The Book of Psalms" at the time when the Jewish 
 Economy was near its close, demonstrating that they were not intended 
 solely for the disj)ensation which was so soon to end, but also for that 
 which was about to be inaugurated. 
 
 Will Mr. Lawson be so good as give us his authority for saying that 
 this collection and labelling were done by divine direction, and the exact 
 date of the decree? "We shall wait with interest for his I'cply. In the 
 mean time as this is a somewhat important point, we waive notice of 
 other assumptions and objections till wo get some solid ground to tread 
 
 To the Editor of the Daily Telegraph. 
 
 Sir: — I have no objection to the most searching criticism, but I have 
 decided objections to misrepresentation. To say that I introduced quota- 
 tions front Home, Luther, Calvin, etc., to prove that they sang nothing 
 but Psalms is not true. Any one who roads my pamphlet ^vill see that 
 I gave (quotations from their writings, simply to show what they thought 
 of the subject matter of the Psalms, and not to show what their practice 
 was. 
 
 I did not say that the Psalms "were collected into vohimes." This is 
 one of a plurality of typographical errors in my communication. I said 
 
CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. 11 
 
 in my manuscript that they were, by Divine direction, collected into a 
 volume and labelled "the Book of Psalms," at the time when the Jewish 
 economy was near its close. The only authority that I have for niaking 
 that statement is that of inference. I cannot give the exact day and 
 date of the decree appointing P^zra, or any one else, to that work, any 
 more than I could furnish the decree appointing David to write the 
 119th Psalm, or Paul to write the epistle to the Romans. I find, how- 
 ever, the Apostles recognising that book of Psalms, and recognising the 
 verv order in which the Psalms are located in the collection, and 1 draw 
 the inference that whether there was a special decree or not in the matter, 
 the Psalms thus collected bore the sanction of divine authority. That 
 the compilation was not made anterior to the time of the Babylonish 
 captivity will not be disputed by the editor of the Tefegraph, who ascribes 
 one of the Psalms in the volume to the irritated state of the captives 
 by the treatment of Jerusalem by the Babylonians. I still adhere to 
 the proposition that the gathering of the fonnerly scattered Psalms into 
 a separate book and labelled the "Book of Psalms," at a time so far on 
 in the old economy, furnishes, at least, presumptive evidence that they 
 were intended not merely for the Jewish, but also for the Christian dis- 
 pensation that was so soon to be inaugurated. 
 
 It certainly will not appear strange that persons of "weaker capacity" 
 should require a little "explanation" of the Psalms, when the conductor 
 of an influential journal is so unenlightened in regard to the spii-it and 
 meaning of some of them. When he represents any of them as the breathing 
 of an "irritated and maddened" spirit, he furnishes indubitable (nidence 
 that he needs more than a "quarter" or even a "half hour's explanation'* 
 to "insense" him into their right meaning. A verse is quoted by you 
 from one of the Psalms. Here is another from the New Testament, 
 "Reward her as she rewarded you; double unto her double." These 
 words come from Heaven the region of unmingled purity. What do 
 you think of them? Are they the breathings of an "irritated and mad- 
 dened" spirit? Are they inconsistent with the true Christian sentiment? 
 Many similar and stronger utterances I can furnish from the Christian 
 Scriptures. Were the writers and speakers "irritated and mfuldenod?" 
 
 It is a fearful theological blunder for one to speak of any of the 
 Psalms as breathing forth "threatenings and slaughter" tignx\\%i 2^ers(yiial 
 enemies. They w«,re dictated by the Holy Spirit who was no more 
 malignant in Jewish times than He is now. In language no stronger 
 than that of the Christian Scriptures, they denounce the judgments of 
 the Almighty on the impenitent, malignant, and persecuting enemies of 
 His church and cause. If any one is not prepared to sing them accord- 
 ing to this, their true spirit and meaning, there is something that he 
 needs far more than a half hour's "explanation" to fit him for the exer- 
 cise — true love to Christ and zeal for His glory. 
 
 . . ' . J. R. Lavvson. 
 
 Barnesville, Nov. lith, 1879. 
 
12 CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. 
 
 The Daily Teleffrajjh Dec, 1880. 
 
 We present to our readers another letter on this subject from the Rev. 
 J. R. Lawson. He seems to think that he has not been properly repre- 
 sented in our remarks, but if he will only reflect a little, he will see 
 that we did not misrepresent liim when we inferred that, to make his 
 quotations from Home, Luther, Calvin, etc*, sustain his thesis — that the 
 Psalms should be exclusively sung in Christian worship — the implication 
 must be that they held to the exclusive system of Mr. Lawson. Other- . 
 wise the quotations have no force. Why Mr. Lawson, in his former 
 letter, will have it that, because we admire and endorse the sentiments 
 quoted, we should also become exclusive psalm-singers. 
 
 Accepting Mr. Lawson's correction of volume for volumes, we do not 
 see that his case is greatly improved. Mr. Lawson spoke in his former 
 letter with so mucli particularity and authority of the divine direction 
 about the collection called the Psalms, its title, its labelling, etc., that 
 we thought we were about to get some new information on a very im- 
 poi-tant subject. But all we have received^ is an inference — very good, 
 indeed, provided the data be correct and the deduction be without flaw. 
 When, however, we find Mr. Lawson crediting David with being the 
 author of the 119th Psalm, while the evidence applicable to the case is 
 utterly opposed to that conclusion, we are disposed to ask proof of his 
 assertions. The authorship and inspiration of the Epistle to the Romans 
 is undoubted, the evidence that St. Paul was the writer being overwhelm- 
 ing, its contents being the evidence of their source. If Mr. Lawson 
 has no better evidence of the divine authority for the collecting and 
 labelling of the book of Psalms than for the divine authority to David 
 to write the 119th Psalm, he has none at all; and if he has as good 
 evidence for these mechanical operations as he has for the inspiration of 
 Paul in Avriting the Epistle to the Romans, we ahould be glad to see it 
 produced. That the book of Psalms was completed either by Ezra, or 
 by some one else, sometime subsequent to the captivity — how long after 
 we know not, though certainly before the coming of Christ — is admitted. 
 That some of the apostles refer to them as "the Book of Psalms," we 
 also admit. But how far all this is from furnishing the inference of 
 divine authority for the collection and labelling, every one must see — 
 except we afiirin that the recognition of a fact as such by apostolic 
 authority must imply a divine origin ; of course not merely providential, 
 but inspired. But the collecting and labelling are only preliminary. 
 The divine appointment of them ito be sung in the collected and labelled 
 form is another presumption, grounded on the fact that they were — at 
 least some of them, and perhaps all of them — sung in the temple ser- 
 vices. But these inferences are nothing compared with the other two, 
 which are necessary to make Mr. Lawson's arguments of any force: 1st. 
 That they were divinely appointed to be sung in the Christian Church 
 to the end of time, and 2nd. That no other psalms, hymns or spiritual 
 songs were ever to be so sung in the Christian Church. There is no evi- 
 dence that there ever was any divine appointment of the kind. To argue 
 that the introduction of the completed book shortly before the conclusion 
 of the Jewish dispensation is any probable proof that it was to be the 
 
CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. 13 
 
 8ul)ject matter of the Christian Church's praise for all time is extremely 
 futile. Even from the time of Ezra there were still several hundred 
 years of usefulness for the collection at a time, too, when prophepy was 
 dormant and when disasters required the spirit-stirring melodies of the 
 Je\vish Bards. So that the ad bono argument is answered at once 
 without supposing they were to be used in the Christian Church. Then, 
 too, though the full collection was not made up till or after Ezra's time 
 yet most probably a collection so labelled or perhaps otherwise labelled 
 had been doing service in the Jewish Church from the time of David, 
 to which was added, each n(!W song judged worthy of a place, in the 
 liook l>y those who had the oversight of the service of praise. 
 
 If Mr. Lawson will manfully give himself to the task before him and 
 show us by authority or necessary inference, and not more assumption, 
 that the Psalms were to be exclusively sung in the Christian Church we 
 shall sit at his feet. So far we must say with the Scottish Jury, "not 
 proven," Mr. Lawson. 
 
 Mr. Lawson thinks that because he can quote passages out of the New 
 Testament, in which are denunciations of judgments of the Almighty 
 on the enemies of His church and cause stronger, as he thinks, than the 
 verse about dashing the little ones of Bal)ylon against the stones, that 
 we are bound to accept these dreadful comminations as the matter of 
 our praise. But no; Mr. Lawson will not let us do that with similar 
 passages in the New Testament. We may do that with the song about 
 Babylon, but not with the denunciations of mystical Babylon. We are 
 glad for Mr. Lawson's sake, considering the position he assumes in his 
 "explanations" that he has not also to explain the passage which he 
 quotes from Revelations. As a matter of curiosity, indeed we would 
 like to hear Mr. Lawson's conmient on that text — "Reward her as she 
 hath rewarded you. Double unto her double." Prior to readino- Mr. 
 Lawson's present letter we v/ould have supposed that he would have told 
 his audience of "weak capacity," that they should not account Cyrus or 
 Alexander or any of the other tyrants who wreaked the A^eno-eance of 
 heaven on Babylonish infants, as particularly happy on that account, 
 but that these who should destroy the offspring of the mystical Babylon 
 ^\■ould certainly have much joy. We would have been sure that Mr. 
 Lawson would have repudiated the idea that it was a joy-bearinf' thino- 
 to dash the head of any child, of Nebuchadnezzer or Belshazzar, against 
 the stones; and we certainly would never have thought that he would 
 think of "rewarding" the representatives of the other Babylon by treat- 
 ing them to double intensified thumbscrews, racks, red-hot pinchers, fires 
 and other tortures. Wg had supposed he would, while admitting the 
 righteousness of the judgments of God on Bal)ylon, tell his liearers that 
 for our improvement we must make Babylon the representative of con- 
 fusion, sin and crime before we can pronounce him happy who kills 
 rnthlessly her infant products. This is the adaptation of the Psalms 
 to his audience credited by us to Mr. Lawson. We never supposed that 
 he could or would try to adapt his audience to the sentiment as presented 
 in the literal and etymological meaning. We hope still> notwithstanding 
 what he says about their application to "the impenitent, malignant and 
 persecuting enemies of His church and cause," and concerning singing 
 
14 CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. 
 
 them "according to their true spirit and meaning," that he would not 
 consider himself particularly happy had he been the chosen instrument 
 to break the Babylonish children's heads, although that is the true out- 
 come of the passage in its apparent signiiication ; nor do we think he 
 would like to preside over a new Inquisition erected for the purpose of 
 rendering double pain to the representatives of the old persecutors, 
 accoiding t<:) the command, "Render unto her double." 
 
 If Mr. Ijawson does not in some such way adapt the Psalms to his 
 congregation, we are sorry for both him and them. If he does, there 
 will not be much Iiai'm, perhaps, in the singing of such a passage, even 
 in the white heat of enthv.siasm, though it is to be observed that the 
 literal signification will, aftjsr it has be;en evicted, come back like the 
 ghost of Banquo, to take the seat prepared for another, marring, at least, 
 the harmonies of the heart, if not the song. 
 
 We must confess that, while we hold that all Christians must accept 
 all the truths of revelation, we think most persons would feel more 
 edified by singing some of the time-honored Cliristian hymns, dear to 
 the whole Christian world, than by the use of those imprecations which 
 Mr. Lawson contends are part of the only proper matter of the Church's 
 praise. The argument in favor of Christianity derived from iuteinal 
 evidence is addressed to the Christian consciousness. If the sai.ie con- 
 sciousness be appealed to on the subject of the propriety of singing 
 such hymns as those beginning, "Just as I am," ''Nearer, my God, to 
 Thee," "Rock of Ages," etc., etc., we think it Avill proclaim in favor of 
 such hymns; and that it would greatly prefer them to those containing 
 the imprecations to which we refer. Yet, according to Mr. Lawson, it 
 is actually innnoral to sing such hymns in Christian worship! 
 
 We have well weighed the consequence of making the above admission. 
 Mr. Lawson, from his lofty standpoint may say "it is a fearful theologi- 
 cal blunder," and he may see in it, as he does, convincing evidence of 
 a want of "toue love to Christ, and zeal for His cause." All we shall 
 say on this subject is that we sincerely hope that "true love to Chi'ist 
 and zeal for His cause" are not confined to the small, but excellent body 
 of people who contend that the entire contents of the Book of Psalms 
 should all be sung, in Christian worship, and that no other songs of 
 praise, not even the brief inspired songs of the New Testament should 
 be so sung. If the contrary were the case, the outlook for the Christian 
 Church would be so gloomy tliat we think even Mr. Lawson himself, 
 when exercising the Christian chanty which we gladly accord to him, 
 would lament and mourn over it. / /C^ 
 
 yMiuu^U ' 
 
 %/ju,i^U i^t^i//^ 
 
 To the Editor of the Daily Telegraph. 
 
 Sir: — I am sorry to have to refer again to such a small matter, but I 
 must once more , call your attention to your error in dealing with my 
 quotations fi'om Home, Luther, etc. I did not infer from the testi- 
 monies of these writers, that they restricted themselves to the Psalms 
 in praise, any more than I inferred from your endorsement of their 
 
CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. 16 
 
 testimonies, that you are a Psalm singer exclusively. I argued from 
 their eulogies that, to be consistent with themselves, they ought to have 
 been Psalm singers, just as I argue from your agreement with their 
 eulogies that, to be consistent with your own admissions, you ought to 
 be exclusively a Psalm singer also. It is an established principle of the 
 Bible — admitted by yourself — that the great Object of worship must 
 always have the best, not the best occasionally, but the best always, : 
 and as divine songs are infinitely superior to the compositions of fallible 
 men, as testified to by Home, Luther, Calvin, and \l\e editor of the 
 Telegra2)h, does it not follow as a legitimate ^ onsequence, that they ought 
 to be exclusively used in Christian praise? On this subject, the excell^ it 
 Romaine, one of the brightest stars in the English church, thus writes : 
 "I want a name for that man who should pretend that he could make 
 better hynms than the Holy Ghost. His collection is large enough ; it 
 wants no addition. It is as perfect as its author, and not capable of any 
 inprovement. "Why, in such a case, would any man in the world take 
 it into his head to sit down and write hymns for the use of the church." 
 To this subject I ask the earnest and unprejudiced attention of your 
 readers. 
 
 That the Psalms — previously scattered — were collected into a separate 
 volume towards the end of the Babylonish captivity; that the volume 
 was styled the Book of Psalms; that it was recognized by the Saviour 
 and His apostles as a distinct book of the inspired Canon; that it was 
 quoted by them in proof of certain articles of the Christian faith, even 
 in the very order in which the Psalms are located in the collection (see 
 Acts xiii. : 33, 55); these are the facts, admitted by yourself, from which 
 I derived the inference — certainly not a wild one — that it was \nt\\ the 
 Divine sanction that the compilation was made — that not only were the 
 individual Psalms given by inspiration of God, but the collection of 
 them into a separate volume was a work of Divine superintendence. 
 You will find it a hard thing, with all your ingenuity, to set aside either 
 the facts or the inference. I still assert that the inspired Book of Psalms 
 having been compiled so far on in the old economy, furnishes strong pre- 
 sumptive evidence that it was intended not merely for the coming cen- 
 turies of the Jewish era but for all time. 
 
 Although it is a matter of no consequence, whatever, to my argument, 
 I am not disposed to withdraw my assertion that David was the writer 
 of the 119th Psalm. "David must undoubtedly have been the writer," 
 says the celebrated commentator Bishop Home. See also Henry and 
 others, whose testimonies I shall be happy to furnish when desired. 
 
 In relation to some of the imprecatory psalms which you characterise 
 as contrary to the Christian spirit and unfit to be sung in Christian 
 times, I desire to make a few remarks. ( 1 ). If they are of such char- 
 acter as you represent them to be, then they are utterly unfit to be read. 
 Why then do you not agitate the question of their total expulsion from 
 the authorised version of the Scriptures? To introduce to our schools 
 and our families — to teach our children to read what is in plain and 
 palpable antagonism to the Christian spirit, is certainly as great a vioia- 
 tion of the Christian sentiment as anything that can be imputed to the 
 Psalms. And, then, why do you not agitate to have other portions of 
 
16 CORRESPONDENCE OX PSALMODY. 
 
 the Old Testament Scrintures expunged also] I can call your attention 
 to large portions of Isaiah and Jeremiah just as imprecatory as the 
 most dreadful utterances of any one of the Psalms. Why, then, do you 
 so earnestly stand up for the Bible in our schools'? AVhy do you stand 
 on the platform of the Bible Society, and advocate the circulation among 
 the nations of that Book which is in such opposition to the Christian 
 sentiment ? (2). If the imprecatory Psalms are contrary to the Chris- 
 tian sentiment, then some portions of the New Testament Scriptures 
 are equally so. In my former letter I called your attention to a speci- 
 men of them. I now invite your attention to others. In the Book of 
 Revelation the Great God is represented as making a "great supper" 
 for "the fowls of Heaven" that they may "eat the flesh of kings, and 
 the flesh of captains, etc." Worse still; the souls under the altar are 
 represented as crying, "How long, O Lord, holy and just and true, dost 
 thou not avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth?" Even the 
 blessed Saviour himself could say hard things. Can any thing in 
 David's utterances exceed those words of "the faithful an(l true Wit- 
 ness,"— "And I will kill her children with death." ( Rev. II. : 23 ). Now, 
 I will not undertake at present to explain the meaning of such passages. 
 My design in inti'oducing them does not require it. I introduce them 
 simply to show that the Psalms of David are not more impi-ecatory than 
 the Cliristi.ai Scriptures. Why then do you reprobate in David what 
 you tolerate in Paul, in the redeemed in glory, in the Redeemer himself?- 
 Reconcile the imprecations of the New Testament with the Christian 
 spirit, and I will promise to reconcile all the Psalmist's utterances with 
 the true Gospel sentiment, so that even the editor of the Telec/raph will 
 sing them ex anhno, '/an apwre. (3). If the imprecatory Psalms are 
 opposed to the spirit of the Gospel, then, morality was a different thing 
 in Jewish times from what it is now. You admit that those Psalms 
 suited the chiirch and were sung by Divine authority, in those days. 
 Has the moral law, then, been changed, making that morally right then 
 which is morally wrong noiv. Has the Holy Spirit changed His nature, 
 exciting to one course then and to a different course now? PeiTish the 
 thought. The moral law is the san e unchangeable law throughout all 
 time. What was morally right in the days of old, is right still. What 
 was morally wrong, is wrong still. A celebrated writer says "Moi'ality 
 is the same now that ever it was; and I cannot think that the Holy 
 Spirit has made that language divine in, the Old Testament which is 
 uncharitable in the New." We have "no new commandment but what 
 was delivered to us from the beginning." I trust, Mr. Editor, that you 
 and all who are like-minded will reconsider the matter, and abandon a 
 position so dishonoring to that dispensation under which the Psalms 
 were first given, and which no more tolemted malignity than the gospel 
 dispensation — a position that is so dishonoring to that Holy Spirit by 
 whom they were indited, and who has assumed the responsibility of the 
 Psalmist's most offensive utterances. 
 
 In the course of your editorial remarks, you very condescendingly 
 make the proposal that if I will manfully set myself to prove that the 
 Bible Psalms were intended to be exclusively used in Chiistian praise, 
 you will willingly sit at my feet. I beg to remind you that I do not 
 
CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. 17 
 
 profess to be lord of any man's conscience — not even my own. I do not 
 ask any one to sit at my feet, but at the feet of Him who has exclusively 
 the right to speak with authority on any question of faith or practice. 
 That I have not manifested great lack of vuailineaa during the previous 
 discussions of the question of Psalmody, will be admitted, I think, even 
 by my oponents. I have not skulked behind a noni, de plume but have 
 always written over my o^vn proper signature. Whether or not there 
 has been any lack of solid, Scnptural argument in my communications 
 I am willing to leave to your intelligent unprejudiced readers to deter- 
 mine. If, after all I have written, your verdict still is "Not proven, 
 Mr. Lawson," I can only deal with you as Luther did with the Pope, 
 and make my appeal from the editor of the St. John Telegraph, to the 
 same editor, when better informed 
 
 J. R. Lawson. 
 
 The Daili/ Telegraph Jany. 17, 1880. 
 
 We publish to-day another letter from the Rev. J. R. Lawson on 
 Psalmody. He holds hard by a grievance, and thinks our reply to his 
 complaint in former lettei-s about quotations from various authors un- 
 satisfactory. We think they were appropriate, but as the matter is of 
 no impoi'tance that we can see to the controversy, to Mr. Lawson or to 
 us, we shall say nothing fui-ther about it at present. 
 
 Mr. Lawson says that since we admit that God should always have 
 the best, we should sing the Psalms exclusively. We have to say in 
 reply, good as they are, some of them are not the best for us to use ex- 
 clusively in our worship. The inspired pmyers of the Bible, many of 
 which are contained in the Psalms, are, no doubt, much superior to some 
 that are used, but still we do not find that Mr. Lawson confines himself 
 to the former. The same may be said as regards sermons and addresses, 
 but Mr. Lawson does not insist on using them alone. As to the quota- 
 tion from Romaine (who is no better authority than Mr. Lawson him- 
 self), "I want a name for that man who should pretend to make better 
 hymns than the Holy Ghost," we say that we never knew that the Holy 
 Ghost made any hymns. That he inspired the writers of the Psalms, 
 and that he still inspires holy men gifted with the poetic charisma, we 
 believe. The mechanical view of inspiration implied in the quotation 
 cannot be sustained. 
 
 In regard to Mr. Lawson's inference from our admissions relative to 
 the collection of the Psalms, we have to recall Mr. Lawson's original 
 statement and note the point of our objection. He says in his first letter, 
 "By divine direction they were collected into a volume and labelled The 
 Book of Psalms." We thought from the ex cathedra style in which Mr. 
 Lawson spoke that he had some souixies of information unknown to us, 
 but we found that all the proof he had for the proposition that the 
 divine Spirit had concerned himself about such mechanical things as 
 collecting and labelling a book, or, as Mr. Lawson phrases it in his 
 present letter, "the collection of them into a separate volume," was that 
 they were afterwards quoted by Christ and His apostles. To this we 
 
18 CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. 
 
 demurred. But this is nothing ps an inference to what succeeds. He 
 says: "I still assert that the inspired book of Psalms, having been com- 
 piled so far on in the old economy, furnishes strong presumptive evidence 
 that it was intended not merely lor the coming centuries of the Jewish 
 era, but for all time." In Mr. Lawson's letter of Nov. 6th, his language 
 was murh. stronger: "By divine direction they were collected and labelled 
 the Book of Psalms at the time when the Jewish economy was near its 
 close, DEMONSTRATING that they were not intended solely," etc. Then it 
 was demonstrating, now it is strong presumptive proof. There is a dif- 
 ference here, and probably in a few weeks more it will, in Mr. Lawson's 
 estimation, as in ours, be no proof at all. Men may think differently of 
 the character of the evidence offered as proof; it is certain it cannot 
 bind the conscience of Christendom nor hush the sacred songs of millions 
 of Christians who at times sing other hymns of praise than are comprised 
 in David's Psalms. 
 
 In a former article we showed the use and advantage of the Psalms 
 so collected to the Jewish church for several centuries. Collections of 
 Psalms had been in use long i)reviously, doing service even from the 
 reign of David, new volumes being added in succession. At the time 
 of Ezra they were united in one, but still retaining their separate iden- 
 tity; so, at least, the best critics affirm. They had time for use, but to 
 us they are useful still. We prize and use them, not for any such ex- 
 clusive reason as that assigned by Mr. Lawson, and use some of them 
 "for their own imperishable worth," that is, as matter of praise. 
 
 It was because Mr. Lawson spoke so confidently of the authorship of 
 the 119th Psalm that we alluded to the matter. That some pious com- 
 mentators of little critical skill assign to David the authorship, we know, 
 but the evidence is overwhelmingly against the correctness of that claim. 
 
 Much graver and more important questions remain to be answered. 
 
 We come to the imprecatory passages. We wished to know in what 
 way Mr. Lawson adapted his audience to some of the passages, but he 
 will not tell us, nor how he would like to be the honored instiniment of 
 rendering to mystical Babylon double in the shape of thumb-screws, etc. 
 If he had done that, he would probably have furnished a clue to an 
 appropriate use of imprecatory passages. 
 
 Instead of this he has quoted a large number of similar spirit, several 
 from the New Testament, and it is worthy of remark that they are all 
 from the Book of Revelations — a book of mystical import, more especially 
 in its prophetic portions, which will be better understood than they are 
 now when the prophecies shall have been fulfilled. 
 
 Mr. Lawson thinks that because we do not wish to sing some of the 
 Psalms, on account of their apparently vengeful spirit, we should cut 
 them and all passages of a similar character out of the Bible. But may 
 they not have other uses besides becoming the matter of Christian song? 
 They have a use as history. They show us the character of the age to 
 which they were approjjriate, how much they were behind us, and how 
 much we have to be thankful for, that we could not now contemplate 
 without horror such acts as dashing the heads of the little Babylonians 
 against the stones. We have touched here upon a matter which requires 
 some consideration. Mr. Lawson says: "If the imprecatory Psalms 
 
CORRESPONOnNCE ON PSALMODY. 10 
 
 are opposed to the spirit of the Gospel then momlity was a differont 
 thing in Jewish times to what it is tiow * * * ♦ Has morality 
 then changed, etc? "Has the Holy Spirit changed his naturel Perish 
 the thought!" We beg, in this conn'^^xion, to call to Mr. Lawson's 
 recollection what Jestis said about Moses, tlie inspired, and the permission 
 of divorce, for the hardness of the Jewish heart — a reason which would 
 not be accepted in a divorce coui-t at least in British realms; further 
 what Jesus said in his sermon on the Mount, "Ye have heard tliat it 
 hath been said, an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. But I say 
 unto you that ye resist not evil, etc." This saying is from Leviticus. 
 "Breach for breach, eye for eye, tooth for tooth," as recorded on the 
 sacred page, yet set aside for a precept of a more patient and gentle tone. 
 Indeed, much of the Sermon on the Mount was spoken with the purpose 
 of elevating mankind to a higher level of morality than they had been 
 able previously to maintain or than had been required by the Mosaic law. 
 It is in this sense that we speak of the Judaistic spirit being diflFerent 
 from the Christian spirit, of being inferior to it, and in a way opposed 
 to it ; and however it is to be explained, the Hebrew Scriptures sanctioned 
 that lower form in some of its enactments. For instance, they sanctioned 
 slavery [see, among other passages. Lev. 25, 44], a system which we say 
 was extinguished by the spirit of Christianity; they permitted and regu- 
 lated bigamy [see Deut. 21, 15 to 18], which we punish by imprison- 
 ment. Several of the inspired men, including David, were polygamists 
 and concubinists, yet we are told that their morality was the same as 
 that of Christianity. No doubt there is an absolute morality which 
 cannot change. It is that of Christ, to which humanity was being 
 educated. But man in the earlier times was barbarous, and incapable 
 for many ages, on account of the hardness of his heart, of receiving the 
 highest and purest conceptions of morality. When we consider the state 
 of morals in Greece in the time of the Trojan war, we wonder that the 
 Hebrew lawgiver was able to establish such a comparatively pure code, 
 and yet we cannot shut our eyes to the inferiority of some of its details 
 to the absolute morality of the decalogue and of that demanded by Jesus. 
 It was the best possible at the time and yet far from the best to which 
 humanity was being educated, and into the possession of which we have 
 come. 
 
 It will then be apparent why we do not cut and carve the Scriptures 
 as Mr. Lawson suggests, and why we yet are unwilling to sing certain 
 passages which are redolent of the inferior spirit, as the exclusive matter 
 of our praise to God. The ancient spirit was cruel, the modem is mild ; 
 conquerors then could flay men alive without compunction, and enjoy 
 the agonies of the extremest torture. We, while punishing criminals 
 with death, demand that it be done with the minimum of pain. To put 
 women to the sword, destroying mother and offspring, and to dash the 
 heads of infants against stones, to render double torture for all the pains 
 they had suffered and such like things, were considered pleasant exercises 
 of the victors over the vanquished, but a cry of execration would go up 
 from all the civilized modem world against any who would be guilty of 
 auch cruelties. And to sing with exultation of such things now without 
 altering the meaning in some way is — well, not to the taste of the 
 majority of Christians. 
 
20 CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. 
 
 Mr. Lawson need hardly have stepped out of his way to defend his 
 manliness, which we had no intention of impeaching; and we hardly 
 think he would have done so, except to appropriate some glory which he 
 supposes attaches to the writmg of his name beneath his letters, and to 
 take a fling at our editorial impersonality, which he, with small regard 
 for correctness but with aA epithet which approaches the scurrilous, calls 
 a owin de plume. We beg to assure Mr. Lawson that his argument is 
 neither the better nor the worse to us for the appendage of his name, 
 nor ought ours to be of mOre or less value to him, because it is in con- 
 formity with journalistic custom. 
 
 Neither was it necessary to remind us that he did not profess to be 
 lord of any man's conscience. We never thought that because we were 
 willing to learn from Mr. Lawson, we were exalting him to the chair of 
 infallibility. How could it enter into Mr. Lawson's mind that because 
 we proposed to take the attitude of the attentive scholar, we were going 
 to endow him with the lordship of our conscience*! We must say, how- 
 ever, that we have been so much disappointed in Mr. Lawson, as a 
 teacher, that we find it necessary to weigh very carefully what h6 pro- 
 pounds. We, however, see very little prospect of his views being 
 adopted and yet we hope the world is daihr becoming better. 
 
 Sir: — At the outset of my remarks, I would desire to remove a mis- 
 apprehension which seems to have taken possession of your mind. You 
 seem to think that my allusion to a nom, de plume was meant for your- 
 self. Such was not the case. I certainly would not speak of an editor, 
 either chief or subordinate, skulking behind a nom de p>^^f'ine for main- 
 taining his editorial impersonality in the exercise of his office. 
 
 I think that on a -reconsideration of the second paragraph of your 
 review, you will see that any reference to Mr. Lawson's inconsistency 
 in not confining himself to Bible prayers and Bible sermons, as well as 
 Bible psalms, is not to the point. If prayers and discourses were to be 
 set to music and sung, there might appear a shade of inconsistency; but 
 prayer and preaching are very different ordinances from singing praise to 
 God. Moreover, if there were a book of prayers in the Bible, and no 
 authority for using any others than those contained in it, Mr. Lawson 
 would certainly confine himself to that book, in the exercise of prayer. 
 If there were a book of sermons in the Bible, given by inspiration, to be 
 used by ministers in their pulpit addresses, and no authority for the usq 
 of anjrthing else, Mr. L. would certainly confine himself to that book, 
 very much to his own ease and the increased edification of his hearers. 
 But it so happens that in the Bible there is neither a book of prayers 
 nor of sermons, so that he must just make his own prayers and addresses 
 as best he can, under the direction of the Word and Spirit of Christ. 
 There is, however, a book of psalms in the Bible, given by inspiration 
 of God, and, therefore, infallibly correct, and as there is not a particle 
 of authority for the use of any other, Mr. L. must just use it until a 
 higher authority than that of man orders him to lay it aside. 
 
CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. 31 
 
 You call iny attention to tho fact, that in relation to a certain point, 
 I now call that preawnptive evidence, which I formerly characterised as 
 demonstrative. You say: "There is a difference here, and probably in a 
 few weeks more, it will be, in Mr. Lawson's estimate, as in ours, no 
 proof at all." Now in your editorial which I am now reviewing, you 
 put it into my power to return the compliment with some little interest. 
 In former comments some of the psalms were characterized by you as 
 unfit to be sung at all ; now they are only imfit to be sung exchmvely. 
 You say: "Some of them are not the best for us to use exchtsively in 
 worship." Formerly you would not sing some of the psalms because of 
 their "irritated and maddened" spirit; now you do not wish to sing 
 them because of their apparently vengeful spirit. (The italics are mine). 
 Thus you are evidently coming round to the right position, and it is to 
 be hoped that in a short time even the appearance of a vengeful spirit 
 will be eliminated, and you will sing them as devoutly and cordially as 
 the most ardent admirers of the psalms could desire. 
 
 As you seem to be somewhat dissatisfied that all my imprecatory 
 quotations should be from the Book of Revelations, I will furnish you 
 with some from other portions of the New Testament. The apostle 
 Paul was not far behind David in his imprecations. "Alexander the 
 coppersmith did me much evil : the Lord reward him according to his 
 work." "If any man love not our Lord Jesus Christ, let him be 
 Anathema Maranatha." "Thou child of the devil, thou enemy of all 
 righteousness;" was his vehement address to Ely mas the sorcerer. Even 
 the tender hearted apostle John could speak hard things: "If any man 
 come and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into your house nor 
 bid him God speed." Even the Redeemer himself could speak roughly. 
 He could be so uncharitable as to call Herod a fox. He could denounce 
 woes against the Scribes and Pharisees as "blind guides, fools, hypocrites," 
 whose proselytes were no better than "the children of hell," and who 
 could "not escape damnation." My object in introducing these and 
 previous quotations, is to show that the Jewish writings are no more 
 imprecatory than the Christian — that the Psalms are no more "apparently 
 vengeful" than the apostolic epistles, and that the condemnation of the 
 spirit and language of some of the Psalms, involves a condemnation of 
 the spirit and language of large portions of the New Testament Scrip- 
 tures. If your pity for the dear little Babylonian innocents, and your 
 horror at the thought of "putting women to the sword, destroying 
 mother and ofispring, and dashing the heads of infants against stones, 
 to render double torture for all the pains they had suffered, and such 
 like things," rouse all the indignation of your soul against the Psalmist 
 for recording and justifying such bloody deeds, why do you not raise 
 "the cry of execration" against Paul and others, and even the Redeemer 
 himself, for language just as "apparently vengeful" and apparently in- 
 consistent with that love that is the fulfilling of the law? 
 
 It is a fearful error into which you have fallen, Mr. Editor, in regard 
 to the destinction between the Jewish and Christian dispensations. I 
 trust that you will reconsider your utterances, and either withdraw or 
 materially modify them. You say : "It is in this sense that we speak 
 of the Judaistic spirit being different from the Christian spirit, of being 
 
22 CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. 
 
 inferior to it, and in a way opposed to it ; and however it is to be ex- 
 plained, the Hebrew scriptures sanctioned that lower fomi in some of 
 its enactments." I suppose that the plain English of that and other 
 statements to the same etFect is, that a spirit that it was moiully right to 
 cultivate and exemplify in Jewish days is morally %vrong now — that 
 there were certain actions morally right then which are morally wrong 
 now — that there was an inferior morality good enough for those daysy 
 but that a higher morality is required now, that which you call the 
 morality of Christ as distinguished from that of Moses. Now, such a 
 theory is utterly inconsistent with the very nature of morality. It is 
 in keeping with the system of the "Man of Sin" who thinks to "change 
 times and laws" Morality is as unchangeable as the Moral Law is. 
 The Moral Law is a transcript of the moral nature of its author who is 
 without variableness or shadow of turning. What was moral therefore 
 in Jewish times, is moral still. Christ came not to change the Moral 
 Law in any respect, either to make it broader or narrower. To talk of 
 the morality of Christ in Christian morality, or contrast to that of 
 Moses or Jewish morality is a grievous error in Theology. On the two 
 commandments of love to God and man, hang all the law, and the 
 Prophets. 
 
 That the Old Testament dispensation sanctioned personal revenge is 
 wholly untrue. On this point, Mr. Editor, you have fallen into the 
 error of the Scribes and Pharisees, who, seeing on the statute book of 
 Israel's commonwealth certain enactments for the punishment of crime, 
 interpreted them as sanctioning private revenge. They were just like 
 one who should go into a court of law, and seeing the judge sentence a 
 thief to the penitentiary or a murderer to the scaffold, and should then 
 go immediately and burn his neighbor's house, or stab him in the dark, 
 under the delusion that the laws of the land justify personal revenge. 
 Now the Saviour's language in His sermon on the Mount, to which you 
 allude, was intended to remove these false glosses of the Scribes and 
 Pharisees. It was intended to distinguish between the magistrate on 
 the bench and the private member of society. "Breach for breach, eye 
 for eye, tooth for tooth" has reference to the procedure in a judicial 
 court, where no personal feelings should be allowed to interfere with 
 the course of justice, but where punishment should always be in pro- 
 portion to the crime. To quote, then, the old judicial law of "eye for 
 eye and tooth for tooth," as sanctioning revenge, and to contrast it with 
 the Christian law of love to enemies, is to manifest woeful unacquaintance 
 with the distinction between the judicial and the moral law; between 
 the magistrate on the bench and the private citizen. The law of Moses 
 no more sanctioned personal revenge than the Saviour's sermon on the 
 Mount. Tlie Hebrew Scriptures no more allowed "an eye for an eye 
 and a tooth for a tooth" in the private relations of life, than the Chris- 
 tian Scriptures. The Book of Proverbs is just as emphatic as Paul's 
 epistle in the requirement: "If thine enemy hunger feed him," etc. 
 Love is the fulfilling of the law; but was it not always so? We have 
 no "new commandment" other than that which "was from the beginning." 
 
 Tlie Book of Psalms has no more personal revenge on it than the 
 Sermon on the Mount. David never wished a curse to fall upon any 
 
CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODV. 23 
 
 persons because they were his personal enemies. He who would not 
 retaliate on his persecutor, Saul, though he had tlie most favorable 
 opportunity to do so, and though, by so doing, he could have freed himself 
 from further peraecution — who could say in relation to Shimei's curses 
 — "Let him curse, for the Lord hath bidden him," probably nmnifested 
 a milder and meeker spirit than many would display, in similar circum- 
 Htances, who now refuse to sing some of David's odes, l)ocauso there 
 is so mucli spite in them. His imprecatoiy psalms are just the right»*ous 
 denunciations of a holy and just God, ngainst those who should set 
 themselves in malignant opposition to His peoj>le and caus(» in the world. 
 There is not a particle of private revenge at the Vjottom of one of them. 
 He who cannot sing them in their true spirit and meaning has yet to 
 learn the true import of those petitions in the Lord's Prayer — "Thy 
 Kingdom come; Thy will be done." If any persons demur to their use 
 in praise, it is either because they do not understand their true meaning, 
 or because they lack the essential element in all devotional exercises — 
 a heart right with God. 
 
 J. R. Lawson. 
 
 Another letter on Psalmody from the Rev. J. R. Lawson will be found 
 in our present issue. Passing over the enigma regarding the nom de 
 plume which we leave in the mystery with which he has invested it, we 
 come to the reassertion of the essential difference between the psalm 
 and the prayer. He has not, however, in his reaffirmation of this dif- 
 ference, grounded it on the same reason which he assigned in his pam- 
 phlet, which was that in prayer we make known our wants, which are 
 ever varying, and so, of necessity, our petitions must vary also ; while 
 as the great object of praise is continually the same, the praises that 
 are suitable at one time are suitable at another. We showed that the 
 Psalms CO tained prayers, Avhile our prayers contain ascriptions of praise 
 — that, in fact, they were to a large extent identical. Mr. Lawson did 
 not condescend to notice this point, though it is fatal to his argument. 
 We may further note that, at the conclusion of the 72nd Psalm, the 
 compilers call the Psalms of David by the very name of prayers: "The 
 prayers of DaviH. the son of Jesse, are ended." They were in error, 
 indeed, for after them other Psalms of David were found and added to 
 the collection; but vhe name "prayers" given by the collectors shows in 
 what light they viewed the Psalms — namely, as vehicles of prayer as 
 much as of praise. But Mr. Lawson says: "If prayers and discourses 
 were to be set to music and sung, there might appear a shade of incon- 
 sistency," etc, Is it then the music and rythm that are insjnred? Is it 
 the adaptation to the harp or the orchestia that gives sacredness to the 
 psalm or prayer? This is an extraordinary position ; it is not in the 
 matter of the Psalms that Mr. LaAvson finds the reason for their exclu- 
 sive use, but in the uninspired mechanical arrangements by wliich they 
 are set to music, and so made capable of being sung. Mr. Lawson says 
 there is no authorized book of prayers in the Bible. We say there are 
 both in the Bible, and there is just as much authority for using them 
 exclusively as for the exclusive use of the Psalms as pi'aise. 
 
24 CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. 
 
 Mr. Lawson defends his lowering of his estimate of the proof con- 
 tained in his so-called argument, that the late period of the collecting 
 and labelling of the Psahns should satisfy us that they were to be used 
 in the Christian Church, by affirming that we also have toned down our 
 objections to the use of some of the Psalms, by our statement that some 
 of them are not the best for us to use exclusively in worship. The sen- 
 tence was first written, They are not the best to be used exclusively, 
 etc., which was altered to some of- them, etc., the word "exclusively" 
 being deleted, but not sufficiently for the printer or proof-reader. But 
 to come back to the proof which with Mr. L. was first demonstrative 
 and afterwards probable, we have to say it is no proof at all — does not 
 contain the slightest shadow of proof, and must, as we have shown by 
 reason sufficient, be altogether eliminated from the controveray. It is 
 Jwrs (le combat. Mr. Lawson, in his desire to prove that the spirit of 
 the New Testament is the same as the Old, quotes some passages, out- 
 side of the Ilevelations. He says : Paul was not far behind David in 
 his imprecations, We think differently. We doubt not that Alexander 
 was a very wicked man who deserved to be relegated to the judgment 
 day. As to the real force of Anathema Maranatha, it seems to good 
 interpreters to mean separated till the coming of the Lord — cut off 
 from the church. There is nothing in the passages descriptive of the char- 
 acter of Elymas, we hold, which any one might not apply to a determined 
 villain. As to Christ calling Herod a fox, and pronouncing woes on the 
 Pharisees we must say that Mr. Lawson was hard run for some parallel 
 when he quoted them as approaching to the spirit of some parts of the 
 psalms. These being comminations against hypoci'ites and apostates we 
 can assent to both. It does not offend our moral sense to find Herod 
 called a fox, but that sense is offended when we are asked to exult over 
 the dashing of the heads of Babylonish children against the stones, or to 
 approve of the destruction of mother and child by one fell swoop. 
 
 Mr. Lawson is notably prudent in passing over facts which he dare 
 not encounter, and in fixing on some api)arently vulnerable point. He 
 has given us no exposition of what Christ meant by saying that Moses 
 for the hardness of the Jewish heart pei-mitted divorce; nor of the 
 slavery which the Jew practised by Mosaic authority; nor of the prac- 
 tice of bigamy; nor of the permission of concubinage; but passed all 
 over with some very patent general truths regai'ding the essential nature 
 of morality in all times and circumstances. We hope Mi*. Lawson is 
 preparing to enlighten us on these points, for though, owing to the 
 pressure on our space, the controversy is rather intermittent, we would 
 not willingly deprive our readers of so much valuable information. Mr. 
 Lawson holds up his hands in horror at the fearful error of making a 
 distinction between Jewish and Christian morality, and our woeful un- 
 acquaintance with the distinction between the judicial and the moral 
 law. We very much fear that he would have thought Christ very much 
 in error when he urged his followers to try to transcend the spirit and 
 tone of certain Mosaic precepts, which, to our mind he most evidently 
 did. This, Mr. Lawson, is not an error but a truth, and a glorious 
 truth ; a ti*uth not changed by our affirmation that the absolute morality 
 is embodied in Thou shalt love the Lord, etc., etc., and thy neighbor as 
 
CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. 25 
 
 thyself; a tnitli whose proof refuses to vanish from the pages of the 
 Mosaic code, Avhich, in tliis particular case, we defy Mr. Lawson's in- 
 genuity to reconcile with our ideas of Christian morality. 
 
 We are unwilling to broaden the bounds of this controversy or we 
 should enter more fully into the whole question of the authority of the 
 judicial law in the present day, and show how far it comes short of the 
 spirit, but we relegate that matter to some other occasion. 
 
 But to revert to the matter. Mr. Lawson thinks us guilty of mistak- 
 ing the judicial tor the moral law, as did the Pharisees. We say we do 
 not believe that the Pharisees fell into any such error, as assuredly 
 neither did we. The spirit which Jesus wishes to change in his remarks 
 on the lex talionis is not that of private revenge — which was not what 
 the Pharisees taught was allowable — but it was that spirit of extreme 
 retaliation which led them to pursue every oflfence to the utmost metes 
 and bounds of justice, — as is apparent when he adds, "If any man sue 
 thee at the law and take away thy coat let him have thy cloak also." 
 The Jewish law encouraged men to go to the extremes of justice, but 
 Christ's principle is "That ye resist not the evil." To our mind there is 
 an evident design by Christ to modify the extreme form of the lex f((lionis, 
 and certainly to make the whole attitude of the Christian spirit in re- 
 gard to the pui-suit of legal avengements an advance on the Jewish 
 spirit. 
 
 The Pharisees may, with the law regarding the avenger of blood in 
 their eye, have taught that, by parity of reasoning, a man who had lost 
 an eye or a tooth might take summary vengeance by retaliation in kind. 
 But considering how much danger there was to the avenger in seeking 
 redress for himself, and how safe it was for him to let the tribunal avenge 
 him, it is not at all likely that they would recommend the private and 
 dangerous mode when another so much more suie was at their election. 
 Mr. Lawson misses the mark when he says that the gloss they put upon 
 the law was the propriety of private revenge. What Jesus taught was 
 that his followers should act as though there was no law — that they 
 should not seek revenge through its instmmentality, but rather suffer 
 wrong than retaliate either in a private or judicial way. Certainly this 
 law, too, though judicial, encouraged a moral disposition among those 
 living under its authority which Christ discouraged, and indeed, this law 
 has, among Christian people, been largely set aside — for, though striking, 
 and wounding are still punishable offences, yet they are not punished in 
 the extreme form authorized by the Jewish lex talionis. If any one is 
 So unfortunate, as either in the heat of passion, or by accident to strike 
 out a tooth or an eye, our laws would not take vengeance in kind, but 
 by some fine or imprisonment according to the nature of the offence, 
 would vindicate justice. This difference we credit to the milder spirit 
 of Christianity infused into modern statute books. Both the law and 
 the vengeful spirit nurtured by the law have the disapprobation of the 
 Master. 
 
 Probably Mr. Lawson may insist that the judicial law, which is moral 
 as far as the magistrate is concerned, is still binding. If so, then we 
 should seek out and put the witch to death, stone the Sabbath-breaker, 
 the wicked and disobedient son, the adulterer and the adulteress, the 
 
26 CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. 
 
 enticer to idolatiy, &c. Perhaps, though the priest was the judge in the 
 case of jealoxisy, the same course should be pursued now in finding out 
 whetlier the spirit of jealousy which seizes some men has any just ground, 
 as was authorized by Moses. But we cannot agree to this ivnpoi-tation 
 of the Jewish judicial law into our institutes. We hold that we have 
 suflficient authority from Christ to set asido these enactments, as we are 
 authorized to set aside the laws regarding slavery, bigamy, &c., and to 
 conclude that certain statutes, not in full accord with the higher require- 
 ments of the supreme moral law, but which were necessary and useful 
 for the time and people are no longer of force in the Christian dispen- 
 sation. 
 
 If Mr. Lawson takes the position that the judicial law in no longer of 
 foi'ce, then he can have no hesitation in allowing that Jews set aside the 
 lex talionis in the case in question. 
 
 Mr. Lawson thinks David was a wonderfully mild man, because he 
 did not slay Sanl, nor Joab, nor Shimei, when he had them in his power. 
 The reason he did not kill Saul was because he feared to put forth his 
 hand against the Lord's anointed ; why he spared Joab was because he 
 dare not put him to death when he desired it, and why he spared Shimei 
 was because he thought it politic to do so. But he kept the revenge on 
 these two till he was beyond the reach of its recoil, and relegated to his 
 son tlie execution of a sentence which he did not find it expedient to 
 carry out himself. But supposing David to have been ever so mild and 
 merciful, still Mr. Lawson's conclusion that if any persons demur to the 
 use of any of his psalms, it is "either because they do not understand 
 their true meaning or because they lack the essential element in all de- 
 votional exercises — a heart right with God," seems rather too much in 
 the ex-cathedra style, especially as Mr. Lawson has so fiir failed to show 
 that we are under any ohlvjation whatever to sing them. The argument 
 that an opponent is either stupid or bad goes, we are aware, a great way 
 with some people and will cover a multitude of sins. Wo forbear to 
 follow up that line of argument, but we would I'ecall Mr. Lawson's at- 
 tention to wh;it he has got to prove before he can suppose we will accept 
 his gratuitous conclusions. 
 
 L That the psalms were exclusively appointed to be sung in the 
 Christian Church. 
 
 2. That they are more in harmony with Christian sentiment than 
 New Testament and other hymns, especially Christian, which celebrate 
 the name of Jesus, and portray his completed work instead of indicating 
 only ty})icaliy and prophetically what that work was to be. 
 
 3. That there is an essential difference between psalms and prayers. 
 
 4. That there is no danger arising from the use of commination psalms 
 lest tlie pei'sonal animus embodied in the letter should be considered the 
 legitimate sjiirit, and be sung as such, 
 
 Mr. Lawson has not yet established one of these positions. Indeed 
 by his recent style of argument he seems to us to have given up all hope 
 of establishing them, more especially the first, without which proof he 
 cannot make any progress whatever, nor offer the shadow of a reason 
 why the great h}'mn-singing Chx'istian world should break their harps 
 and hush all their Te Deums that are not couched in the words of David's 
 
CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. 27 
 
 Sir: — Before entering upon a review of your recent comments, I 
 would desire to correct a misrepresentation — I do not say wilful — that 
 appeared in your brief notice of my lel'ier, before it appeared in i)rint. 
 You speak of Mr. Lawson's "attempt to inculcate the idea that nothing 
 should ever be sung but the Psalms of David." I do not hold or teach 
 any such doctrine as that scriptural, uninspired hymns should never be 
 sung. Many of them I delight in. I love to read them and also to 
 ainy them. It is only when they are introduced into the church, to sup- 
 plement or supplant the inspired Psalms, that I raise my voice against 
 their use. "Bunyaii's Pilgidms Progress" is very excellent reading, but 
 yet I should be very much opposed to the introduction of that book into 
 the pulpit, to be read as a substitute for the Holy Scriptures. And 
 many uninspired hymns are very excellent, but that is no reason why 
 they should be brought into the sanctuary, to take that place in the de- 
 votions of God's people, that by Divine appointment, exclusively belongs 
 to the Songs of Zion. 
 
 A desire to narrov/ the field of discussion, and not a consciousness of 
 weakness, was my sole reason for leaving lumoticed, in ray last letter, 
 the questions of slavery, divorce, polygamy, ete., which have no direct 
 bearing on the subject of psalmody. It is very evident that if such be 
 the pressure on your columns that the question can only come up once a 
 month or so, it will not do to wander over the wild field of the j\idicial 
 law, and discuss all the points connected with it lest the controversy 
 should "drag its slow length along" till a distant futurity. I will, there- 
 ore, leave all these questions for the present, with the general remark 
 ;hat the Hebrew Scriptui'es never sanctioned slavery, bigamy, divorce, 
 3tc. They were always immoral. For wise purposes, Moses, the law- 
 giver of Israel, was not directed to issue a prohibitory law against them, 
 )ut to subject them to a wholesome legislation. Legislation on an exist- 
 ng evil does not involve an approval of it. These things can come up 
 n a separate discussion when the question of Psalmody shall be settled. 
 It is, furthermore, utterly untrue to say that the Hebrew Scriptures 
 lanctioned a spirit of revenge. If the ethics of the New Testament are 
 xpounded in the Sermon on the mount, the ethics of the Old Testament 
 re expoimded in the " Book of Proverbs." Where is the *• lex taliouis " 
 1 the one more than in the other ? When Paul would dissuade Chris- 
 |ians from cherishing a malignant spirit, he quotes from the Book of 
 roverbs — "If thine enemy hunger, feed him," tfec. The " lex talionis" 
 luch the Saviour repealed, was no where but in the perverted judgments 
 f the Jewish false teachers, who misinterpreted the righteous judicial 
 w of "an eye for an eye," *fcc., as warranting private revenge. The 
 ewish magistrate was no more allowed to transcend the bounds of 
 ighteousness, or to oppress any one, in his judicial decisions, than the 
 hristian civil ruler. The private Jew was no more allowed to take the 
 w in his own hands, or go to law in order to gratify spite, than the 
 [rivate Christian. The Saviour in His sermon on the mount, certainly 
 ndemns private revenge, but not more strongly than Moses in the judi- 
 al law — than Solomon in the "Book of Proverbs" or than David in 
 e " Book of Psalms." If one was to find his enemy's ox or his ass 
 ing astray, he was to restoi'e it to the owner. Was there any revenge 
 
28 CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. 
 
 in that ? " Thou shalt not aA'enge or bear any grudge against the children 
 of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself." Was there 
 any " lex lalionis " in that, to be repealed? Consult David's utterances 
 in the seventh and thirty-fifth Psolms, for an exhibition of his spirit, in 
 relation to his bitter personal foes — " Yea, I have delivered him that 
 without cause is mine enemy." " False witnesses did rise up ; they laid 
 to my charge things that I knew not." They rewarded me evil for good 
 to the spoiling of my soul. But as for me when they were sick, my 
 clothing was of sackcloth, 1 humbled myself with fasting. * * * 
 I behaved myself as though he had been my friend or brother," &c. 
 Would it not be a happy thing, if such a spirit was more fully exemplified 
 in Christian times, and by many who now reprobate David because of 
 his " cursing Psalms." 
 
 I am glad to find that you can see nothing inconsistent with the Chris- 
 tian spirit, in the New Testament imprecations — at least those outside 
 the Book of Revelation. Alexander the coppersmith, you say, was " a 
 very wicked man, who deserved to be relegated to the judgment day." 
 But was not Doeg the Edomite, in David's day, just as bad as he ] Why, 
 then, do you condemn David for the very thing in which you justify Paul ] 
 You approve of Paul calling Elymas a " child of the devil, an enemy of 
 all righteousness." But were not the Ziphites, in David's time, just as 
 worthy of reprobation as he 1 Why then is your " moral sense " so much 
 offended when you find David so angry with the enemies of God ? You 
 justify Paul in his ** Anathema Maranatha," the strongest imprecation, 
 perhaps, in the Divine word. You very wisely do not say that you 
 endorse the interpretation of those who see nothing in it but " separated 
 till fche coming of Ihe Lord — cut off from the church." The critics of 
 whom you speak belong, no doubt, to that theological school that sets 
 itself to tone down all the utterances of Holy Writ that are directly 
 antagonistic to Universalism. If all who love not the Lord Jesus Christ 
 ai-e only to be cut off from the Church till the coming of the Lord, then 
 it follows, that at His coming, they will be restored again. Good news 
 certainly for " hypocrites and apostates." The phrase Anathema Maran- 
 atha will admit of no such interpretation. However critics of a certain 
 school may labour to take the fiery edge off such a dreadful utterance, 
 they can never make anything of it less than " everlasting destruction 
 from the presence of the Lord " when He shall coine to take vengeance 
 on them that know not God and that obey not the Gospel. Did David 
 ever use stronger language than that in his worst impi*ecations ] Wh;', 
 the dashing of the heads of little Babylonians against the stones, and 
 even their mothers with them by " one fell swoop " — though the mothers 
 in the picture of carnage are only the creation of your own fertile imag- 
 ination — was nothing, in comparison with the consignment of millions to 
 to everlasting perdition. The dashing of the little Babylonian innocents 
 against the stones was just a speedy, though a rough way to make them 
 happy, according to the theory of universal infant salvation, whilst the 
 apostolic Anathema Maranatha was sure to shut up countless millions of 
 adults in misery for ever. How does it come to pass then, that whilst 
 your " moral sense " does not recoil at the utterances of Paul, it is so 
 much offended with the spirit and utterances of the Psalmist, as so con- 
 
CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. 29 
 
 trary to " our ideas of Christian morality." However acute you may be 
 in detecting distinctions when these may appear to suit your theory, you 
 will never be able to shov to the satisfaction of your intelligent and 
 unprejudiced readers, that there is any essential difference between the 
 spirit of Paul's Epistles and that of David's Psalms. You will require 
 to produce far stronger arguments to prove that the imprecatory Psalms 
 are hostile to the Christian spirit, before that you can wring from your 
 imprejuduced readers any other than the Scotch verdict — -Not proven, 
 Mr. Editor. 
 
 At the close of your comments, you come more closely to the question 
 at issue. You nari'ow the field of discussion to four points. You might 
 very properly have reduced it still farther, by leaving out three of the four 
 points, for it is very evident, that if the first position be established, viz., 
 that the Psalms were exclusively apjwinted to be sung in the Christian 
 Church, then, all other questions may be excluded from the con- 
 troversy. The Divine appointment must be held to be a sufficient settle- 
 ment ot the question, whatever difficultico may appear, and whatever 
 objections may be raised. 
 
 The^Vs^ point that you require me to establish is — '* that the Psalms 
 were exclusively appointed to be sung in the Christian Church." In 
 regard to that proposition, I refer you to my little pamphlet on the 
 " Songs of Zion." I have, in that tractate, shown that there is no need 
 for any other poetical compositions in the service of praise than the 
 Psalms. I have shown that they were composed by Divine inspiration 
 for the very purpose of being used in praise — that, as far as the evidence 
 goes, they wei'e exclusively used during all periods of the old Dispensa- 
 tion that succeeded the time of David — that they were compiled into a 
 separate book, called the " Book of Psalms," under the superintendence 
 of the Divine Spirit, when the Jewish era was near its close, and there- 
 fore "could not have been solely intended for the outgoing but also for the 
 incoming Dispensation. I have shown that when the Kedeemer came to 
 set up the new Dispensation, He did not abrogate the Psalmody that had 
 been previously in use — He gave no intimation, either by precept or 
 example, that there would be any change in the law of Psalmody. He 
 gave no directions to His apostles to prepare a new Psalm Book, nor 
 did He intimate that any would be needed. When He and His disciples 
 sang, it was in the words of the Psalms. When the apostles and early 
 Christians sang, it was exclusively in the words of the Psalms, as far as 
 the evidence goes — and not a single uninspired hymn, used in the church 
 in the service of pi^aise, can be traced farther back than the close of the 
 second century. These are just a small sample of the rea.sons why I hold 
 and teach that the Bible Psalms were appointed to be exclusively sung 
 in the Christian Church. I would now respectfully ask you to produce 
 your Scripture warrant — your Divine authority, for the use of any other 
 hymns, in the praises of the sanctuary, than those contained in that book, 
 given by inspiration of God, and " fitted to express the religion of all 
 saints in all ages." If you fail to establish a Divine autfioriti/, for the 
 use of uninspired hymns in praise, all your reasonings must be labelled — 
 Tekel. 
 
 The second position that you require me to establish is " that they are 
 
30 CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. 
 
 more in harmony with Christian sentiment than New Testament and 
 other hymns, especially Christian, which celebrate the name of Jesus and 
 portray His completed work, instead of indicating only typically and pro- 
 phetically what that work was to be," In regard to that proposition 
 which you put into my hands, I offer the following remarks : (1)1 
 know of no " New Testament hymns " other than those contained in the 
 Book of Psalms. If you can find any such in the New Testament, 
 intended to be sung in the devotional services of the church, please point 
 them out. (2) If the Psalms do not celebi-ate the name Jesus, they 
 celebrate all that the name expresses. They celebrate Him in His 
 Divinity as the Son of God — in His offices as Prophet, Priest and King — 
 in His sufferings, resurrection, glorious ascension, and univeisal media- 
 torial dominion. The Psalms are full of Christ. There is no Book of 
 the Old Testament so frequently quoted by the Redeemer and His 
 apostles, and in every quotation the reference is to Him who saves His 
 people from their sins. Is it not a puerile thing, then, to condemn the 
 Psalms because they do not contain the nnnie Jesus, whilst there is every 
 thing to contemplate and admire which that name imports ? What per- 
 centage of the hymns in common use celebrate the name Jesus ? I have 
 now before me the Scottish Hymnal, published by authority of the 
 General Assembly of the Church of Scotland. I find 200 hymns in that 
 collection. How many of these contain the nnme Jesus? Just 46 
 according to my numeration. That is to say — out of 200 hymns, •' especi- 
 ally Christian," there are 146 that make no mention of the name Jesus. 
 Why do you not consign them to the Index Bxpurgatorhts as unfit for 
 a place in Christian hymnology t (3) It is not true, that the Psalms only 
 indicate typically and prophetically what the Redeemer's work was to be. 
 They celebrate a completed work. In regard to the great facts of human 
 redemption the language of history is more frequently employed than that 
 of projihecy. That is a feature of the Psalms that shows them to have 
 been intended for Christian worship, and that eminently fits them for it. 
 In using them we do not celebrate a Saviour to come as a sacrifice, but, 
 generally, a Saviour as having come, liaving suffered and Jiaving entered 
 into His glory. If the Psalms ai-e unfit for Christian praise, because the 
 minority of them celebrate a Redeemer to come, then they were far more 
 vmfit for praise in Jewish times, because the majority of them celebrate 
 a Saviour as having come and completed the work which was given Him 
 to do. Yet the ancient church, we are assured, did sing them, and by 
 Divine appointment too. 
 
 The third proposition that I am called on to establish is, " That there 
 is an essential difference between Psalms and Prayer." It is somewhat 
 strange that yon who are so acute in detecting distinctions favorable to 
 your position, should be so dull of apprehension in regard to those of an 
 opposite character. When it is a question of distinction between reading 
 and sitiging you can, at a glance, see such a difference between the two 
 exercises, that while you can read the imprecatory Psftlms, you hold up 
 .joth hands in horror at the thought Of singing them. But when it is a 
 question of difference between prayer and praise, you confess that you 
 cannot see it. You see no essential difference between a composi^on 
 offered as a prayer, and that same composition set to music, and sung in 
 
CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. 81 
 
 praise to God. Now, if you can see no distinction in the latter case how 
 is it that you can see it in the former ? To use your own mode of reason- 
 ing — Is it the music and the rythm that infuse into the imprecatory 
 Psalms all their bad spirit, so that whilst you can use them as very good 
 reading you refuse them as Psalms to be sung ? 
 
 There is no proposition that can be more easily established than that 
 there is an essential difference betAveen prayer and praise. They are 
 entirely distinct ordinances iii the Christian Church, as they were in the 
 Jewish. The fact which no one disputes, that there ai-e prayers in the 
 Book of Psalms, does not make against the distinction between the two 
 exercises. The prayers contained in that Book are Psalms. They are 
 prayera intended to be suTig as praises, and hence, whilst they may be 
 properly used either as forms of prayer or as models, their specific charac- 
 ter is that of piuyers to be set to music, and sung in praise, and as such, 
 they do not come within the range of that distinct ordinance which we 
 call prayer. Whatever agreement there may be between prayer and 
 praise, they are distinct exercises of religious worship. And in our 
 worehipping assemblies is there not a full recognition of the distinction 1 
 After a psalm or hymn is sung in praise ; the minister says — " Let us 
 pray." In praise, the worshippers do, or at least should, vocally join : in 
 prayei*, the minister is the mouth-piece of the congi-egation, and the people, 
 generally, are silent. In the two ordinances, the attitude is different. . 
 In smging praise, the people usually stand up, whilst in prayer, many con- 
 gregations lazily and irreverently sit down. And as the two ordinances 
 are distinct in their form, so also in their immediate design. The primary 
 design of prayer is to make known our wants to God j the immediate design 
 of praise is to extol Him " for His goodness and for His wonderful works 
 to the children of men." And as these ordinances are so distinct, so the 
 Great Head of the Church has made provision in the one case, which He 
 has not done in the other. He has furnished to His Church a Book of 
 Psalms, but not a Book of Prayers. That Book of Psalms He has given 
 to be the subject matter of the Church's praise in all generations, and you 
 will find it, Mr. Editor, to be about the hardest work you ever yet 
 attempted, to establish a Divine Warrant, to set that Book aside, or 
 supplement it, by hymns of human composition, in the pi-aises of the 
 sanctuary. 
 
 Th& fourth position that you require me to establish is — " Tliat there 
 is no danger arising from the use of commination psalms, lest the per- 
 sonal animus embodied in the letter, should be considered the legitimate 
 spirit and be sung as such." I shall just leave that proposition in your 
 own hands, Mr. Editor. There is no law of sound reasoning that requires 
 me to prove a negative. I will be very curious to hear your reasoning 
 against the use of an ordinance derived from the danger of abusing it. 
 Of course I expect to hear you argue that we should turn away fi-om 
 a preached Gospel, lest it should prove "the savour of death unto 
 death " — that we should " forsake the assembling of ourselves together," 
 lest we should " come together unto condemnation " — and that we ought 
 to keep away from the Lord's Supper, lest we should eat and drink 
 judgment to ourselves 
 
 J. R. Lawson.' 
 
82 CORRESPOXDEXCE ON PSALMODY. 
 
 The Daily Telegraph, Feb. 25, 1880. 
 
 We insert another letter from the Rev. Mr. Lawaon in our present 
 issue. He thinks we have misrepresented him in our short notice on 
 receipt of liis former letter. He is very sensitive about misrepresentation. 
 Who but a veiy sensitive person would ever have thought that we 
 intended to assume that Mr. Lawson could not, or would not sing any- 
 thing; but tlie Psalms of David 1 We have no doubt — never had — that 
 Mr. Lawson could lind delight in a good hymn. 
 
 When we spoke of Mr. Lawson inculcating the idea that nothing should 
 be sung but the Psalms of David, we had reference to their use in 
 worship — j)ublic worahip — though we need not add the adjective, as in 
 fact we think the same reasons that are for or against their exclusive use 
 in public, hold equally with regard to private woi-ship, nay, to individual 
 worship, and if Mr. Lawson ever sings one of these hymns by himself in 
 the way of woi*ship, we think he has taken the first step in the road to 
 the fair and legitimate use of the same in private and public worehip 
 against which he has, so far, strong objections though, as we think, weak 
 arguments. 
 
 Mr. Lawson thinks that the introduction of some good hymns along 
 with the psalms would find a parallel in taking away the pulpit Bible 
 and replacing it with Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress. There is no harm, 
 surely, in having a good uninspii*ed composition in the shape of a sermon, 
 or a good book of any kind in the pulpit, along with the Bible, and in 
 iising it for instniction. Mr. Spurgeon's sermons, if we mistake not, are 
 sometimes read, perhaps not from the pulpit, but from the ])latforms of 
 good Reformed Presbyterian churches. And we would not object a whit 
 to a few pages of Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progi*ess if a sermon were not avail- 
 able, and if those to whom it was addressed found themselves edified by it. 
 
 Although the questions about divorce, slavery, polygamy, etc., have no 
 direct beai'ing on the subject of Psalmody, they have a very important 
 one on the question regarding the difference of spirit between the old and 
 new Dispensations. Mr. Lawson now admits that Moses by Divine 
 direction instituted wholesome legislation regarding these criminal prac- 
 tices — just the thing we have contended for. Assui'edly, we never sup- 
 posed that God taught that these evils were right things in themselves. 
 All we atfinned was that certain coui*ses of conduct were permitted, and 
 legislated for which were utterly condemned by Christ, and among these 
 we shall afiirm was the lex talionis, in which the doctrine of revenge is 
 found in broad and unmistakable form. That there are passages in the 
 Old Testament where the Christian spirit and doctrine are anticipated we 
 know. We held and hold that there is no higher morality than that 
 embodied in the "sum of the ten commandments." But we hold 
 that for the hardness of the Jewish heart, a lower legislation was adopted, 
 as Mr. L. virtually admits. We also hold that all through the Old Testa- 
 ment there crop out anticipations of the milder and more beneficent spirit 
 which Jesus would have ail His followers to cultivate, just as we have 
 anticipations of the gospel in Isaiah and Ezekiel and the Psalms, indicat- 
 ing, though dimly, what Ohiistianity was to be when presented in the life 
 of its Founder, and breathed into the Church by the Spirit who takes the 
 things of Christ and shows them* to the believer. 
 
CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. 33 
 
 Mr. I;, asserts that the lex tnlionis wliich Jcsiis rei)eale(l was no where 
 but in the pervei-ted jiidgments of Jewish false teachers, as waiTanting 
 private revenge. In our former letter we assigned rejisons, which Mi*. 
 Lawson does not try to answer, indicating clearly that it was not private 
 revenge, but revenge by means of the civil coui-t that Christ here set 
 aside. Mr. L. says that the Saviour does not condemn private revenge 
 more strongly than Moses in the judicial law ; than Solomon in the Book 
 of Proverbs ; than David in the Book of Psalms. " If one was to find 
 an ox or ass going astray he was to restore it to the owner." Was there 
 any revenge in that asks Mr. L. We say no, but this has nothing to do 
 with the lex talioyiis, and is, therefore, not to the point at issue. The 
 next passage is equally aside fi'om the question, as it does not appear 
 that the neighbour had done any wrong to require the application to the 
 magistrate to have the hx talionis put in form. As to David's state- 
 ments of his extreme kindness to those who became his enemies, we liavo 
 to say that the passage quoted by Mr. Lawson only shows how friendly 
 David had been but not what his feelings were after he had been so badly 
 treated. So that we do not see that there is any room for the homily 
 with which Mr. Lawson treats those who do not altogether admire his 
 comminations or his conduct either to Joab or Shiraei, or to the unfortu- 
 nate inhabitants of Rabbah whom he "put under saws, and under harrows, 
 and made them pass through the brick kiln." It is rather out of place to 
 say — " would it not be a happy thing if such a spirit were more fully 
 exemplified in Christian times, &c." 
 
 Mr. Lawson thinks that the comminations of Paul are as bad as those 
 of David. We think far otherwise, but as it would require much space 
 to justify our position we pass by what, after all, is only distantly related 
 to the main subject at issue, which is, were the Psalms exclusively 
 appointed to be sung in the Christian church ? In regard to this Mr. 
 Lawson refers us to his little pamphlet on the " Songs of Zion," and then 
 gives a synopsis of that tract. If he had at the same time condescended 
 to notice and reply to the reasons which in former articles we presented, 
 showing that his arguments were utterly futile, we should have felt that 
 we had something to do. As it is we would just recall to our readers 
 some of the rejoinders we made to Mr. Lawson's statements. Mr. L. 
 says " There is no need for any other poetical compositions in the service 
 of praise than the Psalms." We think there is need of other hymns to 
 express our Christian sentiment ; our Christian gratitude for salvation 
 accomplished ; our views of the Saviour's life, death and work ; their 
 relation to our life, death and work, and a thousand things which the 
 Psalms do not, or only dindy, express. This reason of Mr. Lawson's 
 stands out evidently and absolutely discredited. The Christian conscious- 
 ness says it is false. Mr. Lawson says : " They were composed by Divine 
 inspiration for the very purpose of being used in praise." That position 
 we do not controvert. That they were exclusively used from the time of 
 David, would be more correct ; some of them were so used, for many of 
 them were not composed till long after. " That they were compiled under 
 the superintendence of the Divine Spirit when the Jewish era was near 
 its close, and therefore could not have been intended only for the outgo- 
 ing, but also for the incoming Dispensation," is one of the sheerest assump- 
 
34 CORIIESPONDBNCE ON PSALMODY. 
 
 tionfl. Why, tlio gi-eater part of them had been compiled in the days of 
 Hozekiah, and the last addition was made not near the close of the Jewish 
 Dispensation, but between then and four hundred years l>of'ore that time. 
 ** That the Saviour did not abrogate the Psalmody " we know, and wo 
 know that he did not abrogate instrumental music. " He did not give 
 directions for His apostles to prepare a Psalm book," says Mr. Lawson ; 
 but he prepared no formula of worship whatever, but used that which 
 was in force in his day, leaving it to the Church to develop in accordance 
 with the charisma with which they were endowed. And so we find that 
 there were in the Corinthian Church pci-sons who had Psalms (see 1 Cor. 
 xiv., 26,) introduced into the assemblies — without doubt original. The 
 account which Neander gives of the church Psalmody in the first century 
 is worthy of notice. He says, " Church Psalmody also passed over from 
 the Synagogue into the Christian Church. The Apostle Paul exhorts 
 the Primitive Churches to sing spiritual songs. For this purpose were 
 used the Psalms of the Old Testament, and partly hymns composed ex- 
 pressly for this object, especially hymns of j)raise and prayer to God and 
 to Christ ; such having been known to Pliny as in customary use among 
 the Christians of his time. In the controversies with the Unitarians at 
 the end of the second and beginning of the third centuries, the hymns 
 were appealed to in which from early times Christ had been worshipped 
 as God." So that Mr. Lawson's statement that the early Christians sung 
 exclusively the words of the Psalms, is unsupported. We can appeal to 
 the Church at the close of the second century as affirming that hymns 
 had been used in the Divine service from the earliest days of the Christian 
 worship. Indeed about their existence from the earlier date there was 
 no controvei-sy. The subject matter of dispute was wJuit was the doctrine 
 implied in tlte hymns of such acknowledged antiquity, 
 
 Mr. Lawson talks of the law of psalmody, of abrogating psalmody, of 
 giving directions for the preparation of a new Psalm book, just as though 
 Christianity was to be in the intention of its founder anothe .• " law of 
 commandments contained in ordinances," a set of cast iron regulations, a 
 Procrustean bed, on which every custom introduced by the free spirit 
 should be stretched and docked to the right length. Directions to the 
 apostles to prepare a book of hymns would have effectually prevented 
 the use of such glorious songs as those of the after ages in which Mr. 
 Lawson delights in his secret soul, though liis prejudices prevent him 
 from using them in the congregation. Jesus had no intention of so curb- 
 ing and cramping the spirit of his followers. The inspiration of the 
 favored few was to become the heritage of all — the old men should see 
 visions and the young men dream dreams ; upon the servants and hand- 
 maidens was to be poured out the spirit of prophecy, and every one, 
 according to the natural gift, was to become a teacher, prophet, or psal- 
 mist ; such evidently were in the Church at Corinth. But only think of 
 the disciples sitting down to compose a book of hymns according to the 
 supposed absurd directions of the Master. Hymns are not thus to be 
 made to order, and the new faith must wait a little till the poets have 
 developed in the atmosphere of Christianity. The Jewish religion had to 
 wait many hundred years ere it had a suitable bard, and all along the 
 subsequent ages it was receiving additions to its volume ; and so the 
 
CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. 88 
 
 CliriHtiun faith had to be content for a while with the book prepared 
 already, and afterward with such additions as the aj^es broui^ht gradually 
 to the approval of the Christian consoiouancBS. Tlieso cast iron forms and 
 rules which seem so much in favour with Mr. Lawson, were altogether 
 contrary to tlie spirit of the Master, and of the free community which He 
 came to establish. We would say in view of the attempts made from 
 time to time to put a yoke on the neck of the Christian, '* Stand fast in 
 the liberty with which Christ liath made you free, and bo not again en- 
 tangled with the yoke of bondage." 
 
 Mr. Lawson says lie knows of no New Testament Hymns. We had 
 humbly hoped that the Songs of the Angels, the Magnificat, the songs of 
 Zacharias and Simeon would have been permitted to rank as New Testa- 
 ment Hymns. We have very little doubt that they were used fi'om the 
 earliest ages as part of the Christian Psalmody — and noble hymns they 
 arc — inspired too. What stuff is it to talk of there being no authority 
 for our singing them in Christian Worship. They bear their own autho- 
 rity in their inspiration, their beauty, their adaptation to express our 
 sentiments of praise. Those who would not have them in a Christian 
 Psalmody would not receive a Paul without some Epistle of commenda- 
 tion from some Church. It is well enough to guard against imposition 
 from traders in tinsel and glass, but when we are asked to accept gems 
 of incalculable worth, we would betray too much squeamishness to refuse 
 for want of some formal certificate. 
 
 Mr. Lawson labors hard to show that we have no need of hymns in 
 which the name of Jesus is celebrated. He thinks we have what is 
 meant by it, and that that is enough. While agreeing that Christ is 
 much spoken of in the Psalms we hold that that is not enough, and that 
 we should in addition be at liberty sometimes to hear in Christian 
 worship the name of Jesus, and to sing in the terms which the Christian 
 consciousness feels to be adequate, our gratitude and praise of His com- 
 jileted work. Mr. Lawson undertook a very needless task for the purpose 
 of this argument in counting the number of times the name of Jesus 
 occurs in the Scottish Hymnal, and made a very false deduction in logic 
 from his arithmetical calculation. He says he found, out of 200 hymns, 
 specially Christian, only 4G contained the name of Jesus, and his sapient 
 conclusion is that because we ask that the name of Jesus shall sometimes 
 appear in a Christian hymn book we ought to cast out all the hymns which 
 do not mention that name. Why, we do not object to the use of the 
 Psalms — or hymns which do not contain the name of Jesus — but we 
 object to be bound down exclusively to the use of them, as we would wish 
 to have at least a few, which contain the name and celebrate the com- 
 pleted work, not merely in typical form, as is the case in all the psalms — 
 however historical may be their aspect— (David, Solomon, or some other 
 being the picture or type of him who was afterward to combine in him- 
 self all the offices and work of the prophets, priests and kings of history) 
 — but in the fulfilled and completed form which we can find a solid basis 
 for only in the New Testament history. 
 
 Mr. Lawson's argument for an essential distinction between praise and 
 prayer just amounts to this, that they are different in form — in pi-ayer 
 one leads, in praise all join ; in prayer we use plain prose, in praise verse 
 
36 CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. 
 
 and music; they arc "cUbtinct exercises," "the attitude is different;" 
 tlieir ^'immediate design " is different — yet Mr. Lawson admits tliat many 
 of the psahns are prayers and fit to become models of prayer, and he 
 mi;,'lit havt! added tliat in aUuost all prayers there are praises — yet this 
 is what Mr. L. calls an essential distinction. Why accordinju; to his owii 
 sliowing, the distinction is not essential — but formal. If there be any 
 real distinction it is that between poetry and prose — plain speech and 
 harmonized sounds. After all it is the music that makes the distinction, 
 forms tlie ground of difference — on account of wliich wo are to have free 
 prayer but notliing save David's Psalms ! If any one can convince him- 
 self that this is sound reasoning, and that we are l»ound to the words of 
 David wlien the same Psalms are used as prayers, with or without sing- 
 ing or music, we do not know that anything we can say would lead him 
 to alter his mind. We entirely agree with Mr. Lawson in one thing, 
 that the requirements we made at his hands might be condensed, and 
 that if the first Avere proved the otlier propositions which we develop from 
 it might be dispensed with. But we have shown, and Mr. Lawson by 
 his failure-has shown, that tlie first proposition cannot be established, 
 and that there ■, is no connnand or authority requiring the exclusive use of 
 David's Psalms in the church's praise. i j 
 
 To the Editor of the Teleyraph. 
 
 Sir : — In your comments on my last letter, you endeavour to establish 
 a parallel between the reading of human compositions at religious meet- 
 ings, and the singing of them in the service of praise ; and that because 
 certain persons sometimes engage in the former exercise, they ought not to 
 object to the latter. Now it is not a fact that Reformed Presbyterians 
 ever read " 8purgeon's Sermons " in lieu of God's Word. They never 
 read tliem as a part of their devotional ser\aces, either in the family, the 
 prayer meeting, or the church. Hence there is no parallel between their 
 occasional practice of reading uninspired compositions, in connexion with 
 devotional services, and the practice of those who lay aside an important 
 portion of God's Word, that they may use man's utterances in lieu of it, 
 as a part of the most solemn worship in which one can engage. You say 
 that you would have no objection to a few pages of BungavUs Pilgrim's 
 Progress, if a sermon was not available ; and neither would I. But that 
 is altogether aside from the question at issue. The question is — would 
 you object to have the Pulpit Bible laid aside, and the Pilgrim's Progress 
 substituted ? Would you be willing, that in the direct devotional exer- 
 cises of the congi-egation, the Bible should be shut, and a portion from 
 Bunyan read in its place 1 Would not your "moral sense," and that of 
 every Christian in the assembly, be offended t How is it then that your 
 " Christian consciousness " is not equally offended, when in a more 
 heavenly part of religious service, God's Word is laid aside, and human 
 compositions brought in as a substitute. Read and study the words of 
 the Saviour, " In vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the 
 commandments of men." Would it be very difficult to establish a parallel 
 between teaching for doctiines the commandments of men, and singing 
 for songs the compositions of men 1 
 
CORRESPONDENOi: ON PSALMODY. ff 
 
 Your rcforenco to Davicl'H treatment of tlio Ammonites in putting them 
 "under saws, and under luirrowa of iron, and under axeH of iron, &c.," 
 Hiivours too much of the Tom Paine spirit. lie was accustomed wcorn- 
 fuliy to ask, " Is this the iuHpiration of Ood 1 Was David acting accord- 
 ing to the suggestions of llim who is supposed to 1)0 wis(3 and morciful, 
 when he thus tortured and dcstroycjd Innuhcds of Iniman l)eingsr' In 
 reference to that incident, I shall (piote the words of Dr. Ounuuing, of 
 London, " Now some will he surprised," he says, "to learn that the Ilohrew 
 word beth, which is hero translated " under," does not mean ttnder (that 
 is, ])laced beneath), but moans to (in tho sense in wliich wo say, in oixli- 
 nary language, *I put him to the plough'); the literal meaning is, that 
 he ])ut them to saws, and to harrows, and to axes, and to tho making of 
 lirioks — that he made them perpetual working slaves. There is no 
 warrant whatever for the construction that he destroyed them by saws, 
 and harrows, and axes, or inhumanly forced thcTu into the furnace of the 
 brick-kiln. He simply set them to a labonous drudgery." Similar is 
 the testimony of Dr. Adam Clarke. In reference to 1st Chro. XX. : 3, 
 he says : " The meaning is, Ho made tho people nlnve8, and employed 
 them in sawing, making iron harrows, and in hewing of tvood, and making 
 of brick. Sawing as\mder, hacking, chopping, and hewing human beings, 
 have no place in the text — no more than they had in David's conduct 
 towards the Ammonites." Our common Marginal reference Bible reads 
 thus : " Or, made them saw wood, and stones, dig iron, and labour about 
 furnaces." 
 
 It is somewhat strange that you should so summarily dismiss tho sub- 
 ject of the Imprecations, especially under the plea that " it is only dis- 
 tantly related" to the question of the appointment of the Psalms to be sung 
 in the Christian Church. You, evidently, did not consider the point 
 "only distantly related" to the main question, at the commencement of 
 our correspondence ; when you i)roj)ounded the theory, and fought so 
 bravely to maintain it, that the imprecatory Psalms are wholly irrecon- 
 cilable with the Christian spirit. But now that you have utterly failed 
 to establish your position, you have oi)portunely discovered, that its 
 relation to the main question is only remote. Now I cannot accept your 
 plea as correct. The question of the imprecations is a most vital one in 
 the controversy, and demands a thorough ventilation. The common out- 
 cry against the Psalms is, that they are " full of cursings " — that many 
 of them are utterly inconsistent with the Christian spirit, and ought not 
 to be sung in the Christian Church. It is very evident that, if that 
 indictment can be proved, the question is settled ; the Psalms ought to 
 be excluded from Christian praise. If the indictmen: cannot be sustained 
 by scriptural argument, it ought to be withdrawn. And as you have 
 utterly failed to establish the impeachment, except by the substitution of 
 tisffertion for argument, you owe it to those Psalms whose reputation you 
 have assailed, and to that Spii'it who indited them, to acknowledge your 
 failure, and to withdraw your indictment, instead of taking refuge in the 
 V plea, that it is " only distantly related " to the main question at issue. 
 " In reference to my statement that "there is no need for any other 
 poetical compositions in the service of praise, than the Psalms of David," 
 you say : " This reason of Mr. Lawson's stands out evidently and abso- 
 
38 CORRESPONDEXOE ON PSALMODY. 
 
 lutely discredited. The Chiistian consciousness says, it is false." In this, 
 as in most of your comment^!, you make assertion do the work of argu- 
 ment. That which you call " consciousness " is imperfect even in the 
 wisest and best of men, and is therefore an unsafe rule of either faith or 
 j)ractice. What is true or false, is not to be determined, Quaker fashion, 
 by " the voice within " but by the written Word without. " Christian 
 consciousness " is a veiy variable thing. That which approves itself as 
 tnie to the consciousness of one Christian may be absolutely discredited 
 by another. If Christians are, therefore, to determine their creed and 
 their i)ractice by an ever vai-ying consciousness, how are they to " walk 
 by the same inile and mind the same things?" 
 
 But even assuming that Christian consciousness is a safe rule, thei'c is 
 no truth in the statement, that it pronounces the Book of Psalms to be 
 insufficient for the puqjoses of Christian praise. On the contrary, the 
 very highest style of " Christian cousciousness " that has been ever at- 
 tained to has spoken out unmistakably in favour of the Psalms, as a 
 sufficient manual of praise. The Waldenses in their Alpine Valleys used 
 nothing but the Psalms, and did not feel the least hampered by the restric- 
 tion. In the palmiest days of the Reformation in Scotland, your Presby- 
 terian ancestors and mine used exclusively the Psalms, and they did not 
 feel the need of any other sacred songs. The martyred sons and daughters 
 of the Covenant, in Scotland's dark days of persecution, who would rather 
 go to the dungeon, and the scafTold, than violate their consciences, sang 
 exclusively the Psalms. It will not be denied that the Apostles and the 
 early Christians were the veiy highest types cf Christian character. They 
 were " full of the Holy Ghost and faith." Their's was the highest style 
 of Christian consciousness, ar ^ yet, as you yourself admit, they were con- 
 tent with the Book of Psah v^. They felt no need of any other vehicle of 
 praise. They were satisfiea > ith the " Songs of Zion " as the inspired, 
 the appointed, and sufficient manual of the church's praise. 
 
 Did I not fear to burden your pages unduly, I could quote many 
 testimonies of those whose " Christian consciousness " was and is of the 
 highest order, in favour of the excellency and sufficiency of the Book of 
 Psalms. Athanasius of the 4th Century says : " Yes, in its pages you 
 find portrayed man's whole life, the emotion of his soul and the frames of 
 his mind. We cannot conceive anything richer than the Book of Psalms." 
 Augustine, addressing God, says : " How did I then converse with thee, 
 wheii I read the Psalms of David, those songs full of faith, those accents 
 which exclude all pride ; how did I address thee in those Psalms ; how 
 did they kindle r.iy love to thee !" I'alvin declares : "You cannot read 
 any where more glorious praises of God's peculiar grace towards his 
 Church, or of his works ; you cannot read any where such an enumera- 
 tion of man's deliverances or praises for the glorious proofs of his fatherly 
 care for us, or a more perfect representation to praise him becomingly, 
 or more fei*vent exhortjitions to the discharge of that holy duty." 
 
 To these testimonies I may add that of the Rev. James Bennet, D. D., 
 St. John, N. B., whose opinion you will not be disposed to controvert. 
 In his Wisdom of the King, he uses these words : '* I may here incident- 
 ally notice that, while some of the Psalms are, from their reference to 
 local events, not appropriate to be sung commonly by us, except with due 
 
CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. 39 
 
 explanation, and, as it were, translation into spiritual language, it is, in 
 my mind, better to hold by them, and by the paraphrases in our collection, 
 than to have anything to do with the collections of hymns which are in 
 common use in many churches. There is in these hymns and so called 
 psalms so much inanity, and in some instances so much profanity and 
 false doctrine embodied, that I feel almost content to abide by our own 
 Psalms. There are, indeed, obscure allusions ; there is much bad versifi- 
 cation, obsolete words, &c., which mar their beauty ; yet, upon the whole, 
 there are no vehicles of praise equal to them. I would not have you to 
 be opposed to a smoother rendering of these psalms, nor to be opposed to 
 the singing of other passages from Scripture, either versified or in the 
 prose form ; still, if this cannot be attained, I think we are better to hold 
 by our time honoured collection, than run after the hymns which are so 
 common." 
 
 In reference to what you are pleased to call " the song of the angels, 
 the Magnificat, the song of Zechaiias and Simeon," you say : *' We have 
 very little doubt that, they were used from the earliest ages, aA part of 
 the Christian Psalmody — and noble hymns they are — ^inspired too. 
 What stuff it is to talk of there being no authority for our singing them 
 in Christian worship." I honestly confess that in your dealing with my 
 statement regarding these New Testament hymns, as you call them, you 
 use an argument which I cannot meet. It is that embodied in your 
 peculiarly elegant utteraiice — "What stuff!" Such a mode of reasoning 
 has some weight with certain types of mind, and adherence to it is per- 
 haps the best policy, where there is a manifest scantiness of legitimate 
 argument. 
 
 Even in the face of that argument, however, I venture on the follow- 
 ing remarks: (1) There is no proof that, the utterances of which you 
 speak were soiigs at all. The angels are represented as " praising God, 
 and aayiny." Mary said, " my soul doth magnify the Lord." Zecharias 
 " prophesied, sayinff." Simeon " blessed God, and saicl." You just take 
 it for granted that, all this means singing hymns. Now, it is by no 
 means certain that, there was siiiying in any of the cases referred to. 
 One may compose poetry, and recite it, without having any idea of setting 
 it to music, and singing it. Why, then, do you so confidently call them 
 songs 1 (2) Even supposing them to have been actually sung by the 
 parties, it remains to be proved that, they were used, or intended to bo 
 used, in the praises of the Christian Church. You say that, you have 
 very little doubt that they were so used. Even your opinion, however, 
 does not amount to positive proof. To use your own words in relation 
 to another case. "It is one of the sheerest assumptions." You might 
 just as rationally assume that Erskine's Gospel Sonnets composed a part 
 of the psalmody of the Secession Church of Scotland, simply because one of 
 its early ministers composed them, as that, because Mary composed the 
 original of the Magnificat it was intended to form a part of Christian 
 Psalmody. You have neither the authority of precept or approved ex- 
 ample for the use of it, or any of the others you speak of, in Christian 
 praise. You say : " They bear their o^vn authority, in their inspiration, 
 their beauty, their adaptation to express our sentiments of praise." Yes, 
 how beautifully adapted to express the sentiments of the Editor of the 
 
40 CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. 
 
 St. John Daily Telegi'apli are the words of Mary : " He hath regarded 
 tlie low estate of his hmulmaiden ; for behold from henceforth all genera- 
 tions shall call me blessed." 
 
 Your allusion to the Corinthian Christians (1 Cor. X.IV. : IG) as sanc- 
 tioning, by their example, the use of original Psalms, is peculiarly 
 unfortunate. Whatever their practice was, the design of the Apostle, in 
 alluding to it, was evidently its condemnation, as disorderly and unedify- 
 ing. The cause of Hymnology will not gain much by an appeal to any 
 practice from which apostolic sanction was withheld. 
 
 In regard to the 'practice of the early CJiitrch, you quote the testimony 
 of Neander. He say.s : " The Apostle Paul exhorts the Primitive 
 Churches to sing spiritual songs. For thus purpose were used the Psalms 
 of the Old Testament, and partly hymns composed expressly for this 
 object, especially hymns of praise and prayer to God and to Christ, such 
 having been known to Pliny as in customary use among the Christians 
 of his time. In the controversies with the Unitai'ians, at tlie end of the 
 second, and beginning of the third centiiry, the hymns were appealed to, 
 in which, from early times, Christ had been worshipped as God." 
 
 Now, in estimating the value of that testimony of Neander to the 
 cause of Hymnology, there are two or three things that require to be 
 considered. ( 1 ). In the writings of the Fathers and early church his- 
 torians, the word "hymns" was oftentimes used to designate the inspired 
 Psalms. Indeed, as used in the early writings, the word should be always 
 understood as expressive of the Psalms of David, unless when the scope 
 of the passage requires its application to human compositions. When 
 Neander, therefore, asserts in your quotation, that in the controversies 
 with the Unitarians, the hymns were appealed to, in which, from early 
 times, Christ had been worshipped as God; and when Pliny speaks of 
 the Christians, at an early period, singing hymns to Christ, in which Ho 
 was celebrated as God, the reference is evidently to the inspired Fsahns, 
 which are remarkable for their explicit testimony to the Deity of Christ. 
 (2). In his testimony to the use of human hymns in conjunction with 
 the Psalms, Neander does not speak of apostolic days, but a period after 
 the Apostles had gone to their rest. It is not denied that towards the 
 close of tli3 first century, the jiractice of singing uninspired hymns may 
 have crept into the church, but there is no evidence whatever that, it 
 existed in apostolic days. Of course usage in the church constitutes no 
 authority for any practice, unless it can be traced back to apostolic times, 
 and can be proved to have had the apostolic sanction. It is just at this 
 point that, the argument for uninspired hymns, derived from usage in 
 the church, utterly breaks down. (3). Your historian Neander, speak- 
 ing of a much later period, and on which the light of history shines 
 more clearly, bears the following testimony: "Besides the Psalms which 
 had been used from the earliest times, and the short doxologies and 
 hynnis consisting of verses from the Holy Scriptures, s])iritual songs 
 composed by distinguished churoh teachers were also iiitroduced among 
 the pieces used for public wovship in the Western Church. To the last 
 named practice, much opposition, it is true, was expressed. It was de- 
 manded that in conformity with the ancient custom, nothing should be 
 used in the music of public worship but what was taken from the Sacred 
 Scriptures." 
 
CORRESPONDENCE ON PSALMODY. 41 
 
 Now, from that testimony we learn the following facts: First, the 
 singing of Psalms was "the ancient usage": the Psalms "had been 
 used from the earliest times." Second, the introduction of hymns of 
 human composition into the church services met with " much opposition " 
 until the sixth century. The ancient, apostolic custom was to sing the 
 Psalms. The innovation was to introduce uninspired hymns, which met 
 with much opposition. It is an incontrovertible fact that, the apostolic 
 times were Psalm singing times. " In the Acts of the Apostles," says Dr. 
 H. Bonar, "we find once and again the songs of praise ascending from upper 
 rooms, or private chambers, or prison walls, and these, so far as we knoAv, 
 Ay-ere all in the words of the ancient Psalms, which furnished them with 
 song and hymn." Dr. Killen in his learned work, "The Ancient Church," 
 bears a similar testimony. It is pleasing to notice that the Editor of 
 the Teleyrayh makes the same admission. You say: "and so the Chris- 
 tian faith had to be content for a while with the book prepared already." 
 So that, according to your own admission, there was "a while" that the 
 Christian Church was content with the Book of Psalms. That "while" 
 was the purest and best age of the Church — the Pentecostal age, when 
 "the multitude of them that b eved were of one heart and of one 
 soul" and "walking in the fear Oi the Lord, and in the comfort of the 
 Holy Ghost, were multii)lied." Then,'' the people of God were "content" 
 ■vv'ith the Psalms. The Chiistian consciousness did not cry out for any 
 other vehicle of praise. They sang the Psalms and nothing but the 
 Psalms, and they felt no "curbing nor cramping" of their sj)irit in the 
 exercise. 
 
 On this historic ground I take my stand. Pentecostal times were 
 Psalm singing times. The best age of the Church's past history was a 
 Psalm singing age. Human hymns in Christian worship came in with 
 the decline of the Church's first faith and purity. They floated in on 
 the rising tide of the great Antichristian apostacy; and they will all be 
 swept away by the rising waters of that great Revival which inspired 
 prophecy predicts; and in the sanctuaries of the Millenial Church, no 
 songs of praise shall be heard but the "grave sweet melody" of the 
 "Songs of Zion." 
 
 J. R. Lawson.