228 BIRMINGHAM MUSICAL FESTIVAL. 



lowed of hearing these two masterly efforts in juxtaposition than by 

 constantly repeating the last only, as if what preceded was unwor- 

 thy of notice; With regard to the words, we are at a loss to ima- 

 gine in what manner " Kyrie elecison" or " Benedictus qui venit" 

 can give offence to the tenderest consciences. 



On the sacred Avorks of Haydn and Mozart we may be expected 

 to say a few words. The readers of The Analyst must be aware 

 that we belong to the number of those who for the highest of all 

 subjects require the highest style of art. To term music sacred 

 Avhich excites no veneration, is a palpable misnomer. In vain do the 

 words invite to lofty contemplation if the music, in wanton dalli- 

 ance and sportive fancy, twines, with spell more potent, round the 

 soul its alluring blandishments. If such be its character, the great- 

 er the skill of the composer, the more effectually does he frustrate 

 the object for which sacred music is ordained. If there be any truth 

 in the theory we have already laid down and partially illustrated — 

 namely, that music is a mirror which faithfully reflects the charac- 

 ter of the age — in the (so called) sacred music of the latter half of 

 the eighteenth century our ideas receive ample confirmation. The 

 papal power, long since divested of its physical terrors, had with 

 them lost its influence over the minds of the greater part of the 

 Christian world. The eyes of those who had blindly confided in 

 the infallibilitv of the church now began to be opened; intellect 

 once more asserted her rights, i-eason submitted no longer to be 

 trampled upon by force. But as men are ever pi'one to fall from one 

 extreme into its opposite, so in the present instance : when the enor- 

 mous abuses and egregious follies of priestcraft were laid bare, with 

 powerful and unsparing hand, by the French philosophers, so re- 

 plete with moral deformity, so supported by wilful deception, did 

 the whole fabric appear, that religion herself was pronounced an 

 imposture and cunning device of the learned, to acquire wealth and 

 power by working on the fears of the credulous and the ignorant. 

 The goddess of reason was proclaimed supreme — Alas ! that fanati- 

 cism should assume that noble name ! Aye, fanaticism ; for no cru- 

 saders ever pursued with more unrelenting hate their infidel foes, 

 than did these reasonable men strive to bury, in one common ruin, 

 the noble principle of Veneration and the abuses which the crafty 

 and the designing had wrought under its name. In times like 

 these, when a scoffing demon was let loose upon the earth, when 

 men either abjured all religion or else only professed an adherence 

 to it from motives of self-interest or political expediency, it were idle 

 to expect an art to give utterance to feelings of which the heart 



