232 BIRMINGHAM MUSICAL FESTIVAL. 



um on Music — when it shall have been discovered that for the 

 many theinselves to waken the slumbering mind of the mighty mas- 

 ter, is better than to pay hired labourers for rendering that which 

 when rendered is not understood. We feel that our words will not 

 be wasted ; we write with certainty that we shall touch a respon- 

 sive chord in the bosoms of thousands who, spurning petty vanity 

 and sordid selfishness, actuated solely by a love for art, are applying 

 their energies to its diffusion, and by their exertions affording the 

 best proof that we advocate no idle fancies, no Utopian dreams. 

 The Sacred Harmonic Society, from an humble beginning, has 

 risen to an eminence which the most sanguine among its founders 

 can scarcely have anticipated. The performance of Israel in Egypt, 

 Handel's most stupendous work, filled us with hopes for the cause 

 of Music in England. In the roca/ department they undoubtedly 

 surpassed the paid chorus singers whom, three years before, we had 

 heard perform the same work at Birmingham. How striking, too, 

 was the contrast between that evening's achievement and the 

 threadbare selections and meagre execution of the once-famed An- 

 cient Concerts. Triumphs glorious as these will ever be the result 

 when the many unite their sympathies and their powers. Neither 

 money, nor rank, nor the narrow spirit of exclusiveness can prevail 

 against cordial co-operation. The Sacred Harmonic Society stands 

 on the secure basis of principles stable as the laws of Nature and of 

 mind. We beg its members to accept this tribute, in return for the 

 pleasure they afforded us. They are on the right road. May their 

 prosperity be in proportion to their deserts ! 



Cheering, indeed, is the prospect that the period is approaching 

 when all shall labour in the vast field of art with a view to their 

 own intellectual and moral improvement, where now a few coldly 

 and inadequately toil to obtain a scanty pittance. The powers of 

 mind and of voice requisite to give an air with effect, may ever, 

 perhaps, remain confined to a few ; but the interest derived from 

 even the finest of such exhibitions shrinks into insignificance, com- 

 pared with that inspired by the choral union of countless voices roll- 

 ing through the mazes of endless fugue. And when mankind shall 

 have become acquainted with its higher walks — with the deep 

 truths of which it is a " fit embodyraent" — how different will be 

 the emotions sujigested by the word Music, from those raised by the 

 compound of frivolity and pedantry with which it is now synony- 

 mous. When a longing for, and admiration of, the noble and the 

 grand shall have replaced that eager and restless desire for trifles 

 Avhich disgraces our age, then will the now hidden treasures of for- 



