!PJlSTOR.AL LETTER 
 
 CLERGY AND LAITY 
 
 Drotestat <%tst0pl filntrtl] in ilje *§mtst tf ©Ma, 
 
 OX THE SUBJECTS OF 
 
 CONFIRMATION AND CHURCH MUSIC: 
 
 TO BE BEAD IN THE CONGREGATIONS OF THE DIOCESE OX THE FIRST 
 SUNDAY AFTER ITS RECEPTION. 
 
 Resolved, [by the Convention of the Diocese of Ohio,] That the Bishop be respectfully re- 
 quested to embody so much of his Address as relates to the subjects of Confirmation" and 
 Church Music, in the form of a Pastoral to the Gergy and Laity of the Church, with his 
 request that it be read publicly by the ministers of the churches in this Diocese, to their 
 respective congregations. — [Offered by Rev. Mr. Cumming, and adopted June 8, 1856. 
 
 COLUMBUS: 
 
 PRINTED BY THE OHIO STATE JOURNAL COMPANY. 
 
 1855. 
 
FROM THE LIBRARY OF 
 REV. LOUIS FITZGERALD BENSON, D. D. 
 
 BEQUEATHED BY HIM TO 
 THE LIBRARY OF 
 
 PRINCETON THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY 
 
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 PASTOEAL LETTER 
 
 CLERGY AND LAITY 
 
 Protestant (%tapl %rtjr in tlje gkts* 0f ©p, 
 
 ON THE SUBJECTS OF 
 
 CONFIRMATION AND CHUM MUSIC: 
 
 TO BE READ IN THE CONGREGATIONS OF THE DIOCESE ON THE FIRST 
 SUNDAY AFTER ITS RECEPTION. 
 
 / 
 
 _J^A cllv 
 
 COLUMBUS: 
 
 PRINTED BY THE OHIO STATE JOURNAL COMPANY 
 
 1855. 
 
PASTORAL LETTER. 
 
 Dearly Beloved Brethren : 
 
 Having, at our recent Diocesan Convention at Zanesville, addressed 
 the clergy and laity therein assembled, on certain topics of much inter- 
 est, more particularly on the spiritual qualifications for Confirmation, 
 and the interests of that part of our public worship with which Music 
 is associated, I was requested by the Convention to set forth so much 
 of my Address as related to those two subjects, in the form of a Pas- 
 toral Letter to the Churches. This request I proceed to comply with, 
 by extracting from my Annual Address, as it will be found on the 
 pages of the Journal of the Convention, the precise words on those 
 subjects which attracted the attention of that body. 
 
 On the subject of Confirmation, my Address stated that the number 
 of confirmations since the previous Convention was much less than that 
 of the previous year. Two considerations were given as explaining the 
 difference, namely : the interval between the two Conventions being 
 only a little more than eight months, the parishes visited are twenty-two 
 less than last year, while in almost all instances the interval between 
 the last visitation and the preceding has been shorter than usual. After 
 these reasons, I proceeded as follows : 
 
 But here I take occasion to assure you that while I most earnestly 
 desire the greatest increase of the number of truly converted persons 
 
gathered out of the world into the fold of Christ, and while in such 
 increase and the growth of believers in every .Christian grace, we must 
 look for the only fruit of our ministry that will abide the winnowing of 
 Him whose fan is in his hand, I have no desire that the clergy should 
 present to me for confirmation any but those who, in the judgment of 
 charity, they have reason to trust are truly converted to Christ. 
 Whether a large number presented for confirmation, or any, indeed, 
 are to me a pleasant spectacle, an encouragement to my heart, a just 
 subject of congratulation to the pastor, an evidence of the success of 
 our ministry, or of the prosperity of the Church, depends altogether 
 upon the question, how far they consist of those who seriously and in- 
 telligently profess the hope that, by the grace of Grod, they have been 
 changed in heart, made new creatures in Christ, and in heart and life 
 have truly renounced the world, and embraced, in its stead, the whole 
 obedience of the Gospel. Tell me that those who come to be con- 
 firmed make no such profession in their hearts, tell me that they are 
 renouncing the vanities of the world only after the world's interpreta- 
 tion ; that they do not realize that their confirmation is their solemn 
 declaration before Grod and man, that, in heart and life they have em- 
 braced Christ, and do devote themselves to his service ; tell me that in 
 their state of mind, or in their views of what they promise and profess 
 in their confirmation, there is no security that they will not be seen 
 again, as ever, mingling in scenes of worldly conformity, seeking their 
 pleasure where a spiritual mind can find no pleasure ; tell me there is 
 no promise in their professed experience that the Lord will be glorified 
 in their walk and life, as trophies of his converting grace, then, though 
 hundreds come, I have no pleasure in their confirmation. But tell me 
 that one single soul, out of those hundreds, does realize all ; does se- 
 riously, after solemn self-examination, trust that he is a new creature, 
 and is of a contrite spirit, and loves the service of Christ, and makes 
 him all his hope, and desires only to live for him ; then, though that one 
 
be the obscurest, and poorest, and least valuable in a worldly sense of 
 all, I shall esteem that one soul as of great price, and will lay hands on 
 his head with pleasure indeed, and pray God, with faith, that he may 
 continue His forever, and daily increase in His Holy Spirit more and 
 more, until he enter the everlasting kingdom. Yes, that one contrite 
 heart is to me a more encouraging confirmation than any number who 
 might come in any other spirit. Let us he persuaded, brethren, and 
 act always on the persuasion, that numbers added to the communion, 
 independently of their conversion to God, can never profit the Church, 
 are no blessing to our ministry ; but, on the contrary, must hang as a 
 dead weight upon the true life of the Church, reducing its standard of 
 practical godliness, crippling its energies, deforming its example, and 
 conforming it to the world. What possible benefit to a Church can 
 there be, what evidence of prosperity, what honor to God, what good to 
 the souls of men, in having a number of persons connected with our 
 communion, who, before God and man, have ratified upon their souls 
 the most solemn vows of self-dedication to God and renunciation of the 
 world, and thus have had the door opened to them to the highest privi- 
 leges of the Lord's people, at his holy table, but who either never come 
 to that table, or if they do, are manifesting an example in contradiction to 
 all the qualifications of a true communicant. I well know it is not in 
 us to search the heart, or to eay who are Christ's, and who are not. 
 But we can do what our Church teaches us to do. What she says to all 
 who meditate a participation in the Lord's Supper, she says, and bids 
 us say, to all who think of coming to that ordinance, which is simply 
 the door to that sacrament, and gives title to its reception. Imme- 
 diately before the Order for Confirmation, occur these last words of the 
 Catechism : " What is required of those who come to the Lord's Sup- 
 per ? Answer — To examine themselves whether they repent them 
 truly of their former sins, steadfastly purposing to lead a new life j have 
 
a lively faith in God's mercy through Christ, with a thankful remem- 
 brance of his death; and be in charity with all men." Such, then, 
 are the requisites for confirmation, — serious self-examination as to the 
 work of grace in the heart ; whether it has brought that heart to true 
 repentance j in other words, whether it has created in the sinner a new 
 heart, leading to the steadfast purpose of a new life. And again, self- 
 examination as to that inward work of grace, whether it has proceeded 
 so far as to lead the sinner to the exercise of a " lively faith in God's 
 mercy through Christ ;" in other words, to a "faith that worketh by 
 love," that "overeometh and renounceth the world ;" for no other faith 
 is a lively faith, a faith which expects mercy only through the merits of 
 Christ, renouncing all other trust and hope. 
 
 "We cannot say who thus repents and believes and who does not ; but, 
 brethren, we can earnestly and faithfully teach and maintain that none 
 but such as do thus examine themselves, and in such examination do 
 intelligently trust that they are thus penitent and believing, should 
 come to confirmation any more than to the communion ; and while we 
 encourage all such freely to come to both, we can and ought to warn 
 all others that they come not ; and if any apply to be received, who, 
 besides their sufficient knowledge of Christian doctrine, are not able to 
 profess that they have thus seriously and solemnly examined themselves, 
 and that they do thus trust that they find in themselves the evidences 
 of a true repentance and a lively faith, and are fully purposed, in spirit 
 and in truth, in reality as well as name, to renounce "the pomps and 
 vanities of the world," as well as "the sinful lusts of the flesh," and 
 (as one plainly required act of obedience, and one so nearly connected 
 with confirmation,) to participate in the communion which the Lord 
 has commanded, we ought not to admit them to be confirmed. Must 
 the Bishop, administering confirmation, say in the first prayer of the 
 office, " Almighty God, who has vouchsafed to regenerate these thy 
 servants by water and the Holy Ghost, and hast given unto them for- 
 
giveness of all their sins," and must be not at least have the comfort of 
 feeling assured that, while he can know whether their sins are forgiven, 
 only as they profess to have truly repented, and to be now in the exer- 
 cise of " a lively faith in God's mercy through Christ," and it is only 
 on that supposed profession that the Church puts into his mouth that 
 prayer — must he not, I say, have the comfort of the assurance that all 
 who come to be confirmed do consider themselves as making that pro- 
 fession in the very act of coming ; that their pastor, who presents them, 
 has duly ascertained from each of them that such is their profession and 
 such is their understanding, and that he has solemnly exhorted them 
 that what they thus trust and profess, shall be, according to the admo- 
 nition of the Church, in consequence of having first solemnly "exam- 
 ined themselves'' 'f 
 
 How painful to a Bishop to have to utter those words of prayer over 
 a company of persons presented, and yet not have the confidence that 
 the pastor has been faithful to secure, as far as he can, that self-exami- 
 nation, that right understanding of what each must be considered as 
 doing, that actual, personal, inward and real, as well as outward and 
 ceremonial profession of true repentance and "lively faith." Be per- 
 suaded, we shall never gain souls to Christ, or honor to the Gospel, or 
 prosperity to the Church, or increase to its spiritual strength ; we shall 
 never advance one single step in the fulfilment of our ministry, by 
 relaxing or keeping in the background these plain and self-evident 
 terms. "To this man" saith the Lord, "will I look, even to him 
 that is humble and of a contrite spirit and that trembleth at my word." 
 Many others, when he hath shut the door, will stand without and cry : 
 " Lord, Lord, open unto us," and they will plead that they have "eaten 
 and drunk in his presence," been at his table, and in his name "done 
 many wonderful works," but to none of them will he look, because the 
 contrite heart, the obedient, new heart, the living faith, is not in them. 
 He will say: "I never knew you," — "workers of iniquity" he will 
 
8 
 
 call them. They have deceived themselves. But alas ! did any min- 
 ister of the Gospel, by keeping back from them the truth, by encour- 
 aging them to Gospel ordinances before they had examined themselves, 
 whether they had a gospel repentance and a lively faith; did any % min- 
 ister assist and promote their self-delusion ? Let us be careful. True, 
 we must not break the bruised reed, nor quench the smoking flax ; but 
 we must ask, is the reed a bruised reed ? Is the heart a contrite heart ? 
 Is the flax the smoking flax ? Is the fire of a true love in the heart '( 
 It may be very feeble, as the fire in the flax, when it is so weak that 
 the smoke is its only evidence, but the fire must be there nevertheless, 
 and it will find some way to manifest itself, and nothing can supply 
 its place. 
 
 I have thus enlarged on this subject, brethren, not only that I may 
 again, as I have often done before, contribute my feeble effort to keep 
 up, what there are so many influences at work to depress, namely : 
 the right standard of qualification for, and a strict faithfulness in admit- 
 ting to confirmation, and hence to the communion — a door which requires 
 continual watching ; but that I may encourage you and help your 
 patience and steadfastness, when the trial of having very few candidates 
 to present, after long and earnest laboring, is bearing upon you. 
 
 We are all compassed with infirmities. Man loves the praise of man. 
 It is thought an evidence of a successful minister and a prospering 
 parish when a large flock is presented for confirmation. It may be such 
 evidence — it may not be. A faithful minister is tempted by the desire 
 of such evidence to open the door too wide, to relax the requisitions or 
 not to urge them as he should, to withhold the needed warning, to yield 
 an unmerited encouragement, to urge where he should not. The com- 
 parison of his parish with others in point of confirmations may be painful 
 to him. Be faithful. Leave results to God. Have not Bishops the 
 same temptation ? Are there not comparisons between Dioceses as well 
 as parishes? If a looser system is practised, and a wider door is 
 
opened in other Dioceses, than that which I have always inculcated, 
 must not comparisons be drawn between the number brought to confir- 
 mation there and here, which must seem unfavorable to the compara- 
 tive prosperity of the Church in this Diocese ? None of these things 
 move me, and I trust will not move you. I have learned how little is 
 learned by the mere numbering of the people. The question should 
 first be asked, on what terms, by what rule, more or less strict, are can- 
 didates for confirmation admitted by the pastor, and presented to the 
 Bishop ? Let us stand by our duty, seeking our reward in our duty, 
 and our praise of God. 
 
 After these remarks on Confirmation, I spoke, in my Address to the 
 Convention, on the subject of the Memorial addressed to the House of 
 Bishops at the last General Convention, by certain Presbyters, in re- 
 gard to the better adaptation of our Church services, and whole action, 
 to the need of the times. For much of what I then said on that head, 
 I must refer you to the whole Address, as published in the Journal of 
 the Convention. At the request of the Convention, I place in this 
 Letter the following extracts : 
 
 There is much opinion expressed in the Memorial, and by 
 
 those who have written on the subjects introduced therein, that our ser- 
 vice, at least our morning service, is too long. Whether, when we 
 strictly conform to what is required, adding nothing that is not required, 
 spending no time in our service about appendages which are purely 
 voluntary and of no benefit, the service needs abridgement, I will not 
 now express any opinion. There will be a better opportunity when 
 that question is to be acted on. But that we often make the service 
 too long ; that, in many parts of our Church it is made much too long, 
 
10 
 
 by unedifying, or at least needless, additions to what the rubrics require, 
 I have no doubt. It is a subject, brethren, which demands your serious 
 consideration. One thing is certain, the required service is long enough. 
 The good of our congregations demands that it should be made no 
 longer. Let us then consider how we are chargeable with needless and 
 unprofitable additions, which it were better to avoid. 
 
 Before the beginning of the appointed service, when the minister is 
 ready, and the time has come for its commencement, the precious mo- 
 ments are often occupied with an anthem, or something analogous, and 
 sometimes very long, for which no rubrical provision is made, and which 
 is, almost always, not only selected by, but introduced or omitted at the 
 single discretion of the choir. It is usually a mere 'performance by the 
 orchestra ! which the people are not expected and are unable, to 
 unite in ; and frequently the music is set to words unknown to, and 
 that can not be distinguished by, the congregation. Let it be remem- 
 bered that the service of the Church has not commenced, until such 
 prefixes are ended. By all means, let the people sit while they are in 
 progress ; for the worship has not begun, and their strength should be 
 kept for its own sufficient requirements. I think all the addition made 
 to the length of the service by such preliminaries, however well exe- 
 cuted and well intended, should be avoided. Again : in my younger 
 days, the Gloria Patri was not generally read or sung, except at the 
 end of the Psalter, where it is required. It is not required any where 
 else. But now, at a time when we are met on every side with com- 
 plaints that our service is too long, and it is so much the question how 
 it may be best abridged, the custom is to sing the Gloria Patri at the 
 end of every anthem, and sometimes at the end of every psalm in the 
 daily Psalter. Thus time is needlessly spent. I think that in the 
 present state of our required service, it would be wise to confine the 
 Gloria Patri to the end of the Psalter, and omit it every where else, 
 
11 
 
 especially -when the time occupied in the use of it is increased by its 
 being chanted. Such was old custom in most of our Churches. 
 Composers of music books, for the most part, not ministers or congre- 
 gations, have changed it. Again : there is a most unprofitable and 
 inexcusable protraction in the voluntaries, with which the organ often 
 introduces the chants and hymns ; but especially in those voluntaries 
 which are played between the verses of the psalms and hymns, at the 
 discretion of the organist, and often to the great detriment of the worship 
 of the congregation. Of what possible use are they to the devotion of 
 the people ? "Why must a whole congregation be kept standing, in 
 silence and weariness, to listen simply to an organ ? Why must the 
 devotional sentiment of the hymn, and the connection of thought in the 
 mind of the worshiper, be interrupted to give place simply to the 
 playing of an organ ? The voluntaries are often so long, that they 
 make a serious addition to the length of our services; the more so, 
 when it is recollected that the people are standing while they proceed. 
 I have never known a congregation that did not complain of them ; and 
 still they are tolerated, as if it were supposed they actually belong to 
 the prescribed order of our worship. They are the rubric of the organ- 
 ist, not of the Church. We have not time for them — we have not 
 strength to spend in standing to listen to them. We are inquiring on 
 all sides how our services may be abridged without impairing their 
 integrity. Here is one way — and an easy way. Five minutes, at 
 least — often ten — sometimes fifteen and twenty, would be gained in 
 many churches, by laying aside such useless things as I have now 
 adverted to ; and that would be a gain of an important proportion of 
 the whole time of our morning prayer. But again : have we not often 
 too much chanting, especially when the Te Deum is sung, unless our 
 chanting is brought to its proper simplicity, which would make it oc- 
 cupy scarcely more time than ordinary deliberate reading. I once 
 
12 
 
 timed a To Deum, not unfrequently sung, which occupied eleven min- 
 utes ; and all that while the people were standing in silence ; for, of 
 course, they could not unite in it. Can we complain that our service 
 should seem too long, when such things are done? Often the chants 
 to other parts are much too long ; witness the most common, and at the 
 same time the least devotional, of those employed for the Gloria Patri, 
 and certain chants that are often used at the announcement of the 
 Gospel. The longer, the less suitable, is a general rule with chants for 
 public worship ; because the longer, ordinarily, the less simple, the more 
 complex, the least adapted to the use of the congregation, and the more 
 expensive of time and of the strength of those who wish to stand when 
 the praises of God are sung. 
 
 I believe that, simply, by having better music, because more simple ; 
 by restricting the organ to being the accompaniment, instead of being 
 ever the suspension of the worship, and by having neither reading nor 
 singing where no rubric requires either, till we come to the metrical 
 psalm or hymn, we may avoid a great deal of that weariness to the 
 flesh, which, without any remunerating benefit, causes our services to 
 seem to many, and especially to the aged, too long. For this we need 
 no legislation. And is it not worth our while to see to it? 
 
 This leads me to the general subject of singing in our congregations. 
 How little we have of it ! Singing to our congregations we have in 
 abundance. But what a poor substitute it is for that singing of the 
 praises of God in the congregation and by the congregation, which oin 
 service contemplates, and for the absence of which, as a matter of devo 
 tion, the best music that man ever executed can make no amends. We 
 have become so accustomed to the surrender of all that delightful por- 
 tion of our public worship to the organ and the choir, the whole con- 
 gregation being contented to listen to a mere performance of sacred 
 music, when they are expected all to unite in the vocal praise of God 
 
13 
 
 that we have ceased in a great degree to realize how greatly we have 
 departed from our duty, and our pleasure, and profit, in that part of our 
 worship. Why should not all the responses be given up to the choir, as 
 well as all the psalms and hymns? If it would strike you as a very 
 miserable way of conducting worship to have one voice in the gallery to 
 respond in place of the whole congregation; how is the case improved 
 when a few voices in the gallery are singing in place of the whole con- 
 gregation? I never Isaw the man who did not feel that the singing of 
 a whole assembly, however plain the music, and imperfectly executed, 
 is unspeakably more like the reality of worship, and in accordance with 
 the character of a Church of God ; more impressive, more effective, 
 more calculated to aid devotional affections, than the solitary perform- 
 ances of the best orchestra that ever engrossed to itself the singing of 
 the praises of God. 
 
 I desire very earnestly to call the attention of the clergy to this sub- 
 ject. Congregational singing, with or without the aid of an organ 
 and a choir, is the only singing that answers the ends of public wor- 
 ship. We have far too little of it. In many of our churches it is 
 almost dead. In many it is quite dead. I speak not of this Diocese 
 now, but of our whole Church. The performance of music by a choir 
 often seems to be considered the whole attainment to be desired, as if 
 to listen to performances, instead of to worship with voice and heart, 
 were the whole duty of man, in that part of our services. But can we 
 consent to this? Where is the remedy? Do you say the people will 
 not sing ? Certainly they will not, when chants and tunes are sung 
 that are so new, so difficult, so often changed for others equally new, 
 that not only have they never learned them, but learn them they can 
 not. But how is it when so familiar a tune as Old Hundred is sung ? 
 Do not the people then unite? How is it in the lecture room, the 
 prayer meeting, in the hymn before the Communion ? Do not the people 
 
14 
 
 join ? Why ? Because tunes are sung which are familiar — so simple 
 as to be easily learned — so adapted that no special cultivation of ear or 
 voice is needed for their adoption. And if you would see to it that 
 such tunes and chants alone are sung; if you will prevent this con- 
 stant introduction of new music, without the least regard to the rights 
 of the congregation ; if you will see to it that, not display of voices, 
 nor exhibition of art, but simply the devotional feelings and profit of 
 the people, are consulted in the selection of the chants and tunes, and 
 in the manner of their execution, you will remove all the causes that 
 have led to the evils we now deplore, and will do very much to elevate 
 our public worship, in this very important branch, to a measure of 
 interest in which, in some places of worship, where there are neither 
 choirs nor organs, we are far exceeded, in the judgment of the truly 
 spiritual worshiper. 
 
 And is it. not the duty of the clergy to see to this? Is not the duty 
 of seeing to it entirely committed to the clergy ? I would revive in 
 your recollections the law of the Church, printed in every Prayer Book, 
 just before the Psalms in Metre, where it is written thus : "It shall be 
 the duty of every minister, with such assistance as he can obtain from 
 persons skilled in music, to give order concerning the tunes to be sung 
 at any time in his Church; and especially it shall be his duty to sup- 
 press all light and unseemly music." 
 
 All light and unseemly music ! Music merely for the exhibition of 
 musical art, on the part of a few, which the congregation cannot unite 
 in ; which the very nature of the performance forbids them to unite in ; 
 especially, which is so executed that it requires a very nice ear to ascer- 
 tain any of the words sung — much more to catch them so as to join 
 them together and extract the hidden sentiment of devotion ; music, 
 therefore, which is as much worshiping in an unknown tongue as ever 
 Romish Mass could be — and therefore cannot be worship to the congre- 
 
15 
 
 gation in any degree. I ask you whether such music, no matter how 
 well performed, is not indeed "light and unseemly" considering the 
 rights of the congregation and the only true nature of Christian wor- 
 ship? "What if our reading of prayers should be such that what we 
 say could not he heard j so mumbled or so rapid that the people could 
 not join or follow — would it not be "light and unseemly "? What if 
 we should preach, simply for exhibition of rhetoric or gesture, of art of 
 composition or delivery, so that the mass of our hearers, especially the 
 unlettered, could learn nothing from us — would it not be "light and 
 unseemly" 1 } And must not our hymns and psalms be as intelligible, 
 and as much a part of our common prayer and praise, as the prayers 
 we read, and as level to the minds of the humble and unlettered as our 
 sermons ? 
 
 To the minister, as you have just seen, there is given dominion over 
 the tunes sung. There is no need ordinarily that he should select each 
 tune, though in my visitations I have sometimes had to do that, when I 
 knew that otherwise there would be "unseemly music," such as the 
 minister is required to prevent. But the minister should so exercise 
 his authority, (and there is a way of exercising it, kindly, gently, con- 
 siderately, so as to give no offence and to carry the consent and appro- 
 bation of all with him,) he should so exercise his authority as to sup- 
 press such selections of tunes, as by their frequent newness, and espe- 
 cially by their want of simplicity and facility of adaptation, deprive 
 the congregation of their privilege of vocally uniting in them ; and he 
 should secure that general rule of selection which will insure to the 
 people the tunes which, by the usage of generations, they are able every 
 where to join in, with such additions only, now and then, if additions 
 are really needed, as the people, by frequent repetition, may reasonably 
 be expected to learn. 
 
16 
 
 I believe that, in this way, under the proper exhortation of the min- 
 ister, we may have what, in so many places is lost — real "common 
 prayer" and common praise, when the psalms, and hymns, and an- 
 thems are sung, as well as when they are read. 
 
 I have thus, beloved brethren, presented to you in this Letter, what 
 
 the Convention desired you should all hear. It needs no addition or 
 
 exposition. I commend .it affectionately to your kind acceptance and 
 
 consideration ; and praying the grace of God to be with you, I remain, 
 
 Your affectionate friend and Pastor, 
 
 CHAS. P. McILVAINE. 
 Cincinnati, June 12, 1855. 
 
1 
 
 Gay lord Bros. 
 
 Makers 
 Syracuse, N. Y. 
 
 PAI. JAN. 21, IMS