a contribution to the hymnology of our own Church. And while fully sensible of their imperfections, I may yet (by way of excuse rather than of boast) say, almost in Bishop Hall's words

"I first adventure: follow me who list,

And be the second Eastern Melodist."

SACKVILLE COLLEGE,

Feast of the Epiphany, 1862

INTRODUCTION.

As a general rule, the first poetical attempts of the Eastern, like those of the Western, Church, were in classical measures. But as

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classical Greek died out from being a spoken, language, as new trains of thought were familiarized,—as new words were coined—a versification became valueless, which was attached with no living bonds to the new energy, to the onward movement. Dean Trench has admirably expressed this truth in the introduction to his "Sacred Latin Poetry," and showed how the new wine must be put into new bottles." Ecclesiastical terms must be used, which rebel against classical metre: in Greek, no less than in Latin, five words in eight would be shut out of the principal classical rhythms. Now, the Gospel was preached to the poor. Church hymns must be the life-expression of all hearts. The Church was forced to

make a way for saying in poetry what her message bade her say.*

* As an illustration of this remark, it is worth while noticing how very few examples of Hexameters occur in the New Testament. I believe that the following are all that are tolerable; that is, that can so be scanned without one or two false quantities

S. Luke xxi. 18.

S. John xiii. 5.

-

Θρὶξ ἐκ τῆς κεφαλῆς ὑμῶν οὐ μὴ ἀπόληται.

βάλλει ὕδωρ εἰς τὸν νιπτῆρα, καὶ ἤρξατο νίπτειν. οὐκ ἔστι[ν] δοῦλος μείζων τοῦ κυρίου αὑτοῦ. καὶ περὶ τῶν πιστευσόντων διὰ τοῦ λόγου αὐτῶν. μηδένα βλασφημεῖν, ἀμάχους εἶναι, ἐπιεικεῖς.

S. John xiii. 16.

S. John xvii. 20.

Titus iii. 2.

Heb. xii. 13.

καὶ τροχιάς ὀρθὰς ποιήσατε τοῖς ποσὶν ὑμῶν.

There are some which are very near a hexameter: as S. Matt xxiii. 6

καὶ τὰς πρωτοκαθεδρίας ἐν ταῖς συναγωγαῖς. A tolerable pentameter occurs in Rom. vi. 13

καὶ τὰ μέλη ὑμῶν ὅπλα δικαιοσύνης. and a remarkable iambic in the LORD'S Prayer

τὸν ἄρτον ἡμῶν τὸν ἐπιούσιον δίδου.

S. Gregory Nazianzen, the first Greek Church poet, used only the ordinary classical measures. S. Sophronius of Jerusalem employed (and in their way not unhappily,) Anacreontics and his hymns on various festivals have some elegance. But there is

a certain degree of dilettante-ism, rather than of earnestness, in these compositions ; and the most airy, tripping, frivolous measure that the Greek Muse possessed, never, by any possibility, could form the ordinary utterance of the Church. The Church compositions of S. Sophronius, though called πоnμатα, are in fact mere prose: as those grand prayers on the Epiphany.

How then was the problem to be solved as to the composition of Eastern Church Song? In Latin, somewhat before the time of S. Sophronius, A.D. 630, it was answered by that glorious introduction of rhyme, Why not in Greek also?

Now it is no less true in Greek, than in Latin, that there was a tendency to rhyme

from the very beginning. Open Homer: look for caudate rhymes:

Νημερτής τε καὶ Αψευδὴς καὶ Καλλιάνασσα *Ενθάδ' ἔην Κλυμένη, Ιφιάνασσα.

Ιάνειρα

καὶ

Il. xviii. 46.

*Αστεος αιθομένοιο· θεῶν δέ σε μῆνις ἀνῆκεν· Πᾶσι δὲ θῆκε πόνον πολλοισι δὲ κήδε ἐφῆκεν

Ως Αχιλεὺς Τρώεσσι πόνον καὶ κήδεα θῆκεν. 11. xxi. 523.

Οὐ μὲν γὰρ μεῖζον κλέος ἀνέρος, ὄφρα κεν ἦσιν Η ὅ τι ποσσίν τε ῥέξει καὶ χερσὶ Γεῇσιν.

Odyss. viii. 147.

Leonines are still more common.

The

reader's attention is particularly requested

to those that follow :

11. 11. 220. Εχθιστος δ ̓ ̓Αχιλῆϊ μάλιστ' ἦν, ἤδ ̓ Ὀδυσῆϊ.

484. Εσπετε νῦν μοι, Μοῦσαι, Ολύμπια δώματ' ἔχουσαι.

475. Ρεῖα διακρίνωσιν, ἐπεί κε νομῷ μιγέωσιν.

iii. 84. * Ως ἔφαθ'· οἱ δ ̓ ἔσχοντο μάχης, ἄνεῳτ ̓ ἐγένοντο.