to the Historic-and-Geneological Society and the custodians and
attendants of the Boston Public Library (notably in the Music
Department) for their uniform courtesy and pains in placing every
resource within my reach.

THERON BROWN.

Boston, May 15th, 1906.




INTRODUCTION.


Augustine defines a hymn as "praise to God with song," and another
writer calls hymn-singing "a devotional approach to God in our
emotions,"--which of course applies to both the words and the music.
This religious emotion, reverently acknowledging the Divine Being in
song, is a constant element, and wherever felt it makes the song a
worship, irrespective of sect or creed. An eminent Episcopal divine,
(says the _Christian Register_,) one Trinity Sunday, at the close of his
sermon, read three hymns by Unitarian authors: one to God the Father, by
Samuel Longfellow, one to Jesus, by Theodore Parker, and one to the Holy
Spirit, by N.L. Frothingham. "There," he said, "you have the
Trinity--Father, Son, and Holy Ghost."

It is natural to speak of hymns as "poems," indiscriminately, for they
have the same structure. But a hymn is not necessarily a poem, while a
poem that can be sung as a hymn is something more than a poem.