According to the same Papal biographer,* the pontiff Vitalianus, according to our own Venerable Bede, the pontiff Agatho deputed the Roman singer John, together with Theodore, to instruct the British churches in the science of the ecclesiastical music. The monk Guido of Arezzo, in the eleventh century, conferred a signal benefit on Plain Song, by the invention of a new musical gamut or scale, the notes of which he denominated Ut, Re, Mi, Fa, Sol, and La, from each first and sixth syllable in the Sapphic verses which compose the first strophe of the hymn chanted on the feast of St. John Baptist, the 24th of June. UT queant laxis REsonare fibris, Sancte Joannes. * Johannes quidem Romanus cantor destinatus fuit cum Theodoro æque cive Romano, sed Eboraci Archiepiscopo, per Gallias in Britannias, qui circumquaque positarum Ecclesiarum filios ad pristinam cantilenæ dulcedinem revocans, tam per se, quam per suos discipulos, multis annis Romanæ doctrinæ regulam conservavit. + Intereat (Concilio Hedtfeldensi, A. D. 680 celebrato) huic Synodo, pariterque Catholicæ fidei decreta firmabat vir venerabilis Johannes Archicantor Ecclesiæ S. Petri, et Abbas Monasterii Beati Martini, qui nuper venerat a Roma per jussionem Papæ Agathonis, duce reverentissimo Abbate Biscopo, cognomine Benedicto.-Beda, Hist. Eccl. Lib. cii. Happening, during a visit to Rome, to go into a church whilst the monks were chanting this hymn, Guido perceived that the first syllable of the first word of each succeeding hemistich, regularly ascended, either by a whole, or half tone; so that, commencing with the key-note, and rising to the sixth, there was ultimately formed a complete Greek hexachord. A French musician, called Le Maire, In the public libraries at Rome are preserved several manuscript Missals of a date anterior to the eleventh century, in which the intonations for the Gloria in Excelsis,' and the 'Ite, missa est,' and the chants for the Preface' and the Pater Noster,' are precisely the very same as those employed at High Mass at the present day. The custom of singing psalms, and employing instrumental music during divine worship, constituted as conspicuous a rite in the service of the Jewish Temple, as it does, at present, in the Christian Church. 'David and the chief officers of the army separated for the ministry the sons of Asaph, and of Heman, and of Idithun, to prophesy with harps, and with psalteries, and with cymbals, according to their number serving in their appointed office --and God gave to Heman fourteen sons and three daughters. All of these under their father's hand were distributed to sing in the temple of the Lord with cymbals, and psalteries, and harps, for the service of the house of the Lord; and the number of them with their brethren that taught the song of the Lord, all the teachers were two hundred and eighty eight."* That in the Apostolic times the faithful mingled chanting with their prayers in the public assemblies, is attested by several ex is reported to have superadded the syllable Si, an augmentation which perfectly reproduced the Greek diatonic scale of tetrachords. * 1 Para. C. xxv. V. 1, 6, 7, Protestant Version, 1 Chronicles. pressions in the epistles of St. Paul. Speak' says that Apostle to the Ephesians,*-' to yourselves in psalms and spiritual songs;' and again, to the Colossians, admonish one another in hymns and spiritual songs.' That such instructions were not unheeded by the early believers, is attested even by heathen writers. Lucian glances at the devotion of the Christians in singing hymns; and Pliny relates, in his famous letter to the Roman Emperor Trajan, that on interrogating certain individuals who had been persuaded to return to Gentilism They affirmed of the Christians, that the amount of their fault or their error was, that their custom was to assemble on a certain day before light, and recite reciprocally a hymn to Christ as to God.'§ By writers who have bestowed particular attention on the subject, it is supposed that the Plain Song of the Catholic Church, derived its origin from the synagogue. After the destruction of their temple, and their subsequent dispersion among the nations of the earth, the Jews are presumed to have lost their ancient music; and, therefore, it is in the psalmody and service of our Church, rather than in their synagogues, that must be sought for whatever remains of genuine ancient Hebrew mu * C. v. V. 19. + C. iii. V. 16. Lib. x. Epist. 97. § Affirmabant autem hanc fuisse summam culpæ suæ, vel erroris, quod essent soliti stato die ante lucem convenire, carmenque Christo, quasi Deo, dicere secum invicem. 123 sic. The solemn and devotional character of the Ambrosian chant, is particularly mentioned by several ancient writers; but the improvements engrafted on it by St. Gregory the Great, are still more celebrated. The chanting for the psalmody in the time of St. Ambrose, contained no more than four tones: to these were added four more by Pope St. Gregory. The Psalms are spiritual canticles, and derive their name, ψαλμοι, from the Greek verb ψάλλειν, “to touch a musical instrument gently;' because they were always chanted in the Jewish Temple to the sound of the timbrel, the psaltery, or harp. That they are metrical compositions, and have a rythmus, has been noticed by many eminent ancient and modern writers, amongst the former of whom may be enumerated Josephus, Origen, and St. Je rom. No one, however, has illustrated this point more successfully than Dr. Lowth, in his work "De Sacra Poesi Hebræorum," whose remarks have been corroborated by his commentator Michælis.† The invention of the wind-organ, is ascribed to the times of Julian the Apostate; and the introduction of this instrument into the Church-service, is referred, by some authors,§ to the Pontificate of * Gerbertus de Musica Eccl. tom. i. p. 9. + Prælec. iii. p. 28. See page 193, and Note M, of the Antiquities of the AngloSaxon Church. § Bona and Platina. Pope Vitalian, who occupied the Chair of St. Peter about the year 660. That the organ was known amongst our Saxon ancestors, even at that period, is attested by the poetic enthusiasm with which its thousand voices are noticed by St. Aldhelm, towards the closing of the seventh century. "Maxima millenis auscultans organa flabris Mulceat auditum ventosis follibus iste, The present mode observed throughout the Church, of chanting the psalms by alternate verses at Vespers, and during other portions of the divine office, claims for itself the highest antiquity. From the words of the historian Socrates,* it appears that St. Ignatius Martyr, Bishop of Antioch, and favourite disciple of St. John the Evangelist, was the earliest to introduce into the Church the alternation in singing the hymns and spiritual canticles. According, however, to Theodoretus,t during the reign of the Emperor Constantius, two monks at Antioch, Flavianus and Diodorus, in imitation of what they had already observed amongst the Syrian Christians, distributed the choir into two parts; and regulated that the psalms of David should be chanted by each division alternately. The practice was very soon propagated from Antioch to the neighbouring provinces. But it is to the great St. Ambrose, as we are assured by his * Lib. vi. Ch. 8. + Hist. Eccl. Lib. ii. Ch. 24. |