8. Organs and Cathedral Music

VIII. Organs and Cathedral Music.

It is true, they had musical instruments in the worship of God under the law; but

1. There was then a clear word of institution for them. The trumpets of silver and cornets of horn, were instituted by the hand of Moses (Numbers 10, in the ten first verses, and Leviticus 23:23, 24), and in David's time there were added cymbals of brass, and harps and psalteries of fine wood (1 Chronicles 16:4, 5), and that by authority and direction from God, for so was the commandment of the Lord by his prophets (2 Chronicles 29:25), and therefore they are called the instruments of music of the Lord (2 Chronicles 7:6), and we read also of timbrels, organs, and ten-stringed instruments (Psalms 149:3 & 150:4).

But there is not one word of institution for them under the Gospel, but on the contrary they are cashiered and excluded out of Gospel-worship, by that general rule which the Apostle lays down concerning all the parts of God's worship (1 Corinthians 14:26): Let all things be done to edifying; and verse 15, I will sing with the Spirit, and I will sing with understanding also; but the chanters and choristers are barbarians to all the people, for they play and sing no body knows what, so that the understanding cannot edify by it. If I know not the meaning of the voice, he that speaks shall be a barbarian to me (1 Corinthians 14:11). It is therefore a strange comparison which some have used, who have said they know no argument to prove the organs simply unlawful, but what would prove a cup of wine unlawful. For we must remember, that the question is concerning the use of them in the worship of God: and therefore the answer is, that there is a vast disparity of reason between a cup of wine and organs, for the one is instituted, the other not. Christ has appointed and commanded us to use bread and wine in his worship in the Sacrament of the Supper, but he has not appointed Cathedral music.

2. I do not find in the Scripture, that these musical instruments were a part of their Synagogue-worship, which was moral, but rather of their Temple-worship, which was ceremonial. In their Synagogues they had the public moral worship of God, reading and expounding the law, &c. (Acts 13:15). Some think they had trumpets also in their Synagogues to call the people together, but this was a moral use of them, for which we use the ringing of a bell. But the Scripture is clear, that the musical instruments were appointed to be used continually before the Ark (1 Chronicles 16:4, 5, 6). And the singers and trumpeters stood at the east end of the altar at the dedication of the Temple (2 Chronicles 5:12). And in Hezekiah's time, when the burnt-offering began, the song of the Lord began also, with the trumpets, and with the instruments ordained by David king of Israel (2 Chronicles 29:27, 28). But seeing Christ is come, and has caused the sacrifice and the oblation to cease, and the city and the sanctuary being both destroyed, as (Daniel 9:26, 27), all the worship that was affixed thereto is ceased with it.

3. There was a typical signification in them. The silver trumpet signified the sounding of the silver trumpet of the Gospel through all the world, the preaching of the pure word of God by his messengers, who are said to lift up their voice as a trumpet (Isaiah 58:1). Set the trumpet to your mouth (Hosea 8:1). The tongue of the just is as choice silver (Proverbs 10:20), and both these, and all the rest of their musical instruments, were expressions and signs of joy (Psalms 98:6 & 89:15). Blessed is the people that know the joyful sound. They were therefore fit resemblances to shadow out that heavenly music, and inward melody of the joys and graces of God's Spirit in the hearts of his people. The Apostle therefore exhorts us to sing, but instead of musical instruments, he requires the melody of the heart (Ephesians 5:19), and grace in the heart (Colossians 3:16).

But 4. Suppose the signification of the Jewish music could not be found out, (as indeed it is a hard thing to find out the meaning of all their ceremonies) we are delivered not only from their types and ceremonies, but also from all their yokes and burdens. These things were a part of the burdensome paedagogie, which the church was under in the time of its non-age and childhood, but now the time of Gospel-freedom is come (Galatians 4:1). And therefore Aquinas, though a Popish schoolman, yet he rejects and pleads against these instruments of music, as being then used among the Jews *quia populus erat magis durus & carnalis*, for which reason also they were so much encouraged with promises of temporal things. And this superstition was not brought into the Church of Rome itself in his time, who lived about 400 years ago, and he says the reason was *ne videatur Judaizare*, lest they should seem to Judaize. And he does also well observe, that musical instruments do more stir up the mind to delight, than frame it to a right disposition, they raise natural, rather than true spiritual joy: which they that commend them as an help partly natural and partly artificial, to the exhilarating of the spirits for the praise of God, may do well to consider. They are such an help as God has not appointed, and what God does not appoint, he is not wont to bless. But why should we not have trumpets in the worship of God as well as organs? For the Jews had trumpets also. And why must we have them only in Cathedral churches? If organs be too dear for every poor parish, yet they might get citterns or bagpipes. And why should there not be dancing in the worship of God as well as piping? For those old idolaters in Exodus 32 did not only shout, but also danced and played before their idol. Erasmus, though in many things a Papist, yet he saw the evil of this, that whole flocks of boys should be maintained at a great charge, wasting also their own precious time *in perdiscendis hujusmodi gannitibus*, which Doctor Ames renders thus, in learning this gibble gabble. And all the first Reformers condemn it with one mouth, Zuinglius, Calvin, Peter Martyr, and others, as a part of the legal paedagogie; so that we might as well recall the incense, tapers, circumcision, and all the other shadows of the law into use again.