I will sing with the Spirit, and I will sing with the Understanding also. 1 COR. xiv. 15. The Church Triumphant, and the Church below, Angels and we, assisted by this Art, May sing together, though we dwell apart. Waller on Divine Poesy. HALIFAX: PRINTED AND SOLD BY N. WHITLEY, CROWN STREET. 1831. PREFACE. IT has long been acknowledged and lamented by the Friends of the Establishment, that the Psalmody in our Churches will not bear a Comparison with our other excellent Services. The two Versions generally used, which some have termed authorized, are so closely confined to the Original Subjects, and the Cases of David and the Jewish Church, that they cease to produce that Interest in Christian Congregations, which would animate the devotional exercises of Praise and Thanksgiving. It is not denied that there are exceptions to this observation. The inconvenience, however, just stated, has been so strongly felt, that Selections of Psalms and Hymns have become quite common, and seem to have been ge nerally acknowledged as desirable, if not actually necessary. A really authorized Selection announced as such is a Desideratum. The Compiler of the present Collection begs leave to state, that, though it was his first purpose merely to provide for the Public Service of the Church, and to admit nothing that might not properly be sung in the Congregation; he has complied with the suggestion of some of his Friends, who intimated that if a few Hymns were also introduced more immediately adapted to domestic or private Devotion, the Publication might be still more acceptable. This is the Apology for the insertion of several Hymns not immediately adapted to Public Worship. Halifax, April 21, 1826. |