conformable to the laws of prosody and Latinity, those which could not
be corrected by any milder method being entirely rewritten." The
latter fate befel, among others, the beautiful "Urbs beata
Hierusalem," which now assumed the form (to many, perhaps, better
known), of "Caelestis urbs Jerusalem." Of the "very few" which were
spared, the chief were "Ave maris stella" ("Gentle star of ocean"),
"Dies Irae," "Stabat Mater dolorosa," the hymns of Thomas Aquinas,
two of St Bernard and one Ambrosian hymn, "Jesu nostra Redemptio" ("O
Jesu, our Redemption"), which approaches nearer than others to the
tone of St Bernard. A then recent hymn of St Francis Xavier, with
scarcely enough merit of any kind to atone for its neglect of prosody,
"O Deus, ego amo Te" ("O God, I love Thee, not because"), was at the
same time introduced without change. This hymnary of Pope Urban VIII.
is now in general use throughout the Roman Communion.
Parisian revisions.
The Parisian hymnary underwent three revisions--the first in 1527,
when a new "Psaltery with hymns" was issued. In this such changes only
were made as the revisers thought justifiable upon the principle of
correcting supposed corruptions of the original text. Of these, the
transposition, "Urbs Jerusalem beata," instead of "Urbs beata
Hierusalem," may be taken as a typical example. The next revision was
in 1670-1680, under Cardinal Péréfixe, preceptor of Louis XIV., and
Francis Harlay, successively archbishops of Paris, who employed for
this purpose Claude Santeul, of the monastery of St Magloire, and,
through him, obtained the assistance of other French scholars,
including his more celebrated brother, Jean Baptiste Santeul, of the
abbey of St Victor--better known as "Santolius Victorinus." The third
and final revision was completed in 1735, under the primacy of
Cardinal Archbishop de Vintimille, who engaged for it the services of
Charles Coffin, then rector of the university of Paris. Many old hymns
were omitted in Archbishop Harlay's Breviary, and a large number of
new compositions, by the Santeuls and others, was introduced. It
still, however, retained in their old places (without further changes
than had been made in 1527) about seventy of earlier date than the
11th century--including thirty-one Ambrosian, one by Hilary, eight by
Prudentius, seven by Fortunatus, three by Paul the Deacon, two each by
Sedulius, Elpis, Gregory and Hrabanus Maurus, "Veni Creator" and "Urbs
Jerusalem beata." Most of these disappeared in 1735, although Cardinal
Vintimille, in his preface, professed to have still admitted the old
hymns, except when the new were better--("veteribus hymnis locus datus
est, nisi quibus, ob sententiarum vim, elegantiam verborum, et
teneriores pietatis sensus, recentiores anteponi satius visum est").
The number of the new was, at the same time, very largely increased.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account