Although the fusion of the object and the subject is a characteristic feature of all religious lyrics, it is to be noted that these two elements, the objective and the subjective, are never present in equal degree in the church hymns, but that the one or the other element predominates, wherefore it becomes necessary to classify the church hymns into the _relatively objective_ hymns and the _relatively subjective_ hymns. To the former class belong the hymn proper and the didactic or doctrinal hymns; the latter class, the lyrical hymns in a narrower sense, consists of what may be called hymns of experience and sacrifice. The hymn proper sings the praises of God’s majesty and highness, God’s glorious works and attributes, not as something wholly outside of the subject, yet something which is looked up to with worshipful joy and admiration. “A mighty Fortress is our God” is a good example of this class of church hymns. The didactic or doctrinal hymn presents for quiet and instructive contemplation either certain facts from sacred history or certain parts of the Lutheran doctrine. Examples of this kind are “Nun freut euch, lieben Christen g’mein” and “Es ist das Heil uns kommen her.” In these relatively objective hymns, true church hymns, the objective element is more or less permeated by the life, emotion, and sympathy of the subject. In the hymn proper the subject sings its own joy and its jubilation in the great God and His glorious works. The didactic or doctrinal hymn is not merely rhymed history or rhymed dogmatics, but in it the divine events and truths are celebrated as treasures of faith, sources of spiritual life; by means of it the congregation embraces, acknowledges and utters its confident Yea and Amen to the divine revelation of salvation. The relatively subjective church hymns, the lyrical church hymns in a restricted sense, may be characterized as hymns of experience, because they describe and express religious life in its inner experience, emotions, conditions and manifestations, or because they include meditations which a Christian engages in because of his inner and outer condition; to this class of church hymns belong also the so-called hymns of sacrifice, which are more directly an expression of individual devotion to Jesus Christ. Since the chiefly subjective hymns, because of their nature, are subject to the danger of losing themselves in the individual and the incidental, it is very important that they be supported and permeated by a sound religious philosophy. God’s revelation of salvation, especially Jesus Christ, who in His person and work is at once the vital cause, the life, and the living standard of all the various phenomena and forms in the world of divine grace and truth, must form the background which everywhere gleams forth in the hymnody of the Church, the sun that gives light and warmth to the content, the perfect law which restricts the description and keeps the subjectivity within proper bounds.