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THE CITY TEMPLE AND ITS MUSICAL SERVICE.

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Dr. Joseph Parker was one of the strongest forces that make for righteousness in the city of London. Since the death of Spurgeon probably no preacher has had a more cosmopolitan audience. The very ends of the earth were represented in his congregation. Ministers from Melbourne and Montreal met in his vestry. His record book contains names from the antipodes. It is a signal proof of his power as a master of assemblies that for thirty years at the busy noon-day hour, on one of the busiest days in the week, an audience of two thousand, mostly men, gathered in the City Temple to hear the great preacher.

The Temple itself is a monument of his striking personality. It was erected at a cost of $350,000 on the Holborn Viaduct, in the very heart of "streaming London's central roar." The Viaduct itself is one of the most striking evidences of the energy and enterprise of the great world city. It spans Holborn Valley, a reminiscence of early

London. The church will accommodate two thousand persons, and is filled at every service.

When the World's Sunday-school Convention was held in London, its first sessions were convened in the hall of the Sunday-school Union, up three or four flights of iron stairs. The enterprising B. F. Jacobs said, "This will never do," and the sessions were forthwith transferred to the City Temple and Exeter Hall. In the Temple, to the present writer was assigned the duty of responding for the Dominion of Canada to the address of welcome, a very comprehensive subject. The responsiveness and cordiality of the British audience was at once an inspiration and an aid in speech.

A marked feature of the service in the City Temple is the congregational singing. In this the accomplished wife of Dr. Parker was a potent factor. Her grace, her musical taste and skill, her religious sympathies, gave the musical service a spell of power. We have pleasure in quoting the interview with Mr. A. J. Hawkins, organist and choirmaster of the City Temple, reported in The Musical Herald. He said:

"Dr. Parker's attitude to music was one of sympathy and great encouragement. You know that in my time the music of the service has been considerably developed; indeed it is difficult to see what more we can do than we now do in this way, for, after all, ours is a preacher's service. Dr. Parker was not musical, in the sense of understanding music, but he was decidedly susceptible to it. I have many letters from him relating to the arrangements, and if they were published they would show that he had a great heart for the music of the church. He encouraged us to give the very best' music of which we were capable.

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66 "The deacons should be associated with any reference to Dr. Parker. Their support of the music has always been liberal and friendly. We have a fine library of anthems and sacred music. Dr. Parker liked a bright' anthem. His taste leaned a little towards the old school. Clarke Whitfield's Praise God in His Holiness,' was one of his favourites. Often," continued Mr. Hawkins, "I get letters from organists from various parts of the country telling disheartening tales

of the opposition that their efforts to improve the music of the service have met with from minister or deacons, or both. A more gratifying type of letter relates how the minister has attended a service at the City Temple, and has been so moved by the music that he wants to have the same kind of service in his own church.

"The ordinary service music,' consists of three hymns, a chant, an introit, a setting of the Lord's Prayer, an anthem, and a solo or quartette. In the evening service the General Confession is intoned. We sing in every service a high-class Anglican anthem or sacred chorus. We have a professional quartette, and a voluntary choir of forty-five to fifty members. At the beginning of each month, we print the anthems and principal items of music for each service, and the lists are exhibited upon the church doors. The hymns are fixed each week, and the numbers appear on the service paper, which every worshipper receives on entering. I have always chosen the hymns. Dr. Parker left the matter entirely to me, and it is curious how often they have fitted into the mood of the sermon.

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"At the Thursday service there is less music. It is a preaching service. dozen ladies of the congregation come to lead the two hymns, and we always have a solo, but that is all. Mr. George Harlow, with his trumpet or cornet, has all along been a valuable help on Sunday in the hymns. The tone of the brass instrument is more penetrating than the organ, and seems to rouse the congregation. The hymn-singing of the congregation has always been an impressive part of our service, and we are proud of it. Visitors, Americans especially, always notice it. Here Mr. Harlow has done excellent work. He plays with judgment, and in the soft

verses leaves me with the organ only. Can we get expression from such a mass of people? Certainly; and you will be surprised how quick is the response of the congregation to the lead of the organ and the choir.

"Mrs. Parker's death was mourned by every member of the choir. We lost in her a good friend. Her sweet nature shed its influence on all our members. Of the old voluntary choir she was a leading singer. Then we introduced the professional quartette, and I can never forget how quietly and naturally she changed her seat, giving way to the professional soprano. Yes, my memories of both Dr. and Mrs. Parker are altogether happy and unclouded. Neither ever found fault with us; both were frequent in their appreciation. It is pleasant, indeed, to work amid such surroundings."

Among those present at the memorial service for Dr. Parker was Mr. E. Minshall, whose voluntary work as organist of the City Temple for seventeen years will always be remembered, and Mr. Alexander Tucker, who assisted his old colleagues in the choir. While the congregation was assembling and waiting, Mr. Hawkins played the three funeral marches by Kinross, Schubert, and Chopin. The introit was Sleepers, Wake." Then followed the hymn, "O God, our help in ages past," Bridge's "Crossing the Bar," as a quartette; the hymn, "Rock of Ages," the anthem, "Brother, thou art gone before us (Sullivan), the hymns, "Peace, perfect peace," and Now the labourer's task is o'er," Stainer's Sevenfold Amen, and the Dead March in Saul."

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Since this interview took place, the newspapers have announced that Dr. Parker has, in his will, left one hundred pounds to Mr. Hawkins; a pleasant proof of their cordial relations.

TO JOSEPH PARKER.

BY AMOS R. WELLS.

Voice of English voices,
Point of England's pen,
Flame of England's conscience,
Leonine of men!

How is greatness greatened,
When it lifts its face

To a constant passion,
In a constant place.

Where the true man preaches,
In a gown or smock,

There is a cathedral,

There the people flock.

Where the true man preaches,
Tho' the phrases flash,
Tho' the worded music
Like a fountain plash,

With a light whose glory
Dims all else to dross,
Rises, sole and simple,
Christ's Imperial Cross !
-Independent.

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SIR WILFRID LAURIER.*

THE RIGHT HON. SIR WILFRID LAURIER.

The world's history is that of its great men. We are all hero-worshippers. We follow with keener interest the story of great movers than of great movements. The personal interest of the concrete surpasses any of the abstract. He who knows the lifestory of a Knox, a Cromwell, a Wesley, a Gladstone, has more vivid conception of the general history of their times than if his studies be diffused and dispersed among many minor individuals.

Sir John A. Macdonald and Sir Wilfrid Laurier are the two Canadian statesmen who exercised the most winsome personal charm and the broadest national influence. The one was a leading agent in the federation of the Dominion, the other in the federation of the Empire. Mr. Willison has, in this noble political history, given us a character-study, of unique and fascinating interest, of the great Liberal leader. He brings to his task a rare combination of talents-wide reading, a sympathetic spirit, a judicial temper, a brilliant literary style.

"Sir Wilfrid Laurier and the Liberal Party." A Political History. By J. S. Willison. Toronto: Geo. N. Morang & Company. 8vo, pp. 472-451. Two vols., in case. Price, $6.00.

No more conspicuous figure at the Diamond Jubilee and Coronation pageants was there than that of Sir Wilfrid Laurier. Of all the pro-consuls of the Empire he was the hero. It was an object-lesson in empire-building to see this man of the French race, of the Roman Catholic religion, yet the foremost commoner of the great Dominion, winning the popular plaudits alike at the heart of the Empire and at the capital of the nation, the nation from which Canada had been reft.

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Mr. Willison's graceful style is shown in the opening sentences of his study of Sir Wilfrid. All down the generations the green and quiet country has been the nursery of poets, philosophers, and statesmen. There is comfort and serenity in the open sky, the wide field, and the strip of bush, and a spacious leisure in the long, slow days and solemn, brooding nights. All there is is of divinity in man ripens under such conditions, and the elemental simplicities and austerities of life breed in him high resolves and large ambitions. If we examine the rolls of the great public schools and universities, we shall find that very many of the leaders in the class-lists have come up from rural homes, and were reared perhaps in grievous circumstances.

"The roar and clamour of cities seem to produce diffusion and distraction. Social duties and social ambitions take the best out of lives that, under the steadier conditions which prevail in rural communities, would have been deeper and fuller and richer in human service. How much of the strength and sanity of British statesmanship is the product of quiet English fields and wide ancestral estates! The rugged hills and bleak moors of Scotland are the nursing mothers of immortals. Lincoln's wide vision and infinite patience and high fortitude were caught, perhaps, from the spreading prairies and enduring hills of the west. We may not say it is the fashion of the gods to rear their great ones in the silences of the plains and hills. But there is at least a half-truth in the thought that greatness feeds on isolation, and there is something in the near presence of infinite nature which begets enduring purpose and indomitable ambitions."

While the personal element is strong in this book, it is a record also of the Liberal party since Federation in Canada. It is not a colourless record, but of frank criticism. This is strongly shown in the chapter on the

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Church and the Printer, recording the extraordinary Guibord episode; in those on The Church and the State; The Priest and Politics, The School Question, and others. The broadening relations of Canada to the Empire are well illustrated in the chapters on the Preferential Tariff, and on Imperialism and Racialism, with all of which Sir Wilfrid may say, "Magna pars fui."

Mr. Willison sums up in a sentence the characteristics of his hero as follows: "Sir Wilfrid Laurier's public career is remarkable for consistent and unchanging devotion to three great objects the assertion and maintenance of the principle of federalism, ardent and unflinching championship of civil and religious freedom, patient and courageous resistance to the denationalizing tendencies of racialism, sectarianism, and provincialism."

"Sir Wilfrid Laurier," he says elsewhere, "has always been great enough to know that in order to be a good Catholic, it is not necessary to flout and insult Protestantism, and that in order to be a loyal and selfrespecting British subject, it is not necessary to throw gibes and sneers at other countries."

There are many admirable studies of other Canadian leaders. Of Edward Blake Mr. Willison remarks: "It is doubtful if this continent has bred a more opulent mind than that of Edward Blake. He ranks with Webster and Hamilton and Beecher. On almost every great question of public policy he saw beyond his time. and the future holds for him a still ampler vindication. In his gospel of generous dealing with French and Catholic he was a patriot and a prophet. In his Spartan integrity he gave us a noble example of the best type of British statesmanship."

Of Sir John A. Macdonald, he writes: "In his later years he became very strongly entrenched in the hearts of his countrymen. Sir John A. Macdonald must ever stand as one of the most consummate party leaders in British history, and one of the most picturesque and impressive figures among the statesmen of the Empire."

The book is handsomely printed and well indexed. It contains several examples of Sir Wilfrid's chaste and elegant oratory in both French and English.

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THE WORLD'S SUNDAY-SCHOOL CONVENTION AT JERUSALEM, 1904.

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It is significant of the growth of Sunday-school interests that the World's Sunday-school Convention of 1904 will be held in the land made sacred evermore by the life of our Lord, and in the city of Jerusalem, which is associated with SO much thrilling Bible history. The convention will be held during the Easter week next year, and already very widespread interest is shown in the enterprise. The province of Ontario is entitled to send twenty delegates, who must be Sabbath-school workers, and be appointed by the Executive Committee of the Sabbathschool Association of Ontario.

The ship already engaged, the "Grosser Kurfurst," is to leave New York on March 8th, 1904, and return there May 18th, a cruise of seventy-one days. The programme includes daily addresses, lectures, and Bible studies on shipboard throughout the cruise, addresses by famous Oriental scholars at many points, also the addresses by representatives from all parts of the world in the convention.

Two immense tents will be provided

for the convention. They will be pitched so as to be thrown together as near Mount Calvary as possible, outside the city of Jerusalem, near the Damascus Gate, and chairs or settees will be provided for 1,200 persons. Arrangements will also be made so that meetings or sessions of the convention may be conveniently held at Mars' Hill, Sea of Galilee, Hills of Bethlehem, Abraham's Oak, Olivet, Bethany, Calvary, and the Garden of Geth

semane.

The itinerary includes stops at Madeira, Algiers, Malta, Athens, Constantinople, with a visit to Robert College; Smyrna, and a side trip to Ephesus; Beirut, with side trip to Damascus, and overland to Jerusalem, or by steamer from Beirut to Jaffa, with full week in Jerusalem; also a visit to Alexandria and Cairo, with side trip to Upper Egypt; Naples and Rome.

The price of the entire trip,seventy-one days-first-class accommodations throughout, is from $300 to $750. There are two hundred berths, ranging from $300 to

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