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TROUBADOURS AND MINNE-SINGERS. 351
which came into general use, through the efforts of Luther, who himself composed some of them. Luther had a most musical nature, which left its imprint upon his whole epoch.
It is related of him, that he spent the largest part of the night before he appeared to define his doctrines before the Diet of Worms, playing on his lute, in order to give composure and firmness to his thoughts.
He ranked music next to theology, and said: — " I am not ashamed to acknowledge, that next to divinity there is no study which I prize so highly as that of music."
With the reformation, the epoch of modern music may be said to begin. Of course there was both crudity and pedantry in the art, but the Meister-singers, although they yet existed centuÂries later, had ceased to exert an influence.
There are but few curious facts, which are not generally known, from that age, to our own. Yet we think a brief sketch of the growth of some branches of our music, will not be uninteresting to the general reader, even if the facts have loBt the relish of novelty. |
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