Daniel 3:5

The sound of the cornet, flute, harp.

Eastern Musical Instruments

The instruments enumerated here are mostly still in use in the present time, but some of them have become obsolete. The cornet is a brass trumpet manufactured in the country, and used in martial music. There are several kinds of flute, both single and double. The harp is no longer in use, nor the “psaltery,” which is a similar instrument of the same kind; they have been replaced by the ood, which gives a richer sound, and is more portable. The “sackbut” is a tamboora, a sort of guitar, of various shapes and sizes; in its most complete and perfect form it is three feet nine inches long, has ten strings of fine wire, and forty-seven steps. It is played with a plectrum, and is often inlaid with mother-of-pearl and valuable woods. It is often, however, of smaller size and less costly materials. The “dulcimer” is a kanoon, or sander. The “kanoon” is the original of our piano, both being probably derived from the lyre and the harp, whence the piano was first called a harpsichord. This instrument consists of a box two inches in depth, and of an irregular form, its greatest length being thirty-nine inches, and its width sixteen. There are only twenty-four notes, and, like the piano, each note has three strings, which are tuned with a key. The sounding-board lies under the strings, and is perforated, and covered with fish-skin where the bridge rests. The performer lays the instrument on his knees, and strikes the chords with the forefinger of each hand, to which is fastened a plectrum of horn. Another form of this instrument, called “santur,” is a double kanoon, and comes still nearer to our piano; the strings are of wire, and only double; they are struck with wooden hammers held in the hand. When used in a procession, this instrument is suspended from the neck by means of a cord. (H. J. Van Lennep, D.D.)

The Religion of Ceremonial

Are all the coloured garments so many visions of beauty? Is there some strain religious in the blare of brazen trumpets and the throb of military drums? Most of the people that we see gathered together around great sights would gladly be at home, listening to the voice of child, or friend, or bird. Do external images fill the soul? is it enough to have a painted God? What wonder if we begin by worshipping things that are seen? That course would seem to be natural, and would seem to be able to justify itself by sound reasoning of a preliminary kind. Who could not in ignorance of other deity worship the sun? Sometimes he seems to be almost God! How multitudinous are his phases, how manifold the apocalypse within which he shows his uncounted riches; now so pale, as if he were weary, an eye half closed in sleep long needed, long delayed; and then in full pomp, every beam, so to say, alive, and the whole heaven amazed and delighted at this vision of glory, as if hidden within that fount of flame and heat there lay ten thousand times ten thousand summers, and ten thousand times ten thousand purple autumns, with all their largesses of fruit and flowers and benison, for the sustenance and the nutrition of men; then lost among the clouds, where, indeed, he seems to be disporting himself in painting a thousand academies by one look of his eyes; see how he fills the clouds and seems to shape them, or fall into their shape, making them burn and sparkle and glitter, and invests them with unimagined and untransferable colours; a marvellous, glorious sight! Who could not uncover his head in presence of such glory, and say, Surely this is the gate at least that opens upon the palaces of God. To worship nature would seem in certain stages of development to be right. God made it; God made the green grass and the blushing flower; the great hills, stairways to heights which man never scaled; God made the valleys and the mountains; and what are these fountains saying to the hearing ear? Only the true listener can tell; the vulgar man hears nothing in that splash of water, but the refined soul hears in it melody and song, music religious, and hint of other music that might please the ear of God. As we grow in wisdom, in capacity, in understanding, in sympathy, we close our eyes upon the universe, and say it is no more to us an image that should be sought unto for purposes of worship; but we see within, by a Divinely directed introspection, the true altar, the true sanctuary, the true centre of acceptable worship. Thus we grow from the natural to the spiritual, and when we have obtained the measure of our growth we say, “God is a Spirit”; if we still preserve the image, it is as we should preserve a symbol, that was helpful to us before we saw the thing signified. If our religion is in colour, form, aesthetic attitude and motion, our religion will surely come to nought; but if our piety live in eternity, if it feed itself upon the almightiness and the grace of God, as shown in the Cross of Christ, then it will abide for ever. (Joseph Parker, D.D.)