LETTER OF
The GOSPEL TRUTH CHARLES G. FINNEY
1869
To Edward Payson Marvin
20 December 1869
[MS in Finney Papers, Box 9 , Oberlin College Archives]
Oberlin 20th Dec.1869.
My Dear Brother Marvin.
Yours of the 13th is recd.
I can not say that we have any
particular hymns which we
use for the promotion of revivals.
{I have found in experience that
I must not lay much stress on
impressions produced by that
peculiar kind of singing
in general use in revivals.
It is an impression on the sensibility
more by far than on the intellect,
& hence to be used with care.
I have found that preaching
& conversation are the safest
instrumentalities to use for the
conversion of sinners. Song has
more to do with the devotional
feelings of christians than
with the conversion of sinners.
This is my experience. Song should
[page 2]
be used with much judgment
& caution even to touch the
feelings of christians at times
when "Zion is intavail."
I never knew a christian in
travail of soul to incline to
singing.} After the children
are born song is natural
& useful, but while the
pains of travail continue
song is unnatural, injurious,
dangerous, as it tends strongly
to divert the soul from its agonizing
struggle before it has prevailed.
{It is easy to sing away the spirit
of agonizing & prevailing prayer.}
No leader of a prayer meeting
who is himself in travail of soul
for sinners will introduce much
singing. It is unnatural, & even
painful to him while the
anguish of travail is upon
him. When he has prevailed,
[page 3]
& the souls for whom he prayed
in such anguish are born
of God, he will sing. It is
only those who are not in travail
who really are not in the work &
are not in travail that feel like
singing. We have here a great deal
of singing & of good singing,
as we have two professors of music
& a musical conservatory
connected with our college.
We also are almost always
having what, in other places,
would be a revival, but
which is not more than a
common state of religious
interest here. We sing many of
the hymns which I see you have,
but we have very little of what
in other places they call chorus
singing. We have not so much of
this as I often wish we had.
Our trained choirs are mostly
[page 4]
singing new tunes & commit
to memory very few tunes so
as to be able to sing them without
their note books. Every new note
book they must have & sing them
through. The books & the singers are
frequently changed, & if I want
a particular piece or hymn
sung at any moment, it is
seldom that our choir can
sing it unless the particular
book that has it, is on hand.
{But I never, any where have found
myself able to use the usual
revival hymns, without much
caution. If used without discre
tion they let down the tone & power
of a revival, sing away conviction
of sin & travail of soul & render
the work superficial & evanescent.
Keep song in its place & it is good.
But a singing revivalist will in eternity
if not in time learn his mistake.} I am
an old music teacher & leader & am very fond
[page 1, along the left margin]
of sining. But above I have given my experience of nearly 50 years
of revival labor. God bless you.
C. G. Finney.
Footnotes:
This letter is not in the Finney Papers.
The section following, and later sections, enclosed in brackets { }, are marked off in pencil in the margin of the manuscript. This may have been done by Marvin to indicate to a publisher which sections to copy; or, perhaps, so that he could easily locate extracts to quote when giving an address.
Finney had evidently meant to write Zion is in travail. This is not an exact quotation from the Bible. Compare Micah 4:10: "Be in pain, and labor to bring forth, O daughter of Zion, like a woman in travail;" and Isaiah 66:8: "... for as soon as Zion travailed, she brought forth her children."
Finney is reiterating here what he had elaborated upon in one of his "Lectures on Revivals of Religion" published in 1835, about the effect of singing on prayer meetings. He may have been reminded of that, having recently re-read the book.
That section in the "Lectures" was examined by William W. Patton in an article on "Singing Revivals" published in The Independent (New York), 21 September 1876, pp. 6-7. Patton was seeking to defend the new fashion of revival singing and the success of evangelists like Moody and Sankey, and Whittle and Bliss, although at the same time warning his readers of the pertinence of some of Finney's criticisms.
This word is not clear on the photocopy of the letter.
Finney's omission of the g from singing looks like a Freudian slip.