lyric forms, so that
they might give to their flocks in popular and easily remembered forms,
prayers and formulas of faith.

_Second Proposition_:-The Breviary hymns have the principal elements of
poetic beauty.

Briefly, these elements are sublimity of thought, beauty of sentiment,
aptness of expression, unction of form. In these matters the Breviary
hymns are not inferior to the classic poetry of paganism, nor to the
much-belauded beauties of the Gallican Breviary hymns (_vide_ Bacquez,
_Le Saint Office_, notes vi. and viii. in finem).

The composition of the hymns is in perfect harmony with the end for
which they are intended, that is, liturgical prayer, chanted prayer.
Their phrases do not display the vain and superfluous literary glitter
of the much-lauded Gallican hymns, but their accents go out from the
sanctuary and live in the hearts of the people. Their language is, like
the thought and expression of the psalms, the word of a soul praying to
God and adoring Him in fervour, in simplicity, and in faith. Of the
piety and expression of the French hymns, Foinard, an ardent apostle of
the French liturgical novelties, wrote: "Il ne parait pas que ce soit
l'onction qui domine dans les nouveaux Breviaries; on y a la verite,
travaille beaucoup pour l'esprit; mais il semole qu' on n'y a pas
travaille autant pour le coeur." Letourneux, the fierce Jansenist, wrote
to the Breviary-poet, Santeuil, his co-worker: "Vous faites fumer
l'encens; mais c'est un feu estranger qui brule dans l'ensenoir. La
vanite fait en vous ce que la charite devrait faire." And the Catholic
De Maistre, so famed for his fair-minded criticisms, wrote of the new
hymn-makers' works: "They make a certain noise in the ear, but they
never breathe prayer, because their writers were all alone (_i.e._,
unaided by the grace and guidance of the Holy Spirit) when they composed
them." Of the Roman Breviary hymns he wrote: "They always pray and
excite the soul to prayer." "Train your hearts to attention, and hear
all their prayers. You will in them see the true religion, as clearly as
you see the sunbeams."

_Fourth Proposition_:--The characteristic of the Roman Breviary hymns is
to express with lively sentiments and with unction the noble ideas and
beautiful sentiments of the supernatural order, in a simple manner,
without prosodical pretension, yet having ever a true rhythm which
sometimes vies with better compositions.

The characteristic mentioned in th