regational. Therefore he produced
by degrees a series of hymns, which he described as designed to be sung
between the Nicene Creed and the Sermon, and to be connected in some
degree with the Collects and Gospels for the day. Thus he was the real
originator in England of the great system of appropriate hymnology, which
has become almost universal, and many of his own are among the most
beautiful voices of praise our Church possesses. We would instance Nos.
135 and 263 in "Hymns Ancient and Modern,"--that for the 21st Sunday
after Trinity, a magnificent Christian battle-song; and that for
Innocents' Day, an imitation of the old Latin hymn "_Salvete flores
Martyrum_." They were put together, with others by Dean Milman and a few
more, into a little volume, which Heber requested Dr. Howley, then Bishop
of London, to lay before the Archbishop, that it might be recommended for
use in churches, but the timidity of the time prevented this from being
carried into effect.

A deep student of church history, his letters show him trying every
practical question by the tests of ancient authority as well as
instructive piety, and, on these principles, already deploring the undue
elevation of the pulpit and debasement of the Altar to which exclusive
preference of preaching had led. Missions had, since the days of Carey's
first opening of the subject become so predominant a thought with the
Nonconformist bodies, and were often conducted so irregularly, that there
was certain dread and distrust of them among the sober-minded and
orthodox; but Heber was one of the first English churchmen who perceived
that to enlarge her borders and strengthen her stakes was the bounden
duty of the living Church. He was a fervent admirer of Henry Martyn,
whose biography was published soon after the news of his death reached
England, and his feeling found vent in that hymn so familiar to us
all--"From Greenland's icy mountains."

He was meantime rising in influence and station,--Canon of St. Asaph,
Preacher at Lincoln's Inn, Select Preacher before the University. He was
beloved by all ranks: by the poor for his boundless charity and sympathy;
and by his equals, not only for these qualities, but for his sunny
temper, bright wit, and playfulness, which showed in his conversation,
his letters, and in many a droll, elegant, and scholarly _jeu d'esprit_,
thrown off by a mind that could do nothing without gracefulness. All
this prosperity was alloyed onl