Brorson"s hymns were received with immediate favor. The Rare Clenod of Faith pa.s.sed through six editions before the death of its author, and a new church hymnal published in 1740 contained ninety of his hymns. Pietism swept the country and adopted Brorson as its poet. But its reign was surprisingly short. King Christian VI died in 1746, and the new king, a luxury-loving worldling, showed little interest in religion and none at all in Pietism. Under his influence the movement quickly waned. During the latter part of the eighteenth century it was overpowered by a wave of religious rationalism which engulfed the greater part of the intellectual cla.s.ses and the younger clergy. The intelligentsia adopted Voltaire and Rousseau as their prophets and talked endlessly of the new age of enlightenment in which religion was to be shorn of its mysteries and people were to be delivered from the bonds of superst.i.tion.
In such an atmosphere the old hymns and, least of all, Brorson"s hymns with their mystic contemplation of the Saviour"s blood and wounds could not survive. The leading spirits in the movement demanded a new hymnal that expressed the spirit of the new age. The preparation of such a book was undertaken by a committee of popular writers, many of whom openly mocked Evangelical Christianity. Their work was published under the t.i.tle The Evangelical Christian Hymnal, a peculiar name for a book which, as has been justly said, was neither Evangelical nor Christian. The compilers had eliminated many of the finest hymns of Kingo and Brorson and ruthlessly altered others so that they were irrecognizable. To compensate for this loss, a great number of "poetically perfect hymns" by newer writers--nearly all of whom have happily been forgotten--were adopted.
But while would-be leaders discarded or mutilated the old hymns and, with a zeal worthy of a better cause, sought to force their new songs upon the congregations, many of these clung tenaciously to their old hymnal and stoutly refused to accept the new. In places the controversy even developed into a singing contest, with the congregations singing the numbers from the old hymnal and the deacons from the new. And these contests were, of course, expressive of an even greater controversy than the choice of hymns. They represented the struggle between pastors, working for the spread of the new gospel, and congregations still clinging to the old. With the highest authorities actively supporting the new movement, the result of the contest was, however, a foregone conclusion. The new enlightenment triumphed, and thousands of Evangelical Christians became homeless in their own church.
During the subsequent period of triumphant Rationalism, groups of Evangelical laymen began to hold private a.s.semblies in their own homes and to provide for their own spiritual nourishment by reading Luther"s sermons and singing the old hymns. In these a.s.semblies Brorson"s hymns retained their favor until a new Evangelical awakening during the middle part of the nineteenth century produced a new appreciation of the old hymns and restored them to their rightful place in the worship of the church. And the songs of the Sweet Singer of Pietism have, perhaps, never enjoyed a greater favor in his church than they do today.
[8]Another translation: "Like thousand mountains brightly crowned" by S. D. Rodholm in "World of Song".
Nicolaj Frederik Severin Grundtvig the Singer of Pentecost.
Chapter Eleven.
Grundtvig"s Early Years.
The latter part of the eighteenth and the earlier part of the nineteenth century produced a number of great changes in the spiritual, intellectual and economic life of Denmark. The strong Pietist movement at the time of Brorson, as we have seen, lost much of its momentum with the death of King Christian VI, and within a few years was overwhelmed by a wave of the intellectual and religious Rationalism then engulfing a large part of Europe. Religion, it was claimed, should be divested of its mysteries and reason made supreme. Whatever could not justify itself before the bar of the human intellect should be discarded as outworn conceptions of a less enlightened age. The movement, however, comprised all shades of opinions from pure agnosticism to an idealistic belief in G.o.d, virtue and immortality.
Although firmly opposed by some of the most influential Danish leaders of that day, such as the valiant bishop of Sjaelland, Johan Edinger Balle, Rationalism swept the country with irresistible force. Invested in the attractive robe of human enlightenment and appealing to man"s natural intellectual vanity, the movement attracted the majority of the upper cla.s.ses and a large proportion of the clergy. Its adherents studied Rousseau and Voltaire, talked resoundingly of human enlightenment, organized endless numbers of clubs, and--in some instances--worked zealously for the social and economic uplift of the depressed cla.s.ses.
In this latter endeavor many pastors a.s.sumed a commendable part. Having lost the old Gospel, the men of the cloth became eager exponents of the "social gospel" of that day. While we may not approve their Christmas sermons "on improved methods of stable feeding," or their Easter sermons "on the profitable cultivation of buckwheat," we cannot but recognize their devoted labor for the educational and economic uplift, especially of the hard-pressed peasants.
Their well-meant efforts, however, bore little fruit. The great majority of the people had sunk into a slough of spiritual apathy from which neither the work of the Rationalists nor the stirring events of the time could arouse them.
The nineteenth century began threateningly for Denmark, heaping calamity after calamity upon her. England attacked her in 1801 and 1807, robbing her of her fine fleet and forcing her to enter the European war on the side of Napoleon. The war wrecked her trade, bankrupted her finances and ended with the severance of her long union with Norway in 1814. But through it all Holger Danske slept peacefully, apparently unaware that the very existence of the nation was threatened.
It is against this background of spiritual and national indifference that the towering figure of Grundtvig must be seen. For it was he, more than any other, who awakened his people from their lethargic indifference and started them upon the road toward a happier day spiritually and nationally.
Nicolaj Frederik Severin Grundtvig, like so many of Denmark"s greatest men, was the son of a parson. He was born September 8, 1783, at Udby, a country parish in the south-eastern part of Sjaelland. His father, Johan Ottesen Grundtvig, was a pastor of the old school, an upright, earnest and staunch supporter of the Evangelical Lutheran faith. His mother, Catherine Marie Bang, was a high-minded, finely educated woman with an ardent love for her country, its history, traditions and culture. Her son claimed that he had inherited his love of "song and saga" from her.
The Grundtvigs on both sides of the family were descendants of a long line of distinguished forebears, the most famous of whom was Archbishop Absalon, the founder of Copenhagen and one of the most powerful figures in 13th Century Denmark. And they still had relatives in high places. Thus Johan Edinger Balle, the formerly mentioned bishop of Sjaelland, was a brother-in-law of Johan Grundtvig; Cathrine Grundtvig"s brother, Dr. Johan Frederik Bang, was a well-known professor of medicine and the stepfather of Jacob Peter Mynster; and her younger sister, Susanna Kristine Steffens, was the mother of Henrik Steffens, a professor at the universities of Halle and Breslau, a friend of Goethe and Schiller, and a leader of the early Romantic movement, both in Germany and Denmark.
Cathrine Grundtvig bore her husband five children, of whom Nicolaj was the youngest. But even with such a large household to manage, she found time to supervise the early schooling of her youngest son. She taught him to read, told him the sagas of his people and gave him his first lessons in the history and literature, both of his own and of other nations.
It was a period of stirring events. Wars and revolutions raged in many parts of Europe. And these events were eagerly followed and discussed in the parsonage. Listening to his elders, Grundtvig saw, as it were, history in its making and acquired an interest in the subject that produced rich fruits in later years. The wholesome Christian life of his home and the devotional spirit of the services in his father"s church also made a deep impression upon him, an impression that even the scepticism of his youth could not eradicate.
But his happy childhood years ended all too quickly. At the age of nine he left his home to continue his studies under a former tutor, Pastor L. Feld of ThyreG.o.d, a country parish in Jylland. There he spent six lonely but quite fruitful years, receiving among other things a solid training in the cla.s.sical languages. In 1798, he completed his studies with Rev. Feld and enrolled in the Latin school at Aarhus, the princ.i.p.al city of Jylland. But the change proved most unfortunate for young Grundtvig. Under the wise and kindly guidance of Rev. Feld he had preserved the wholesome, eager spirit of his childhood, but the lifeless teaching, the compulsory religious exercises and the whole spiritless atmosphere of his new school soon changed him into an indifferent, sophisticated and self-satisfied cynic with little interest in his studies, and none at all in religion.
At the completion of his course, however, this att.i.tude did not deter him from enrolling at the University of Copenhagen with the intention of studying for the ministry. A university education was then considered almost indispensable to a man of his social position, and his parents earnestly wished him to enter the church. Nor was his att.i.tude toward Christianity greatly different from that of his fellow students or even from that of many pastors already preaching the emasculated gospel of G.o.d, Virtue, and Immortality which the Rationalists held to be the true essence of the Christian religion. Believing the important part of the Gospel to be its ethical precepts, Grundtvig, furthermore, prided himself upon the correctness of his own moral conduct and his ability to control all unworthy pa.s.sions. "I was at that time," he later complained, "nothing but an insufferably vain and narrow-minded Pharisee."
From this spirit of superior self-sufficiency, only two things momentarily aroused him during his university years--the English attacks upon Copenhagen; and a series of lectures by his cousin, Henrik Steffens.
Steffens, as a student at Jena, had met and become an enthusiastic disciple of Sch.e.l.ling, the father of natural philosophy, a pantheistic colored conception of life, opposed to the narrowly materialistic views of most Rationalists. Lecturing at the university during the years 1802-1803, Steffens aroused a tremendous enthusiasm, both among the students and some of the older intellectuals. "He was a fiery speaker," Grundtvig remarks later, "and his lectures both shocked and inspired us although I often laughed at him afterward."
Despite his attempt to laugh away the impression of the fiery speaker, Grundtvig, nevertheless, retained at least two lasting memories from the lectures--the power of the spoken word, a power that even against his will could arouse him from his cynical indifference, and the reverence with which Steffens spoke of Christ as "the center of history." The human race, he contended, had sunk progressively lower and lower from the fall of man until the time of Nero, when the process had been reversed and man had begun the slow upward climb that was still continuing. And of this progress the speaker in glowing terms pictured Christ as the living center.
Grundtvig was graduated from the university in the spring of 1803. He wished to remain in Copenhagen but could find no employment and was forced, therefore, to return to his home. Here he remained for about a year, after which he succeeded in obtaining a position as tutor for the son of Lieutenant Steensen Leth of Egelykke, a large estate on the island of Langeland.
Except for the fact that Egelykke was far from Copenhagen, Grundtvig soon became quite satisfied with his new position. Both the manor and its surroundings were extremely beautiful, and his work was congenial. His employer, a former naval officer, proved to be a rough, hard-drinking worldling; but his hostess, Constance Leth, was a charming, well-educated woman whose cultural interests made the manor a favored gathering place for a group of like-minded ladies from the neighborhood. And with these cultured women, Grundtvig soon felt himself much more at home than with his rough-spoken employer and hard-drinking companions.
But if Grundtvig unexpectedly was beginning to enjoy his stay at Egelykke, this enjoyment vanished like a dream when he suddenly discovered that he was falling pa.s.sionately in love with his attractive hostess. It availed him nothing that others as he well knew might have accepted such a situation with complacence; to him it appeared an unpardonable reproach both to his intelligence and his honor. Having proudly a.s.serted the ability of any intelligent man to master his pa.s.sions, he was both horrified and humiliated to discover that he could not control his own.
Nicolaj Frederik Severin Grundtvig.
Grundtvig never consciously revealed his true sentiment to Constance Leth. At the cost of an intense struggle, he managed outwardly to maintain his code of honorable conduct. But he still felt humbled and shaken by his inability to suppress his inner and as he saw it guilty pa.s.sion. And under this blow to his proud self-sufficiency, he felt, perhaps for the first time in his life, the need for a power greater than his own. "To win in this struggle," he wrote in his diary, "lies beyond my own power. I must look for help from above or sink as the stone sinks while the lightly floating leaves mock it and wonder why it cannot float as they do."
The struggle against his pa.s.sion engendered a need for work. "In order to quiet the storm within me," he writes, "I forced my mind to occupy itself with the most difficult labor." Although he had paid small attention to the suggestion at the time, he now remembered and began to read some of the authors Steffens had recommended in his lectures: Goethe, Schiller, Sch.e.l.ling, Fichte, Shakespeare and others. He also studied the work of newer Danish writers, such as Prof. Jens Moller, a writer on Northern mythology, and Adam Oehlenschlaeger, a young man who, inspired by Steffens, was becoming the foremost dramatic poet of Denmark. He even renewed the study of his long neglected Bible. The motive of his extensive reading was, no doubt, ethical rather than esthetic, a search for that outside power of which the battle within him revealed his urgent need. Thus he wrote: My spirit opened its eyes, Saw itself on the brink of the abyss, Searched with trembling and fear Everywhere for a power to save, And found G.o.d in all things, Found Him in the songs of the poets, Found Him in the work of the sages, Found Him in the myths of the North, Found Him in the records of history, But clearest of all it still Found Him in the Book of Books.
The fate that appears to crush a man may also exalt him. And so it was with Grundtvig. His suffering crushed the stony sh.e.l.l of cynical indifference in which he had long enclosed his naturally warm and impetuous spirit and released the great latent forces within him. In the midst of his struggle, new ideas germinated springlike in his mind. He read, thought and wrote, especially on the subject that was always near to his heart, the mythology and early traditions of the Northern peoples. And after three years of struggle, he was at last ready to break away from Egelykke. If he had not yet conquered his pa.s.sion, he had so far mastered it that he could aspire to other things.
Thus ended what a modern Danish writer, Skovgaard-Petersen, calls "the finest love story in Danish history." The event had caused Grundtvig much pain, but it left no festering wounds. His firm refusal to permit his pa.s.sion to sully himself or degrade the woman he loved had, on the contrary, made it one of the greatest incitations to good in his whole life.
On his return to Copenhagen Grundtvig almost at once obtained a position as teacher in history at Borch"s Collegium for boys. His new position satisfied him eminently by affording him a chance to work with his favorite subject and to expand his other intellectual interests. He soon made friends with a number of promising young intellectuals who, in turn, introduced him to some of the outstanding intellectual and literary lights of the country, and within a short while the list of his acquaintances read like a Blue Book of the city"s intelligentsia.
Although Grundtvig was still quite unknown except for a few articles in a current magazine, there was something about him, an originality of view, an arresting way of phrasing his thoughts, a quiet sense of humor, that commanded attention. His young friends willingly acknowledged his leadership, and the older watched him with expectation. Nor were they disappointed. His Northern Mythology appeared in 1808, and Episodes from the Decay of Northern Heroism only a year later. And these strikingly original and finely written works immediately established his reputation as one of the foremost writers of Denmark. There were even those who in their enthusiasm compared him with the revered Oehlenschlaeger. A satirical poem, "The Masquerade Ball of Denmark," inspired by the frivolous indifference with which many people had reacted to the English bombardment of Copenhagen in 1807, showed his power of burning scorn and biting satire.
In the midst of this success and the preparation of plans for new and more ambitious works, Grundtvig received a request from his old father to come home and a.s.sist him with his parish work. The request was not at all pleasing to him. His personal att.i.tude toward Christianity was still uncertain, and his removal from the capital would interfere with his literary career. But as the wish of his good parents could not be ignored, he reluctantly applied for ordination and began to prepare his probation sermon.
This now famous sermon was delivered before the proper officials March 17, 1810. Knowing that few besides the censors would be present to hear him and feeling that an ordinary sermon would be out of place before such an audience, Grundtvig prepared his sermon as an historical survey of the present state of the church rather than as an Evangelical discourse.
His study of history had convinced him of the mighty influence Christianity had once exerted upon the nations, and he, therefore, posed the question why this influence was now in decline. "Are the glad tidings," he asked, "which through seventeen hundred years pa.s.sed from confessing lips to listening ears still not preached?" And the answer is "no". Even the very name of Jesus is now without significance and worth to most people of the younger generation, "for the Word of G.o.d has departed from His house and that which is preached there is not the Word of G.o.d, but the earth-bound speculations of men. The holy men of old believed in the message they were called to preach, but the human spirit has now become so proud that it feels itself capable of discovering the truth without the light of the Gospel, and so faith has died. My Brethren!" he exclaims, "Let us not, if we share this blindness and contempt for the heavenly light, be false and shameless enough to desecrate the Holy Place by appearing there as preachers of a Christianity in which we ourselves do not believe!"
The sermon was delivered with much force and eloquence. Grundtvig felt himself stirred by the strength of his own argument; and a comparison of the warm devotional spirit of a church service, as he remembered it from his childhood, with the cold indifference of later days moved him to sentimental tears, the first pious tears that he had shed for many years, he said later. Even the censors were so impressed that they unanimously awarded him the mark of excellent, a generosity they bitterly regretted a few weeks later. For Grundtvig, contrary to his promise--as the censors a.s.serted but Grundtvig denied--published his sermon. And it was warmly received by the Evangelicals as the first manna that had fallen in a desert for many years. But the Rationalists violently condemned it and presented the Committee on Church Affairs with an indignant protest against its author "for having grossly insulted the Danish clergy."
Considering the enthusiastic approval the sermon had received in various quarters, the committee would gladly have squashed the complaint. But the complainers, comprising many of the most influential pastors in the city, were too powerful to be ignored. And so Grundtvig was found guilty "of having willfully insulted the Danish clergy, both individually and as a body," and sentenced to receive a reprimand by the dean of the theological faculty.
When Grundtvig on January 11, 1811, presented himself before the dean to receive his reprimand, he looked so pale and shaken that even the worthy official took compa.s.sion upon him and advised him privately that he must not take his sentence too seriously. It was not, however, the stern reprimand of the dean but an experience of far greater consequence that so visibly blanched the cheeks of the defendant.
The prospect of entering the active ministry caused Grundtvig to examine seriously his own att.i.tude toward Christianity. And although the bishop vetoed his a.s.signment to Udby and thus released him from the immediate prospect of entering the pulpit, this did not stop the trend of his thoughts. He had lost his former indifference toward religion and discovered the historical significance of Christianity, but just what did the Christian faith mean to him personally?
He was still pondering this question, when in the fall of 1810, he commenced a study of the Crusades, "the heroic age of Christianity," as one historian called the period. The phrase appealed to him. He had lately wandered through the mystic halls of Northern G.o.ds and heroes and deplored the decay of their heroic spirit. He admired the heroic, and his heart still wavered between the mighty Wodin and the meek and lowly Christ. But the heroic age of Christianity--was it possible then that Christianity too could rise to the heroic?
In the course of his study he read The Early History of Prussia by A. von Kotzebue in which the author, after ridiculing "the missionary zeal that, like a fire on the steppes, caught the kings of Poland and Scandinavia and moved them to frantic efforts for the conversion of neighboring peoples," proudly stated, "But while her neighbors all accepted Christianity and the withered cross drew steadily nearer to the green oak, Prussia remained faithful to her ancient G.o.ds."
"The withered Cross!" The words stung Grundtvig to the quick. He hurled the book away, sprang up and stormed about the room, vowing that he would henceforth dedicate his life to the cause of the spurned emblem.
A few weeks of restless exaltation followed. He read his Bible, studied Luther"s catechism and pondered the ways and means of accomplishing a reform of his church, especially a reform inspired by pen and ink. But his New Year"s Night, a small book published during this period, shows his still troublesome uncertainty, his constant wavering between the old G.o.ds and the Christ of the Gospels, between various degrees of Rationalism and a full acceptance of the mystery of the cross. In a mighty hymn of praise to the suffering Savior, he wrote many years later: "Yes, my heart believes the wonder of Thy cross, which ages ponder"--but he had yet to pa.s.s through the depths before he could say that. Even so, he now exultingly wrote: "On the rim of the bottomless abyss toward which our age is blindly hastening, I will stand and confront it with a picture, illumined by two shining lights, the Word of G.o.d, and the testimony of history. As long as G.o.d gives me strength to lift up my voice, I will call and admonish my people in His name."
But from this pinnacle of proud exultation, he was suddenly hurled into the abyss when, like a bolt of lightning, the thought struck him: But are you yourself a Christian, have you received the forgiveness of your sin?
"It struck me like a hammer, crashing the rock," he said later, "what the Lord tells the unG.o.dly: "What hast thou to declare my statutes or that thou shouldest take my covenant into thy mouth, seeing that thou hatest my instruction and castest my word behind thee!"" Gone like a dream were now all his proud fancies. Only one thought filled his whole being--to obtain the forgiveness of his sin and the a.s.surance of G.o.d"s grace. But so violent became his struggle that his mind at times reeled on the brink of insanity. His young friends stood loyally by him, comforting and guarding him as far as they could. And when it became clear that he must be removed from the noise of the city, one of them, F. Sibbern, volunteered to take him home. There his old parents received him with understanding, even rejoicing that anxiety for his soul and not other things had so disturbed his mind.
The peace of the quiet countryside, the understanding care of his parents and the soothing influence of their firm Evangelical faith acted as a balm to Grundtvig"s struggling spirit. He loved to enter the old church of his childhood, to hear his father preach, or sit alone before the altar in meditation and prayer. And there before the altar of the church in which he had been baptized and confirmed, he at last found peace, the true peace of G.o.d that pa.s.seth all understanding.
After the great change in his life, Grundtvig now wished most heartily to become his father"s a.s.sistant. The elder Grundtvig had already forwarded his resignation from the pastorate but was more than happy to apply for its return and for the appointment of his son as his a.s.sistant. And so, Grundtvig was ordained at Copenhagen, May 11, 1811, and installed at Udby a few days later. He was back again in the old church of his childhood.
Chapter Twelve.
The Lonely Defender of the Bible.
Grundtvig began his work at Udby with all the zeal of a new convert. He ministered to young and old, spent himself in work for the sick and the poor, and preached the Gospel with a fervor that was new, not only to the people of Udby, but to most people of that generation. If other things had not intervened, like his father, he might have spent his life as a successful country pastor. But his father died January 5, 1813. The authorities refused to confirm Grundtvig in the vacant charge, and he and his mother, shortly afterward, were compelled to leave the parsonage that had been their home for more than forty years. His mother settled in Prasto, a small city a few miles from Udby, and Grundtvig returned to Copenhagen to search for a new position, a task that this time proved both long and painful.
Among available positions, Grundtvig especially coveted a professorship in history at the newly founded university of Oslo, Norway, at which three of his friends, S. B. Hersleb, Niels Trechow and George Sverdrup, had already obtained employment. But although these friends worked zealously for his appointment, even after the separation of Norway from Denmark, their efforts were fruitless. Grundtvig was not destined to leave his native land. Nor were his attempts to secure other work successful. In spite of the fact that he applied for almost every vacancy in the church, even the smallest, his powerful enemies among the Rationalists were influential enough to prevent his appointment to any of them.
Meanwhile he was by no means idle. Following his conversion, he felt for a time like a man suddenly emerging from darkness into the brightness of a new day. Old things had pa.s.sed away, but the brilliance of the new light confused him. What could he do? How many of his former interests were reconcilable with his new views? Could he, for instance, continue his writings? "When my eyes were opened," he writes, "I considered all things not directly concerned with G.o.d a hindrance to the blessed knowledge of my Lord, Jesus Christ." After a time he saw, however, that his ability to write might be accepted as a gift from G.o.d to be used in His service. "The poet when inspired," he says, "may proclaim a message from above to the world below," and so, "after dedicating it to Himself, the Lord again handed me the harp that I had placed upon His altar."
During his brief stay at Udby, Grundtvig published three larger works: Episodes from the Battle between Ases and Norns, Saga and A New Year"s Gift for 1812.[9] The first of these was nearly completed before his conversion, and as he now reread the ma.n.u.script, its content almost shocked him. Was it possible that he had felt and written thus only a few months ago! He thought of destroying the work but decided to recast it in conformity with his present views and to express these clearly in a preface. With the completion of this task, however, he took a long leave from the "ice-cold giants of the North" that had so long engrossed his attention.
After his brief visit with the heroes of the past, Grundtvig again turned his attention to their descendants in the present. And the contrast was almost startling. The war still was dragging on and the country sinking deeper and deeper into the mora.s.s of political, commercial and economic difficulties. But the majority of the people seemed completely indifferent to her plight. "They talked of nothing," Grundtvig says, "but of what they had eaten, worn and amused themselves with yesterday, or what they would eat, wear and amuse themselves with tomorrow." Was it possible that these people could be descendants of the giants whose valor and aggressive spirit had once challenged the greater part of Europe?
Grundtvig was convinced that the spiritual apathy of his people resulted from the failure of their spiritual leaders to uphold the Evangelical faith, and that the salvation of the nation depended on a true revival of Evangelical Christianity. For this reason he now exerted every means at his command to induce the people and, especially, their leaders to return to the old paths. In numerous works, both in verse and in prose, he urged the people to renew the faith of their fathers and challenged their leaders to take a definite stand for Biblical Christianity. He became the lonely defender of the Bible.
Among outstanding personalities of that day, there were especially two that attracted widespread attention: J. P. Mynster, a.s.sistant pastor at the Church of Our Lady in Copenhagen, and Adam Gottlieb Oehlenschlaeger, the dramatic poet, then at the height of his fame. With their influence these men, as Grundtvig saw it, might give a strong impetus to the much needed awakening; and, he therefore, approached them personally.
Rev. Mynster, a stepson of Grundtvig"s maternal uncle, after a period of rationalism, had experienced a quiet conversion to Evangelical faith and won a respected name as a faithful and gifted preacher of the Gospel, a name which he retained throughout his conspicuous career as pastor of the Church of Our Lady in Copenhagen and, later, as Bishop of Sjaelland. He and Grundtvig, working to the same purpose, ought to have united with another, but they were both too individualistic in temperament and views to join forces. Mynster was coldly logical, calm and reserved, a lover of form and orderly progress. Grundtvig was impetuous, and volcanic, in constant ferment, always in search of spiritual reality and wholly indifferent to outward appearances. His own experience had led him to believe that a return to Evangelical Christianity could be effected only through a clean break with Rationalism, and he could not understand Mynster"s apparent attempt to temporize and bring about a gradual transition from one to the other. There should be no compromise between truth and falsehood. All believers in the Gospel should stand up and proclaim it fearlessly, no matter what the consequences.
And so Grundtvig wrote to Mynster: "Dear Rev. Mynster, I owe you an apology for asking a question that in our days may appear inexcusable: What is your real belief regarding the Bible and the faith of Jesus Christ? If you humbly believe in G.o.d"s Word, I shall rejoice with you even if you differ with me in all other things. Dear Rev. Mynster--for you are that to me--if my question appears unseemly, you must not let it hurt you, for I have written only as my heart dictates." But Mynster did feel offended and answered Grundtvig very coldly that his questions implied an unwarranted and offensive doubt of his sincerity that must make future intercourse between them difficult--if not impossible.
Nor was Grundtvig more successful with a letter of similar purport to Oehlenschlaeger whose later writings he found lacked the spiritual sincerity of his earlier work. "My concern about this," he wrote, "is increased by the thought that this lessening of spirituality must be expressive of a change in your own spiritual outlook, your inner relationship with G.o.d whom all spiritual workers should serve, counting it a greater achievement to inspire their fellow men with a true adoration of our Lord than to win the acclaim of the world." But like Mynster the highly feted poet accepted this frank questioning of his inner motive as an unwarranted impertinence, the stupid intrusion of an intolerable fanatic with whom no friend of true enlightenment could have anything to do. Grundtvig was fast finding out what it means to be counted a fool for Christ"s sake--or for what he thought was Christ"s sake.
In the midst of these troubles Grundtvig again turned his attention to history, his favorite subject from childhood days. His retreat from the present to the past implied no abolition, however, of his resolve to dedicate himself to a spiritual revival of his people. Through his historical work he wished to show the influence of Christianity upon the people of Europe. "That the life of every people," he writes, "is and must be a fruit of faith should be clear to all. For who can dispute that every human action--irrespective of how little considered it may have been--is expressive of its doer"s att.i.tude, of his way of feeling and thinking. But what determines a man"s way of thinking except his essential thoughts concerning the relationship between G.o.d and the world, the visible and the invisible? Every serious thinker, therefore, must recognize the importance of faith in the furtherance of science, the progress of nations and the life of the state. It is a fearful delusion that man can be immoral, an unbeliever, even an enemy of the cross of Christ, and yet a furtherer of morality and science, a good neighbor and a benefactor to his country."
A Brief Survey of the World"s History, which Grundtvig published in 1812, is thus the opposite of an objective presentation of historical events. It is a Christian philosophy of history, an attempt to prove the truth of the Gospel by its effect upon the nations. With the Bible before him Grundtvig weighs and evaluates people and events upon the scale of the revealed word. And his judgment is often relentless, stripping both persons and events of the glorified robes in which history and traditions invested them. In answer to countless protests against such a method of reading history, Grundtvig contends that the Christian historian must accept the consequences of his faith. He cannot profess the truth of Christianity and ignore its implication in the life of the world. If the Gospel be true, history must be measured by its relation to its truth.
Grundtvig"s history caused a sensation, especially on account of its frank appraisal of many well-known persons. Nearly all praised its lucid style; a few, such as George Sverdrup, spoke highly of its strikingly original estimate and correlation of events; but the intelligentsia condemned it as the work of an impossible fanatic. With this work, they claimed, Grundtvig had clearly removed himself from the pale of intelligent men.
But while his enemies raged, Grundtvig was already busy with another work: A Brief Account of G.o.d"s Way with the Danish and Norwegian Peoples. This history which, written in verse and later published under the t.i.tle of Roskilde Rhymes, was first read at a diocesan convention in Roskilde Cathedral, the Westminster Abbey of Denmark. Although the poem contained many urgent calls to the a.s.sembled pastors to awake and return to the way of the fathers, whose bones rested within the walls of the historic sanctuary, its reading caused no immediate resentment. Most of the reverend listeners are reported, in fact, to have been peacefully asleep when late in the evening Grundtvig finished the reading of his lengthy ma.n.u.script. But a paper on "Polemics and Tolerance" which he read at another convention two years later kept his listeners wide awake.
"Our day has inherited two shibboleths from the eighteenth century: enlightenment and tolerance. By the last of these words most people understand an att.i.tude of superior neutrality toward the opinions of others, even when these opinions concern the highest spiritual welfare of man. Such an att.i.tude has for its premise that good and evil, truth and falsehood are not separate and irreconcilable realities but only different phases of the same question. But every Christian, thoroughly convinced of the antagonism and irreconcilability of truth with falsehood, must inevitably hate and reject such a supposition. If Christianity be true, tolerance toward opinions and teachings denying its truth is nothing but a craven betrayal of both G.o.d and man. It is written, "Judge and condemn no one" but not "Judge and condemn nothing." For every Christian must surely both judge and condemn evil.
"There are times when to fight for Christianity may not be an urgent necessity; but that cannot be so in our days when every one of its divine truths is mocked and a.s.sailed.
"You call me a self-seeking fanatic, but if I be that, why are you yourself silent? If I be misleading those who follow me, why are you, the true watchmen of Zion, not exerting yourself to lead them aright? I stand here the humblest of Danish pastors, a minister without a pulpit, a man reviled by the world, shorn of my reputation as a writer, and held to be devoid of all intelligence and truth. Even so I solemnly declare that the religion now preached in our Danish church is not Christianity, is nothing but a tissue of deception and falsehood, and that unless Danish pastors bestir themselves and fight for the restoration of G.o.d"s word and the Christian faith there will soon be no Christian church in Denmark."
The immediate effect of this bold challenge was a stern reprimand from Bishop Frederik Munter, accompanied by a solemn warning that if he ever again ventured to voice a similar judgment upon his fellow pastors, sterner measures would at once be taken against him. Besides this, his enemies raved, some of his few remaining friends broke with him, and H. C. rsted, the famous discoverer of electro-magnetism, continued an attack upon him that for bitterness has no counterpart in Danish letters. In the midst of this storm Grundtvig remained self-possessed, answering his critic quite calmly and even with a touch of humor. Although relentless in a fight for principles, he was never vindictive toward his personal enemies. In 1815, he published a collection of poems, Kvaedlinger, in which he asks, "Who knoweth of peace who never has fought, whoso has been saved and suffered naught?" And these lines no doubt express his personal att.i.tude toward the battles of life.
Being without a pulpit of his own, Grundtvig, after his return to Copenhagen, frequently accepted invitations to preach for other pastors. But as the opposition against him grew, these invitations decreased and, after the Roskilde affair, only one church, the church of Frederiksberg, was still open to him. Grundtvig felt his exclusion very keenly, but he knew that even friendly pastors hesitated to invite him for fear of incurring the disapproval of superiors or the displeasure of influential parishioners. And so, at the close of a Christmas service in the Frederiksberg church in 1815, he solemnly announced that he would not enter a pulpit again until he had been duly appointed to do so by the proper authorities.
Grundtvig"s withdrawal from the church, though pleasing to his active enemies, was a great disappointment to his friends. His services had always been well attended, and his earnest message had brought comfort to many, especially among the distressed Evangelicals. But others, too, felt the power of his word. Thus a man in Copenhagen, after attending one of his services, wrote to a friend, "that he had laughed at the beginning of the sermon and wept at its conclusion" and that "it was the only earnest testimony he had ever heard from a pulpit." And a reporter writing to a Copenhagen newspaper about his last service said, "Our famous Grundtvig preached yesterday at Frederiksberg church to such a crowd of people that the church was much too small to accommodate them. Here were people from all walks of life, and the speaker, we are convinced, stirred them to the bottom of their souls. Here was a Mynster"s clarity, a Fallesen"s earnestness, and a Balle"s appeal united with a Nordahl Brun"s manliness and admirable language." And this about a man for whom his church had no room!
Thus Grundtvig instead of the friendly co-operation he had hoped for especially from the spiritual and intellectual leaders of the people found himself virtually shut out from the circle to which he naturally belonged, and from the church he loved, perhaps better than any man of his generation.
But if his hope of enlisting the leaders in a campaign to revive the spiritual life of the common people had been disappointed, his own determination to devote his life to that purpose remained unshaken. If he could look for no help from the recognized leaders of his nation, he must somehow gain a hearing from the common people themselves. His personal contact with these, however, was rather slight. Except for his brief work as a pastor, he had so far spent the greater part of his life in intellectual pursuits quite removed from the interest of the common man. And the question was then how he, a man without any special position and influence, could reach the ears of his countrymen.
In searching for an answer to this question, he remembered the two things that most profoundly had influenced his own spiritual outlook, his study of the traditions and history of his people, and his religious awakening in 1810. Was it not possible then that a like change might be engendered in others by presenting them with a picture of their own glorious past or, as his friend Ingemann later expressed it, by calling forth the generations that died to testify against the generation that lived? In presenting such a picture he would not have to rely on his own inventiveness but could use material already existing, foremost among which were the famous Sagas of Norwegian Kings by Snorra Sturlason, and Denmark"s Chronicle by Saxo Grammaticus, the former written in Icelandic, and the latter in Latin.
When Grundtvig presented this plan to his remaining friends, they received it at once with enthusiasm and began the organization of societies both in Denmark and Norway for the purpose of sponsoring its execution, in itself a most herculean task.
The two books contain together about fifteen hundred large and closely printed pages and present a circ.u.mstantial account of the early mythological and factual history of the two nations. Even a merely literal translation of them might well consume years of labor. But Grundtvig"s plan went much farther than mere literal translation. Wishing to appeal to the common people, he purposed to popularize the books and to transcribe them in a purer and more idiomatic Danish than the accepted literary language of the day, a Danish to be based on the dialects of the common people, the folk-songs, popular proverbs, and the old hymns. It was a bold undertaking, comparable to the work of Luther in modelling the language of the German Bible after the speech of the man in the street and the mother at the cradle, or to the great effort of Norway in our days to supplant the Danish-Norwegian tongue with a language from the various dialects of her people. Nor can it be said that Grundtvig was immediately successful in his attempt. His version of the sagas sounds somewhat stilted and artificial, and it never became popular among the common people for whom it was especially intended. Eventually, however, he did develop his new style into a plain, forceful mode of expression that has greatly enriched the Danish language of today.
For seven years Grundtvig buried himself in "the giant"s mount," emerging only occasionally for the pursuit of various studies in connection with his work or to voice his views on certain issues that particularly interested him. He discovered a number of errors in the Icelandic version of Beowulf and made a new Danish translation of that important work; he engaged in a bitter literary battle with Paul Mueller, a leader among the younger academicians, in defence of the celebrated lyric poet, Jens Baggesen, who had aroused the wrath of the students by criticising their revered dramatist, Oehlenschlaeger; and he fought a furious contest with the greatly admired song and comedy writer, John L. Heiberg, in defence of his good friend, Bernhard Severin Ingemann, whose excellent but overly sentimental lyrics had invited the barbed wit of the humorist. But although Grundtvig"s contributions to these disputes were both able and pointed, their main effect was to widen the breach between him and the already antagonistic intellectuals.
In 1817 Grundtvig published the second part of World Chronicles, and a few issues of a short-lived periodical ent.i.tled "Dannevirke" which among other excellent contributions presented his splendid poem, "The Easter Lily," a poetic dramatization of our Lord"s resurrection, about which the poet, Baggesen, said that "it outweighed all Oehlenschlaeger"s tragedies and that he himself had moments when he would rather have been the author of this incomparably beautiful poem than of everything he himself had written."
Grundtvig began his translation of the sagas on a wave of high enthusiasm. But as the years multiplied, the interest of his supporters waned and he himself wearied of the task. He began, besides, to doubt his ability to resurrect the heroic dead in such a manner that they could revive the dropping spirit of the living.
In a welcome to Ingemann, on his return from a tour abroad, he expresses the hope that the poet will now devote his gifts to a reincarnation of his country"s old heroes. He himself has tried to do this. "He has made armor, shields and swords for them of saga"s steel, and borrowed horses for them from the ancient bards, but he has no cloth fit for the coats of such elegant knights nor feathers beautiful enough to adorn their helmets. He can sound a challenge but has no voice for singing; he can ring a bell but can not play the lute." In other words, he can depict the thoughts and ideals of the old heroes but lacks the poetical ability to recreate them as living personalities--a remarkably true estimate of his own limitations.
The discovery that his translation of the sagas was not accomplishing its intended purpose, and a growing apprehension that the written word was, perhaps, impotent to revive the spiritual life of his people, engendered in him an increasing wish to leave "the mount of the dead" and re-enter the world of the living. His economic circ.u.mstances also necessitated a change. In 1818 he had married Elizabeth Blicher, the daughter of a brother pastor, and he found it well nigh impossible to support his wife and growing family on the meager returns from his writings and a small pension which the government allowed him for his work with the sagas.
Spurred by these reasons, he applied for almost every vacancy in the church, even the smallest, and, in 1821, succeeded in obtaining an appointment to the pastorate at Prasto, a small city on the south-eastern sh.o.r.es of Sjaelland.
Grundtvig was well satisfied with his new charge. He was kindly received by his congregation; the city was quite close to his beloved Udby, and his mother still lived there. "In the loveliest surroundings my eyes have ever seen and among a friendly people," he writes, "my strength soon revived so that I could continue my literary work and even complete my wearisome translation of the sagas."
An incident is related from his work at Prasto which throws a somewhat revealing light upon his ability as a pastor. At his only confirmation service there, the confirmants, we are told, wept so that he had to pause several times in his address to them in order to let them regain their composure. Since he was always quite objective in his preaching and heartily disbelieved in the usual revival methods, the incident ill.u.s.trates his rare ability to profoundly stir even the less mature of his hearers by his objective presentation of the Gospel. Even his bitterest enemies could not deny the evident effectiveness of his ministry in every charge he served.
His work at Prasto was, however, of brief duration. In 1822, less than two years after his installation, he received and accepted a call as a.s.sistant pastor at Our Savior"s Church in Copenhagen, thus attaining his long deferred wish for a pulpit in the capital.
[9]The printed text is corrupt here. Saga: A New Year"s Gift for 1812 is one work. Possibly the third work referenced is World Chronicles, the first part of which was published in 1812.
Chapter Thirteen.
The Living Word.
Grundtvig began his ministry in the capital with high hopes, but he was soon disappointed. His services as usual attracted large audiences, audiences that frequently overflowed the s.p.a.cious sanctuary. But these came from all parts of the city, an ever changing throng from which it was quite impossible to create a real congregation. The parish itself was so large that the mere routine duties of his office consumed much of his time. There were ma.s.s weddings, ma.s.s baptisms, ma.s.s funerals for people of whom he knew little and could have no a.s.surance that he was not "giving the holy unto dogs or casting pearls before swine." With the prevailing decay of church-life most pastors accepted these conditions with equanimity, but to Grundtvig they const.i.tuted an increasingly heavy burden.
He was still lonely. Awakened Christians were few, and his fellow pastors were nearly all Rationalists who looked upon him as a dangerous fanatic whom it was best to avoid. Grundtvig"s opinion about them, though different, was scarcely higher. It provoked him to observe pastors openly repudiating doctrines and ordinances which they had sworn to defend. To his mind such a course was both dishonorable to themselves and unjust toward their congregations which, whether or not they approved of these unlawful acts, had to be served by their parish pastors. The majority, it is true, accepted the new doctrines with indifference. Rationalism then as now promoted apathy rather than heresy. But Grundtvig observed its blighting effect everywhere, even upon himself.