Justin Appel

Dear Friends,

Today, I would like to take as my beginning, two lines from today’s Heth section of Psalm 119:

“You only are my portion, O Lord”

“The earth, O Lord, is full of your love.”

These lines, and the themes they represent, flow naturally into a text from the English metaphysical poet, Thomas Traherne (c. 1636-1674).

I am currently preparing to conduct a short cantata by Gerald Finzi, his Dies Natalis, which sets bits of Traherne’s prose to music for tenor and string orchestra. Traherne’s Centuries, a collection of sets of 100 meditations, revolve around the themes God’s glory in the created glory, and of an intimate relationship with God, experienced by a child in a natural state of innocence and wonder. This is the subject matter of Dies Natalis (Birthday).

I am a bit in awe of this text and music together, because it mysteriously transports one to the Garden of Eden, to “the Estate of Innocence” of youth, in which “all things were spotless and pure and glorious; yea, and infinitely mine, and joyous and precious.”

Traherne, through Finzi’s beautiful melodies and atmosphere, leads us to remember who God created us to be—perfect beings made in His likeness!—and for what purpose—to delight in God’s presence and in His beauty in all created things. In all of this, the child knows directly what is needed, even as God speak directly to the mature saint in the nous:

“Is it not strange, that an infant should be the heir of the whole World, and see those mysteries which the books of the learned never unfold?”

Something about this really breaks my heart. Every movement of Dies Natalis seems to communicate this message, but I’ll share just one part, Wonder.

Yours in Christ,

—Justin

IV. Wonder

How like an angel came I down!
How bright are all things here!
When first among His works I did appear
O how their glory did me crown!
The world resembled His Eternity
In which my soul did walk;
And every thing that I did see
Did with me talk.

The skies in their magnificence
The lovely, lively air,
O how divine, how soft, how sweet, how fair!
The stars did entertain my sense;
And all the works of God, so bright and pure,
So rich and great, did seem,
As if they ever must endure
In my esteem.

A native health and innocence
Within my bones did grow,
And while my God did all His Glories show,
I felt a vigour in my sense
That was all Spirit. I within did flow
With seas of life, like wine;
I nothing in the world did know
But ’twas Divine.