In an inaugural address students of the Trinity College of Music, Dr. Russell Wells, Vice-Chancellor of the University of London, dealt with "Song as a Force in History."
Song, he said, expressed emotion, and men's actions were governed by emotion. It was remarkable how small a place songs received in history books, but songs had at times effected a powerful force in nations. Certain songs had had a definite influence on the course of events. What was the influence, say, of Luther's Line feste Burg, written in 1529? It became in a few years popular with all the Protestants of Europe. and might have been called the Hymn of the Reformation. Again, in England, when the redoubtable Roundheads were in' power, the song, "The King shall enjoy his own again," had sustained the Royalists during the Com-! monwealth and had undoubtedly promoted the Restoration. One of the most formidable songs in} our history had been "Lillibullero," and Wharton, who wrote it, boasted that he drove James LI. from the throne by a few verses of a song.
Then we had the songs of the Jacobite movement, but the bulk of them about Prince Charlie were composed after the Rebellion of 1745, and whilst they kept alive the sentiment, they could hardly be said to have inspired it. A great force in this country was God save the King," which was written in Hanoverian times. There seemed no doubt that the composer was English, but the tune had been first used by the Danes and then by the Prussians.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.