Christian Singers of Germany

Henry of Loufenburg

Henry of Loufenburg, who was a priest at Freiburg, and afterwards a monk in the convent of St. John in Strasburg, was the chief sacred poet of the fifteenth century in Germany, and furnished a large number of these transformations of secular into religious songs, and he also translated many of the great Latin hymns. He was himself a fertile composer, and some of his hymns are very graceful and sweet, but many 92 are prolix and fantastic; and though they seem to have been liked in the religious world of his own day, they scarcely bear transplanting to ours. One of the best is