When once taken into general use the custom continued everywhere, through
carelessness and obstinacy, long after the churches possessed plenty of
psalm-books. An early complaint against it was made by Dr. Watts in the
preface of his hymns, which were published by Benjamin Franklin in 1741. As
Watts' Psalms and Hymns were not, however, in general use in New England
until after the Revolution, this preface with its complaint was for a long
time little seen and little heeded.
It is said that the abolition came gradually; that the impetuous and
well-trained singers at first cut off the last word only of the deacon's
"lining;" they then encroached a word or two further, and finally sung
boldly on without stopping at all to be "deaconed." This brought down
a tempest of indignation from the older church-members, who protested,
however, in vain. A vote in the church usually found the singers
victorious, and whether the church voted for or against the "lining," the
choir would always by stratagem vanquish the deacon. One old soldier took
his revenge, however. Being sung down by the rampant choir, he still showed
battle, and rose at the conclusion of the psalm and opened his psalm-book,
saying calmly, "_Now_ let the _people of the Lord sing_."
The Rowley church tried diplomacy in their struggle against "deaconing,"
by instituting a gradual abolishing of the custom.
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