In the first half of the eighteenth century the assumption that the best art teaches religion is as firmly entrenched in musical as in literary circles, perhaps even more so. As we saw in chapter 3, music was felt to have irresistible power over the emotions and mind, such that it could do dreadful damage; but in alliance with a moral or religious message it was a wonderful force for good. John Blow's preface to his Amphion Anglicus is indicative. This introduction to a (very) secular song collection stresses music's religious pedigree and its ability to civilise, to reform ‘and, above all, to inflame the Pious and Devout’. Still bound by the Protestant tradition that views lay singing of anything but psalm settings with suspicion, Blow makes the case for merely social music almost apologetically, and he ends his preface with an assurance that the present volume will shortly be followed by one ‘incomparably better: I mean my Church-Services, and Divine Compositions’. The opinion of Humphrey Wanley, librarian to Robert and Edward Harley, Earls of Oxford, is evidence of the assumption among disinterested connoisseurs that sacred music is superior to secular because it is more improving: