Chapter III (1)

HYMNS OF CHRISTIAN DEVOTION AND EXPERIENCE.

"JESU DULCIS MEMORIA."

"Jesus the Very Thought of Thee."

The original of this delightful hymn is one of the devout meditations of Bernard of Clairvaux, a Cistercian monk (1091-1153). He was born of a noble family in or near Dijon, Burgundy, and when only twenty-three years old established a monastery at Clairvaux, France, over which he presided as its first abbot. Educated in the University of Paris, and possessing great natural abilities, he soon made himself felt in both the religious and political affairs of Europe. For more than thirty years he was the personal power that directed belief, quieted turbulence, and arbitrated disputes, and kings and even popes sought his counsel. It was his eloquent preaching that inspired the second crusade.

His fine poem of feeling, in fifty Latin stanzas, has been a source of pious song in several languages:

Jesu, dulcis memoria
Dans vera cordi gaudia,
Sed super mel et omnium
Ejus dulcis presentia.

Literally--

Jesus! a sweet memory
Giving true joys to the heart,
But sweet above honey and all things
His _presence_ [is].

The five stanzas (of Caswall's free translation) now in use are familiar and dear to all English-speaking believers:

Jesus, the very thought of Thee
With sweetness fills my breast,
But sweeter far Thy face to see,
And in Thy presence rest.

Nor voice can sing nor heart can frame
Nor can the memory find,
A sweeter sound than Thy blest name,
O Saviour of mankind.

The Rev. Edward Caswall was born in Hampshire, Eng., July 15, 1814, the son of a clergyman. He graduated with honors at Brazenose College, Oxford, and after ten years of service in the ministry of the Church of England joined Henry Newman's Oratory at Birmingham, was confirmed in the Church of Rome, and devoted the rest of his life to works of piety and charity. He died Jan. 2, 1878.

_THE TUNE._

No single melody has attached itself to this hymn, the scope of selection being as large as the supply of appropriate common-metre tunes. Barnby's "Holy Trinity," Wade's "Holy Cross" and Griggs' tune (of his own name) are all good, but many, on the giving out of the hymn, would associate it at once with the more familiar "Heber" by George Kingsley and expect to hear it sung. It has the uplift and unction of John Newton's--

How sweet the name of Jesus sounds
In the believer's ear.

"GOD CALLING YET! SHALL I NOT HEAR?"

Gerhard Tersteegen, the original author of the hymn, and one of the most eminent religious poets of the Reformed German church in its early days, was born in 1697, in the town of Mors, in Westphalia. He was left an orphan in boyhood by the death of his father, and as his mother's means were limited, he was put to work as an apprentice when very young, at Muhlheim on the Ruhr, and became a ribbon weaver. Here, when about fifteen years of age, he became deeply concerned for his soul, and experienced a deep and abiding spiritual work. As a Christian, his religion partook of the ascetic type, but his mysticism did not make him useless to his fellow-men.

At the age of twenty-seven, he dedicated all his resources and energies to the cause of Christ, writing the dedication in his own blood. "God graciously called me," he says, "out of the world, and granted me the desire to belong to Him, and to be willing to follow Him." He gave up secular employments altogether, and devoted his whole time to religious instruction and to the poor. His house became famous as the "Pilgrims' Cottage," and was visited by people high and humble from all parts of Germany. In his lifetime he is said to have written one hundred and eleven hymns. Died April 3, 1769.

God calling yet! shall I not hear?
Earth's pleasures shall I still hold dear?
Shall life's swift-passing years all fly,
And still my soul in slumber lie?

* * * * *

God calling yet! I cannot stay;
My heart I yield without delay.
Vain world, farewell; from thee I part;
The voice of God hath reached my heart.

The hymn was translated from the German by Miss Jane Borthwick, born in Edinburgh, 1813. She and her younger sister, Mrs. Findlater, jointly translated and published, in 1854, _Hymns From the Land of Luther_, and contributed many poetical pieces to the _Family Treasury_. She died in 1897.

Another translation, imitating the German metre, is more euphonious, though less literal and less easily fitted to music not specially composed for it, on account of its "feminine" rhymes:

God calling yet! and shall I never hearken?
But still earth's witcheries my spirit darken;
This passing life, these passing joys all flying,
And still my soul in dreamy slumbers lying?

_THE TUNE._

Dr. Dykes' "Rivaulx" is a sober choral that articulates the hymn-writer's sentiment with sincerity and with considerable earnestness, but breathes too faintly the interrogative and expostulary tone of the lines. To voice the devout solicitude and self-remonstrance of the hymn there is no tune superior to "Federal St."

The Hon. Henry Kemble Oliver, author of "Federal St.," was born in Salem, Mass., March, 1800, and was addicted to music from his childhood. His father compelled him to relinquish it as a profession, but it remained his favorite avocation, and after his graduation from Harvard the cares of none of the various public positions he held, from schoolmaster to treasurer of the state of Massachusetts, could ever wean him from the study of music and its practice. At the age of thirty-one, while sitting one day in his study, the last verse of Anne Steele's hymn--

So fades the lovely blooming flower,

--floated into his mind, and an unbidden melody came with it. As he hummed it to himself the words shaped the air, and the air shaped the words.

Then gentle patience smiles on pain,
Then dying hope revives again,

--became--

See gentle patience smile on pain;
See dying hope revive again;

--and with the change of a word and a tense the hymn created the melody, and soon afterward the complete tune was made. Two years later it was published by Lowell Mason, and Oliver gave it the name of the street in Salem on which his wife was born, wooed, won, and married. It adds a pathos to its history that "Federal St." was sung at her burial.

This first of Oliver's tunes was followed by "Harmony Grove," "Morning," "Walnut Grove," "Merton," "Hudson," "Bosworth," "Salisbury Plain," several anthems and motets, and a "Te Deum."

In his old age, at the great Peace Jubilee in Boston, 1872, the baton was put into his hands, and the gray-haired composer conducted the chorus of ten thousand voices as they sang the words and music of his noble harmony. The incident made "Federal St." more than ever a feature of New England history. Oliver died in 1885.

"MY GOD, HOW ENDLESS IS THY LOVE."

The spirited tune to this hymn of Watts, by Frederick Lampe, variously named "Kent" and "Devonshire," historically reaches back so near to the poet's time that it must have been one of the earliest expressions of his fervent words.

Johan Friedrich Lampe, born 1693, in Saxony, was educated in music at Helmstadt, and came to England in 1725 as a band musician and composer to Covent Garden Theater. His best-known secular piece is the music written to Henry Carey's burlesque, "The Dragon of Wantley."

Mrs. Rich, wife of the lessee of the theater, was converted under the preaching of the Methodists, and after her husband's death her house became the home of Lampe and his wife, where Charles Wesley often met him.

The influence of Wesley won him to more serious work, and he became one of the evangelist's helpers, supplying tunes to his singing campaigns. Wesley became attached to him, and after his death--in Edinburgh, 1752--commemorated the musician in a funeral hymn.

In popular favor Bradbury's tune of "Rolland" has now superseded the old music sung to Watts' lines--

My God, how endless is Thy love,
Thy gifts are every evening new,
And morning mercies from above
Gently distil like early dew.

* * * * *

I yield my powers to Thy command;
To Thee I consecrate my days;
Perpetual blessings from Thy hand
Demand perpetual songs of praise.

William Batchelder Bradbury, a pupil of Dr. Lowell Mason, and the pioneer in publishing Sunday-school music, was born 1816, in York, Me. His father, a veteran of the Revolution, was a choir leader, and William's love of music was inherited. He left his father's farm, and came to Boston, where he first heard a church-organ. Encouraged by Mason and others to follow music as a profession, he went abroad, studied at Leipsic, and soon after his return became known as a composer of sacred tunes. He died in Montclair, N.J., 1868.

"I'M NOT ASHAMED TO OWN MY LORD."

The favorite tune for this spiritual hymn, also by Watts, is old "Arlington," one of the most useful church melodies in the whole realm of English psalmody. Its name clings to a Boston street, and the beautiful chimes of Arlington St. church (Unitarian) annually ring its music on special occasions, as it has since the bells were tuned:

I'm not ashamed to own my Lord
Or to defend His cause,
Maintain the honor of His Word,
The glory of His cross.

Jesus, my God!--I know His Name;
His Name is all my trust,
Nor will He put my soul to shame
Nor let my hope be lost.

Dr. Thomas Augustine Arne, the creator of "Arlington," was born in London, 1710, the son of a King St. upholsterer. He studied at Eton, and though intended for the legal profession, gave his whole mind to music. At twenty-three he began writing operas for his sister, Susanna (a singer who afterwards became the famous tragic actress, Mrs. Cibber).

Arne's music to Milton's "Comus," and to "Rule Brittannia" established his reputation. He was engaged as composer to Drury Lane Theater, and in 1759 received from Oxford his degree of Music Doctor. Later in life he turned his attention to oratorios, and other forms of sacred music, and was the first to introduce female voices in choir singing. He died March 5, 1778, chanting hallelujahs, it is said, with his last breath.

"IS THIS THE KIND RETURN?"

Dr. Watts in this hymn gave experimental piety its hour and language of reflection and penitence:

Is this the kind return?
Are these the thanks we owe,
Thus to abuse Eternal Love
Whence all our blessings flow?

* * * * *

Let past ingratitude
Provoke our weeping eyes.

United in loving wedlock with these words in former years was "Golden Hill," a chime of sweet counterpoint too rare to bury its authorship under the vague phrase "A Western Melody." It was caught evidently from a forest bird[10] that flutes its clear solo in the sunsets of May and June. There can be no mistaking the imitation--the same compass, the same upward thrill, the same fall and warbled turn. Old-time folk used to call for it, "Sing, my Fairweather Bird." It lingers in a few of the twenty- or thirty-years-ago collections, but stronger voices have drowned it out of the new.

[Footnote 10: The wood thrush.]

"Thacher," (set to the same hymn,) faintly recalls its melody. Nevertheless "Thacher" is a good tune. Though commonly written in sharps, contrasting the B flat of its softer and more liquid rival of other days, it is one of Handel's strains, and lends the meaning and pathos of the lyric text to voice and instrument.

"WHEN I SURVEY THE WONDROUS CROSS."

This crown of all the sacred odes of Dr. Watts for the song-service of the church of God was called by Matthew Arnold the "greatest hymn in the English language." The day the eminent critic died he heard it sung in the Sefton Park Presbyterian Church, and repeated the opening lines softly to himself again and again after the services. The hymn is certainly _one_ of the greatest in the language. It appeared as No. 7 in Watts' third edition (about 1710) containing five stanzas. The second line--

On which the Prince of Glory died,

--read originally--

Where the young Prince of Glory died.

Only four stanzas are now generally used. The omitted one--

His dying crimson like a robe
Spreads o'er His body on the tree;
Then am I dead to all the globe,
And all the globe is dead to me.

--is a flash of tragic imagination, showing the sanguine intensity of Christian vision in earlier time, when contemplating the Saviour's passion; but it is too realistic for the spirit and genius of song-worship. That the great hymn was designed by the writer for communion seasons, and was inspired by Gal. 6:14, explains the two last lines if not the whole of the highly colored verse.

_THE TUNE._

One has a wide field of choice in seeking the best musical interpretation of this royal song of faith and self-effacement:

When I survey the wondrous Cross
On which the Prince of Glory died,
My richest gain I count but loss,
And pour contempt on all my pride.

Forbid it, Lord, that I should boast
Save in the death of Christ my God;
All the vain things that charm me most,
I sacrifice them to His blood.

See from His head, His hands, His feet,
Sorrow and love flow mingled down;
Did e'er such love and sorrow meet;
Or thorns compose so rich a crown?

Were the whole realm of Nature mine,
That were a present far too small;
Love so amazing, so divine,
Demands my soul, my life, my all.

To match the height and depth of these words with fitting glory of sound might well have been an ambition of devout composers. Rev. G.C. Wells' tune in the _Revivalist_, with its emotional chorus, I.B. Woodbury's "Eucharist" in the _Methodist Hymnal_, Henry Smart's effective choral in Barnby's _Hymnary_ (No. 170), and a score of others, have woven the feeling lines into melody with varying success. Worshippers in spiritual sympathy with the words may question if, after all, old "Hamburg," the best of Mason's loved Gregorians, does not, alone, in tone and elocution, rise to the level of the hymn.

"LOVE DIVINE, ALL LOVES EXCELLING."

This evergreen song-wreath to the Crucified, was contributed by Charles Wesley, in 1746. It is found in his collection of 1756, _Hymns for Those That Seek and Those That Have Redemption in the Blood of Jesus Christ_.

Love Divine all loves excelling,
Joy of Heaven to earth come down,
Fix in us Thy humble dwelling,
All Thy faithful mercies crown.

* * * * *

Come Almighty to deliver,
Let us all Thy life receive,
Suddenly return, and never,
Nevermore Thy temples leave.

* * * * *

Finish then Thy new creation;
Pure and spotless let us be;
Let us see our whole salvation
Perfectly secured by Thee.

Changed from glory into glory
Till in Heaven we take our place,
Till we cast our crowns before Thee
Lost in wonder, love and praise!

The hymn has been set to H. Isaac's ancient tune (1490), to Wyeth's "Nettleton" (1810), to Thos. H. Bailey's (1777-1839) "Isle of Beauty, fare thee well" (named from Thomas Moore's song), to Edward Hopkins' "St. Joseph," and to a multitude of others more or less familiar.

Most familiar of all perhaps, (as in the instance of "Far from mortal cares retreating,") is its association with "Greenville," the production of that brilliant but erratic genius and freethinker, Jean Jacques Rousseau. It was originally a love serenade, ("Days of absence, sad and dreary") from the opera of _Le Devin du Village_, written about 1752. The song was commonly known years afterwards as "Rousseau's Dream." But the unbelieving philosopher, musician, and misguided moralist builded better than he knew, and probably better than he meant when he wrote his immortal choral. Whatever he heard in his "dream" (and one legend says it was a "song of angels") he created a harmony dear to the church he despised, and softened the hearts of the Christian world towards an evil teacher who was inspired, like Balaam, to utter one sacred strain.

Rousseau was born in Geneva, 1712, but he never knew his mother, and neither the affection or interest of his father or of his other relatives was of the quality to insure the best bringing up of a child.

He died July, 1778. But his song survives, while the world gladly forgets everything else he wrote. It is almost a pardonable exaggeration to say that every child in Christendom knows "Greenville."

"WHEN ALL THY MERCIES, O MY GOD."

This charming hymn was written by Addison, the celebrated English poet and essayist, about 1701, in grateful commemoration of his delivery from shipwreck in a storm off the coast of Genoa, Italy. It originally contained thirteen stanzas, but no more than four or six are commonly sung. It has put the language of devotional gratitude into the mouths of thousands of humble disciples who could but feebly frame their own:

When all Thy mercies, O my God
My rising soul surveys,
Transported with the view I'm lost
In wonder, love and praise.

Unnumbered comforts on my soul
Thy tender care bestowed
Before my infant heart conceived
From whom those comforts flowed.

When in the slippery paths of youth
With heedless steps I ran,
Thine arm unseen conveyed me safe,
And led me up to man.

Another hymn of Addison--

How are Thy servants bless'd, O Lord,

--was probably composed after the same return from a foreign voyage. It has been called his "Traveller's Hymn."

Joseph Addison, the best English writer of his time, was the son of Lancelot Addison, rector of Milston, Wiltshire, and afterwards Dean of Litchfield. The distinguished author was born in Milston Rectory, May 1, 1672, and was educated at Oxford. His excellence in poetry, both English and Latin, gave him early reputation, and a patriotic ode obtained for him the patronage of Lord Somers. A pension from King William III. assured him a comfortable income, which was increased by further honors, for in 1704 he was appointed Commissioner of Appeals, then secretary of the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, and in 1717 Secretary of State. He died in Holland House, Kensington, near London, June 17, 1719.

His hymns are not numerous, (said to be only five), but they are remarkable for the simple beauty of their style, as well as for their Christian spirit. Of his fine metrical version of the 23rd Psalm,--

The Lord my pasture shall prepare,
And feed me with a shepherd's care,

--one of his earliest productions, the tradition is that he gathered its imagery when a boy living at Netheravon, near Salisbury Plain, during his lonely two-mile walks to school at Amesbury and back again. All his hymns appeared first in the _Spectator_, to which he was a prolific contributor.

_THE TUNE._

The hymn "When all Thy mercies" still has "Geneva" for its vocal mate in some congregational manuals. The tune is one of the rare survivals of the old "canon" musical method, the parts coming in one after another with identical notes. It is always delightful as a performance with its glory of harmony and its sweet duet, and for generations it had no other words than Addison's hymn.

John Cole, author of "Geneva," was born in Tewksbury, Eng., 1774, and came to the United States in his boyhood (1785). Baltimore, Md. became his American home, and he was educated there. Early in life he became a musician and music publisher. At least twelve of his principal song collections from 1800 to 1832 are mentioned by Mr. Hubert P. Main, most of them sacred and containing many of his own tunes.

He continued to compose music till his death, Aug. 17, 1855. Mr. Cole was leader of the regimental band known as "The Independent Blues," which played in the war of 1812, and was present at the "North Point" fight, and other battles.

Besides "Geneva," for real feeling and harmonic beauty "Manoah," adapted from Haydn's Creation, deserves mention as admirably suited to "Addison's" hymn, and also "Belmont," by Samuel Webbe, which resembles it in style and sentiment.

Samuel Webbe, composer of "Belmont," was of English parentage but was born in Minorca, Balearic Islands, in 1740, where his father at that time held a government appointment; but his father, dying suddenly, left his family poor, and Samuel was apprenticed to a cabinet-maker. He served his apprenticeship, and immediately repaired to a London teacher and began the study of music and languages. Surmounting great difficulties, he became a competent musician, and made himself popular as a composer of glees. He was also the author of several masses, anthems, and hymn-tunes, the best of which are still in occasional use. Died in London, 1816.

"JESUS, I LOVE THY CHARMING NAME."

When Dr. Doddridge, the author of this hymn, during his useful ministry, had finished the preparation of a pulpit discourse that strongly impressed him, he was accustomed, while his heart was yet glowing with the sentiment that had inspired him, to put the principal thoughts into metre, and use the hymn thus written at the conclusion of the preaching of the sermon. This hymn of Christian ardor was written to be sung after a sermon from Romans 8:35, "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?"

Jesus, I love Thy charming name,
'Tis music to mine ear:
Fain would I sound it out so loud
That earth and heaven should hear.

* * * * *

I'll speak the honors of Thy name
With my last laboring breath,
Then speechless, clasp Thee in my arms,
The conqueror of death.

Earlier copies have--

The _antidote_ of death.

Philip Doddridge, D.D., was born in London, June 26, 1702. Educated at Kingston Grammar School and Kibworth Academy, he became a scholar of respectable attainments, and was ordained to the Non-conformist ministry. He was pastor of the Congregational church at Northampton, from 1729 until his death, acting meanwhile as principal of the Theological School in that place. In 1749 he ceased to preach and went to Lisbon for his health, but died there about two years later, of consumption, Oct. 26, 1752.

_THE TUNE._

The hymn has been sometimes sung to "Pisgah," an old revival piece by J.C. Lowry (1820) once much heard in camp-meetings, but it is a pedestrian tune with too many quavers, and a headlong tempo.

Bradbury's "Jazer," in three-four time, is a melody with modulations, though more sympathetic, but it is hard to divorce the hymn from its long-time consort, old "Arlington." It has the accent of its sincerity, and the breath of its devotion.

"LO, ON A NARROW NECK OF LAND."

This hymn of Charles Wesley is always designated now by the above line, the first of the _second_ stanza as originally written. It is said to have been composed at Land's End, in Cornwall, with the British Channel and the broad Atlantic in view and surging on both sides around a "narrow neck of land."

Lo! on a narrow neck of land,
Twixt two unbounded seas, I stand,
Secure, insensible:
A point of time, a moment's space,
Removes me to that heavenly place,
Or shuts me up in hell.

O God, mine inmost soul convert,
And deeply on my thoughtful heart
Eternal things impress:
Give me to feel their solemn weight,
And tremble on the brink of fate,
And wake to righteousness.

The preachers and poets of the great spiritual movement of the eighteenth century in England abated nothing in the candor of their words. The terrible earnestness of conviction tipped their tongues and pens with fire.

_THE TUNE._

Lady Huntingdon would have lent "Meribah" gladly to this hymn, but Mason was not yet born. Many times it has been borrowed for Wesley's words since it came to its own, and the spirit of the pious Countess has doubtless approved the loan. It is rich enough to furnish forth her own lyric and more than one other of like matter and metre.

The muscular music of "Ganges" has sometimes carried the hymn, and there are those who think its thunder is not a whit more Hebraic than the words require.

"COME YE SINNERS POOR AND NEEDY."

Few hymns have been more frequently sung in prayer-meetings and religious assemblies during the last hundred and fifty years. Its author, Joseph Hart, spoke what he knew and testified what he felt. Born in London, 1712, and liberally educated, he was in his young manhood very religious, but he went so far astray as to indulge in evil practices, and even published writings, both original and translated, against Christianity and religion of any kind. But he could not drink at the Dead Sea and live. The apples of Sodom sickened him. Conscience asserted itself, and the pangs of remorse nearly drove him to despair till he turned back to the source he had forsaken. He alludes to this experience in the lines--

Let not conscience make you linger,
Nor of fitness fondly dream;
All the fitness He requireth
Is to feel your need of Him.

During Passion Week, 1767, he had an amazing view of the sufferings of Christ, under the stress of which his heart was changed. In the joy of this experience he wrote--

Come ye sinners poor and needy,

--and--

Come all ye chosen saints of God.

Probably no two hymn-lines have been oftener repeated than--

If you tarry till you're better
You will never come at all.

The complete form of the original stanzas is:

Come ye sinners poor and needy,
Weak and wounded, sick and sore;
Jesus ready stands to save you,
Full of pity, love and power.
He is able,
He is willing; doubt no more.

The whole hymn--ten stanzas--is not sung now as one, but two, the second division beginning with the line--

Come ye weary, heavy laden.

Rev. Joseph Hart became minister of Jewin St. Congregational Chapel, London, about 1760, where he labored till his death, May 24, 1768.

_THE TUNE._

A revival song by Jeremiah Ingalls (1764-1828), written about 1804, with an easy, popular swing and a _sforzando_ chorus--

Turn to the Lord and seek salvation,

--monopolized this hymn for a good many years. The tunes commonly assigned to it have since been "Greenville" and Von Weber's "Wilmot," in which last it is now more generally sung--dropping the echo lines at the end of each stanza.

Carl Maria Von Weber, son of a roving musician, was born in Eutin, Germany, 1786. He developed no remarkable genius till he was about twenty years old, though being a fine vocalist, his singing brought him popularity and gain; but in 1806 he nearly lost his voice by accidently drinking nitric acid. He was for several years private secretary to Duke Ludwig at Stuttgart, and in 1813 Chapel-Master at Prague, from which place he went to Dresden in 1817 as Musik-Director.

Von Weber's Korner songs won the hearts of all Germany; and his immortal "Der Freischutz" (the Free Archer), and numerous tender melodies like the airs to "John Anderson, my Jo" and "O Poortith Cauld" have gone to all civilized nations. No other composer had such feeling for beauty of sound.

This beloved musician was physically frail and delicate, and died of untimely decline, during a visit to London in 1826.

"O HAPPY SAINTS WHO DWELL IN LIGHT."

Sometimes printed "O happy _souls_." This poetical and flowing hymn seems to have been forgotten in the making up of most modern church hymnals. Hymns on heaven and heavenly joys abound in embarrassing numbers, but it is difficult to understand why this beautiful lyric should be _universally_ neglected. It was written probably about 1760, by Rev. John Berridge, from the text, "Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord,"

The first line of the second stanza--

Released from sorrow, toil and strife,

--has been tinkered in some of the older hymn-books, where it is found to read--,

Released from sorrows toil and _grief_,

--not only committing a tautology, but destroying the perfect rhyme with "life" in the next line. The whole hymn, too, has been much altered by substituted words and shifted lines, though not generally to the serious detriment of its meaning and music.

The Rev. John Berridge--friend of the Wesleys, Whitefield, and Lady Huntingdon--was an eccentric but very worthy and spiritual minister, born the son of a farmer, in Kingston, Nottinghamshire, Eng., Mar. 1, 1716. He studied at Cambridge, and was ordained curate of Stapleford and subsequently located as vicar of Everton, 1775. He died Jan. 22, 1793. He loved to preach, and he was determined that his tombstone should preach after his voice was still. His epitaph, composed by himself, is both a testimony and a memoir:

"Here lie the earthly remains of John Berridge, late vicar of
Everton, and an itinerant servant of Jesus Christ, who loved his
Master and His work, and after running His errands many years, was
called up to wait on Him above.

"Reader, art thou born again?

"No salvation without the new birth.

"I was born in sin, February, 1716.

"Remained ignorant of my fallen state till 1730.

"Lived proudly on faith and works for salvation till 1751.

"Admitted to Everton vicarage, 1755.

"Fled to Jesus alone for refuge, 1756.

"Fell asleep in Jesus Christ,--" (1793.)

_THE TUNE._

The once popular score that easily made the hymn a favorite, was "Salem," in the old _Psalmodist_. It still appears in some note-books, though the name of its composer is uncertain. Its notes (in 6-8 time) succeed each other in syllabic modulations that give a soft dactylic accent to the measure and a wavy current to the lines:

O happy saints that dwell in light,
And walk with Jesus clothed in white,
Safe landed on that peaceful shore,
Where pilgrims meet to part no more:

Released from sorrow, toil and strife,
Death was the gate to endless life,
And now they range the heavenly plains
And sing His love in melting strains.

Another version reads:

----and welcome to an endless life,
Their souls have now begun to prove
The height and depth of Jesus' love.

"THOU DEAR REDEEMER, DYING LAMB."

The author, John Cennick, like Joseph Hart, was led to Christ after a reckless boyhood and youth, by the work of the Divine Spirit in his soul, independent of any direct outward influence. Sickened of his cards, novels, and playhouse pleasures, he had begun a sort of mechanical reform, when one day, walking in the streets of London, he suddenly seemed to hear the text spoken "I am thy salvation!" His consecration began at that moment.

He studied for the ministry, and became a preacher, first under direction of the Wesleys, then under Whitefield, but afterwards joined the Moravians, or "Brethren." He was born at Reading, Derbyshire, Eng., Dec. 12, 1718, and died in London, July 4, 1755.

_THE TUNE._

The word "Rhine" (in some collections--in others "Emmons") names a revival tune once so linked with this hymn and so well known that few religious people now past middle life could enjoy singing it to any other. With a compass one note beyond an octave and a third, it utters every line with a clear, bold gladness sure to infect a meeting with its own spiritual fervor.

Thou dear Redeemer, dying Lamb,
I love to hear of Thee;
No music like Thy charming name,
Nor half so sweet can be.

The composer of the bright legato melody just described was Frederick Burgmüller, a young German musician, born in 1804. He was a remarkable genius, both in composition and execution, but his health was frail, and he did not live to fulfil the rich possibilities that lay within him. He died in 1824--only twenty years old. The tune "Rhine" ("Emmons") is from one of his marches.

"WHILE THEE I SEEK, PROTECTING POWER."

Helen Maria Williams wrote this sweet hymn, probably about the year 1800. She was a brilliant woman, better known in literary society for her political verses and essays than by her hymns; but the hymn here noted bears sufficient witness to her deep religious feeling:

While Thee I seek, Protecting Power,
Be my vain wishes stilled,
And may this consecrated hour
With better hopes be filled.
Thy love the power of thought bestowed;
To Thee my thoughts would soar,
Thy mercy o'er my life has flowed,
That mercy I adore.

Miss Williams was born in the north of England, Nov. 30, 1762, but spent much of her life in London, and in Paris, where she died, Dec. 14, 1827.

_THE TUNE._

Wedded so many years to the gentle, flowing music of Pleyel's "Brattle Street," few lovers of the hymn recall its words without the melody of that emotional choral.

The plain psalm-tune, "Simpson," by Louis Spohr, divides the stanzas into quatrains.

"JESUS MY ALL TO HEAVEN IS GONE."

This hymn, by Cennick, was familiarized to the public more than two generations ago by its revival tune, sometimes called "Duane Street," long-metre double. It is staffed in various keys, but its movement is full of life and emphasis, and its melody is contagious. The piece was composed by Rev. George Coles, in 1835.

The fact that this hymn of Cennick with Coles's tune appears in the _New Methodist Hymnal_ indicates the survival of both in modern favor.

Jesus my all to heaven is gone,
He whom I fixed my hopes upon;
His track I see, and I'll pursue
The narrow way till Him I view.
The way the holy prophets went,
The road that leads from banishment,
The King's highway of holiness
I'll go for all Thy paths are peace.

The memory has not passed away of the hearty unison with which prayer-meeting and camp-meeting assemblies used to "crescendo" the last stanza--

Then will I tell to sinners round
What a dear Saviour I have found;
I'll point to His redeeming blood,
And say "Behold the way to God."

The Rev. George Coles was born in Stewkley, Eng., Jan. 2, 1792, and died in New York City, May 1, 1858. He was editor of the _N.Y. Christian Advocate_, and _Sunday School Advocate_, for several years, and was a musician of some ability, besides being a good singer.

"SWEET THE MOMENTS, RICH IN BLESSING."

The Hon. and Rev. Walter Shirley, Rector of Loughgree, county of Galway, Ireland, revised this hymn under the chastening discipline of a most trying experience. His brother, the Earl of Ferrars, a licentious man, murdered an old and faithful servant in a fit of rage, and was executed at Tyburn for the crime. Sir Walter, after the disgrace and long distress of the imprisonment, trial, and final tragedy, returned to his little parish in Ireland, humbled but driven nearer to the Cross.

Sweet the moments, rich in blessing
Which before the Cross I spend;
Life and health and peace possessing
From the sinner's dying Friend.

All the emotion of one who buries a mortifying sorrow in the heart of Christ, and tries to forget, trembles in the lines of the above hymn as he changed and adapted it in his saddest but devoutest hours. Its original writer was the Rev. James Allen, nearly twenty years younger than himself, a man of culture and piety, but a Christian of shifting creeds. It is not impossible that he sent his hymn to Shirley to revise. At all events it owes its present form to Shirley's hand.

Truly blesséd is the station
Low before His cross to lie,
While I see Divine Compassion
Beaming in His gracious eye.[11]

[Footnote 11: "Floating in His languid eye" seems to have been the earlier version.]

The influence of Sir Walter's family misfortune is evident also in the mood out of which breathed his other trustful lines--

Peace, troubled soul, whose plaintive moan
Hath taught these rocks the notes of woe,

(changed now to "hath taught _these scenes_" etc).

Sir Walter Shirley, cousin of the Countess of Huntingdon, was born 1725, and died in 1786. Even in his last sickness he continued to preach to his people in his house, seated in his chair.

Rev. James Oswald Allen was born at Gayle, Yorkshire, Eng., June 24, 1743. He left the University of Cambridge after a year's study, and became an itinerant preacher, but seems to have been a man of unstable religious views. After roving from one Christian denomination to another several times, he built a Chapel, and for forty years ministered there to a small Independent congregation. He died in Gayle, Oct. 31, 1804.

The tune long and happily associated with "Sweet the Moments" is "Sicily," or the "Sicilian Hymn"--from an old Latin hymn-tune, "O Sanctissima."

"O FOR A CLOSER WALK WITH GOD."

The author, William Cowper, son of a clergyman, was born at Berkhampstead, Hertfordshire, Eng., Nov. 15, 1731, and died at Dereham, Norfolk, April 25, 1800. Through much of his adult life he was afflicted with a mental ailment inducing melancholia and at times partial insanity, during which he once attempted suicide. He sought literary occupation as an antidote to his disorder of mind, and besides a great number of lighter pieces which diverted him and his friends, composed "The Task," an able and delightful moral and domestic poetic treatise in blank verse, and in the same style of verse translated Homer's _Odyssey_ and _Iliad_.

One of the most beloved of English poets, this suffering man was also a true Christian, and wrote some of our sweetest and most spiritual hymns. Most of these were composed at Olney, where he resided for a time with John Newton, his fellow hymnist, and jointly with him issued the volume known as the _Olney Hymns_.

_THE TUNE._

Music more or less closely identified with this familiar hymn is Gardiner's "Dedham," and also "Mear," often attributed to Aaron Williams. Both, about equally with the hymn, are seasoned by time, but have not worn out their harmony--or their fitness to Cowper's prayer.

William Gardiner was born in Leicester, Eng., March 15, 1770, and died there Nov. 11, 1853. He was a vocal composer and a "musicographer" or writer on musical subjects.

One Aaron Williams, to whom "Mear" has by some been credited, was of Welsh descent, a composer of psalmody and clerk of the Scotch church in London. He was born in 1734, and died in 1776. Another account, and the more probable one, names a minister of Boston of still earlier date as the author of the noble old harmony. It is found in a small New England collection of 1726, but not in any English or Scotch collection. "Mear" is presumably an American tune.

"WHAT VARIOUS HINDRANCES WE MEET."

Another hymn of Cowper's; and no one ever suffered more deeply the plaintive regret in the opening lines, or better wrought into poetic expression an argument for prayer.

What various hindrances we meet
In coming to a mercy-seat!
Yet who that knows the worth of prayer
But wishes to be often there?

Prayer makes the darkest clouds withdraw,
Prayer climbs the ladder Jacob saw.

The whole hymn is (or once was) so thoroughly learned by heart as to be fixed in the church among its household words. Preachers to the diffident do not forget to quote--

Have you no words? ah, think again;
Words flow apace when you _complain_.

* * * * *

Were half the breath thus vainly spent
To Heaven in supplication sent,
Our cheerful song would oftener be,
"Hear what the Lord hath done for me!"

And there is all the lifetime of a proverb in the couplet--

Satan trembles when he sees
The weakest saint upon his knees.

Tune, Lowell Mason's "Rockingham."

"MY GRACIOUS REDEEMER I LOVE."

This is one of Benjamin Francis's lays of devotion. The Christian Welshman who bore that name was a Gospel minister full of Evangelical zeal, who preached in many places, though his pastoral home was with the Baptist church in Shortwood, Wales. Flattering calls to London could not tempt him away from his first and only parish, and he remained there till his triumphant death. He was born in 1734, and died in 1799.

My gracious Redeemer I love,
His praises aloud I'll proclaim,
And join with the armies above,
To shout His adorable name.
To gaze on His glories divine
Shall be my eternal employ;
To see them incessantly shine,
My boundless, ineffable joy.

Tune, "Birmingham"--an English melody. Anonymous.

"BLEST BE THE TIE THAT BINDS."

Perhaps the best hymn-expression of sacred brotherhood, at least it has had, and still has the indorsement of constant use. The author, John Fawcett, D.D., is always quoted as the example of his own words, since he sacrificed ambition and personal interest to Christian affection.

Born near Bradford, Yorkshire, Jan. 6, 1739, and converted under the preaching of Whitefield, he joined the Methodists, but afterwards became a member of the new Baptist church in Bradford. Seven years later he was ordained over the Baptist Society at Wainsgate. In 1772 he received a call to succeed the celebrated Dr. Gill, in London, and accepted. But at the last moment, when his goods were packed for removal, the clinging love of his people, weeping their farewells around him, melted his heart. Their passionate regrets were more than either he or his good wife could withstand.

"I will _stay_," he said; "you may unpack my goods, and we will live for the Lord lovingly together."

It was out of this heart experience that the tender hymn was born.

Our fears, our hopes, our aims are one,
Our comforts and our cares.

Dr. Fawcett died July 25, 1817.

Tune, "Boylston," L. Mason; or "Dennis," H.G. Nägeli.

"I LOVE THY KINGDOM, LORD."

"Dr. Dwight's Hymn," as this is known _par eminence_ among many others from his pen, is one of the imperishable lyrics of the Christian Church. The real spirit of the hundred and twenty-second Psalm is in it, and it is worthy of Watts in his best moments.

Timothy Dwight was born at Northampton, Mass, May 14, 1752, and graduated at Yale College at the age of thirteen. He wrote several religious poems of considerable length. In 1795 he was elected President of Yale College, and in 1800 he revised Watts' Psalms, at the request of the General Association of Connecticut, adding a number of translations of his own.

I love Thy kingdom, Lord,
The house of Thine abode,
The Church our blest Redeemer saved
With His own precious blood.

I love Thy Church, O God;
Her walls before Thee stand,
Dear as the apple of Thine eye,
And graven on Thy hand.

Dr. Dwight died Jan. 11, 1817.

Tune, "St. Thomas," Aaron Williams, (1734-1776.)

Mr. Hubert P. Main, however, believes the author to be Handel. It appeared as the second movement of a four-movement tune in Williams's 1762 collection, which contained pieces by the great masters, with his own; but while not credited to Handel, Williams did not claim it himself.

"MID SCENES OF CONFUSION."

This hymn, common in chapel hymnbooks half a century and more ago, is said to have been written by the Rev. David Denham, about 1826.

_THE TUNE._

"Home, Sweet Home" was composed, according to the old account, by John Howard Payne as one of the airs in his opera of "Clari, the Maid of Milan," which was brought out in London at Drury Lane in 1823. But Charles Mackay, the English poet, in the London Telegraph, asserts that Sir Henry Bishop, an eminent musician, in his vain search for a Sicilian national air, _invented_ one, and that it was the melody of "Home, sweet Home," which he afterwards set to Howard Payne's words. Mr. Mackay had this story from Sir Henry himself.

Mid scenes of confusion and creature complaints
How sweet to my soul is communion with saints,
To find at the banquet of mercy there's room
And feel in the presence of Jesus at home.
Home, home, sweet, sweet home!
Prepare me, dear Savior for glory, my home.

John Howard Payne, author at least, of the original _words_ of "Home, Sweet Home," was born in New York City June 9, 1791. He was a singer, and became an actor and theatrical writer. He composed the words of his immortal song in the year 1823, when he was himself homeless and hungry and sheltered temporarily in an attic in Paris.

His fortunes improved at last, and he was appointed to represent his native country as consul in Tunis, where he died, Apr. 9, 1852.

"O, COULD I SPEAK THE MATCHLESS WORTH."

The writer of this hymn of worshiping ardor and exalted Christian love was an English Baptist minister, the Rev. Samuel Medley. He was born at Cheshunt, Hertfordshire, June 23, 1738, and at eighteen years of age entered the Royal Navy, where, though he had been piously educated, he became dissipated and morally reckless. Wounded in a sea fight off Cape Lagos, and in dread of amputation he prayed penitently through nearly a whole night, and in the morning the surprised surgeon told him his limb could be saved.

The voice of his awakened conscience was not wholly disregarded, though it was not till some time after he left the navy that his vow to begin a religious life was sincerely kept. After teaching school for four years, he began to preach in 1766, Wartford in Hertfordshire being the first scene of his godly labors. He died in Liverpool July 17, 1799, at the end of a faithful ministry there of twenty-seven years. A small edition of his hymns was published during his lifetime, in 1789.

O could I speak the matchless worth,
O could I sound the glories forth
Which in my Saviour shine,
I'd soar and touch the heavenly strings
And vie with Gabriel while he sings,
In notes almost divine!

_THE TUNE._

"Colebrook," a plain choral; but with a noble movement, by Henry Smart, is the English music to this fine lyric, but Dr. Mason's "Ariel" is the American favorite. It justifies its name, for it has wings--in both full harmony and duet--and its melody feels the glory of the hymn at every bar.

"ROCK OF AGES CLEFT FOR ME."

Augustus Montagu Toplady, author of this almost universal hymn, was born at Farnham, Surrey, Eng., Nov. 4, 1740. Educated at Westminster School, and Trinity College, Dublin, he took orders in the Established Church. In his doctrinal debates with the Wesleys he was a harsh controversialist; but his piety was sincere, and marked late in life by exalted moods. Physically he was frail, and his fiery zeal wore out his body. Transferred from his vicarage at Broad Hembury, Devonshire, to Knightsbridge, London, at twenty-eight years of age, his health began to fail before he was thirty-five, and in one of his periods of illness he wrote--

When languor and disease invade
This trembling house of clay,
'Tis sweet to look beyond my pains
And long to fly away.

And the same homesickness for heaven appears under a different figure in another hymn--

At anchor laid remote from home,
Toiling I cry, "Sweet Spirit, come!
Celestial breeze, no longer stay,
But swell my sails, and speed my way!"

Possessed of an ardent religious nature, his spiritual frames exemplified in a notable degree the emotional side of Calvinistic piety. Edward Payson himself, was not more enraptured in immediate view of death than was this young London priest and poet. Unquestioning faith became perfect certainty. As in the bold metaphor of "Rock of Ages," the faith finds voice in--

A debtor to mercy alone,

--and other hymns in his collection of 1776, two years before the end came. Most of this devout writing was done in his last days, and he continued it as long as strength was left, until, on the 11th of August, 1778, he joyfully passed away.

Somehow there was always something peculiarly heartsome and "filling" to pious minds in the lines of Toplady in days when his minor hymns were more in vogue than now, and they were often quoted, without any idea whose making they were. "At anchor laid" was crooned by good old ladies at their spinning-wheels, and godly invalids found "When languor and disease invade" a comfort next to their Bibles.

"Rock of Ages" is said to have been written after the author, during a suburban walk, had been forced to shelter himself from a thunder shower, under a cliff. This is, however, but one of several stories about the birth-occasion of the hymn.

It has been translated into many languages. One of the foreign dignitaries visiting Queen Victoria at her "Golden Jubilee" was a native of Madagascar, who surprised her by asking leave to sing, but delighted her, when leave was given, by singing "Rock of Ages." It was a favorite of hers--and of Prince Albert, who whispered it when he was dying. People who were school-children when Rev. Justus Vinton came home to Willington, Ct., with two Karen pupils, repeat to-day the "la-pa-ta, i-oo-i-oo" caught by sound from the brown-faced boys as they sang their native version of "Rock of Ages."

Gen. J.E.B. Stuart, the famous Confederate Cavalry leader, mortally wounded at Yellow Tavern, Va., and borne to a Richmond hospital, called for his minister and requested that "Rock of Ages" be sung to him.

The last sounds heard by the few saved from the wreck of the steamer "London" in the Bay of Biscay, 1866, were the voices of the helpless passengers singing "Rock of Ages" as the ship went down.

A company of Armenian Christians sang "Rock of Ages" in their native tongue while they were being massacred in Constantinople.

No history of this grand hymn of faith forgets the incident of Gladstone writing a Latin translation of it while sitting in the House of Commons. That remarkable man was as masterly in his scholarly recreations as in his statesmanship. The supreme Christian sentiment of the hymn had permeated his soul till it spoke to him in a dead language as eloquently as in the living one; and this is what he made of it:

_TOPLADY._

Rock of ages, cleft for me,
Let me hide myself in Thee;
Let the water and the blood,
From Thy riven side which flowed,
Be of sin the double cure,
Cleanse me from its guilt and power.

Not the labor of my hands
Can fulfil Thy law's demands;
Could my zeal no respite know,
Could my tears for ever flow,
All for sin could not atone,
Thou must save, and Thou alone.

Nothing in my hand I bring,
Simply to Thy cross I cling;
Naked, come to Thee for dress,
Helpless, look to Thee for grace:
Foul, I to the fountain fly;
Wash, me, Saviour, or I die.

Whilst I draw this fleeting breath,
When my eyestrings break in death;
When I soar through tracts unknown,
See Thee on Thy judgment throne,
Rock of ages, cleft for me,
Let me hide myself in Thee.

_GLADSTONE._

Jesus, pro me perforatus,
Condar intra tuum latus;
Tu per lympham profluentem,
Tu per sanguinem tepentem,
In peccata mi redunda,
Tolle culpam, sordes munda!

Coram Te nec justus forem
Quamvis tota vi laborem,
Nec si fide nunquam cesso,
Fletu stillans indefesso;
Tibi soli tantum munus--
Salva me, Salvator Unus!

Nil in manu mecum fero,
Sed me versus crucem gero:
Vestimenta nudus oro,
Opem debilis imploro,
Fontem Christi quæro immundus,
Nisi laves, moribundus.

Dum hos artus vita regit,
Quando nox sepulcro legit;
Mortuos quum stare jubes,
Sedens Judex inter nubes;--
Jesus, pro me perforatus,
Condar intra tuum latus!

The wonderful hymn has suffered the mutations common to time and taste.

When I soar thro' tracts unknown

--becomes--

When I soar to worlds unknown,

--getting rid of the unpoetic word, and bettering the elocution, but missing the writer's thought (of the unknown _path_,--instead of going to many "worlds"). The Unitarians have their version, with substitutes for the "atonement lines."

But the Christian lyric maintains its life and inspiration through the vicissitudes of age and use, as all intrinsically superior things can and will,--and as in the twentieth line,--

When my eyestrings break in death;

--modernized to--

When my eyelids close in death,

--the hymn will ever adapt itself to the new exigencies of common speech, without losing its vitality and power.

_THE TUNE._

A happy inspiration of Dr. Thomas Hastings made the hymn and music inevitably one. Almost anywhere to call for the tune of "Toplady" (namesake of the pious poet) is as unintelligible to the multitude as "Key" would be to designate the "Star-spangled Banner." The common people--thanks to Dr. Hastings--have learned "Rock of Ages" by _sound_.

Thomas Hastings was born in Washington, Ct., 1784. For eight years he was editor of the _Western Recorder_, but he gave his life to church music, and besides being a talented tone-poet he wrote as many as six hundred hymns. In 1832, by invitation from twelve New York churches, he went to that city, and did the main work of his life there, dying, in 1872, at the good old age of eighty-nine. His musical collections number fifty-three. He wrote his famous tune in 1830.

"MY SOUL BE ON THY GUARD"

Strangely enough, this hymn, a trumpet note of Christian warning and resolution, was written by one who himself fell into unworthy ways.[12] But the one strong and spiritual watch-song by which he is remembered appeals for him, and lets us know possibly, something of his own conflicts. We can be thankful for the struggle he once made, and for the hymn it inspired. It is a voice of caution to others.

[Footnote 12: I have been unable to verify this statement found in Mr. Butterworth's "Story of the Hymns."--T.B.]