Category: Biographies
Isaac Watts was born at Southampton, July 17th, 1674, the same year in which John Milton died. He was the eldest of nine children, and was named after his father, Isaac. His father was a truly worthy and respectable man. In the course of the future years of his very long life,...
Isaac Watts was born at Southampton, July 17th, 1674, the same year in which John Milton died. He was the eldest of nine children, and was named after his father, Isaac. His fat...
2. CHAPTER II.The neighbourhood of London, to which Isaac Watts removed from Southampton for the purpose of completing his studies, and preparing for the work of the ministry, was Stoke Newin...
3. CHAPTER III.Returning from Southampton, Isaac Watts entered the family of Sir John Hartopp, the first of those two influential friends whose names will always be associated with his own; it...
4. CHAPTER IV.Watts preached his first sermon on his birthday, July 17th, 1698; he was then twenty-four years of age. He probably mingled with his duties as tutor those of chaplain to the exc...
5. CHAPTER V.The fact that the first work published by Watts was the “Sacred Lyrics” may justify this early estimate of his character as a sacred poet. It is probable, nay it is certain, tha...
6. CHAPTER VI.It was at that period of Watts’ life, when he felt in a very especial manner his loneliness, and fever and infirmity were reducing him to a painful sense of abiding weakness, th...
7. CHAPTER VII.So early as the year 1700 Watts’ brother, Mr. Enoch Watts, wrote a letter to him from Southampton, urging upon him the publication of his hymns. It sets not only the mind of the...
8. CHAPTER VIII.The friends of Watts, at almost any period of his life, form an interesting and very memorable circle, a very striking portrait gallery. Amongst them are some well-known names,...
9. CHAPTER IX.One of the most considerable of Watts’ correspondents and apparently intimate friends, was Frances, Countess of Hertford, afterwards Duchess of Somerset. This lady was the daugh...
10. CHAPTER X.There was living in London contemporary with Watts one of those ungentle, unbeautiful spirits, from whose malignant jealousy few men of eminence entirely escape; he appears to h...
11. CHAPTER XI.Take the life of almost any man who has stood in any relation to the thought and intelligence of his times, in any period of English history, and it is interesting to regard him...
12. CHAPTER XII.It would be a very difficult thing to realize now in the suburb of Stoke Newington, the Stoke Newington of Isaac Watts’ day. The mighty city has absorbed it; the lanes, the fiel...
13. CHAPTER XIII.“The World to Come” was for a long time one of those favourite pieces which occupied a place upon our forefathers’ book-shelves, and especially charmed the dwellers at home in t...
14. CHAPTER XIV.Watts, as we have seen, lived so much in retirement and retreat, and was so constant a sufferer from the infirmities of health, that little is known in the way of incident and a...
15. CHAPTER XV.He died in 1748, at the age of seventy-four, in ripe years, and hoary with the honours of holiness. We are dependent upon his friend and biographer, Dr. Gibbons, for almost all...
16. CHAPTER XVI.In attempting any estimate of the prose writings of Watts we give the first place to his educational works. And without descending to adulation it may be fairly questioned wheth...