Part 19

W We give Thee but Thine own _Walsham How_ We plough the fields and scatter _Matthias Claudius_ We saw Thee not when Thou didst come _Gurney_ Weary of earth and laden with my sin _Stone_ When God of old came down from heaven _Keble_ When I survey the wondrous cross _Watts_ *When morning gilds the skies _Tr. E. Caswall_ †When the weary, seeking rest _Bonar_

FOOTNOTES

[1]James Martineau, vol. ii. p. 99.

[2]_Christian Year_ (Fifth Sunday in Lent).

[3]Ibid. (Preface).

[4]‘The general Church histories mostly neglect or ignore hymnology, which is the best reflection of Christian life and worship.’—Schaff: _Mediaeval Christianity_, ii. 403. See also Lilly’s _Christianity and Modern Civilization_, ch. v., ‘The Age of Faith.’

[5]_Church Hymns_ (revised edition, 1903). A new edition of _Hymns Ancient and Modern_ is being prepared.

[6]Ordained.

[7]John Ellerton: _Principles of Hymn-book Construction_, p. 228.

[8]Keble’s _Occasional Papers and Reviews_, 1877, p. 92. This essay, a review of Josiah Conder’s _Star in the East_, was published in the _Quarterly Review_, 1825. The quotation from Burns will remind many readers of Keble’s own lines (Third Sunday in Lent)—

There’s not a strain to Memory dear, Nor flower in classic grove, There’s not a sweet note warbled here, But minds us of Thy love.

[9]The words rendered ‘meditation’ in these verses are not the same. The one perhaps suggests the devout meditation which is murmured half aloud, the other silent converse or communing with oneself.

[10]Lightfoot’s _Colossians_.

[11]Trench’s _Synonyms of New Testament_.

[12]Εἰς τὸ τέλος ἐν ὕµνοις, ψαλµὸς τῷ ’Ασάφ, ᾠδὴ πρὸς τὸν ’Ασσύριον.

[13]Neh. ix. 5.

[14]Ps. xxii. 3 (R.V.), margin.

[15]Isa. lx. 18.

[16]Cf. Jer. xlix. 25.

[17]Cf. Eph. v. 20: εὐχαριστοῦντες πάντοτε.

[18]Heb. xiii. 15.

[19]C. G. Rossetti.

[20]C. Wesley.

[21]_The Holy Year_, pp. xxxii., xxxiii.

[22]_The Hymn Lover_, p. 146.

[23]_Hymns of the Christian Church and Home_ (Preface).

[24]Longfellow’s _The Singers_.

[25]Herbert’s _A True Hymn_.

[26]Cary’s _Dante_, Par. xiv.

[27]There is an article in the _Journal of Sacred Literature_ for July 1864, on ‘Eccentricities of Hymnology: Early Moravian Hymn-books,’ which gives abundant illustrations to justify Southey’s statement that ‘the most characteristic parts of the Moravian hymns are too shocking to be inserted here’ (_Life of Wesley_).

[28]‘Viatrix,’ in an article on ‘The Tramp Ward,’ in the _Contemporary_ for May 1904, says, ‘I have discovered that this (“Lead, kindly Light”) and “Abide with me,” with “Jesu, Lover of my soul:” are tramps’ favourites.’

[29]Matthew Arnold’s _Progress_. These lines were altered, much for the worse, in later editions.

[30]Martineau’s _Hymns for Church and Home_ (Preface).

[31]Ps. lxxxi. 1 (P.B.V.).

[32]St. Augustine on Ps. lviii.

[33]Ps. lxviii. 20 (R.V.), ‘God is unto us a God of deliverances.’

[34]Exod. xv. ‘The song is, of course, incorporated by E from an earlier source, perhaps from a collection of national poems.... Probably, however, the greater part of the song is Mosaic, and the modification or expansion is limited to the closing verses; for the triumphant tone which pervades it is just such as might naturally have been inspired by the event which it celebrates.’—Driver’s _Literature of the Old Testament_.

[35]Wordsworth’s _Ode to Duty_.

[36]Edward Irving’s _The Book of Psalms_, Works, i. p. 410.

[37]Cheyne.

[38]Cheyne.

[39]Kirkpatrick’s _Psalms_ (Cambridge Bible).

[40]Irving’s Introduction to Horne’s _Psalms_, Works, vol. i. p. 416 (slightly abridged).

[41]The _Holy Year_, p. xxxviii. The Bishop refers in a note to ‘one modern hymn, beginning, “My God, the spring of all my joys,” and consisting only of twelve (_sic_) lines, in which the pronouns _I_ and _my_ occur no less than eleven times.’ He might have added that in the twelve lines of Ps. xxiii. personal pronouns occur seventeen times, and that ‘My God’ occurs fifty-eight times in the Psalter.

[42]There are, of course, Psalms of the Old Testament not included in the Psalter admirably adapted for Christian worship. See Part II. of Dr. Barrett’s _Congregational Church Hymnal_.

[43]‘We have been especially glad to mark the essentially metrical structure of the Lord’s Prayer in St. Matthew’s Gospel, with its invocation, its first triplet of single clauses, with one common burden, expressed after the third but implied after all, and its second triplet of double clauses, variously antithetical in form and sense.’—Westcott and Hort, Introduction, p. 320.

[44]W.H., Introduction, p. 320.

[45]‘_Adfirmabant autem, hanc fuisse summam vel culpae suae vel erroris, quod essent soliti stato die ante lucem convenire, carmenque Christo, quasi deo, dicere secum invicem._’—Pliny, _Ep._ x. 97.

[46]Eusebius: _Ecclesiastical History_, x. 28 (Bohn’s translation).

[47]Eusebius, vii. 24.

[48]_Confessions_, ii. pp. vi., vii.

[49]Trench’s _Sacred Latin Poetry_, pp. 81, 82.

[50]‘Most old MSS. read _munerari_. The common reading, “_in gloria numerari_,” does not appear to be found in any MSS., but is in many (not all) printed editions of the Breviary from about 1491 onwards. Mr. Gibson suggests that it is not so much due to the natural confusion of letters as to the well-known words added by Gregory the Great to the canon of the Mass _in electorum tuorum jubeas grege numerari_.’—_Dictionary of Hymnology_, p. 1121.

[51]Cf. Pss. xxxiii. 22; xxxi. 1; lxxi. 1 (P.B.V. & R.V.).

[52]Hutton’s _English Saints_, p. 208.

[53]The Sarum Breviary reads, _Et nox fidei luceat_.

[54]Mone’s _Hymni Latini_, i. 381.

[55]Masters, 1852.

[56]_Church Hymns_, 586, Cædmon, Tr. R. M. Moorsom; 212, Bede, Tr. C. S. Calverly.

[57]Coverdale’s _Remains_ (Parker Society, 1846). The original is a German hymn beginning _Ich ruf zu dir, Herr Jesu Christ_. Miss Winkworth, in her _Chorale Book_, described it as anonymous, but Julian ascribes it to Johannes Agricola (1492-1566). Miss Winkworth’s translation begins, ‘Lord, hear the voice of my complaint,’ Rev. A. Tozer-Russell’s, ‘Lord, Jesus Christ, I cry to Thee.’

[58]Miller’s _Singers and Songs of the Church_.

[59]‘We mention the name of Clement Marot, important here chiefly for the influence he might have had. For he translated the Psalms into French verse, put them to tunes, and set the Court singing them. Let us think for a moment what England owes to those sweet and simple hymns which it is our godly fashion to sing in the churches and in the homes from earliest childhood, and which form a link to connect our religion with our daily life. Let us only try to think what we should be without these. And then give praise to Marot, for it was he who gave to France what should have been the foundation and beginning of a national book of praise and service of song, had not the bigots, the stupid mischievous bigots, stopped the singing because they pretended to see heresy in the words—David’s words. And France is without hymns to this day.’—Besant’s _Essays and Historiettes_, ‘The Failure of the French Reformation,’ p. 78.

[60]A full and interesting account of the Old Version is given in Julian. Holland’s notices of these writers are also good.

[61]_Wode_ or _wood_, Anglo-Saxon = mad, violent.

[62]‘This literary curiosity occurs at the end of a book entitled, _A godly Medytacion of the Christian Soule_, &c., compyled in Frenche, by Lady Margarite, Quene of Naverre. This psalm is reprinted in Park’s edition of _The Royal and Noble Authors of Great Britain_.’—Farr’s _Select Poetry of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth_ (Parker Society), 1835.

[63]Pight = pitched, laid.

[64]This hymn appeared in Bickersteth’s _Christian Psalmody_ in three verses, of which Miller says, ‘two stanzas bear no resemblance’ to Sandys’s original. The _Methodist Hymn-book_ cento is much nearer to Sandys, though it has many variations.

[65]Farr’s _Select Poetry of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth_. The poem has ten verses. Most are unsuited for congregational use, as may be judged from the following lines:—

The carrion crow, that loathsome beast, Which cries against the rain, Both for her hue and for the rest The devil resembleth plain: And as with guns we kill the crow, For spoiling our relief, The devil so must we o’erthrow With gunshot of belief.

[66]Palgrave’s _Treasury of Sacred Song_, p. 333. Palgrave gives five of his poems.

[67]Condor gives three verses, but the third is very inferior to these. The two I quote are included by Professor Palgrave and Mr. Quiller-Couch in their anthologies. Conder apparently did not know the author’s name. He took the verses from an ‘old collection.’

[68]From a MS. in the British Museum. Cf. the very full and interesting article in Julian, p. 580.

[69]_Life of Ken_, ii. p. 201.

[70]Altered later to ‘I wake, I wake.’

[71]Altered to ‘void of.’

[72]Plumptre’s _Life of Ken_, vol. ii. p. 268.

[73]Plumptre’s _Life of Ken_, vol. ii. p. 288.

[74]_Christian Psalmist_, Preface, xviii.

[75]Preface to Austin’s _Devotions_, Edinburgh, 1789.

[76]_Dictionary of Hymnology_, Article: ‘Roman Catholic Hymnody.’

[77]_Arundel Hymns_, 77.

[78]_Poems_ (1872), p. 62.

[79]I quote Austin’s text. Wesley’s changes do not improve it.

[80]This hymn is from the _Office for Monday Lauds_.

[81]From Farr’s _Select Poetry of the Reign of James I._

[82]_Presbyterian Hymnal_, 531.

[83]Ken’s hymn for St. Matthew’s Day was edited by Bishop Walsham How, and in that form appears in _Hymns Ancient and Modern_, and in _Church Hymns_.

[84]_Worship Song_, 15; _School Hymns_, 6.

[85]There is a good sketch of Wither in Willmott’s _Lives of the Sacred Poets_, and an excellent biographical introduction by Mr. Edward Farr in _The Hymns and Songs of the Church_ (Library of Old Authors). Both these volumes give striking portraits, the latter one of the poet in his twenty-first year, surrounded by the punning motto, ‘I grow and wither both together.’

[86]Barton did not always reach so high a level. One of his versions of the ‘Te Deum’ is in this fashion—

The blest Apo- stles glorious company, Do praise Thy ho- ly Name continually.

[87]_Religio Medici._

[88]The best illustration is the hymn beginning

Saviour, if Thy precious love, Could be merited by mine.

No. 37 in the first edition of Wesley’s _Hymns_, No. 24 in the last. I am sorry it was omitted from the _Methodist Hymn-book_.

[89]There is a delightful chapter on George Herbert in Lady McDougall’s _Songs of the Church_.

[90]_Introductory Essay_, by J. H. Shorthouse, to Unwin’s facsimile reprint of _The Temple_.

[91]Julian, ‘Psalters, English,’ p. 919.

[92]The story of the Scotch psalms and paraphrases I must leave. It is well told in outline in Julian. The Scotch version has few literary or poetic graces, but it has held the heart and guided the mind of many generations, to whom it has been infinitely more precious than the smoother and more poetic verses of Addison, Heber, and Keble could ever be.

[93]This small witticism was repeated by Romaine in the preface to his _Treatise on Psalmody_, though he had the good sense to strike it out of his second edition, at the request, it is said, of Lady Huntingdon.

[94]Preface to _Christian Psalmist_.

[95]_Treasury of Sacred Song_, p. 349.

[96]Watts has been unfortunate in his biographers. Mr. Paxton Hood’s book is lively and interesting, but its style is amazingly slovenly. Here is a curious sentence: ‘His daughter and sole heiress, Margaret, married Thomas, Duke of Norfolk, so the estate descended to the Howard family, and became the Duke’s place; he lost his head; passing to his eldest son, he sold it in 1592 to the mayor, corporation, and citizens of London.’ The writer adds, naïvely, ‘This is a singular piece of history’ (p. 55).

[97]Julian, Article: ‘Congregational Hymnody.’

[98]Preface to _Psalms_. Dr. Martineau justified his own editing of Watts’s hymns by this sentence. ‘Every adaptation of a Jewish psalm to Christian worship affords an instance of theological adaptation; and the same rule which is applied to Dr. Watts’s hymns when their Trinitarianism is expelled, Watts himself has systematically applied to David’s writings, in reforming and spiritualizing their Judaism.’—Preface to _Hymns for the Christian Church and Home_.

[99]_Lives of the Poets._

[100]One of Wesley’s Communion hymns begins—

Come to the supper, come, Sinners, there still is room.

[101]The hymn has seven verses. It is given with slight alterations, and the omission of one verse in Barrett’s _Congregational Church Hymnal_, 497.

[102]Henry Ward Beecher included this song in his _Plymouth Collection_.

[103]Julian, p. 831.

[104]_The Training of the Twelve_, p. 24.

[105]‘Joseph Hart,’ by the late Rev. B. A. Gregory, M.A., _City Road Magazine_, December 1876.

[106]_Poems_ by Theodosia, vol. ii. (1780).

[107]Often begins in hymn-books with the third verse, ‘And O [Father] whate’er of earthly bliss.’

[108]Julian, p. 332.

[109]Telford’s _Charles Wesley_, p. 245.

[110]Cf. Lightfoot’s _Colossians_, i. 27, iii. 16.

[111]Green’s _History of the English People_.

[112]_Short Hymns_, 2 Tim. i. 7.

[113]_Hymns and Sacred Poems_ (1739).

[114]_Church Hymns_ (1903), Preface.

[115]This verse is from the ‘hymn on my conversion,’ mentioned by C. Wesley in his _Journal_, May 23, 1738. It was written at Mr. Bray’s, Little Britain. Five verses are in the _Methodist Hymn-book_, 358.

[116]Watts wrote ‘very.’ ‘Every’ is Wesley’s emendation.

[117]I quote the following verse as an illustration: in doing so there is no risk of spoiling a hymn dear to anybody:—

Exempted from the general doom, The death which all are born to know; Enoch obtained his heavenly home By faith, and disappeared below.

[118]Reprinted by Pickering in 1868 as ‘Bishop Ken’s _Christian Year_.’

[119]These hymns are in _Hymns and Sacred Poems_ (1739). The Epiphany hymn is in _Church Hymns_, 115, with alterations.

[120]Cf. _Paradise Lost_, bk. 1.

That with reiterated crimes, he might Heap on himself damnation.

I cannot refrain from saying how much I regret the omission of this hymn from the _Methodist Hymn-book_. It is retained by the American Methodist Episcopal, Primitive Methodist, and others, though the Primitive Methodist most unfortunately changes ‘flaming’ into ‘loving’ eyes in verse 3, apparently overlooking the reference to ‘His eyes were as a flame of fire.’

[121]_Hymns on the Lord’s Supper_, by John and Charles Wesley, presbyters of the Church of England. With a preface concerning the Christian Sacrament and Sacrifice, extracted from Dr. Brevint, Bristol. Printed by Felix Farley, M DCC XLV.

[122]Canon Carter’s _Altar Hymnal_ has eight of Wesley’s hymns. He also ascribes to C. Wesley Miss Leeson’s translation of _Victimae Paschali_.

‘Christ, the Lord, is risen to-day,’ Christians, haste your vows to pay.

[123]The whole book was reprinted, in 1871, with Wesley’s _Companion for the Altar_ (extracted from _Thomas à Kempis_), and an Introduction by Mr. W. E. Dutton, under the title, _The Eucharistic Manuals of John and Charles Wesley_. Mr. Dutton’s design was to show that ‘the Wesleys held opinions and taught doctrines now known as Catholic, yet far in advance of the times in which they lived, and very different from the doctrines taught by that body of men now called by their name.’ I may also mention another interesting book, now out of print, Mr. Warrington’s _Echoes of the Prayer-book in Wesley’s Hymns_.

[124]Col. ii. 19.

[125]_Methodist Hymn-book_, 729.

[126]_Hymns Ancient and Modern_, 553. _Altar Hymnal_, 151.

[127]Cf. ‘And here we offer and present unto Thee, O Lord, ourselves, our souls and bodies;’ with verse iv., ‘Take my soul and body’s powers,’ _Methodist Hymn-book_, 562.

[128]‘The ordinary position of the ‘Gloria in Excelsis’ in ancient liturgies was at the beginning, not at the end of the office. It so stood in our own Liturgy down to 1552, when it was placed at the end of the service.... It may be truly said that there is no Liturgy in the world which has so solemn and yet so magnificent a conclusion as our own.’—Proctor and Maclear’s _Introduction to the Book of Common Prayer_.

[129]Tyerman’s _Whitefield_, vol. i. p. 465.

[130]_Poetical Works_, vol. iii.

[131]Tyerman’s _Whitefield_, vol. i. p. 478.

[132]The hymn has seventeen verses, some of which are, as Whitefield says, ‘very bad.’ _Methodist Hymn-book_, 65.

[133]_Wesley Poetry_, vol. iii. p. 60.

[134]_Works_, vol. xiii.

[135]_Poetical Works_, vol. iii. p. 78; _Methodist Hymn-book_, 435.

[136]Tyerman’s _Wesley’s Designated Succession_, vol. i. p. 88, 89.

[137]Cf. Tyerman’s _Wesley_ and Horne’s _History of the Free Churches_.

[138]_Poetical Works_, vol. iv. p. 446.

[139]Ibid., vol. iii. p. 23.

[140]_Poetical Works_, vol. iii. p. 21.

[141]Ibid., vol. iii. p. 73.

[142]Telford’s _Charles Wesley_, p. 245.

[143]_Poetical Works_, vol. v. p. 133.

[144]_Methodist Hymn-book_, 366. Wesley himself closed this hymn with Ken’s doxology.

[145]Cf. Phil. i. 9.

[146]I am inclined to think there is a reference here to the ἀγρἁµµατοί καὶ ἰδιῶται of Acts iv. 13.

[147]Trench’s _Notes on the Parables_.

[148]Charles Wesley wrote _favour_. John Wesley improved both the sense and sound by changing the word to _mercy_.

[149]_Poetical Works_, vol. x. p. 57. Charles Wesley wrote _bleeds_; the change to _grieves_ was made in John Wesley’s hymn-book.

[150]_Poetical Works_, vol. i. p. 50.

[151]_Hymns and Sacred Poems_ (1749); _Poetical Works_, vol. v. p. 306.

[152]Wesley included forty-nine hymns under the heading, ‘For Believers Groaning for Full Redemption,’ and twenty-six under the heading, ‘Believers Brought to the Birth.’ These sections were, later, united under the title, ‘Seeking for Full Redemption.’ The _Methodist Hymn-book_ has forty-four, of which thirty-seven are Charles Wesley’s, three translations by John Wesley, two by Miss Havergal, one by Dr. Bonar, and one by T. Monod.

[153]_Methodist Hymn-book_, 905.

[154]Ibid., 88.

[155]The hymn, ‘When quiet in my house I sit,’ _Methodist Hymn-book_, 264, is made up of Nos. 300-303 in the _Short Poems_.

[156]Julian, p. 1149.

[157]Julian, p. 478, thinks that Bakewell wrote a very small portion of this hymn. Some readers will be interested to know that more than thirty years ago a great-grandson of John Bakewell’s was selling newspapers in the streets of a town in the North of England—friendless, homeless, ragged, and in delicate health. He came to The Children’s Home, and grew up worthy of his remote ancestors. He became an architect, and did some excellent work, but died in early manhood of consumption.

[158]_Apologia._

[159]See Wright’s _Town of Cowper_.

[160]John Wesley was very indignant at the refusal of ordination to John Newton, but was probably too loyal to the Church to suggest his becoming a Methodist preacher.—_Journal_, March 20, 1760.

[161]It was to the first Lord Dartmouth that Ken, on the recommendation of Pepys, became chaplain in the Tangier Expedition of 1683. His character may be judged from a letter, in which he writes that he has ‘to answer to God for the preservation of so many souls He hath been pleased to place under my care.’—Plumptre’s _Life of Ken_.

[162]Hazlitt’s _English Poets_, p. 123.

[163]_Supra_, p. 111.

[164]Wesley’s _Journal_, May 25, 1750.

[165]Tyerman’s _Whitefield_, ii. 174.

[166]Julian, p. 681, gives the three versions.

[167]Julian, p. 971. The three-verse cento, dear to Methodists, is slightly varied from that of Thomas Cotterill, of Sheffield.

[168]In early hymn-books there is often confusion between Wesley and Toplady. At the end of his reprint of Toplady’s _Poetical Remains_, Sedgwick gives a list of seventeen hymns of Charles Wesley’s, attributed to Toplady.

[169]Elvet Lewis’s _Sweet Singers of Wales_, p. 29.

[170]Lewis’s _Sweet Singers_, ch. iii. There are other Welsh singers included in this little book who deserve to be more widely known, but my limited space does not allow further quotation.

[171]Smith’s _Heber_, p. 84.

[172]It is curious how widespread the fear of Methodism was. Crabbe added to his beautiful and touching lines, beginning

Pilgrim, burthened with thy sin, Come the way to Zion’s gate,

a note explaining that it had been suggested to him that ‘this change from restlessness to repose in the mind of Sir Eustace is wrought by a Methodistic call.’ He protests, however, that ‘though evidently enthusiastic in respect to language,’ they ‘are not meant to convey any impropriety of sentiment.’

[173]Advent Sunday.

[174]This was written in 1825, two years before the publication of Heber’s _Hymns_ and of the _Christian Year_.

[175]Barry’s _Newman_, pp. 51, 52.

[176]John Ellerton, p. 185.

[177]Lyte wrote some verses, ‘The Dying Christian to his Soul,’ which are in a much more triumphant strain, but they are not equal to Toplady’s poem.

[178]_Holy Year_, xi. Dr. Wordsworth was then (1862) Canon of Westminster.

[179]‘Conversation of an hour and a half with Anstice on practical religion, particularly as regards our own situation. I bless and praise God for his presence here.’—Morley’s _Gladstone_, vol. i. pp. 55, 56.

[180]It is omitted from the _Methodist Hymn-book_. It was No. 990 in the former book, and is in the Presbyterian (469) and Baptist (641).

[181]This hymn is not in _Hymns Ancient and Modern_, but it is in _Church Hymns_, Presbyterian, Baptist, Congregational, Horder’s, Primitive Methodist, and many other hymn-books.

[182]_Westminster Abbey Hymn-book_, 288; _Young People’s Hymnal_, 161.

[183]Michael Bruce’s ‘Ode to the Cuckoo.’

[184]Preface to _Poems_, p. xviii.

[185]The hymn has seven verses, _Poems_, p. 59.

[186]_Methodist Hymn-book_, 520.

[187]_Congregational Hymnal_, 127; _Baptist Hymnal_, 128.

[188]The last lines differ from the usual version. The change was made by Professor Palgrave himself, and, at his wish, the verse was given in this form in the _Young People’s Hymnal_.

[189]_The Household of Faith_, p. 8.

[190]‘The Church, Dissent, and Nation,’ _National Review_, July 1903.

[191]This lecture was delivered in Sheffield.

[192]Cf. _Church Hymnary_ (Presbyterian), _Church Hymns_ (S.P.C.K.), _Westminster Abbey Hymn-book_.

[193]The most important of these is in the last line. Montgomery wrote first, ‘His name—what is it? Love.’ He was, of course, dissatisfied with this anti-climax, and altered the line to ‘That name to us is Love.’ But the change in _Hymns Ancient and Modern_ (said to be Keble’s) is a great improvement, ‘His changeless name of Love.’ It is remarkable that Montgomery did not include this hymn in his _Christian Psalmist_.