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STORIES OF THE 
 GREAT HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 
 

 

 

 
Stories of the * 
 Great Hymns of the 
 
 
 
 BY 
 SILAS H. PAINE 
 
 Introduction by 
 LUTHER D. WISHARD 
 
 NEW ERA PUBLISHING COMPANY 
 MONTCLAIR, NEW JERSEY 
 
Coryricut, 1925, BY 
 NEW ERA PUBLISHING co. 
 
 Printed in the United States of America by 
 J, J. LITTLE AND IVES COMPANY, NEW YORK 
 
DEDICATED TO 
 MARY S. PAINE 
 
 Whose constant collaboration with 
 
 her husband made this book possible 
 
STANZA OF A 
 Favorite HyMN oF 
 LINCOLN 
 
 “Tf you are too weak to journey 
 Up the mountain steep and high, 
 You can stand within the valley, 
 As the multitude goes by; 
 
 You can chant in happy measure, 
 As they slowly pass along ; 
 
 Tho’ they may forget the singer, 
 They will not forget the song.” 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 By Lutuer D. WisHaArRD 
 
 This monumental research in hymnology is not the 
 author’s only memorial. Neither is it his chief service. His 
 varied activities are deserving of much fuller treatment than 
 this brief foreword. Such treatment will be given them in 
 the near future in a fitting biographical monograph. His 
 aptitude for research led him into a number of other fields, 
 covering the fauna and flora, the revolutionary and abori- 
 ginal history of the Lake George region and the pictorial 
 teachings of the Bible. Such work was done after office 
 hours throughout his working year and during his periodic 
 vacations. 
 
 Hymnology was one of his chief diversions. A busy 
 official of a corporation of world-wide note, he took time 
 throughout a period of forty years to assemble a large and 
 rare collection of hymn books and also to compile a mass 
 of incidents concerning hymns, their authorship, the causes 
 which gave them birth, and their influence upon lives. 
 These incidents have now been published under the title 
 “Stories of the Great Hymns of the Church.” The most 
 widely known man in the industrial world, his daily busi- 
 ness associate for many years, was wont to say, “If Silas 
 H. Paine says ‘it is true,’ it is.’ The ‘accuracy of this 
 rare work on hymnology can have no higher endorse- 
 ment. I believe it can justly be said of Mr. Paine, as one 
 of our former statesmen said of himself, “I would rather 
 be right than be President.” Mr. Paine had no patience 
 with the legendary and apocryphal. “The truth, the whole 
 
 1X 
 
x INTRODUCTION 
 
 truth, and nothing but the truth,” was his motto in research. 
 He once remarked to the writer, in questioning the authen- 
 ticity of the birth story of a well known hymn, “I would 
 rather not know so many things, than know so many 
 things that are not so.” In quoting our greatest American 
 humorist he unconsciously let me into one of the great 
 secrets of his successful life. 
 
 His interest in hymnology was undoubtedly awakened 
 and deepened by reason of his many years’ service as a 
 Sunday School superintendent. This interest found first 
 expression in the collection of five thousand hymn books 
 without a duplicate, whose publication spanned eighteen 
 centuries. Anyone passing through Hartford, with a few 
 hours at his disposal, will be richly rewarded by visiting a 
 library alcove of the Congregational Theological Seminary. 
 He will there live over again his childhood as the writer 
 did one winter day, by renewing his acquaintance with 
 this collection of old time Church and Sunday School hymn 
 books which he never expected to see again: “The Golden 
 Chain,” “Musical Leaves,” “The Singing Pilgrim,” “The 
 Oriole,” ““Winnowed Hymns.” How these familiar titles re- 
 call walks through clover fields to the village church in the 
 good old summer time,—yes, and through snowdrifts in 
 the good old winter time,—the ringing voices of singing 
 _ children, the recital of Scripture verses, the wholesome ad- 
 monitions of “our teachers dear,’ as they were character- 
 ized in song, the stroll through the village graveyard after 
 Sunday School, as a reward for good behavior during the 
 preceding week. As one recalls the words and melodies 
 which come floating down the flood of years, is it because 
 of the magic spell which time has woven around our memo- 
 ries that the old songs seem so superior to much of the 
 semi-jazz jargon which marks the measure of too much of 
 the juvenile singing of nowadays? If there be a larger, 
 rarer collection of church hymnology on this continent or 
 any continent we have yet to hear of it. 
 
 It was about. 1883 when Mr. Paine first became so in- 
 
INTRODUCTION xi 
 
 terested in hymnology. His interests were perennial. They 
 ‘ran on forever. When in 1900 I renewed with him my 
 acquaintance first made in 1879, he was serving as host 
 in his new hotel at Silver Bay. The event of the week 
 was not the fishing excursion to Jabe’s Pond, the ascent 
 of Black Mountain, the steam yacht trip to Paradise 
 Bay, the ride to Fort Ticonderoga, or even the Saturday 
 night dance, as far removed from present day dancing as 
 the span of a continent. 
 
 The chief event of the week during the early summers 
 of our outings there was Mr. Paine’s Sunday evening service 
 of song in the auditorium. He furnished the prelude to 
 every hymn with stories apt, fascinating, and inspiring, 
 stories in quest of which he had ransacked libraries of 
 music in America and Great Britain. Never until then 
 had I heard an audience really “sing with the spirit and 
 with the understanding also,” and it was then that I first 
 realized that one cannot sing with the spirit until he under- 
 stands why, when, where, and by whom the hymn came into 
 being, and what service the hymn has rendered in making 
 and remolding men. I had joined in the singing of Reginald 
 Heber’s majestic missionary hymn in audiences which I 
 had addressed almost all the way “From Greenland’s Icy 
 Mountains to India’s Coral Strand,” but never with the 
 sensations with which I have heard the inspired and inspir- 
 ing words sung after the thrilling account by Mr. Paine 
 of the occasion of its composition. We have sung “I Love 
 to Steal Awhile Away” since childhood without knowing 
 that Phoebe Brown, who lived a century ago, “had so many 
 children she didn’t know what to do”; so, after putting 
 them to bed (without spanking, I trow) she sought rest in 
 prayer as she walked under the elms at “the hour of setting 
 day,”’ and wrote “TI love to steal awhile away from little 
 ones and care.” What a hymn for tired mothers! 
 
 The time would fail me to thus allude to dozens, yes 
 scores of hymns of whose birth and fruitful life I have 
 heard Mr. Paine speak in the song service on the shore 
 
xil INTRODUCTION 
 
 of Silver Bay at twilight, when his vibrant voice was ac- 
 companied by 
 
 “Tow stir of leaves and dip of oars, 
 And lapsing waves on quiet shores.” 
 
 It was then that I began urging him to give the entire 
 church the inspiration of his many years of world-wide 
 search for the ancestry of our greatest and most loved 
 hymns. It is well that he did not then accede to my appeal, 
 for his task of collection was far from completed. Now that 
 it is finished, the churches need wait no longer for this rare 
 ministry of song at the hands of one of its- most loyal sons. 
 
 Even Silas Paine would have been unequal to this arduous 
 labor of love had he toiled alone. His wife, Mary, collabo- 
 rated with him in this, as in all of his varied researches, 
 with unwearied devotion and fine discrimination. Her name 
 deserves the place given it on the dedicatory page. It is 
 owing to her loyalty and abounding generosity that this rare 
 volume, a veritable De Luxe, containing eight hundred and 
 five stories of hymns, is offered to the Christian world at 
 a cost far below its commercial value. 
 
 The writer of the above is indeed honored in being ac- 
 corded the opportunity to furnish this tribute to his old 
 comrade-in-arms who, although “being dead, yet speaketh” 
 through these glowing pages as with a tongue of fire. No— 
 he is not dead, but alive forevermore. 
 
“SINGING WITH THE SPIRIT AND. WITH THE 
 UNDERSTANDING ALSO.” 
 
 A Lay Sermon by 
 Siuras H. PAINne. 
 
 A hymn book lies beside the Bible on every pulpit desk. 
 One was given by inspiration of God. The other has been 
 said to contain: “The holiest thoughts of holiest men in 
 their holiest moments.” One is “profitable for doctrine, 
 for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness,” 
 and the other is helpful in all departments of Christian 
 work and worship. It has been quaintly said of hymns, that 
 “they make Bible truths portable in men’s memories”; and 
 it is no disparagement of Scripture to assert that often- 
 times a Bible truth, clothed in the language of a hymn, 
 finds lodgment in the heart when in the plainer words of 
 Scripture it had failed to do go. 
 
 One of the Secretaries of The American Board recently 
 told me of an incident in his own career which illustrates the 
 truth of this assertion. When, a young man, he was settled 
 as colleague of a pastor, whose advancing years demanded 
 help, one day his younger colleague was called to visit one 
 of the aged members of the church, who was dying. He 
 found her downeast and discouraged; and, in his effort to 
 comfort and cheer her, he repeated all the Scripture verses 
 he could think of that were adapted to that end, but entirely 
 without success, and he left her discouraged over his failure. 
 Going to the old pastor he told him of the case, and the 
 latter at once responded: ‘Let us go back and see her again; 
 T will go along.” As they entered the room, where the dying 
 woman lay, the old pastor gave her a cheerful greeting and 
 
 Xi 
 
xiv A LAY SERMON 
 
 then said: “I’ve just been thinking about the old hymn 
 we've sung together so many times: 
 
 “How firm a foundation, ye saints of the Lord, 
 
 Is laid for your faith in His excellent word! 
 What more can he say than to you He hath said,— 
 To you, who for refuge to Jesus have fled?” 
 
 As if touched by magic fingers the clouds were dissipated, 
 and now the same Scripture words, that had failed before, 
 brought comfort and hope. This incident suggests the 
 thought that a familiarity with hymns will be useful to 
 you in your work as pastors. 
 
 A fire occurred over two hundred years ago in the rectory 
 of a little church in Epworth, England. Two things escaped 
 the flames: one was a bit of paper that was carried up into 
 the air and fell singed and smoked upon the grass; the 
 other was a puny child, who was with difficulty rescued 
 from an upper window. Never fire yielded richer salvage, 
 for the paper contained the words of a hymn just written 
 by the rector, which has found a permanent place in 
 Methodist hymnology: 
 
 “Behold the Saviour of Mankind 
 Nailed to the shameful tree! 
 How vast the love, that him inclined 
 To bleed and die for thee!”’ 
 
 The puny child became the leader of that mighty evan- 
 gelical movement which swept over England in the eigh- 
 teenth century, and which he developed and crystallized 
 into that wonderful organization we know as the Methodist 
 Church. The incident was prophetic, for John Wesley could 
 never have succeeded in building that great organization 
 had it not been for the hymns of his brother, Charles. 
 
 A singing church is almost sure to be a working and a 
 spiritual church. If, when you become pastors, you find 
 your churches cold and dead, get them to singing, and 
 you will sing them into warmth and life and power. 
 
A LAY SERMON XV 
 
 The purpose of this lecture is to suggest some of the 
 practical methods by which hymns can be made helpful 
 in your work and worship. 
 
 The first method consists in giving information about 
 the hymns themselves. Hymns have a history. Some of 
 them were born out of rich and deep experience. The story 
 of their birth has been told and is available. If you can 
 tell these stories to your people, the hymns of which you 
 tell them will always thereafter have greater value to them 
 and will be more heartily sung. Take for example the 
 familiar hymns: 
 
 “Rock of Ages.” 
 
 “T Love to Steal Awhile Away.” 
 
 “Abide with Me, Fast Falls the Eventide.” 
 
 “Hear my Prayer, O Heavenly Father.” 
 
 “Stand Up! Stand Up for Jesus!” 
 
 “Jesus, These Eyes Have Never Seen.” 
 
 “Lead, Kindly Light! Amid the Encircling Gloom.” 
 “Blest Be the Tie that Binds.” 
 
 “My Days Are Gliding Swiftly By.” 
 
 “My Country! ’Tis of Thee.” 
 
 There, I have given you the titles of ten hymns, all of 
 them familiar ones, and with them a very enjoyable evening, 
 and one that will be profitable as well, can be arranged. A - 
 good name for such a song service would be, “HyMNs wITH 
 A History.” 
 
 But, information about the authors of hymns is of more 
 value than the story of the hymns themselves. Among hymn 
 writers are some of the choicest spirits that ever lived; and 
 it is worth while to bring your people into touch with such 
 characters as John Newton, Ann Steele, Ray Palmer, and 
 Fanny Crosby. Such information has also the additional 
 value that it gives to you in the preparation of services of 
 song a far wider range; for example: if you can tell the 
 story of Isaac Watts, you can in connection with the story 
 use any one of his hymns. “AN Hour witH Hymn 
 
XV1 A LAY SERMON 
 
 Writers” is a good title to give to a song service of this sort. 
 
 Another class of facts about hymns partakes a little of 
 the character of both classes already named, and yet is 
 not just like either. I do not know that I can better define 
 it than by giving you an example. Turn to: 
 
 “Art Thou Weary, Heavy Laden?” 
 “There’s a Wideness in God’s Mercy.” 
 “Oh Sacred Head, Now Wounded.” 
 “There Were Ninety and Nine.” 
 “Shine, Mighty God!” 
 
 Next comes the story of what these hymns have done. 
 In this connection the field is unlimited in scope, and full 
 of rare adventure. Oh! how these old hymns have travelled 
 through the whole earth in their mission of comfort and 
 help! One sang its song of cheer to Livingstone in the heart 
 of Africa; another uttered its cry of warning to a gambler 
 in China; one soothed a maniac into calm in a New York 
 asylum; another broke from the lips of a dying girl in a 
 New York tenement house; one line, caught by an actress’ 
 ear as she walked the streets of London, changed her to 
 a gospel singer; and another line, whispered by a lady over 
 a suicide’s shoulder, saved him from the fatal step. 
 
 These stories—simple little stories, most of them—are 
 of value to you; for what these hymns have done they can 
 do again; and it is possible for you to so use them that 
 they shall become a veritable gospel and be endued with 
 “The power of God unto salvation.” Now come with me 
 to the battlefield of Shiloh. All day the battle has raged, 
 and night has drawn her curtain now, and the stars look 
 down upon strange scenes. Here and there squads of sol- 
 diers are burying the dead, and surgeons and nurses are 
 caring for the wounded, and chaplains are whispering to 
 the dying. Stop here with me and listen where an agent of 
 the Christian Commission kneels by the side of a dying boy. 
 Already the chill of coming death is on his hands and brow, 
 “Take off that ring from my finger, chaplain, and give it to 
 
A LAY SERMON xvii 
 
 my sister at home, and tell her to keep it to remember me 
 by. Tell her that I spoke of her when I was dying and sent 
 her my love. Reach into my pocket, chaplain, and get 
 my wallet; there’s a little money in it and a few keepsakes; 
 give them to my mother, and tell her that I have lived in 
 the army as I promised her I would, and that I did no dis- 
 honor to her or to my father’s name on the battlefield. Say 
 good-bye to them, chaplain, for me, and tell them that I 
 died contented and happy. And now, chaplain, sing to 
 me.” And the chaplain began to sing: 
 
 “There is a fountain filled with blood, 
 Drawn from Immanuel’s veins; 
 And sinners, plunged beneath that flood, 
 Lose all their guilty stains.” 
 
 And the boy exclaimed: “Oh, yes, I know that hymn; I 
 can sing that, too.” And then as the chaplain sang the boy 
 joined in, and every few words he broke into the song 
 with some comment of his own. 
 
 “In that day there shall be a fountain opened in the 
 house of David and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem for sin 
 and for uncleanness.’”—Zech. 13: 1. 
 
 But tunes have stories to tell as well as hymns. I do 
 not refer to the statelier music of the oratorio or that for 
 the organ only, but the ‘Hymn-tunes,” as we call them, 
 such as are ordinarily used in the worship of the church. 
 In the days of Watts and Wesley hymns were numbered 
 by thousands, and tunes, suitable to sing them to, by 
 dozens. It was Wesley’s practice to seize upon any song 
 of the theater or the street, the moment it became popular, 
 and make it carry some newly written hymn into the homes 
 of the people. The practice has outlived him, and many of 
 the church tunes of the day began their career in secular 
 connections. Greenville, which we use with the words: 
 “Tord dismiss us with thy blessing,” first appeared in a 
 very short-lived opera in France, and later as a love song 
 in England with the title, “Rosseau’s Dream.” Kirk White’s 
 
xViil A LAY SERMON 
 
 hymn, “When Marshalled on the Nightly Plain,” we sing 
 to the tune of the Scotch song “Bonnie Doon.” One of 
 Fanny Crosby’s sweetest hymns is sung to the love sick 
 music of “Robin Adair.” But there are others written for 
 sacred use which also have their history; and interest in 
 the singing of hymns will be greatly increased by “AN 
 EvENING AMONG THE TUNES.” 
 
 Many of our hymns are paraphrases or imitations of 
 the Psalms, and “An EvENING WITH THE PsALMs” can be 
 made instructive and profitable. I wish I were able to 
 adequately describe the book from which such a service 
 would be taken. It is the oldest hymn book in the world. 
 Back of Wesley and Watts, back of Milton and Marot, 
 back of the Bernards of Cluny and Clairvaux, back of 
 St. Stephen of Mount Saba, and St. Clement of Alexandria, 
 five hundred years before the time when Mary sang “Mag- 
 nificat,” its latest hymn was written. And a thousand years 
 still farther back its earliest song was sung. What voices 
 have sung these Psalms! David, the king, sang them to 
 the music of his harp; Solomon, the wise, sang them; 
 Nehemiah, the great prototype of our own Seth Low, in 
 the mighty task of rebuilding a nearly ruined city—he sang 
 these songs and a score of other old prophets and heroes 
 whose names are writ large in Bible history, and the Master 
 himself sang them as he met with his disciples in that upper 
 chamber. 
 
STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 
 
 No. 1. 
 “HOLY BIBLE—BOOK DIVINE!”—1805. 
 
 JoHN Burton, 1773—1822. 
 
 When the Rey. Dr. Thomas Stockton, one of the celebrated 
 preachers of the Protestant Methodist Church, was an old 
 man, he visited Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and preached one 
 Sunday morning in the pulpit of his friend and former 
 colleague, Rev. Alexander Clark. The church was crowded 
 to its utmost capacity. Dr. Stockton was so weak that a 
 high arm chair was placed for him behind the pulpit, and 
 he preached sitting. His subject was the value of the Bible 
 to the world, and after some introductory remarks he asked 
 Mr. Clark, who sat behind him, to remove the Bible from 
 the desk, and then drew a vivid word picture of what the 
 world would be were there no Bible in it. Then turning 
 suddenly he exclaimed, “Brother Clark, give us back the 
 Bible!” and as it was placed upon the pulpit desk, he 
 grasped it in both hands, and sprang from his chair, and 
 clasped it in his arms, and exclaimed: 
 
 “Holy Bible! Book Divine 
 Precious treasure, thou art mine!” 
 
 It was a dramatic act, and its effect upon the audience 
 was thrilling. And then he closed with another picture, 
 1 
 
2 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 as vivid, but more beautiful than the first, of what the 
 Bible has done for the world. 
 
 The author’s son relates that his father taught this hymn 
 to him before he was able to read. 
 
 Wore. 
 “STAND UP, AND BLESS THE LORD”’—1825. 
 
 JAMES Montcomery, 1771—1854. 
 
 An old man lay seriously ill in England fifty years ago, 
 and a friend often came in to talk and read to him. In 
 earlier years this old man had written many a hymn, and 
 one day he placed in the hands of his friend a manuscript 
 copy of his hymns and asked to have him read from them. 
 As he read, the poet became greatly affected, and the reader 
 was about to stop, when he spoke up, “Read on, I am glad 
 to hear you. The words recall the feelings which first sug- 
 gested them. All my hymns embody some portion of the 
 history of the joys or sorrows, the hopes and fears of this 
 poor heart.” 
 
 Here is one of the hymns which evidently was written in 
 some time of joy. 
 
 No. 8. 
 “QO FOR THE DEATH OF THOSE”—1804. 
 
 JAMES Montcommry, 1771—1854. 
 
 It is not often the case that one is permitted to read his 
 own obituaries, and to know what the world intends to 
 say of him when he has left it. The author of this hymn 
 was an exception, however, to this statement. By an error, 
 the report of his death reached this country while he was 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 3 
 
 yet living, and notices of his life and career were published 
 in many of the religious papers. These papers crossed the 
 Atlantic, and he had the privilege of reading them. His 
 hymns, which nearly every hymnal in the country contained 
 specimens of, had endeared him to the Christian people 
 here, and the notices of his death brought tears to his eyes 
 when he found what a place he held in the affection of the 
 religious world. When his death took place, it was one of 
 those translations of which it can be said, “He was not, 
 for God took him,” for he died in his sleep. 
 
 No. 4. 
 “WHEN JORDAN HUSHED HIS WATERS STILL”—1820. 
 
 THOMAS CAMPBELL, 1777—1844. 
 
 Lovers of American history and romance have probably 
 all read “Gertrude of Wyoming, A Pennsylvania Tale,” 
 - first published in 1809. Its author was Thomas Campbell, 
 who won great distinction as a poet, but is only known in 
 hymnology by this piece and one other, not often used, 
 beginning “The rainbow shines! no fabling dreams.” 
 
 No. 6. 
 “HAIL TO THE LORD’S ANOINTED”’—1821. 
 
 James Montcomery, 1771—1854. 
 
 James Montgomery was greatly interested in the work 
 of foreign missions and was in great demand as a speaker 
 at the meetings of the missionary societies. At one such 
 meeting held in the Wesleyan Chapel at Liverpool, April 
 14, 1822, he delivered an address, and closed it by repeating 
 this hymn taken from a Christmas ode he had written the 
 
4 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 year before. It aroused the enthusiasm of the great audi- 
 ence to a very high pitch as we can easily imagine it would, 
 coming fresh from the lips of its author. It is a rendering 
 of the Seventy-second Psalm. Dr. Adam Clark was then 
 writing his Commentary on the Bible, and he was presiding 
 at this meeting. At its close he begged of Mr. Montgomery 
 a copy of the hymn, and inserted it in his commentary on 
 this Psalm. 
 
 No. 6. 
 “PRAYER IS THE SOUL’S SINCERE DESIRE”—1819. 
 
 James Montcomery, 1771—1854. 
 
 Rev. Edward Bickersteth had written a “Treatise on 
 Prayer,” and asked Mr. James Montgomery to write a 
 hymn on the subject of prayer suitable for publication in 
 this book. This hymn was written in accordance with that 
 
 request. : 
 The first five stanzas are simply a poetic definition of 
 prayer, with no claim whatever to be called a hymn, and 
 yet nearly every hymn book contains them and the piece 
 is very popular. 
 
 No. 7. 
 “LORD OF HOSTS! TO THEE WE RAISE”—1821. 
 
 JAMES MONTGOMERY, 1771—1854. 
 
 On July 9, 1821, the cornerstone of a new Church to be 
 called St. George’s Church was laid at Sheffield, England. 
 This was the home of James Montgomery, the poet, and he 
 was asked to write a hymn to be sung at the ceremony. 
 This is the hymn he wrote, and it was first sung then. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 5. 
 
 No. 8. 
 “HOW SWEET, HOW HEAVENLY IS THE SIGHT’—1792. 
 
 Rev. JosepH Swain, 1761—1796. 
 
 Did you ever hear a workman singing at his work and 
 did you ever listen to hear what kind of a song he was 
 singing? An orphan boy in Birmingham, England, was 
 apprenticed to a London engraver, and there he was exposed 
 to all the moral dangers that surround the young when they 
 are strangers in a great city. But he became a Christian 
 soon, and then to give utterance to his happiness he began 
 to write hymns, and to comfort himself by singing them. 
 An acquaintance overheard the singing, and took the boy to 
 Church, something he had not known anything about till 
 then. He became a Baptist, and soon began to preach 
 himself, and then became the pastor of a little church. He 
 had great success, so that the little building had to be en- 
 larged, and his church members increased from 27 to 200. 
 And then at thirty-five, when apparently just beginning a 
 useful life, he died. 
 
 No. 9. 
 
 “LATE, LATE, SO LATE! AND DARK THE NIGHT AND 
 CHILL.” 
 
 Str ALFRED TENNYSON, 1809—1892. 
 
 ~Some of our hymns come from curious sources. One of 
 
 Alfred Tennyson’s most popular works was the series of 
 poems called “Idyls of the King.” Among these poems is 
 one ‘entitled “Guinevere,” who was King Arthur’s Queen, 
 but who at last fled from the court, and sought refuge in a 
 convent. Here she was*waited upon by a little maid. Now 
 listen to the story as Tennyson relates it: 
 
STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “So the stately Queen abode 
 For many weeks unknown, among the nuns; 
 Nor with them mingled, nor told her name, nor sought, 
 Wrapt in her grief, for housel, or for shrift, 
 But communed only with the little maid, 
 Who pleased her with a babbling heedlessness, 
 Which often lured her from herself: but now, 
 This night, a rumor widely blown about 
 Came, that Sir Modred had usurped the realm, 
 And leagued him with the heathen, while the King 
 Was waging war on Lancelot! Then she thought 
 ‘With what a hate the people and the King 
 Must hate me,’ and bowed upon her hands, 
 Silent, until the little maid, who brooked 
 No silence, brake it, uttering, ‘Late! so late! 
 What hour, I wonder, now?’ and when she drew 
 No answer, by and by began to hum 
 An air the nuns had taught her, ‘Late, so late!’ 
 Which, when she heard, the Queen looked up and said, 
 ‘O maiden, if indeed ye list to sing, 
 Sing, and unbind my heart that I may weep.’ 
 Whereat, full willingly, sang the little maid.” 
 
 No. 10. 
 “QO FOR A CLOSER WALK WITH GOD”—1779. 
 
 Witu1AmM Cowper, 1731—1800. 
 
 If we can know some of the little peculiarities of an 
 
 author, as well as the more prominent traits of his char- 
 acter, we are more interested often, in what he has written. 
 The author of this hymn was one of the most bashful of 
 men. He held at one time the appointment of clerk to 
 the Committees of the House of Lords, but gave it up be- 
 cause it necessitated his appearing now and then in the 
 room where they were assembled. And at his home in the 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 7 
 
 little village of Olney it was a long time before he could 
 overcome his diffidence enough to offer prayer in their little 
 weekly prayer meetings, although those who heard him pray 
 testify that he was as gifted in that as in the writing of 
 hymns. This hymn was quoted by Southey, who wrote a 
 biography of Cowper as an evidence of his insanity. 
 
 No. 11. 
 “ON THE MOUNTAIN’S TOP APPEARING.” 
 
 Rev. Tuomas Ketuy, 1769—1855. 
 
 Thomas Kelly was an Irish boy, the son of a judge. He 
 studied law, but becoming a Christian he became a clergy- 
 man of the Established Church; but his preaching was too 
 evangelical to suit the condition of that Church in Ireland 
 at that time, and the pulpits of the Church were closed 
 against him. Mr. Kelly was rich, and so, driven out of 
 the Church, he built churches for himself. He was greatly 
 interested in the work of foreign missions and wrote many 
 hymns on this subject. Possibly we can get a glimpse of 
 his character by this little conversation: An old school- 
 mate met him when he was well along in years and said 
 to him, “You will live to a great age, Mr. Kelly.” “Yes,” 
 was the reply, “I am confident I shall, for I expect never . 
 to die.” But they were both right, for he lived to be eighty- 
 six even in this world. 
 
 No. 12. 
 “JESUS WHERE’ER THY PEOPLE MEET”—1769. 
 Wiuui1AM Cowper, 1731—1800. 
 “QO LORD OUR LANGUID SOULS INSPIRE”—1769. 
 
 Rev. Jonn Newton, 1725—1807. 
 
 In the little village of Olney more than a hundred years 
 ago there lived in adjoining houses two intimate friends. 
 
8 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 One was William Cowper, a despondent invalid; the other 
 Rev. John Newton, curate of the parish. There was in 
 the village an unoccupied residence, which because of its 
 size as compared with the other cottages, was called ‘The 
 Great House.” John Newton and William Cowper carried 
 on a little social weekly prayer meeting in the village, and 
 in 1769 this was removed to “The Great House,” and 
 Newton decided to celebrate the event by a new hymn which 
 should be first sung on that occasion. So he and his friend 
 Cowper, each composed one and these are the hymns they 
 wrote. Newton’s hymn is often found with a different 
 beginning. “Dear Shepherd of Thy people hear.” 
 
 No. 13. 
 “MY LORD, HOW FULL OF SWEET CONTENT’”—1702. 
 
 MapaMeE JEANNE B, Dz La Morte Guton, 1648—1717. 
 
 Madam Guion was a French woman, who suffered a great 
 deal through the unkindness of friends, the death of a 
 child, and her own sickness which at the age of twenty-two 
 _ left her disfigured for life. She belonged to the sect called 
 “Quietists,”’ whose name explains quite well their peculiar 
 views. She wrote a book in which was given an account of 
 what was called the “Prayer of Silence,” in which not only 
 is there no utterance by the voice, but even the mind, instead 
 of turning from one request to another, simply concentrates 
 itself upon the thought “Thy will be done.” This work was 
 greatly feared by the Romanists, who collected it by hun- 
 dreds and burnt all they could collect. She was imprisoned 
 twice for her religious views, and then banished. Some of 
 her hymns were written from behind prison walls, and 
 this one in the first year of her banishment, so that its 
 language is that. of her own experience. It was written in 
 French and translated by William Cowper. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 9 
 
 No. 14. 
 (See No. 169.) 
 
 “SHOW PITY, LORD, O LORD, FORGIVE”—1719. 
 
 Rev. Isaac Watts, 1674—1748. 
 
 A young man once complained of the hardening effect 
 upon himself of a severe sermon on sin to which he had 
 listened, and he was asked to read this Psalm. He attempted 
 to do so, but his feelings as he read nearly overcame him, 
 and at last when he reached the words “I am condemned 
 but Thou art clear,’ he burst into tears and rushed from 
 the room. From that day his life was that of a converted 
 man. 
 
 No. 168. 
 “NOT ALL THE BLOOD OF BEASTS”—1709. 
 
 Rev. Isaac Watts, 1674—1748. 
 
 A London City Missionary relates the story that a 
 Jewess found this hymn printed on a piece of paper that 
 came into the house as a wrapper for a piece of butter. 
 Its reference to the sacrificial rites of her own church fixed 
 it in her mind, and she could not shake off the impression 
 it produced. She was led by it to a reading of the Bible 
 and to an acceptance of Christ as her Savior. In conse- 
 quence of her religious change her husband forsook her, 
 and she lived in poverty, but remained faithful to Christ 
 to the end of life. Do you know, I dislike to burn up even 
 a scrap of paper that has anything good printed or written 
 on it? Who knows if I spare it what eye may see it, or 
 what heart may be comforted by it? 
 
10 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 No. 16. 
 “THE GOD OF ABRAHAM PRAISE”—1770. 
 
 Rev. THomas Ouivers, 1725—1799. 
 
 In 1729, in a little village in England, a little boy four 
 years old lost both his parents. He was taken by a farmer 
 until he was eighteen, and then bound out as an apprentice 
 to a shoemaker. By this time he had become about as 
 bad as a fellow could be, so bad indeed, that he soon had 
 to leave that neighborhood. After wandering from town 
 to town, he went to Bristol, and there he heard Whitefield 
 preach. The text was “Is not this a brand plucked out of 
 the fire?” That sermon resulted in his conversion. I don’t 
 know as I can give you any better evidence that his con- 
 version was genuine than by saying that as he had wandered 
 about before his conversion he had left small debts owing 
 to many people; and as soon as he was converted he retraced 
 his steps from town to town, and with money he made at 
 his trade repaid the sums he owed. In the year 1772, Mr. 
 Olivers was visiting a friend in Westminster and one day 
 strolled into a Jewish synagogue when he heard a celebrated 
 Hebrew air sung by the priest, Signieur Leoni. Mr. Olivers 
 was so captivated by the singing and by the melody that 
 he resolved at once to write.a Christian hymn to suit it, 
 and the hymn was written before the visit ended. Although 
 Mr. Olivers had had but little education, this hymn has 
 been called one of the finest pieces in the English language. 
 The Jewish priest gave him the melody, and it received his 
 name “Leoni.” In a note published with the original tract 
 in which this hymn appeared are references to sixty passages 
 of scripture used ‘or illustrated by the hymn. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 11 
 
 No. 17. 
 “GOD CALLING YET! SHALL I NOT HEAR?”—1730. 
 
 GERHARD TERSTEEGEN, 1697—1769. 
 Translated by Miss Jane Borthwick, 1825. 
 
 A German boy was on a journey, and while walking 
 through a forest alone he was seized by violent spasms 
 that threatened his life. He prayed earnestly that he 
 might be spared in order that he might better prepare him- 
 self for eternity. His prayer was answered, and he at once 
 dedicated himself entirely to Christ. 
 
 His father was dead, and his mother was poor, and to 
 support her and himself he had already, when only fifteen 
 years old, gone into a little business. There are one or 
 two remarkable things about him. One is that finding the 
 business he had entered upon to be one that interfered with 
 his religious life, he left that business and chose another 
 not open to that objection. Later on, to give himself still 
 more time for religious work, he divided his business with 
 a partner, and still later, to have all his time for evangelis- 
 tic work, of which he did a great deal, visiting from house to 
 house among the poor and the sick, he gave up his business 
 entirely. His house became known as “The Pilgrims’ Cot- 
 tage,” and it became the resort of multitudes of the poor and 
 sick. They came for medicine and food, and clothing and 
 comfort, and never were disappointed. And so he filled up 
 his life with useful deeds, and they were all done in honor 
 of and in imitation of the Christ to whose service he had 
 dedicated his life. Coming from such a man as this, does 
 not this hymn have a new and deeper interest for us? 
 
 He wrote a form of dedication of himself to Jesus in his 
 own blood when twenty-seven. 
 
 He wrote more than one hundred hymns. 
 
12 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 No. 18. 
 “BEHOLD THE SAVIOUR OF MANKIND”—1709. 
 
 Rev. Samus WESLEY, 1662—1735. 
 
 On February 9, 1709, the rectory of the little town of 
 Epworth in Lincolnshire, England, was burned to the ground. 
 Not much was saved from the fire. Not much, did I say? 
 Two things were saved; almost by a miracle a six-year-old 
 boy was rescued from the burning building; and by the 
 saving of that life the moral history of the world was — 
 changed; for that boy was John Wesley, the founder of 
 that great and valiant wing of the Christian army we 
 know as Methodists. The other thing that was saved was 
 a piece of paper somewhat singed by the flames, but legible 
 yet, containing a piece of music and the words of a hymn, 
 written by the rector whose house had been burned, who 
 was none other than Samuel Wesley, the father of John 
 and Charles Wesley, and of seventeen other Wesleys as 
 well. This is the hymn that was saved. There never was 
 a house burned from which so much was saved from the 
 flames. 
 
 In 1803, a boy of fifteen named Samuel Rollerson was a 
 baker’s apprentice at Hilton, England. At this time a 
 number of French prisoners were located near by, and young 
 Rollerson’s business frequently led him to the barracks. 
 Methodism in those days had found its way into the army, 
 and religious services were often held in an out-building 
 belonging to the barracks. Samuel, whose mind had for 
 some time been exercised on religious subjects, was admitted 
 into these meetings and at one of them, while the hymn 
 beginning “Behold the Saviour of mankind!” was being 
 sung, he found his way to the Cross, the sin burden fell off, 
 and the rough stable became to him the gate of heaven. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 13 
 
 No. 19. 
 
 “RISE, CROWNED WITH LIGHT, IMPERIAL SALEM, 
 RISE!”—1712. 
 
 ALEXANDER Popr, 1688—1744, 
 
 It was John Dryden, the poet, who translated from the 
 Latin the hymn beginning: 
 
 “Creator, Spirit, by Whose aid.” 
 
 One day he was sitting in a coffee house in London; the 
 door opened and a friend of Dryden’s brought in a delicate 
 little boy twelve years old, who was eager to see the 
 celebrated poet and had persuaded the gentleman to take 
 him into the coffee house. The boy became a greater poet 
 than the man he had been so curious to see, for he was 
 Alexander Pope. He was a Roman Catholic, and that is 
 no doubt the reason why he wrote no poems intended, 
 when he wrote them, for hymns, for written in English at 
 the time when he lived, his Church would have refused to 
 use them. In the Spectator, a daily paper published in 
 London, for Wednesday, May 14, 1712, Joseph Addison, 
 one of the editors, said: “I will make no apology for enter- 
 taining the reader with the following poem, which is written 
 by a great genius, a friend of mine in the country who is 
 not ashamed to employ his wit in the praise of his Maker.” 
 Then follows a poem entitled “Messiah,” and beginning: 
 
 “Ye nymphs of Solyma! begin the song!” 
 
 From this poem no less than five hymns have been taken 
 for use in our hymn book, and this is one of them. 
 
14 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 No. 20. 
 “VITAL SPARK OF HEAVENLY FLAME”—1712. 
 
 ALEXANDER Popr, 1688—1744. 
 
 This hymn, if indeed it is to be called by that name, is 
 not only an imitation but a growth. There is a love poem 
 by Sappho 600 years before Christ, and later a poem by 
 the Roman Emperor Adrian (A. D. 138) written when he 
 was dying. Pope says that he had both of these in his 
 mind when he wrote. Then just before the time of Pope, 
 Thomas Flatman made a translation of Adrian’s poem and 
 improved upon the sentiment, and last of all Pope im- 
 proved upon his own version at the request of Mr. Steele, 
 editor of the Spectator. Adrian only spoke of death in 
 dim and timid uncertainty. Thomas Flatman rose a little 
 higher and wrote of a life beyond, that might be better and 
 could not be worse than this; but Pope, the Christian, 
 concludes his poem with the Scripture words: 
 
 “O grave, where is thy victory! 
 O death, where is thy sting!” 
 
 No. 21. 
 (See No. 164.) 
 
 “ALL PRAISE TO THEE, ETERNAL LORD’—1524. 
 
 Rev. Martin LutHer, 1483—1546. 
 
 Four hundred years ago, a little boy fourteen years of 
 age was sent away from home to school, at Magdeburg. 
 His father was too poor to support him, and he earned 
 his bread by singing ballads in the streets: 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 15 
 
 “Foxes to their holes have gone, 
 Every bird into its nest; 
 But I wander here alone, 
 And for me there is no rest.” 
 
 A year later he was sent to another town where he had 
 relatives who it was hoped would assist him, but they 
 neglected him. As he was singing his plaintive little song 
 one day before a house, the wife of the man who lived in 
 it saw him and took him in. Her house became his home 
 and -she his benefactress, and he to please her learned to 
 play on the flute and the lute. This was Martin Luther, and 
 his own experience of the power of song in boyhood, led him 
 to give it a very high place of importance in after years. 
 When he was deep in the contest with the Church of Rome, 
 he gathered a band of men at his own house who were 
 skilled in music, and they arranged the hymns he had written 
 to the favorite tunes of the German people, and then he 
 had the hymns and the tunes printed on slips and circu- 
 lated all over the land, until Luther’s hymns and Luther’s 
 tunes were in the mouths of all the people. And the 
 priests said, “Luther has done us more harm by his hymns 
 than by his sermons.” 
 
 No. 22. 
 “NOW THANK WE ALL OUR GOD”’—1644. 
 
 Rev. Martin Rinxart, 1586—1649. 
 
 Martin Rinkart was a cooper’s boy, and because his 
 father was too poor to educate him, he supported himself 
 by his musical skill while he studied theology. It is not 
 always the case that a prophet has no honor among his 
 own people, and Rinkart came back to the town of his 
 birth and boyhood to be the pastor of their Church. He 
 lived among them through a terrible pestilence which raged 
 
16 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 in 1637, and then through a famine which followed it. The 
 Thirty Years’ War was also raging, and he was in full sym- 
 pathy with his people in all these troubles. The Swedish 
 army besieged. their town and demanded thirty thousand 
 thalers of the people. It was a sum far beyond their 
 ability to pay, and Rinkart went out to the enemy’s camp 
 to intercede for his townsmen. Failing in this, when 
 he returned he called on the people to gather for prayer, 
 and God answered their request; and the Swedish com- 
 mander consented to terms they were able to meet. Awhile 
 after, in 1644, as Rinkart was sitting at his study window, 
 he heard the sound of a trumpet, coming nearer and nearer. 
 His heart sank within him, for he thought the soldiers of 
 one side or the other were about to be quartered ‘again 
 upon the town. Just then his wife came in and told him 
 that the people in the street were all gathering about a 
 horseman who had just come in and had surely brought 
 some great news, for the people were shouting at the top 
 of their voices. Rinkart hurried out, and as he went his 
 people gathered about him to tell him that the horseman 
 brought the news that a treaty of peace had been signed 
 and the long war was over. Rinkart went back to his study 
 and offered up a prayer of thankfulness, and then seated 
 himself at his desk, and continued his thanksgiving by writ- 
 ing this hymn. As he finished it, a melody seemed to 
 strike his ear, and, taking up his pen, again he wrote music 
 for his hymn. The tune to which the hymn is usually 
 sung, however, is one that was composed for it by Johann 
 Kriiger, who lived at the same time as the author of the 
 hymn. This tune is usually called “Nun Danket,” these 
 being the first German words of the hymn, but in some 
 books it is known as “Wittenberg.” This is said to be the 
 best known tune in the world. In Germany, at midnight, 
 on New Year’s eve, it is the custom of every orthodox house- 
 hold to sing this hymn to this tune. It has also become 
 a very popular tune in England. It has been often used 
 in Germany on occasions of note. In Stuttgart in 1816- 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 17 
 
 1817 there was a great famine, and on July 28, 1817, the 
 first load of wheat from the new crop, which gave promise 
 that the famine was over, entered the town. It was deco- 
 rated with flowers, and the people made the day one of 
 festival and thanskgiving, and in the service this song was 
 sung. The hymn is based on the Apocryphal book of 
 Ecclesiasticus. The first two stanzas are a paraphrase of 
 Eccles, 50:22-24, which was the text of the Swedish chap- 
 lain on New Year’s day, 1649, when thanksgiving services 
 were held upon the reestablishment of peace. 
 
 No. 23. 
 “TEACH ME, MY GOD AND KING.” 
 
 Rev. Grorce Hersert, 1593—1633. 
 
 George Herbert, born three hundred years ago (1593), 
 has been called the prince and model of all country parsons. 
 When fifteen, he went to Trinity College at Cambridge, 
 and soon after he sent home to his mother (his father was 
 dead) a little poem, as a testimony, as he told her, that his 
 “noor abilities in poetry should be all and ever consecrated 
 to God’s glory.” That was a good beginning, and he kept 
 his vow as long as he lived. His whole life, as we look at 
 it through the vista of three centuries, was a continuous 
 poem, and it was all a song of praise to God; until at 
 last, just the Sunday before he died, he arose from his bed 
 and took his lute on which he had loved to play for nearly 
 his whole life, and as he took it he said: 
 
 “My God, my God, 
 My music shall find Thee, 
 And every string 
 Shall have his attribute to sing.” 
 
18 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 It was he who wrote that hymn so much admired, 
 beginning: 
 
 “Sweet day, so cool, so calm, so bright, 
 Bridal of earth and sky.” 
 
 No. 24. 
 “COME, HOLY GHOST, IN LOVE. SHED ON US.” 
 HeRMANNUs Contractus, 1013—1054. 
 
 Vent Sancte Spiritus. 
 
 In the year 1013 there was born a boy to whom they gave 
 the name of Herman. When he was seven years old, he 
 stood but a poor chance in the world. He was “bowed, 
 before and behind, and crippled and lame.” That is to 
 say, he was humpbacked, with a bent chest, otherwise de- 
 formed, and withal a paralytic. He was the son of a count, 
 and counts in those davs were expected to do hard riding 
 and hard fighting. Little Herman could do neither, so he 
 was carried off to a convent called the Convent of St. Gall, 
 to be made into a monk. If you search for his name in his- 
 tory under the family name, you will not find it, for every- 
 where he is spoken of under a nickname which his crippled 
 body suggested — Hermannus Contractus, which means 
 Herman the cripple. He grew to be a master of verse, and 
 is said to have written “many thousands” of songs, but 
 they are now unknown. It is now supposed that he wrote 
 this hymn which is now so celebrated. 
 
 This translation of it is by Rev. Ray Palmer. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 19 
 
 No. 26. 
 
 “O MORNING-STAR, HOW FAIR AND BRIGHT.” 
 “WAKE, AWAKE, FOR NIGHT IS FLYING”’—1598. 
 
 Rey. Putiurp Nicowar, 1556—1608. 
 
 In the town of Unna, Westphalia, in 1597, there raged a 
 dreadful pestilence which carried off more than fourteen 
 hundred persons. Dr. Philip Nicolai was the Lutheran 
 pastor in this town and from his window saw the almost 
 constant burial processions, and quite naturally his thoughts 
 were much about death and the future world. He wrote 
 his thoughts and published them for the good of others and 
 added to them these two hymns. For the last of the two 
 the tune is said also to have been composed by Nicolai, and 
 harmonized by Jacob Pretorius, the organist of his Church. 
 
 The translations are by Miss Catherine Winkworth. 
 
 No. 26. 
 “THE LORD DESCENDED FROM ABOVE.” 
 
 THOMAS STERNHOLD, 1500—1549. 
 
 In a little town named Awre, in Gloucestershire, England, 
 there is to be seen recorded in the parish register this 
 statement: “Let it be remembered for the honour of this 
 parish of Awre, that from it first sounded out the ‘Psalms 
 of David in English Metre, by Thomas Sternhold and John 
 Hopkins.’ ” 
 
 Thomas Sternhold held the office of “Groom of the Robes,” 
 to Henry VIII and Edward VI of England. He was him- 
 self a pure man, and was so greatly scandalized by the 
 obscene and wicked songs that were in common use in the 
 court that he undertook to provide a higher and purer 
 material by turning into English metre some of the Psalms 
 of David. This explains the peculiar language in the title 
 
20 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 which he gave to his collection. “Very mete to be used of 
 all sorts of people privately for their godly solace and com- 
 fort; laying apart all ungodly songes and ballads which 
 tend only to the nourishing of vice and corrupting of 
 youth.” The courtiers, however, preferred their old songs, 
 and would not sing Sternhold’s Psalms. But the poetry 
 and music were both better than any that had been com- 
 posed at that time, uncouth as they seem now, and so 
 they were adopted to be sung in parish churches. Among 
 all the pieces in that old collection, but two or three have 
 been thought worthy to live, and then usually in greatly 
 altered form, but one stanza of this Psalm is just as Stern- 
 hold wrote it, and it is so nearly a perfect gem that it will 
 probably live to the end of time. It is what is here used 
 as the two first stanzas of the hymn. 
 
 No. 27. 
 “LET US WITH A GLADSOME MIND”—1624. 
 
 JoHN Mixton, 1608—1674. 
 
 It has been said of Milton that “his youth and his old 
 age he devoted to himself and his fame; his middle life 
 to his country.” This rendering of the One Hundred Thirty- 
 sixth Psalm was one of the products of his youth, having 
 been written when he was a boy at school and fifteen years 
 of age. As every one knows he wrote “Paradise Lost.” 
 Just as it was finished a Quaker friend, Thomas Ellwood, 
 was visiting him, and read the poem. Then he said to 
 Milton, “Thou hast said much here of Paradise Lost; what 
 hast thou to say of Paradise Found?” Later, Ellwood vis- 
 ited Milton again, and had placed in his hand a copy of 
 “Paradise Regained,” of which Milton said to him, “This 
 is owing to you, for you put it into my head by the question 
 you asked me, which before I had not thought of.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 21 
 
 No. 28. 
 “SHEPHERD OF TENDER YOUTH.” 
 
 CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA, 150—220. 
 
 This hymn takes us farther back in point of time than 
 any other hymn known. It is usually ascribed to Clement 
 who died about the year 217, although he himself speaks of 
 it as if he had quoted it from an author earlier still. He 
 is supposed to have been born at Athens so he may have 
 heard his grandfather tell of hearing Paul preach on Mars 
 Hill. He was a heathen, however, but an earnest student. 
 He found his way to Alexandria in Egypt, where was then 
 the greatest library in the world, and here he fell under the 
 teaching of a Christian teacher, and became a convert him- 
 self. His hymn as he wrote it was a catalogue of names 
 applied to Christ; and the translation of it, as you will see, 
 only follows that idea in a very general way. Something 
 of the circumstances under which Clement lived and wrote 
 can be gathered from the following, “Daily, martyrs are 
 burned, beheaded, and crucified before our eyes.” 
 
 The translation is by Rev. Henry M. Dexter, who says, 
 “T first translated it literally into prose and then transfused . 
 as much of its language and spirit as I could into the hymn.” 
 
 No. 29. 
 “THE ROYAL BANNERS FORWARD GO”—575. 
 
 Vexilla Regis prodeunt. 
 
 VENANTIUS Fortunatus, 530—609. 
 
 In addition to their value for purposes of worship some 
 of our hymns have an interest attaching to them because 
 
22 STORIES OF THE GREAT. 
 
 of their connection with important events in history. This 
 is one of that sort. In 1670, messengers were sent out 
 among all the Indian tribes of the Northwestern territory, 
 inviting them to meet a representative of the King of France 
 at the Sault St. Marie, which is the narrow stream connect- 
 ing Lake Superior with Lake Huron. At the appointed time 
 in the spring of 1671, the chiefs of fourteen tribes with their 
 warriors and families were camping on the little stream 
 awaiting the arrival of the great Frenchman of whom they 
 had heard. On his arrival, one fine day in June of that 
 year, he led his soldiers fully armed to the top of a little hill 
 which overlooked the camp. The Jesuit priests accompanied 
 in their robes of office, and all about them were gathered the 
 wondering Indians. They had brought with them a cross, 
 and after one of the priests had pronounced upon it a bless- 
 ing, it was planted on the hill top, while all the priests and 
 soldiers who could join them sang in the Latin tongue the 
 words of this hymn: 
 
 “The Royal banners forward go, 
 The Cross shines forth with mystic glow!” 
 
 and then in the name of the King of France, St. Lusson, 
 who led the expedition, took possession of the land to the 
 ocean beyond them, and the gulf to the south. 
 
 The translation is by Rev. John Mason Neale. 
 
 No. 30. 
 “MY GOD, I LOVE THEE! NOT BECAUSE.” 
 
 Francis Xavier, 1506—1552. 
 
 Written by a Jesuit priest and missionary. He went to 
 India where he labored with extraordinary zeal and self- 
 devotion, both among the natives and the vicious Europeans 
 whom he found there. His enthusiasm rose above all fear, 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 23 
 
 and Cross in hand singing hymns as he went, he used to 
 venture amongst the worst of the heathen confident of 
 success. 
 
 No. 31. 
 “SWEET THE TIME, EXCEEDING SWEET”—1779. 
 
 Rev. Grorcr Burper, 1752—1832. 
 
 George Burder was one of the active, industrious, useful 
 ministers of a hundred years ago. The profession chosen for 
 him was that of an artist, but after preaching awhile as a 
 lay preacher, he gave up his artistic pursuits and was 
 ordained. He originated the London ‘Religious Tract So- 
 ciety,’ which has for a century almost, occupied the same 
 field in Great Britain as the American Tract Society has 
 in this country. He saw a need among the smaller villages 
 of volumes of sermons, written in a manner and upon sub- 
 jects of interest to them, and he prepared, one after another, 
 eight volumes of such sermons, which had an enormous sale, 
 reaching nearly a million copies before his death. This 
 hymn was first published in the London Evangelical Maga- 
 zine, April, 1779, and its original purpose can be gathered 
 from its title, “An Hymn for Christian Company.” 
 
 No. 32. 
 “Q JESUS CHRIST, GROW THOU IN ME”—1780. 
 
 Rev. JoHANN Caspar Lavater, 1741—1801. 
 
 Some one has said that every one ought to have a hobby. 
 Now here is a man who had a hobby. He lived 150 years 
 ago in Switzerland, and was curate of a church in Zurich. 
 He began to study the faces of his friends to see if he could 
 tell their characters from their countenances. Then he 
 
24 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 extended his study to people whom he met and gathered 
 pictures of people of whom he had heard; and at last he 
 published a book, on “Physiognomy,” in which he tried to 
 prove by these faces which he had gathered and classified 
 that character conformed to the outline of the face. 
 
 But he did better work than this, for he preached good 
 sermons, set a good example of Christian living and wrote 
 many good hymns, of which this is one. 
 
 No. 38. 
 “T KNOW THAT MY REDEEMER LIVES”—1789. 
 
 Rev. SamMueL Meptey, 1738—1799. 
 
 This hymn is a good illustration of a peculiarity of 
 Medley’s hymns. He delighted in repetition or alliteration. 
 Here are sixteen lines and fourteen of them begin with the 
 same two words. Dozens of his hymns exhibit the same 
 peculiarity. His hymns illustrate the different conditions 
 under which people lived and worked then. Books and 
 printed matter were not so plentiful, and Medley, whenever 
 he composed a hymn, printed it on a “broadside,” as it was 
 then called, for distribution among the people. After a while 
 these broadsides were SA together into a little book, 
 and published. 
 
 No. 84. 
 “AM I A SOLDIER OF THE CROSS?”—1720. 
 
 Rev. Isaac Warts, 1674—1748. 
 
 Tn the time of Doddridge and Watts it was a very common 
 practice for the minister to write a hymn appropriate to 
 the subject upon which he preached, and to give it out at 
 the close of the sermon. The method then in vogue of lining 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 25 
 
 out, two lines at a time, made this feasible. The minister 
 could read the hymn he had prepared as the closing of the 
 sermon, and the clerk could then line it out for the singers. 
 Nearly all of Doddridge’s hymns were written to be so used, 
 and it was no unusual thing for Watts. This hymn was in 
 this way read at the close of a sermon preached in 1727 
 entitled “Holy Fortitude or Remedies against Fear’; and 
 the text was “Stand fast, quit you like men, be strong.” Its 
 appropriateness to the subject is apparent, and its effect 
 upon an audience must have been great, when read for the 
 first time at the close of such a sermon, by the author him- 
 self. The hymns named below were all written for such 
 occasions by Rev. Isaac Watts. 
 
 “Blest Redeemer, how divine!” 
 
 Text: “All things whatsoever you would that men should do 
 to you, do ye even so to them.” (Matthew, 8:12.) 
 
 “Awake my zeal, awake my love.” 
 
 Text: “Whether life or death .. . all are yours.” (I Cor- 
 inthians, 3:22.) 
 
 Watts wrote three sermons and three hymns on this text: 
 
 “What shall the dying sinner do?” 
 
 Text: “I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ, for it is 
 the power of God unto salvation to every one that be- 
 lieveth.” (Romans, 1:16.) 
 
 “And is this life prolonged to me?” 
 
 Text: “Whether life or death, . . . all are yours.” (I Cor- 
 inthians, 3:22.) 
 
 Watts wrote three sermons and three hymns on this text. 
 
26 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 “Questions and doubts be heard no more.” 
 
 Text: “He that believeth on the Son of God hath the wit- 
 ness in himself.” (I John, 5:10.) 
 
 “How is our nature spoiled by sin.” 
 
 Text: “Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation.” 
 (Romans, 3:25.) 
 
 “Do I believe what Jesus saith?” 
 
 Text: “Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, what- 
 soever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, what- 
 soever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, 
 whatsoever things are of good report, if there be any virtue 
 and if there be any praise, think on these things.” (Phil- 
 lipians, 4:8.) 
 
 “Jesus! Thy blessings are not few.” 
 
 Text: “I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ; for it is 
 the power of God unto Salvation to every one that 
 believeth.” (Romans, 1:16.) Preached in 1723. 
 
 “Father of Glory! to Thy name.” 
 Text: “For through Him we both have access by one Spirit 
 unto the Father.” (Ephesians, 2:18.) Preached in 1727. 
 “O that I knew the secret place!” 
 
 Text: “Oh that I knew where I might find Him! that I 
 might come even to His seat! I would order my cause 
 before Him, and fill my mouth with arguments.” (Job, 
 23:3-4.) Preached in 1721. 
 
 “O happy soul that lives on high!” 
 
 Text: “For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in 
 God.” (Colossians, 3:3.) Preached in 1721, 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 27 
 “Do flesh and nature dread to die?” 
 Text: “Followers of them who through faith and patience 
 inherit the promises.” (Hebrews, 6:12.) 
 “Must friends and kindred droop and die?” 
 
 Text: “Whether life or death, . . . . all are yours.” (I Cor- 
 inthians 3:22.) Watts wrote three sermons and three hymns 
 on this text. 
 
 The hymns named below were all written for such occa- 
 sions by Rev. Philip Doddridge (1702—1751). 
 “Great God of heaven and earth arise.” 
 Written for a Fast Day, January 9, 1739. 
 
 “Hark the glad sound, the Saviour comes!” 
 
 Luke, 4:18-19, It is the passage beginning, “The Spirit of 
 the Lord is upon me, because He hath anointed me to 
 preach the gospel to the poor,” etc.; and the sermon was a 
 Christmas sermon preached December 28, 1735. 
 
 “Shepherd of Israel, bend Thine ear.” 
 This hymn was composed “at a meeting of ministers at 
 Bedworth, during their long vacancy.” (April 10, 1735). 
 “Arise, my tenderest thoughts, arise.” 
 
 Text: “I beheld the transgressors and was grieved: because 
 they kept not Thy word.” (Psalm 119:158.) Preached 
 June 10, 1739. 
 
 “Lord of the Sabbath! hear our vows.” 
 
 Text: “There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of 
 God.” (Hebrews, 4:9.) Preached January 2, 1736. 
 
28 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 “O God of Bethel by whose hand.” 
 
 Text: “And Jacob vowed a vow,” etc. (Genesis, 28:20- 
 22.) Preached January 16, 1736. 
 
 “Grace! ’tis a charming sound.” 
 
 Text: “By grace ye are saved.” (Ephesians 2:5.) Dodd- 
 ridge is not much more than the translator of this hymn. 
 A Moravian woman, Esther Griinbeck, born at Gotha in 
 1717 and dying in 1796, wrote a hymn beginning “Grace! 
 grace! Oh that’s a joyful sound,” and her hymn is probably 
 the foundation for this one by Doddridge. 
 
 “Sovereign of all the worlds on high.” 
 
 Text: “And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the 
 Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father.” 
 (Galatians, 4:6.) 
 
 “How gentle God’s commands.” 
 
 Text: “Casting all your care upon Him, for He careth for 
 you.” (I Peter, 5:7.) The last two lines contain an espe- 
 cially beautiful thought—exchanging a burden for a song. 
 
 “O happy day that fixed my choice.” 
 
 Text: “And all Judah rejoiced at the oath: for they had 
 sworn with all their heart, and sought him with their whole 
 desire: and he was found of them and the Lord gave them 
 rest round about.” (II Chronicles 15:15.) 
 
 “Awake, my soul, stretch every nerve.” 
 
 Text: “Not as though I had already attained, either were 
 already made perfect; but I follow after, if that I may 
 apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ 
 Jesus. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 29 
 
 “Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but 
 this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, 
 and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I 
 press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of 
 God in Christ Jesus.’ (Philippians, 3:12-14.) 
 
 “My gracious Lord, I own Thy right.” 
 
 Text: “But if I live in the flesh, this is the fruit of my 
 labor: yet what I shall choose I wot not.” (Philippians, 
 1:22.) 
 
 “God of my life, through all my days.” 
 
 Text: “While I live will I praise the Lord: I will sing praises 
 unto my God while I have any being.” (Psalm 146:2.) 
 
 “Great Source of being and of love!” 
 
 Text: Ezekiel, 47:1-12. It is the parable of healing the 
 waters of the Dead Sea, by the waters of the Sanctuary. 
 
 “The Saviour when to heaven He rose.” 
 
 Text: “And He gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; 
 and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers: 
 For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the 
 ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ.” (Ephe- 
 sians, 4:11-12.) The occasion was the ordination of the 
 Rev. Abraham Tozer, June 20, 1745. 
 
 “Let Zion’s watchmen all awake.” 
 
 Text: “Obey them that have the rule over you,” etc. 
 (Hebrews 13:17.) The special occasion being the ordina- 
 tion of a minister at Floore, in Northamptonshire, England, 
 October 21, 1736. 
 
 “See, Israel’s gentle Shepherd stands.” 
 
 Text: “But when Jesus saw it, He was much displeased, and 
 said unto them, Suffer the little children to come unto me, - 
 
30 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 and forbid them not; for of such is the kingdom of God.’ 
 (Mark, 10:14.) 
 “The King of Heaven His table spreads.” 
 Text: “And the servant said, Lord, it is done as thou hast 
 commanded, and yet there is room.” (Luke, 14:22.) 
 “And will the great eternal God.” 
 
 Text: “And of Zion it shall be said, This and that man was 
 born in her; and the Highest himself shall establish her.” 
 (Psalm, 87:5.) The special occasion was the opening of a 
 new meeting house at Oakham, England. 
 
 “Jesus, my Lord, how rich Thy grace.” 
 
 Text: “Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least 
 of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.” (Matthew, 
 25:40.) 
 
 “Father of mercies, send Thy grace.” 
 
 Text: the Parable of the Good Samaritan. (Luke, 10:30- 
 37.) 
 
 “These mortal joys how soon they fade.” 
 “Rich are the joys which cannot die.” 
 
 These are alterations of the same hymn. Text: “Provide 
 yourselves bags which wax not old, a treasure in the heavens 
 which faileth not.” (Luke, 12:33.) 
 
 “Awake ye saints and raise your eyes.” 
 
 Text: ‘Now is our salvation nearer than when we believed.” 
 (Romans, 13:11.) 
 
 “How swift the torrent rolls!” 
 
 Text: “Your fathers, where are they?” (Zechariah, 1:5.) 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 31 
 “Ye golden lamps of heaven farewell.” 
 
 Text: “The sun shall be no more thy light by day; neither 
 for brightness shall the moon give light unto thee: but the 
 Lord shall be unto thee an everlasting light, and thy God 
 thy glory. 
 
 “Thy sun shall no more go down; neither shall thy moon 
 withdraw itself: for the Lord shall be thine everlasting light, 
 and the days of thy mourning shall be ended.” (Isaiah, 
 60: 19-20.) 
 
 “Eternal Source of every joy.” 
 
 Text: “Thou crownest the year with thy goodness.” 
 (Psalm, 65:11.) 
 
 “Now let the feeble all be strong.” 
 
 Text: “There hath no temptation overtaken you but such ag 
 is common to all men: but God is faithful who will not suffer 
 you to be tempted above that you are able, but will with the 
 temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able 
 to bear it.” (I Corinthians, 10:13.) Preached June 24, 
 1739. 
 
 “Now let our mourning hearts revive.” 
 
 Text: “Moses, thy servant is dead,” etc. (Joshua, 1:2, 4, 
 5.) Preached August 22, 1736, on the death of a minister 
 at Kettering. 
 
 “Thrice happy souls, born from heaven.” 
 
 Text: “Let not thine heart envy sinners: but be thou in 
 the fear of the Lord, all the day long.” (Proverbs, 23:17.) 
 Preached March 27, 1737. 
 
 “Jesus! I love Thy charming Name.” 
 
 Text: “Unto you that believe He is precious.” (I Peter, 
 2:7.) Preached May 8, 1737. 
 
32 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 “Now let our cheerful eyes survey.” 
 
 Text: “And Aaron shall bear the names of the children of 
 Israel in the breast-plate of judgment upon his heart.” 
 (Exodus, 28:29.) His subject being, “Christ bearing the 
 names of his people on his heart.” 
 
 “Behold the amazing sight.” 
 
 Text: “And I, if I be lifted up will draw all men to me.” 
 (John, 12:32.) Preached May 8, 1737. 
 
 No. 365. 
 “FATHER, WHATE’ER OF EARTHLY BLISS.” 
 
 Miss ANNE STEELE, 1716—1778. 
 
 Miss Anne Steele was engaged to be married. The prep- 
 arations were all made for the wedding. Some of the guests 
 had already arrived and she was momentarily expecting the 
 arrival of her lover, when a messenger came with the intelli- 
 gence that he had just been drowned. Her reason almost 
 fled at the sudden shock. It has been said that this hymn 
 was the result of this early experience, but this is doubtful 
 -as her whole life was a succession of trials to any of which 
 the hymn might have applied with equal appropriateness. 
 The truth probably is that her trials led to a spirit of resig- 
 nation and contentment which pervaded all her hymns. 
 
 No. 36. 
 
 “SINCE ALL THE VARYING SCENES OF TIME”—1746. 
 
 Rev. JAMES Hervey, 1714—1758. 
 
 In the year 1729, a few students at Oxford banded them- 
 selves together under the leadership of John Wesley, and 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 33 
 
 agreed that they would attend regularly every week the 
 Sacrament of the Church, and observe the method of study 
 prescribed by the University. It is safe for us to surmise 
 from the fact that this band numbered only a few students, 
 that to be faithful to the Church and the school was the 
 exception and not the rule; and this is all the more certain 
 from the fact that this little band brought down upon them- 
 selves the sneers of the other students who gave to them 
 what they thought was the ridiculous nickname of ‘‘Method- 
 ists.” And in this little band we have the germ of the 
 great religious denomination which now bears this name. 
 James Hervey, the author of this hymn, was a member of 
 this band. 
 
 No. 37. 
 “LOVE DIVINE ALL LOVE EXCELLING”?—1749. 
 
 Rev. CHARLES WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 We are apt to think of a poet doing his work in some 
 quiet room, with books, and pictures, and statuary, and 
 flowers perhaps, about him, and this hymn seems just one 
 of the sort to be composed amid such surroundings; but 
 there is no probability that it was written under any such 
 circumstances. Charles Wesley was for a great part of his 
 life a traveling preacher, going from village to village, now 
 preaching in some Methodist home to the family and neigh- 
 bors, and again in some churchyard, with a tombstone for 
 his platform. His traveling was done on horseback, and he 
 carried little cards in his pocket, on which he used to write 
 hymns in shorthand as he jogged along the road, he and his 
 horse. Then, when on his journey he would reach an inn, 
 he would rush in and ask for pen and ink, and would write 
 out the hymn he had composed, and mounting his horse, ride 
 on-again. Once he wrote in his journal, “Near Ripley my 
 horse threw and fell upon me. My companion thought I 
 
34 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 had broken my neck; but my leg only was bruised, my hand 
 sprained, and head stunned, which spoiled my making 
 hymns till the next day.” 
 
 No. 388. 
 “COME LET US WHO IN CHRIST BELIEVE”—1741. 
 
 Rev. CuHarutes WesLry, 1708—1788. 
 
 The two Wesleys were in their day the great champions 
 of what was called the Arminian doctrine, which has ever 
 since been the distinguishing doctrine of the Methodist 
 Church, and a theological warfare was hotly waged between 
 them and the followers of Calvin, such as Whitefield, 
 Toplady, and others. One of the weapons used with great 
 effect by the Wesleys was a series of hymns, each bearing 
 upon the question at issue, and which, under the title of 
 “Hymns of God's Everlasting Love,” they spread broadcast 
 among the people in the form of tracts. This is one of these 
 theological swords with which its author sought to slay the 
 Calvinists. 
 
 No. 39. 
 “HOLY AS THOU, O LORD, IS NONE”—1762. 
 Rey. Cuartes Westey, 1708—1788. 
 
 Did it ever occur to you how the Scriptures have been 
 duplicated in our hymns? Not only their doctrines, but 
 their historical facts have been restated in verse. The 
 Psalms have been paraphrased in whole or in part by scores 
 of poets, and selected passages from every book of the Bible 
 have been made the subject of similar paraphrases. Rev. 
 Samuel Wesley, the father of John and Charles, put the 
 whole New Testament into verse, and Charles Wesley in 
 addition to versifying most of the Psalms and writing many 
 hymns based on Scripture passages, wrote nearly thirty-five 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 35 
 
 hundred (3,491) short hymns which were practically para- 
 phrases of verses selected from Genesis to Revelation. This 
 hymn is one of these on I Samuel, 2:2. 
 
 No. 40. 
 “LET EARTH AND HEAVEN AGREE”—1741. 
 Rev. Cuartes Wesiey, 1708—1788. 
 
 In the time of the Wesleys the theological warfare between 
 Calvinism and Arminianism was hotly waged. The Wesleys 
 were the champions of the Arminian faith and lost no oppor- 
 tunity for setting forth their views. One of their weapons 
 in the contest was the hymn. They wrote quite a number 
 for this special purpose, each setting forth some tenet of the 
 Arminian creed, and these they distributed widely in the 
 form of tracts, and afterward in collected form with the title 
 of “Hymns on God’s Everlasting Love.” (1741). This was 
 one of these hymns written to fight the Calvinists with. 
 The doctrine of the last two lines: 
 
 “For all my Lord was crucified; 
 For all, for all, my Saviour died.” 
 
 was a favorite one with Charles Wesley. In another of his 
 hymns on the same subject, he uses the extravagant phrase: 
 
 “Take back my interest in Thy Blood 
 Unless it streamed for all the race.” 
 No. 41. 
 “COME, SINNERS, TO THE GOSPEL FEAST’—1747. 
 Rev. CuHartes WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 One day more than a century ago (it was in 1790) a man — 
 stood under the old elm on Boston Common and began to 
 
36 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 sing. It was his method of calling together a congregation, 
 for he was a preacher who had just come to the city from 
 Connecticut, and his preaching had attracted great atten- 
 tion wherever he had been. This hymn was the song he 
 sung: “Come, sinners, to the Gospel feast,”’ and the event is 
 a notable one because the sermon. preached then and there 
 was the first Methodist sermon ever preached in Boston, 
 and it marked the beginning of Methodism in that region. 
 The singer was a notable man in his time, Jesse Lee, who 
 won for himself the title of the “Apostle of Methodism in 
 New England.” 
 
 No. 42. 
 
 “THERE IS NO FLOCK HOWEVER WATCHED AND 
 TENDED.” 
 
 Henry W. LoncreLttow, 1807—1882. 
 
 If you should ever see the journal of Henry W. Long- 
 fellow, you would find away back in 1847, the record of the 
 birth of a little daughter who was named Fannie for her 
 mother. And a little over a year later you would find an 
 entry, “Little Fannie is quite ill and lies patient and mourn- 
 ful. All thoughts center on the little sufferer—which way 
 will the balance of life and death turn?” Then he comforts 
 himself by putting in a stanza of the old German hymn of 
 Paul Gerhardt: 
 
 “Give to the winds thy fears, 
 Hope and be undismayed. 
 God hears thy sighs and counts thy tears, 
 God shall lift up thy head.” 
 
 And a few days later you would find this, “A day of agony. 
 The physicians have no longer any hope. I cannot yet 
 abandon it. Motionless she lies—only a little moan now 
 and then . , . lower and lower. Through the silent deso- 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 37 
 
 late rooms the clocks tick loud, and they all seem laboring 
 on, to the fatal hour.” And then he writes of her death. 
 And while in this sorrow the father wrote a poem called 
 “Resignation,” which is often used as a funeral hymn when 
 children are dead: 
 
 “There is no flock however watched and tended 
 But one dead lamb is there. 
 There is no fireside howsoe’er defended 
 But has one vacant chair.” 
 
 No. 48. 
 
 “I KNOW NOT THE HOUR WHEN MY LORD WILL 
 COME”—1870. 
 
 Puiuip Buiss, 1838—1876. 
 
 At the great Moody and Sankey revival services in 
 Boston in the winter of 1876, there was one singer whose 
 voice next to that of Mr. Sankey himself the great audi- 
 ences most delighted to hear. His songs were written by 
 himself and sung to music of his own composing, and were 
 full of Christian experience. One evening he rose to sing 
 and he prefaced his singing by saying, “I don’t know as I 
 shall ever sing here again, but I want to sing this as the 
 language of my heart”; and then he sang his own song just 
 written: . 
 
 “T know not the hour when my Lord will come 
 To take me away to His own dear home: 
 But I know that His presence will lighten the gloom, 
 And that will be glory for me.” 
 
 A few days later, while riding to his home in Chicago, the 
 train crashed through a rotten bridge at Ashtabula, Ohio, 
 and Mr. Bliss and his wife were burned to death. 
 
 The hymn was suggested by reading the well-known 
 book, “The Gates Ajar.” 
 
38 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 No. 44. 
 “JESUS CHRIST OUR TRUE SALVATION.” 
 
 Rev. JoHN Huss, 1369—1415. 
 
 We have many hymns that were written by people who 
 were at some time imprisoned for their fidelity to their con- 
 victions, and some that were actually written behind prison 
 bars, but this is the only one I remember that was written 
 by a martyr. John Huss was a Bohemian reformer. He 
 was excommunicated by the Romish Church; then his writ- 
 ings were collected and burned; then he was imprisoned, and 
 finally on July 6, 1415, his own birthday, he was burnt at 
 the stake. 
 
 The translation is by Rav. R. F. LirrLepa.e. 
 
 No. 46. 
 “BEHOLD THE MOUNTAIN OF THE LORD.” 
 
 MicHaeEu Bruce, 1746-1767. 
 
 Michael Bruce was the son of a Scotch weaver. He was 
 a bright boy and as pious as bright. When only a child he 
 sometimes led in the family devotions at home. His parents 
 were poor, and in order to maintain himself at school during 
 the summer he taught a school himself in the winter. He 
 belonged to a singing class in the village where they lived, 
 and at the teacher’s request he wrote some songs to be used 
 in place of some which the teacher thought unsuitable. One 
 of these was an “Ode to the Cuckoo,” and twelve were 
 hymns, and many members of the class learned them by 
 heart. But the poor boy worked and starved himself to 
 death, and when twenty years old he returned to his father’s 
 home to die. The next spring he was too weak to longer sit 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 39 
 
 up and walk about, but he wrote an “Elegy on Spring.” 
 Just listen to one stanza of it: 
 
 “Now Spring returns, but not to me returns 
 The vernal joy my better years have known; 
 Dim in my breast life’s dying taper burns, 
 And all the joys of life with health are flown.” 
 
 He had intended to publish his poems while yet he lived, but 
 his strength waned; and so he spent his last days in selecting 
 and transcribing such as he thought worthy of preservation. 
 This he did in bed, and he died in that year only twenty-one 
 years old. The manuscript he left was given by his parents 
 to a friend of their dead boy, Rev. John Logan, to be pub- 
 lished for their benefit. Awhile after he published a book 
 which he claimed contained them, but it was found only to 
 have a few, and these the poorest; but a number of years 
 later Logan published a book of poems as of his own compo- 
 sition, and lo and behold! here were the songs of Michael 
 Bruce, stolen by his friend and published as his own. This 
 hymn was one of these. 
 
 No. 46. 
 “QO MOTHER DEAR, JERUSALEM.” 
 
 D. Dickson, 1583—1663. 
 
 This hymn and the one beginning “Jerusalem my happy 
 home” have a common origin and are slightly different 
 forms of the old hymn of Bernard of Cluny, and possibly all 
 are of still earlier origin in a hymn of Gregory’s. Many 
 years ago a young Scotchman lay on his deathbed in New 
 Orleans. He was visited by a Presbyterian minister, but 
 for some time he seemed to shut himself up from all the 
 minister’s attempts to reach his heart. Discouraged, the 
 visitor turned away, and scarcely knowing what he did 
 
40 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 began to sing to himself, “Jerusalem, my happy home, name 
 ever dear to me.’ Unconsciously he had touched a tender 
 chord in the sick man’s heart, for he exclaimed, “My mother 
 used to sing that hymn’; and through the gateway of this 
 song the minister found entrance to his heart for the Gospel 
 message, 
 
 No. 47. 
 “THERE IS A LAND OF PURE DELIGHT.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Watts, 1674—1748. 
 
 Dr. Watts was born at Southampton on the south coast 
 of England. The city stands, as those of you know who 
 have landed there from any of the steamers from this coun- 
 try, between two bodies of water, and looks out toward the 
 open sea, of which the Isle of Wight intercepts the view. 
 Across the stream was the ‘‘New Forest” as it was called, 
 with its green meadows. It was this view which as a boy 
 Watts often saw, that tradition says, suggested the imagery 
 of this hymn, only part of which is given here, for it begins 
 with the well-known lines, “When I can read my title clear.” 
 
 No. 48. 
 
 “WHEN RISING FROM THE BED OF DEATH”—1712. 
 
 JosEPH Appison, 1672—1719. 
 
 For account of Addison and the Spectator, see No. 49. 
 
 This hymn appeared in the Spectator, Saturday, October 
 18, 1712, at the end of a prose article, in which occur these 
 words: “Among all the reflections which usually arise in the 
 mind of a sick man, who has time and inclination to con- 
 sider his approaching end, there is none more natural than 
 that of his going to appear naked and unbodied before Him 
 Who made him.” And this is the key-note of the hymn. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 41 
 
 No. 49. 
 
 “WHEN ALL THY MERCIES, 0 MY GOD”—1712. 
 
 JosEPH ADDISON, 1672—1719. 
 
 There is a famous old school in London known as the 
 Charterhouse. Two hundred years ago, two boys were 
 schoolmates and playmates there. One was very much of 
 a romp, never well out of one scrape before he was in 
 another, while the other was a studious, well-behaved boy, 
 who took all sorts of prizes in school for progress and 
 deportment. Yet the two boys were chums, and always 
 together. They kept up the friendship until manhood and 
 through life. The newspapers of that day were pretty poor 
 from every point of view and poorest of all from a literary 
 standpoint. They had little indeed to attract anyone. 
 These two boys, now grown to manhood, whose names by 
 the way were Richard Steele and Joseph Addison, started a 
 daily paper of a new and better kind than anything before 
 known. They called it The Spectator. The “Spectator” 
 was an imaginary character supposed to be a gentleman of 
 high culture, who had traveled abroad, and was now living 
 in London. Here he walked of a morning among the banks 
 and business houses, and later to the theaters and concerts 
 and clubs. He knew all the fine ladies and gentlemen, and 
 wherever he went he was always observing, always com- 
 menting, always criticizing. But he was a bashful man and 
 only talked to a few intimate friends. One of these has ever 
 since been a celebrated man because of the talks the ‘“Spec- 
 tator” had with him, and we have often heard of him under 
 the name of Sir Roger De Coverley. The new paper lived 
 only about a year, but while it lived it was all the go in 
 London. Gentlemen read it over their breakfasts, and ladies 
 in their parlors; and, “Have you read The Spectator?” 
 became the common question when acquaintances met. 
 
42 STORIES OF THE GREAT — 
 
 Steele and Addison furnished most if not all the matter, and 
 it differed from any other paper then published in that its 
 tone was moral and pure. Every Saturday Addison pub- 
 lished in it an essay distinctively religious, and at the end 
 of most of them he placed a religious poem. This hymn, 
 containing thirteen stanzas, was appended to an article en- 
 titled “Praise to God,” which appeared in The Spectator, 
 August 9, 1712. 
 
 No. 50. 
 “THE SPACIOUS FIRMAMENT ON HIGH”’—1712. 
 
 JosmepH AppIsoN, 1672—1719. 
 
 (See No. 49 for notice of the author and The Spectator.) 
 
 This hymn appeared in The Spectator, August 23, 1712, 
 at the close of an essay on “The Right Means to Strengthen 
 Faith.” 
 
 No. 1. 
 “THE LORD MY PASTURE SHALL PREPARE”—1712. 
 
 JosEPH AppIson, 1672—1719. 
 
 (For notes on author see No. 49.) 
 
 This hymn appeared in The Spectator for July 26, 1712, 
 at the end of an essay on “Trust in God.” In the essay there 
 is this beautiful sentence, “The person who has a firm trust 
 in the Supreme Being, is powerful in His power, wise by His 
 wisdom, happy in His happiness. He reaps the benefit of 
 every Divine attribute, and loses his own insufficiency in 
 the fullness of Infinite perfection.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 43 
 No. 82. 
 
 “O, SOMETIMES THE SHADOWS ARE DEEP.” 
 
 Erastus JOHNSON, 1826— 
 
 A poor hymn, with little poetic merit, and no particularly 
 important religious sentiment, is often brought into great 
 popularity because of its fortunate setting to a tune that 
 strikes the popular fancy. Some of the so-called “Gospel 
 hymns” and many of the Sunday school hymns are of this 
 character; and on the other hand it is equally true that 
 many a hymn that touches closely human experience and 
 does it with poetic grace remains unused because it is wedded 
 to a poor tune. I have in mind such a hymn. I know its 
 author. I have worked with him, and slept with him. A 
 man with true poetic genius, and deep piety. His whole life 
 has been a struggle with poverty and disappointment, and 
 sorrow, but he has always been true to his convictions and 
 true to his God. He was born in Maine, and with the 
 Yankee restlessness he has swapped farms from Maine to 
 California and back again; and now, an old man, still strug- 
 gling, still hoping, he is waiting for one more swap, by which 
 he will exchange a little, barren, worn-out farm in Maine 
 for a home in the fair fields of heaven. 
 
 This hymn is like the attar of roses, every stanza is the 
 expressed fragrance of a thousand of life’s roses crushed. 
 Listen: 
 
 “Oh! sometimes the shadows are deep, 
 And rough seems the path to the goal: 
 And sorrows, sometimes how they sweep, 
 Like tempests down over the soul. 
 Oh! then to the Rock let me fly 
 To the Rock that is higher than I. 
 
 “Oh sometimes how long seems the day, 
 And sometimes how weary my feet! 
 
44 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 But toiling in life’s dusty way 
 
 The Rock’s blessed shadow, how sweet! 
 Oh! then to the Rock let me fly, 
 
 To the Rock that is higher than I. 
 
 “Oh! near to the Rock let me keep, 
 If blessings, or sorrows prevail: 
 Or climbing the mountain way steep, 
 Or walking the shadowy vale. 
 Then quick to the Rock I can fly, 
 To the Rock that is higher than I. 
 
 There is the hymn, beautiful and true, but it has been 
 set to an unsingable tune, and the tune has sunk the hymn. 
 
 No. 6&8. 
 “JESUS SHALL REIGN WHERE’ER THE SUN.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Warts, 1674—1748. 
 
 On Whitsunday, 1862, on one of the Samoan Islands in 
 the South Pacific, there was gathered a wonderful assem- 
 blage. More than five thousand of the natives of the dif- 
 ferent islands were gathered there under the spreading 
 branches of the banyan trees. Foremost among them sat 
 the King of all the islands, King George the Sable. All 
 around him were seated his old chiefs and warriors, who had 
 shared with him the dangers and fortunes of many a battle, 
 and were now assembled about him to join in the ceremony 
 by which he and all the islands under his authority formally 
 abandoned heathen chiefdom, and adopted a Christian form 
 of government. Most of those present had been born as 
 heathen and many of them had been cannibals: now they 
 were, nominally at least, a Christian people, and the King 
 himself was a preacher of the gospel. What would Isaac 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 45 
 
 Watts have thought, if he could have listened, while that 
 great audience began their solemn service by singing the 
 hymn he had written a century and a half before, when 
 no missionary society had begun its work? 
 
 No. 64. 
 “GOD IS THE REFUGE OF HIS SAINTS.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Watts, 1674—1748. 
 
 The Rev. Luke Scott was a Methodist missionary to 
 Trincomalee, Ceylon. In 1863, soon after he landed, he 
 was conducting a service in the chapel and had almost 
 reached the end of the first hymn. The people were singing: 
 
 “Zion enjoys her Monarch’s love, 
 Secure against the threatening hour.” 
 
 when all at once the shock of an earthquake was felt, accom- 
 panied by a noise resembling that produced by a heavy 
 train going over a wooden bridge. The congregation was 
 thrown into alarm, but the preacher calmly gave out the 
 next lines: 
 
 “Nor can her firm foundations move 
 Built on His faithfulness and power.” 
 
 Then came the second shock very much louder than the 
 first and accompanied by an awful shaking: the noise, 
 too, was very strange, too complex for description. The 
 alarm of the people increased as the building seemed to 
 reel as though it would fall to the ground. Notwithstanding 
 this, the service was proceeded with, Mr. Scott preaching 
 from “I sought the Lord, and He heard me, and delivered me 
 from all my fears.” 
 
 Rev. Joun B. Srmon, in Wesleyan Methodist Magazine, 
 
 September, 1880. 
 
46 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 56. 
 “FROM GREENLAND’S ICY MOUNTAINS”—1819. 
 
 Rev. RecrnaLD Hesper, 1783—1826. 
 
 A general collection had been called for in all the Churches 
 of England, to be taken up on Whitsunday, 1819. A young 
 rector was visiting Dr. Shipley, his father-in-law, just at 
 that time, and on Saturday Dr. Shipley said to the young 
 minister, “Write something for them to sing in the morning.” 
 
 So the young man went over to another part of the 
 room, and soon the doctor shouted, “What have you 
 written?” and the three stanzas which had already been 
 completed were read to him. 
 
 “There, there, that will do very well.” 
 
 “No! no! the sense is not complete yet.” And so he added 
 a fourth stanza, and the Dean stopped him, and would not 
 let him write any more. 
 
 “Tet me add one more stanza,” said the young man, but 
 the Dean was inexorable. And so our Missionary Hymn 
 has but four stanzas, when its author wanted to give us 
 five. It was printed on slips that evening and sung by the 
 people next morning, but two or three years later the words 
 found their way to this country, and fell into the hands of 
 a lady in Savannah, Georgia, who liked them so much that 
 she was anxious to find a tune to suit them. She ransacked 
 her books in vain, and then happened to remember that 
 down the street there was a young bank clerk who was 
 thought to have considerable musical talent. So to him 
 she went with the hymn and asked if he could write a 
 tune to fit it. He complied, and in a half hour handed her 
 the tune that with the words is sung all over the world as 
 the “Missionary Hymn.” The Savannah bank clerk was 
 Lowell Mason. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 47 
 
 No. 86. 
 
 “ROCK OF AGES, CLEFT FOR ME”—1776. 
 
 Rev. Aucustus Montacur Topuapy, 1740—1778. 
 
 An English widow and her boy sixteen years old were 
 visiting in a country place in Ireland. The mother was a 
 member of the Church of England, and the boy was accus- 
 tomed to its service. One night he wandered past a barn 
 in which an uneducated but earnest layman was preaching. 
 The text was Ephesians 2:13: “But now in Christ Jesus 
 ye who sometimes were far off, are made nigh by the Blood 
 of Christ.” Speaking of that text long after he said, “It 
 was from that passage Mr. Morris preached on that mem- 
 orable evening. Strange, that I who had so long sat 
 under the means of grace in England, should be brought 
 nigh unto God in an obscure part of Ireland, amidst a 
 handful of God’s people met together in a barn, and under 
 the ministry of one who could hardly spell his name.” This 
 boy was Augustus Montague Toplady, author of this hymn. 
 
 If any of us could have gone into a little parish Church 
 in a quiet village in the eastern part of Devonshire, about 
 the time our national Declaration of Independence was 
 issued, we should have found a vicar leading the devotions 
 of the people, who was thus described: “He had an ethereal 
 countenance and light, immortal form. His voice was music. 
 His vivacity would have caught the listener’s eye, and his 
 soul-filled looks and movements would have interpreted his 
 language, had there not been such commanding solemnity 
 in his tones as made apathy impossible, and such simplicity 
 in his words that to hear was to understand. From easy 
 explanations he advanced to rapid and conclusive arguments, 
 and warmed into importunate exhortations, till conscience 
 began to burn, and feelings to take fire from his awe-kindled 
 spirit, and himself and his hearers were together drowned 
 
48 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 in sympathetic tears.” This is a word picture of Augustus 
 Montague Toplady and his preaching. 
 
 In the Gospel Magazine for March, 1776, there appeared 
 an article on the National Debt of England. Its enormous 
 amount was given, how much was the annual interest; and 
 the article ended with these questions and answers: “How 
 doth the Government raise this interest annually? By tax- 
 ing those who lent the principal and others. When will the 
 Government be able to pay the principal? When there is 
 more money in England’s treasury alone than there is at 
 present in all Europe. And when will that be? Never.” 
 Following this article the editor, Mr. Toplady, proceeded 
 to write what he called “A Spiritual Improvement of the 
 Foregoing,”’ in which he tried to estimate how many sins 
 each of the human race had committed, supposing he broke 
 some law of God once a day, twice a day, once an hour, and 
 so on, and then he asks the same questions concerning these 
 debts we owe to God, that had been asked as to the debt 
 owed by the Government of England. ‘When shall we be 
 able to pay off this debt we owe to God? Never. But will 
 not God accept of us less than we owe, and so enable us 
 to pay? Impossible!” And then he turns to Christ as the 
 only hope. “Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of 
 the law, and then he gives this hymn.” 
 
 Gladstone has translated this hymn into both Latin and 
 Greek, but it has been also translated into a great many of 
 the living languages of the world, as well as into the dead 
 ones. Rey. Dr. Pomeroy, during a tour through Eastern 
 countries, found his way into an Armenian Church in Con- 
 stantinople, while the congregation were singing. The 
 words he could not understand, but it was evident that the 
 singers were singing “with the understanding”, and were in 
 earnest in their song. All sang with closed eyes, as if in 
 prayer, and as the melody proceeded, he saw that tears 
 were starting here and there and trickling down the singers’ 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 49 
 
 cheeks. He was interested to know what words could 
 awaken such emotions, and found that it was a translation 
 into their language of our English hymn “Rock of Ages.” 
 
 No. 57 
 “T ASK NOT NOW FOR GOLD TO GILD.” 
 
 JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER, 1807—1892. 
 
 In the town of Haverhill, Massachusetts, there lived a 
 Quaker farmer, with an industrious, hard-working boy. He 
 had few advantages of school or books, but he improved 
 such as he had, and now and then wrote a bit of poetry. 
 While he was still a farmer’s boy, he sent, with great timi- 
 dity, one of these little poems to the editor of a little paper 
 published in the neighbouring town of Newburyport. The 
 editor going to his office one day found the poem tucked 
 under the door. It was written on coarse paper in blue 
 ink, and thinking it was mere worthless rhyme, he was 
 about to throw it into the waste basket, when he suddenly 
 changed his mind, and read it through. He thought he 
 discerned in it the genius of true poetry, and published it. 
 Soon other poems came from the same source, and at last 
 the editor, who was none other than William Lloyd Gar- 
 rison, afterward the great apostle of anti-slavery, inquired 
 of the postman where these letters came from, and got the 
 reply that he believed they ,were sent by a farmer’s boy 
 over in East Haverhill. ‘I will ride over and see that 
 farmer’s boy,” said Mr. Garrison, and when he went he 
 found the young poet at work with his father on the farm. 
 This was the introduction to the world of literature of 
 John Greenleaf Whittier, “the Quaker Poet,’ who wrote 
 this hymn, and whose poetry has been probably more widely 
 read than that of any other American poet unless it be 
 H. W. Longfellow. 
 
50 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 58. 
 
 “LEAD, KINDLY LIGHT! AMID THE ENCIRCLING 
 GLOOM”—1833. 
 
 Rev. JouN Henry Newman, 1801—1890. 
 
 John -Henry Newman was a clergyman of the Church 
 of England, and one of the leaders in what was called the 
 “High Church Party.” At the time this hymn was written 
 he was on a voyage in the Mediterranean Sea. He was sick 
 in body and depressed in spirits. A great discussion was 
 going on in the Church at home, in which he had borne a 
 leading part, and in which he took an intense interest. He 
 was wavering in his own views, not of personal faith, but 
 as to whether he should remain in the Church of England 
 or go over to the Roman Catholic Church. He was honestly 
 and earnestly seeking for light, and this hymn, written 
 there on shipboard in the Mediterranean Sea, was his 
 prayer for guidance. To him the answer came that led 
 him some years later to join the Romish Church, and he 
 became one of its Cardinals, and one of its ablest men. 
 But seekers for light and guidance of all religious faiths 
 are using his hymn, and finding it helpful. 
 
 No. 59. 
 “WHAT OUR FATHER DOES IS WELL.” 
 
 Rev. BENJAMIN SCHMOLKE, 1672—1737. 
 
 Benjamin Schmolke, a Silesian, wrote this hymn in Ger- 
 man. It was a hymn for farmers to be sung when the 
 harvests were bad, but by the translation into English 
 has been made one of our best hymns of submission to the 
 Will of God, in all the events of life. Schmolke wrote more 
 than a thousand hymns. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 51 
 
 No. 60. 
 “WALK IN THE LIGHT! SO SHALT THOU KNOW.” 
 
 BrrnarpD Barton, 1784—1849. 
 
 Bernard Barton was a Quaker, and in England bore 
 the title of the “Quaker Poet,” as Whittier has borne it in 
 America. At twenty-six, he became clerk in a bank in 
 England, and stayed there forty years until he died. After 
 he had been there thirty years and more, he said in a letter 
 dated the eleventh month, sixteenth day of 1843, “I took 
 my seat on the identical stool I now occupy at the desk to 
 the wood of which I have now well-nigh grown, in the 
 third month of the year 1810, and there I have sat for 
 three and thirty years beside the odd eight months without 
 one month’s respite in all that time. I often wonder that 
 my health has stood this sedentary probation as it has and 
 that my mental faculties have survived three and thirty 
 years of putting down figures in three rows, casting them 
 up and carrying them forward, ad infinitum.” 
 
 No. 61. 
 “JESUS! I LOVE THY CHARMING NAME.” 
 
 Rev. Pururp DoppripGr, 1702—1751. 
 
 In 1702, almost two hundred years ago, in London, there 
 was born a boy, the twentieth child of his mother, and at 
 his birth he seemed too feeble to live; but live he did, and 
 when a child his mother used to show him the pictures on 
 the Dutch tiles with which their fireplace was adorned and 
 tell him the story about them. They represented Bible 
 scenes, and so his mind was stored with Bible stories, and 
 with them Bible truths, before he could read them himself. 
 
52 ‘STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 Later he became a minister, a teacher, and an author. He 
 it was who wrote the book called “The Rise and Progress 
 of Religion in the Soul,” which had a circulation unequalled 
 perhaps by any other book in that century. As was the 
 custom with many preachers in those times he usually ended 
 his sermons with a hymn written to enforce the truth he 
 had been preaching upon. One Sunday he preached a 
 sermon from the text “Unto you that believe He is precious.” 
 (I Peter, 2:7.) and he wrote this hymn to be sung at the 
 close of that sermon. 
 
 No. 62. 
 “OQ THOU, FROM WHOM ALL GOODNESS FLOWS.” 
 
 Rev. THomas Hawets, 1732—1820. 
 
 What the author of this hymn thought about the way 
 church singing should be conducted may be gathered from 
 what he said in the preface to a hymn book he compiled 
 and in which this hymn appeared in 1792. He wrote: 
 “Even in our public worship the voice of joy and gladness 
 is too commonly silent, unless in that shameful mode of 
 psalmody, now almost confined to the wretched solo of a 
 parish clerk, or to a few persons huddled together in one 
 corner of the church, who sing to the praise and glory of 
 themselves, for the entertainment or oftener for the weari- 
 ness of oe congregation; an absurdity too glaring to be 
 overlooked, and too shocking to be ridiculous.” 
 
 No. 63. 
 “JESUS, THY BLOOD AND RIGHTEOUSNESS.” 
 
 This hymn has required the work of three people to 
 prepare it for our use. Paul Eber was a German Lutheran 
 
 ° 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH ; 53 
 
 who was born in 1511, and died in 1569. He was one of 
 Luther’s friends and Melanchthon’s, too. The first stanza 
 of this hymn, which then began, “Jesus, Thy robe of right- 
 eousness,” he wrote. Count Zinzendorf (1700-1760) was 
 a Bohemian Nobleman, and a noble man. He wrote two 
 thousand hymns, and later improvised them on the occasions 
 when they were used. He was a preacher as well as a 
 poet, and was the protector and patron of the Moravians, 
 when they were driven out of their home in Austria. He 
 visited their missionaries in the West Indies, and on the 
 Island of St. Eustatius he took this stanza of Paul Eber’s 
 and added thirty-two more of his own. Then came John 
 Wesley, the founder of Methodism, and translated the 
 whole into English in 1740. 
 
 There is a sweet little story told how Queen Christiana 
 of Prussia saw one day a very beautiful little girl, a 
 daughter of the palace gardener, playing among the flowers, 
 and had the child brought to her in the palace and placed 
 in a chair near her at dinner time. She was enjoying in 
 anticipation the delight and surprise she thought the child 
 would show at the beautiful things about her, but instead 
 of looking about at these things the little girl quietly bowed 
 her head, and before all the guests at the dinner of the 
 Queen, she softly repeated a translation of the first stanza 
 of this hymn: 
 
 “Christ’s dear Blood and righteousness 
 Be to me as jewels given. 
 Crowning me when I shall press 
 Onward through the gates of heaven.” 
 
54 . STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 No. 64. 
 “THE LORD MY SHEPHERD IS.” 
 
 Rey. Isaac Warts, 1674—1748. 
 
 It may not be amiss now and then for us to do a little 
 “looking backward,” and to compare our hymns with those 
 our ancestors sang. When the Pilgrims landed on Plymouth 
 Rock in 1620, they brought with them “Ainsworth’s Psalms.” 
 This had a prose translation of each Psalm and a para- 
 phrase in so-called verse. Here is his version of this Psalm. 
 
 “1. Jehovah feedeth me, I shall not lack. 
 
 2. In grassy folds, he down dooth make me lye: 
 he gently-leads me, quiet waters by. 
 
 3. He dooth return my soul: for his name sake, 
 in paths of justice leads-me-quietly. 
 
 4. Yea, though I walk, in dale of deadly-shade, 
 ile fear none yll; for with me thou wilt be: 
 thy rod thy staff eke, they shall comfort me. 
 
 5. Fore me, a table thou hast ready-made; 
 in their presence that my distressers be: 
 Thou makest fat mine head with ointing-oil; 
 
 6. my cup abounds. Doubtless good and mercie 
 shal all the dayes of my life folow me: 
 also within Jehovah’s howse, I shal 
 to length of days, repose-me-quietlie.” 
 
 This Twenty-third Psalm is one of the easiest of the 
 whole 150 to versify, and you can easily imagine what 
 some of the more difficult ones would be under the spell 
 of Ainsworth’s muse. A few years later the worthy Pilgrims 
 became discontented with these Psalms, and clamored for 
 something better; so certain of their own ministers set to 
 work on an improvement, and soon produced what is known 
 as “The Bay Psalm Book.” For a hundred years and more 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 55 
 
 this was the New England hymn book; and here is the same 
 Psalm as they sang it: 
 
 a 1e 
 
 2. 
 
 The Lord to me a shepherd is, 
 Want therefore shall not I, 
 
 He in the folds of tender grass 
 Doth make me down to lie; 
 
 He leads me to the waters stili. 
 Restore my soul doth he; 
 
 In paths of righteousness he will 
 For his name sake lead me. 
 
 In valley of death’s shade although 
 I walk, I’ll fear none ill: 
 
 For thou me with thy rod, also 
 Thy staff me comfort will. 
 
 Thou hast fore me a table spread 
 In presence of my foes: 
 
 Thou dost anoint with oil my head, 
 My cup it overflows. 
 
 Goodness and mercy my days all 
 Shall surely follow me: 
 
 And in the Lord’s house dwell I shall 
 So long as days shall be.” 
 
 Perhaps we can by comparison with these two paraphrases 
 of this familiar Psalm as our ancestors sang it, appreciate 
 the beauty of the one we now use, by Isaac Watts. It 
 contains only four more words than the English translation 
 of the Psalm as we have it in the Bible, and a pleasant way 
 to sing it is to repeat the Bible verse as we remember it and 
 then sing the corresponding verse of the hymn, to the tune 
 of “Dennis.” 
 
 During the civil war a soldier from a New England home 
 was marching upon the enemy with fixed bayonet and at 
 
56 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 a double quick time. While thus running to meet what he 
 felt might be sudden death, these lines flashed through his 
 mind: 
 “The Lord my Shepherd is, 
 I shall be well supplied; 
 Since He is mine, and I am His, 
 What can I want beside?” 
 
 The thought came, “Oh, how I wish I could say, ‘The 
 Lord my Shepherd is!’” Then, suddenly, while rushing on, 
 he turned the wish into a resolve, and said, ‘““The Lord my 
 Shepherd shall be!’”’ Relating his experience months after- 
 wards to a company of Christian Commission Delegates, 
 he said, “and, dear friends, He has been ever since.” 
 
 H. Porter Smitu, of Cambridge, Massachusetts, 
 in Congregationalist, November 1, 1888. 
 
 No. 65. 
 
 Miss Auice Carry, 1820—1871. 
 Miss PHorse Carry, 1824—1871. 
 
 In a family of-nine children in a little settlement in Ohio 
 sixty years ago, there were two sisters whose names have 
 more frequently been spoken together than separately. 
 Their parents were poor; so poor that one of the sisters 
 said that “the first fourteen years of my life it seemed as if 
 there was nothing in existence but work. The whole family 
 struggle was just for the right to live free from the curse 
 of debt.” Worn out with the care of so great a family, 
 the mother died when they were young, and a step-mother 
 soon’ took her place. The girls wanted to read at night 
 when their work was done, but she would not give them 
 candles; but the girls got saucers of lard, and a rag, and by 
 that light they read and wrote. They had one secret which 
 they kept) from:each other, and that was that each wrote 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 57 
 
 poetry. And so they went along side by side, together, 
 each guarding her secret from the other until, when she was 
 fourteen, Phoebe wrote a poem that was accepted and pub- 
 lished in a paper. Alice, her sister, was four years older, 
 but it was three years later before she got a poem into print. 
 This was the childhood of Alice and Phoebe Carey. 
 
 No. 66. 
 ~JROUS, SILL LEAD ON?-T 721: 
 
 Count Nicuouas Louis’ ZinzenvorF, 1700—1760. 
 
 The author was Nicholas Louis Zinzendorf, a Bohemian 
 Count, and one of the most remarkable men of the eigh= 
 teenth century. When a child he used to gather children 
 together to pray, and wrote letters to the Saviour. From 
 eleven to sixteen he was at school at Halle, and formed 
 himself and his companions into a religious order named 
 the “Order of the Mustard Seed,” with its mottoes and 
 insignia; so that the Y. M. C. A. and the Y. P.S. of C. E., 
 cannot claim to have been first in banding young Christians 
 together in organized form. He began hymn writing when 
 only a boy, and continued it all his life long, and some of 
 his hymns were improvised. He used to preach, too, and 
 said that “after the discourse I generally announce another 
 hymn appropriate to the subject. When I cannot find one 
 I compose one.” He wrote in all about two thousand hymns. 
 He was also a great believer in singing as a means of reli- 
 gious improvement, and organized meetings for practice. 
 He had a wonderful memory and would often sing stanzas 
 from various hymns and intersperse them with stanzas of 
 his own composed at the moment. 
 
 This hymn was translated by Jane Borthwick, an English 
 lady. ; 
 
58 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 67. 
 “LORD, IT BELONGS NOT TO MY CARE.” 
 
 Rev. Ricuarp Baxter, 1615—1691. 
 
 The present age is none the better that it has set aside 
 so many of the books that proved helpful to past genera- 
 tions. The older people of today will remember that when 
 libraries were smaller, and books in laymen’s houses fewer, 
 “Baxter’s Call,” and “Baxter’s Saints’ Rest,” were two of 
 the “old stand-bys,” depended upon to bring the children 
 into the kingdom, and to comfort those already in. Nothing 
 worth mentioning distinguished the boyhood of Baxter. He 
 was chaplain of one of Cromwell’s regiments and after the 
 Restoration was chaplain to Charles Second. He was im- 
 prisoned once for the character of his preaching. Later 
 he was fined for a paraphrase of the New Testament, and 
 being unable to pay the fine was again imprisoned. This 
 hymn was written in the latter part of his life, and is the 
 experience of a persecuted, sick man, tired of life, yet willing 
 to live, and leaving the whole affair to God. He entitled 
 it “The Covenant and Confidence of Faith,’ and at the 
 end of it he wrote this note, “This covenant my dear wife 
 in her former sickness subscribed with a cheerful will.” 
 She was already dead, but she had been a great comfort 
 to him, having shared some of his prison life with him. 
 
 No. 68. 
 “HOW BRIGHT APPEARS THE MORNING STAR.” 
 
 Rev. Pump Nicouar, 1556—1608. 
 
 In the town of Unna, in Westphalia, in 1597, there raged 
 a dreadful pestilence which carried off above fourteen hun- 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 59 
 
 dred persons. Dr. Philip Nicolai was the Lutheran pastor 
 there and saw from his window the almost constant burial 
 - processions. Naturally his thoughts were much about death 
 and the future world, and for the benefit of others he pub- 
 lished his thoughts in a book, to which he added two hymns 
 written at this time, this being one of the number. The 
 music for it he arranged himself from a popular secular song. 
 It was translated by two brothers-in-law, Philip Pusey and 
 Algernon Herbert. 
 
 No. 69. 
 “IN THE CROSS OF CHRIST I GLORY.” 
 
 JoHN Bowrine, 1792—1872. 
 
 It is a singular fact that one of the favorite hymns of 
 Trinitarians was written by a Unitarian. John Bowring 
 was an English Knight, and can claim to have been almost 
 a universal genius, or at least to have distinguished himself 
 in many and quite different departments of life. He was 
 a prominent writer in defense of the principles of Unitarian- 
 ism. He sat in the English Parliament for ten years, and 
 was the consul of that government at Canton, and later 
 the Governor of Hongkong, and went on a special political 
 mission to Siam. He wrote a biography of Jeremy Bentham, 
 the Unitarian theologian, books of travel in the Philippine 
 Islands and in Siam, a book of morals for young people, 
 books on commercial affairs: studied the Russian language 
 and published a book of Russian poetry translated into 
 English; did the same with Spanish, the Dutch, the 
 Polish, the Hungarian, and the Bohemian. And even 
 this list only partly tells the story of his life work. The 
 first line of this hymn is inscribed on its author’s 
 tombstone. 
 
60 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 70. 
 “COME, HOLY SPIRIT, HEAVENLY DOVE.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Watts, 1674—1748. 
 
 A young man, who had been a leader of gay companions, 
 was induced one evening to attend a religious meeting, and 
 the Word of God to which he listened went lke an arrow 
 to his heart. To stifle his convictions he went to a public 
 house near by where he and his companions often spent 
 the nights in revelry. His talent for singing made him a 
 welcome comer always, and he was called on for a song. 
 He began some rollicking piece, but in the very midst of — 
 it the words all seemed to vanish from his memory, and he 
 tried in vain to recall them. But in their place there came 
 rushing into his mind, the words, probably learned in boy- 
 hood, at church, or home: 
 
 “Come, Holy Spirit, heavenly Dove, 
 With all Thy quickening powers. 
 
 Come shed abroad a Saviour’s love, 
 And that shall kindle ours,” 
 
 As he had before left the house of prayer, he now left 
 
 the house of revelry, with humbled pride, and shortly after 
 he began a Christian life. 
 
 No. 71. 
 “THERE WERE NINETY AND NINE THAT SAFELY LAY.” 
 
 Miss ExizasetH C. CLEPHANE, 1830—1869. 
 
 A lady in Scotiand, reading the parable of the Good 
 Shepherd, was much impressed with the thought of Christ 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 61 
 
 leaving the glories of heaven, and becoming a seeker of 
 men who had gone astray, and she put her thoughts’ into 
 verse. The little poem was published in a religious maga- 
 zine in Scotland, and so drifted into newspapers in various 
 places. This was in 1868. Six years later Moody and 
 Sankey, after a series of wonderful revival meetings through 
 Scotland, were on the way from Edinburgh to Glasgow to 
 hold a farewell meeting there. Glasgow had been the scene 
 of perhaps their most successful work, and this meeting 
 promised to be one of great interest. Mr. Sankey wished 
 to introduce some new hymn which would represent Christ 
 as a compassionate and all-sufficient Saviour. Before get- 
 ting on the train he gathered up at a newsstand several 
 papers to read on the cars, and in one of them he found 
 these verses. “There,” said he; “that’s just the hymn I 
 have been wanting for the Glasgow meeting.” 
 
 Next day, as he tells it, “This little tune or chant that 
 it is set to came to me,” and before he had written the tune 
 down upon paper, he put the little newspaper scrap before 
 him on the organ, and sang it to the people. And now a 
 very strange thing occurred: away in the gallery there sat 
 a lady who was at first startled and then greatly affected 
 at the song; and she sent a little note to Mr. Sankey 
 saying, “I thank you for having sung my dead sister’s 
 hymn.” 
 
 No. 72. 
 “NOW IS THE ACCEPTED TIME.” 
 
 JoHN Dose, 1757—1840. 
 
 A hundred years ago, if we had visited a Baptist Church 
 in Skinner Street, Poole, in Dorsetshire, England, we should 
 have noticed conspicuous among the worshipers a very tall 
 man; and if we had asked who it was, we should have been 
 
62 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 told it was “Old Doble.” “Old Doble’s” real name was 
 John Dobell, a somewhat remarkable and eccentric man 
 whose occupation was that of port gauger of liquors. His 
 wife was a member of the church, but his name does not 
 appear upon its records. He had considerable leisure, which 
 he used mostly in the writing of religious books. One day 
 he visited a lady who was sick, and she said to him, “I 
 wish I could see before I die a hymn book full of Christ and 
 His Gospel, and without any mixture of freewill or merit.” 
 Such a hymn book he set himself to compile. He contributed 
 to it about twenty of his own compositions, this hymn among 
 the number. 
 
 No. 73. 
 “COME YE DISCONSOLATE, WHERE’ER YE LANGUISH.” 
 Tuomas Moorg, 1799—1852. 
 
 Tom Moore was an Irish boy, the son of a Dublin grocer. 
 He was a youthful prodigy, and when only a child excited 
 admiration by his recitations. When fourteen years of age 
 his verses were so well written as to appear in the Dublin 
 Magazine, While a young man, he became an actor in a 
 theatre at Kilkenny, and fell in love with one of the actresses 
 and married her. There is nothing to indicate that he 
 was in any sense a Christian man or even lived with any 
 very high moral purpose, and yet he wrote and published 
 thirty-three “Sacred Songs,” some of which find place in 
 nearly all our collections. If it may be said of Sir John 
 Bowring’s hymn, “In the Cross of Christ I glory,” that it 
 indicates a theology in his heart different from and better 
 than that in his head, it may be said of Tom Moore’s hymns, 
 that they prove that there may be a religion of the head 
 which never appears in the life. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 63 
 No. 74. 
 “GLORY TO THEE, MY GOD, THIS NIGHT.” 
 
 BisHorp THomas Ken, 1637—1711. 
 
 Old Izaak Walton, the patron saint of all the fishermen, 
 married a girl named Ann Ken. She had a little brother 
 whose care fell upon her when his mother died, as she 
 died when the little boy was five years old. When thirteen 
 years of age the boy went to Winchester School, and 
 although that was two hundred and fifty years ago (1650), 
 his name scratched upon one of the posts is still shown to 
 visitors. He became a clergyman of the Church of England, 
 and later one of its bishops. He had the courage of his 
 convictions and was a prisoner at one time in the Tower of 
 London because of his refusal to do what he deemed a 
 wrong. He was chaplain to King Charles Second at one 
 time, and after a night of revelry King Charles would often 
 say, “Now I must go and hear good Bishop Ken tell me 
 my faults.” He never forgot his school, and composed for 
 the boys who attended it a “Manual of Prayers,’ which 
 became very popular. In this book he inserted three quite 
 long hymns, which he entitled, respectively, “A Morning 
 Hymn,” “An Evening Hymn,” and “A Midnight Hymn.” 
 In his advice to the students he says, “Be sure not to omit 
 the morning, evening, and midnight hymn.” Each one of 
 these hymns ended with the stanza now universally sung 
 by Christians, “Praise God from Whom all blessings flow,” 
 and this hymn is a part of his “Evening Hymn.” 
 
 The tune now called “Evening Hymn,” but which was at 
 first called “Canon,” is older than the hymn, and it is 
 reasonably certain that it was the first one used with it, 
 so that hymn and tune have kept together for two hundred 
 and fifty years. Thomas Tallis, the composer, was an 
 organist in Waltham Abbey and served in connection with 
 the Royal Chapel under four sovereigns, King Henry 
 
64 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 Highth, King Edward, and Queens Mary and Elizabeth. 
 Organists who get good salaries nowadays may be better 
 contented by comparing theirs with his, which was seven 
 pence a day. 
 
 A drunken printer of London was Roger Miller, but he 
 became a missionary working among the poor and the out- 
 cast of the same city where he had once caroused. In 1847 
 his mother died, and he started by railroad from London 
 to Manchester to attend the funeral. It was late at night, 
 and Miller had suggested singing Ken’s evening hymn, that 
 day might end with a devotional song. Among the stanzas 
 were these: 
 
 “Teach me to live that I may dread 
 The grave as little as my bed. 
 Teach me to die, that so I may 
 Rise glorious at the judgment day.” 
 
 Never did the singing of earth come nearer to blending with 
 the song of heaven, for scarcely had they ended their eve- 
 ning hymn when there came the crash of colliding cars and 
 Roger Miller was dead. 
 
 No. 768, 
 “ABIDE WITH ME! FAST FALLS THE EVENTIDE.” 
 
 Rev. Henry F. Lyte, 1793—1847. 
 
 The circumstances under which this hymn was written are 
 peculiarly sad. The author was curate of “a sea-faring 
 folk” at Brixham, Devonshire, England. Here he “made 
 hymns for his little ones, and hymns for his hardy fisher- 
 men, and hymns for sufferers like himself.” He had been 
 in poor health, and it had been decided that he must make 
 a trip to some more southern climate. Of this trip he said, 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 65 
 
 “While I talk of-flying, I am just able to crawl, and ask 
 myself whether I shall be able to leave England at. all.” 
 Before leaving he met his people once more in a Communion 1 
 Service, and spoke some parting words. At its close, he | 
 dragged himself to his room and remained there a long 
 time. That evening he gave to a relative this hymn, written 
 undoubtedly during the twilight of that Sabbath day. It 
 recorded his own feelings; ‘“‘the darkness” was “deepening,” 
 “life’s little day” was “ebbing swiftly to its close,’ and not 
 long afterward on this very journey, at Nice, France, he 
 died. An English magazine in 1887 invited its readers 
 to send in lists of what they considered to be the hundred 
 best hymns. About thirty-five hundred lists were received, 
 and this hymn stood second in favor among the hymns, 
 “Rock of Ages” only receiving more votes. 
 
 Rev. George D. Baker of Philadelphia, when once at 
 Nice, went to see the poet’s grave and found there a young 
 man in tears who had been led to Christ through this hymn. 
 
 No. 76. 
 “GUIDE ME, O THOU GREAT JEHOVAH.” 
 
 Rev. WiLuiAM W1.uiAMs, 1717—1791. 
 
 The author began studying medicine, but a sermon he 
 listened to one day preached in a churchyard, turned him 
 to Christ and to the work of the ministry. Opposed to the 
 Established Church, he became an itinerant Methodist 
 preacher, and spent fifty years in hurrying from place to 
 place all over Wales, to preach the Gospel. His sermons 
 were eloquent and they came hot from his heart and greatly 
 stirred the audiences who heard them. At a meeting of 
 ministers, Howell Harris, who, by the way, was the preacher 
 whose sermon in the churchyard was the means of Williams’ 
 conversion, challenged his brother ministers to try their 
 
66 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 hands at composing a few stanzas to be read at their next 
 meeting. Williams had never tried his pen at poetry, but 
 now he tried it and with such success that he went on writ- 
 ing in both Welsh and English until his reputation as a 
 hymn writer was as great as it was as an orator, and he was 
 called the “Watts of Wales.” This hymn is one of those 
 written first in Welsh, and afterward translated into English. 
 
 No. 77. 
 “THERE IS A BOOK THAT ALL MAY READ.” 
 
 Rev. JoHN Kesie, 1792—1866. 
 
 A clergyman of the Church of England who added to 
 native talent, a fine education, and poetic taste, became the 
 leader of a new movement in that Church intended to bring 
 more into prominence and honor, its sacred days, its ritual 
 and service. From it perhaps has grown what we now 
 know as High Churchism. As leisure gave him opportunity, 
 he wrote short poems intended to celebrate the Church days 
 and festivals of the year. It was not his plan to publish 
 these, but “to go on improving the series all his life and 
 leave it to come out, if judged useful, only when he should 
 be fairly out of the way.” For the sake of getting the 
 benefit of their suggestions and criticisms he read some of 
 these poems to intimate friends, and so their existence be- 
 came known, and their publication was insisted upon. This 
 is the history of a volume of poems known as “The Chris- 
 tian Year: Thoughts in verse for the Sundays and Holidays 
 throughout the year,” published in 1827, when John Keble 
 was but thirty-five, which has had such a sale both in 
 England and America as to make it one of the wonders 
 in the history of publishing. He clung to his original idea 
 of improving the poems, and embodied his improvements 
 in successive editions as they appeared, until a few days 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 67 
 
 before he died he gave the final revision to the ninety-sixth 
 edition. Scarcely a hymn book has been issued for many 
 years either in England or America, that has not contained 
 some of the.hyinns of John Keble, taken from ‘The Chris- 
 tian Year.” This is one of them. 
 
 No. 78. 
 “FAR FROM THE WORLD, O LORD, | FLEE.” 
 
 Wiuu1amM Cowper, 1731—1800. - 
 
 Cowper was easily depressed by his surroundings. At 
 one time he became quite insane and was placed under the 
 charge of a physician. Upon his cure he went to reside at 
 Huntingdon, and on the way he enjoyed one of the seasons, 
 of religious ecstacy which often came to him between his 
 periods of depression. Upon reaching his destination he 
 found himself among strangers, and at once felt a depres- 
 sion coming over him. He withdrew from the room, and 
 prayed for encouragement. God cheered him, and the next 
 day at church the devotion of a stranger sitting near him 
 greatly delighted him. Now full of joy, he went from the 
 House of God, to that same place, where he had found 
 happiness the night before and wrote this hymn as an ex- 
 pression of his feelings and gave it the name “Retirement.” 
 
 No. 79. 
 “ALL HAIL THE POWER OF JESUS’ NAME”—1779. 
 
 Rev. Epwarp PERRONET, 1726—1792 
 
 In the diary of Charles Wesley, about the year 1750, 
 there may be found references to a man with whom he had 
 
68 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 become so intimate that he often writes of him as “Ned.” 
 This was Rev. Edward Perronet, a preacher of the Methodist 
 connection. The treatment received in those days by the 
 Methodist preachers may be imagined from ohe quotation 
 from Wesley’s diary dated 1749 as follows: “From Roch- 
 dale went to Bolton, and soon found that the Rochdale lions 
 were lambs in comparison with these at Bolton. Edward 
 Perronet was thrown down and rolled in mud and mire. 
 Stones were hurled and windows broken,” etc. This is the — 
 man who wrote the hymn “All hail the power of Jesus’ 
 name.” <A tune for the hymn was composed by a friend 
 of the author, William Shrubsole, who was a music teacher, 
 and the tune with one stanza of the hymn was published 
 together in The Gospel Magazine, November, 1779. The 
 tune was called “Miles Lane.” It is seldom used now, but 
 Dr. Robinson gives it in his “Spiritual Songs.” Perhaps it 
 may serve to fix the author and the composer in our minds 
 if I quote the last clause of Mr. Perronet’s will, as follows: 
 “Tastly, I do here give and bequeath all and every property 
 I am at this time or may be at the time of my decease 
 possest of, both real and personal, to the afore mentioned 
 Mr. William Shrubsole, and to his heirs, to be by them 
 enjoyed and disposed of as they shall see meet for ever, 
 in consideration of his respect for me, his services to me, 
 and that pure and disinterested affection he has ever shown 
 me from our first acquaintance even when a proverb of 
 reproach, cast off by all my relations, disinherited unjustly 
 and left to sink or swim as afflictions and God’s providence 
 should appoint.” 
 
 “An interesting incident is told in connection with ‘Miles 
 Lane,’ and the late Henry Smart. It was formerly the 
 custom for the organist to play a short interlude between 
 every verse of the hymn. In Smart’s early days there were 
 some grumblers (the race is not yet quite extinct) who 
 adversely criticised his manner of playing the organ in the 
 service. Smart said nothing, but waited his opportunity. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 69 
 
 It came when ‘Mile’s Lane’ was to be sung. He started it 
 in the original key, C. All went well at the first verse, 
 and a ‘hearty sing’ was in prospect. In the interlude be- 
 tween verses one and two Smart modulated, almost imper- 
 ceptibly, into D flat, a semitone higher. Between verses 
 two and three he modulated into D, when it was found 
 the high notes on ‘Crown Him’ did not come quite so 
 easily. Between verses three and four, a semitone higher 
 still, until the high notes of these and the remaining verses 
 must have made the acquaintance of the ‘Lost Chord.’ 
 Needless to say that the young organist effectually silenced 
 his critics by this clever display of skill.” 
 F. G. Epwarps in Nonconformist Musical Journal, 
 September, 1890. 
 
 “Some months ago the Fourth Massachusetts regiment 
 was marching to battle. They had become quite wearied, 
 and some of the men were even falling out by the way, 
 when a soldier struck up that noble tune ‘Coronation’ to 
 the well known words, ‘All hail the power of Jesus name.’ 
 The effect was electric. The fine old tune rose as upon 
 wings from the lips of the soldiers, and flew along the 
 columns with such vigor and zest, that the troop sprang 
 along with invigorated spirits; proving this grand old song 
 to be as inspiring in the army as in the prayer meeting.” 
 
 Ladies’ Repository, March, 1865, 
 
 No. 80. 
 “OH! SING TO ME OF HEAVEN,” 
 
 Mrs. Mary S8. B. SHINDLER, 1810. 
 
 On one occasion when a little Irish boy was sitting on 
 the doorstep, and singing, ‘““There’ll be no sorrow there,” 
 a doubting and downcast stranger who was passing said, 
 
70 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “What place can that be, my boy, in which there is no 
 sorrow?” 
 The boy at once replied: 
 
 “In Heaven above, where all is love.” 
 
 Tne words were simple, but they were used to calm his 
 troubled heart and give him peace. 
 
 Rev. I. O. Sloan, relates an incident which occurred in 
 one of the hospitals after the battle of Antietam. A young 
 Massachusetts soldier, Charles Warren, had been led by 
 unremitting care and faithful admonition to give’ himself 
 up to Jesus. His leg, it was found, must be amputated to 
 save his life. Mr. Sloan, unwilling to witness the scene, 
 turned away as they carried the soldier to the operating 
 table. He had not walked far, before he heard Warren’s 
 cheerful voice, singing: 
 
 “There'll be no sorrow there; 
 In Heaven above, where all is love, 
 There’ll be no sorrow there.” 
 
 He turned back and found the soldier drowsy from the 
 chloroform administered. Thus he remained, for the opera- 
 tion proved useless, until he passed away. 
 
 The following incident occurred during the war between 
 the United States and Mexico: 
 
 “While stopping at the town of Matamoros, a number of 
 our soldiers, as was their custom, met together to spend their 
 time in rude and noisy revelry. Amid these social gather- 
 ings, the sound of vocal and instrumental music was always 
 heard. Indeed the majority of our men were excellent 
 singers; and, as they came from various parts of the Union, 
 the favorite airs of each section were soon made familiar. 
 Although they generally preferred such as were of light 
 and trifling nature, still they often sang the tunes most pop- 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 71 
 
 ular with the different churches. The persons to whom 
 we have alluded had been assembled for some time; the 
 wine was flowing freely, and their hilarity steadily increased; 
 everything seemed to promise them enjoyment. At this 
 time a soldier belonging to a Southern regiment entered 
 the room, and taking a seat in the midst of the company, 
 began singing very deliberately, a hymn commencing: 
 
 ‘O, sing to me of Heaven.’ 
 
 “The tune was solemn and affecting; the language was 
 moving and impressive. The strangeness of the circum- 
 stance at once secured the attention of all present, and, as 
 the singer proceeded, the effect was striking; the liquor 
 ceased to flow, the rude oaths were hushed, and the sound 
 of merriment died away. When the last verse was con- 
 cluded, a perfect stillness reigned; the spell of revelry had 
 been broken, and the anticipated gayeties were doomed thus 
 singularly to disappointment.” 
 
 No. 81. 
 “BRIGHTLY BEAMS OUR FATHER’S MERCY.” 
 
 Purp Buiss, 1838—1876. 
 
 This hymn was suggested by the following incident, told 
 by Mr. D. L. Moody: 
 
 “On a dark and stormy night, when the waves rollet 
 like mountains, and not a star was to be seen, a boat, 
 rocking and plunging, neared the Cleveland aoevae 
 
 ““Are you sure this is Cleveland?’” asked the captain, 
 seeing only one light from the lighthouse. 
 
 “Quite sure, sir,’ replied the pilot. 
 
 “Where are the lower lights?’ 
 
 “Gone out, sir.’ 
 
72 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “Can you make the harbor?’ 
 
 “We must or perish sir.’”’ And with a strong hand and 
 a brave heart, the old pilot turned the wheel. But alas! 
 In the darkness he missed the channel, and with a crash 
 upon the rocks the boat was shivered, and many a life lost 
 in a watery grave. Brethren, the Master will take care of 
 the great lighthouse: let us keep the lower lights burning.” 
 
 No. 82. 
 
 “SAILOR, THOUGH THE DARKNESS GATHERS.” 
 
 Pure Buiss, 1838—1876. 
 
 The following passage in a sermon by Rev. E. P. Good- 
 win, D.D., preached in the First Congregational church, 
 Chicago, suggested this hymn. “Some ships cross the ocean 
 with clear skies, smooth seas and fair winds, and come into 
 port with streamers flying and bands of music making jubi- 
 lee. Others come in storms, with the skies black as night, 
 the wind like a hurricane, and the sea like mountains—and 
 they come in all battered, yards gone, masts splintered, 
 hardly enough left to hang together. But the difference 
 amounts to nothing. The only important thing from first 
 to last 1s, not what the log says about storm or calm, but 
 that they all steer close to the compass, and do their best 
 to make the harbor. So they only get there safely; what 
 happened to them by the way is of no account. So as to 
 God’s children. There may, there will be vast variety 
 of experience: to some, prosperity, success, joy—to others, 
 adversity, defeat, grief. But what may be your lot or 
 mine, is of no consequence. The only thing of moment is, 
 that we stick close to our chart and push for shore with all 
 our might. So we gain that, the pleasures or perils of the 
 way do not matter,” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 73 
 No. 83. 
 
 “THERE’S A LIGHT IN THE WINDOW FOR THEE, 
 BROTHER.” 
 
 Puiuip Buss, 1838—1876. 
 
 This hymn was suggested by the following incident: 
 A boy of twelve years worked out by the day to support 
 a widowed mother, carrying home his earnings at night. 
 “One night,” he says, “it being very dark and muddy, and 
 having three miles to travel, and a heavy bundle to carry, 
 I did not reach home until late. My mother, feeble and 
 weary, had retired, but she quickly aroused when she 
 heard my voice, and soon met me at the door with a warm 
 kiss, and warmer tears and a ‘God bless you, my dear boy.’ 
 As she received my bundle, she exclaimed, ‘After this, my 
 son, I’ll set a light in the window for you,’ and true to her 
 word, the bright light in the window appeared, and Oh! 
 how it cheered my heart ever for years. Health failing 
 me, I left home, leaving brothers to help mother, and went 
 to sea. When I had been three years from home and was 
 on the Pacific Ocean, mother died: but just before she 
 expired, she said to those around her, ‘Give Edward my 
 dying blessing, for he has been a good boy, and tell him 
 I have gone to heaven, and I will set a light in the window 
 for him,’ ” 
 
 No. 84 
 “HAVE YOU ON THE LORD BELIEVED?” 
 
 Puiuie Buiiss, 1838—1876. 
 
 A vast fortune was left in the hands of a minister for 
 one of his poor parishioners. Fearing that it might be 
 squandered if suddenly bestowed upon him, the wise min- 
 
74 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 ister sent him a little at a time, with a note saying: “This 
 is thine; use it wisely; there is more to follow.” “Brethren, 
 that’s just the way the Lord deals with us.” 
 
 The above incident, told by Mr. D. L. Moody, suggested 
 this hymn. 
 
 No. 88. 
 “MY SOUL REPEAT HIS PRAISE.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Watts, 1674—1748. 
 
 This is Dr. Watts’ version of the One Hundred and Third 
 Psalm. It is related concerning the family life of Rev. 
 John Angell James, that it was his custom to read the One 
 Hundred and Third Psalm always at prayers on Saturday 
 night, but his wife died; and the Sabbath drew nigh while 
 she lay dead in the house. The members of the stricken 
 family gathered in the twilight; some of them wondered 
 whether this old song of the temple, fairly ringing and 
 vibrant with thanksgiving would be given out now while 
 the shadows were hanging so deeply overhead. But the 
 faithful servant of God simply turned to the familiar place, 
 and said gently: “No reason do I see, why we should 
 change our custom tonight; let us read our usual Psalm.” 
 
 Rev. C. 8. Ropinson, D.D. 
 
 No. 86. 
 “OF ALL THAT DECKS THE FIELD OR BOWER.” 
 
 AspuL MESSEEH. 
 
 Abdul Messeeh was a native of Delhi, one of the fruits 
 of the ministry of Rev. Henry Martin. He himself engaged 
 in missionary work with great zeal and efficiency. In 1825 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 75 
 
 he was admitted into the ministry of the Established Church 
 by Bishop Heber, who said of him, “He is a very fine old 
 man, with a magnificent gray beard, and of much more 
 gentlemanly manners than any Christian native whom I 
 have seen. He is in every way fit for holy orders, and is 
 a most sincere Christian, quite free, so far as I could 
 observe, from all conceit and enthusiasm. His long eastern 
 dress, his long gray beard, and his calm, resigned counte- 
 nance, give him already almost the air of an apostle.” 
 During his last-sickness, in 1827, his own hymn afforded him 
 much consolation. A part of India is inhabited by a race 
 called “Khonds.” They are very superstitious and have 
 long offered human sacrifices, usually children whom they 
 have kidnapped or bought. These children are tied to 
 stakes on the day of sacrifice and their flesh cut away piece 
 by piece, till they die. Some years ago some of these kid- 
 napped children were rescued by English officers and sent 
 to mission stations to be cared for and educated. One of 
 these boys, to whom the missionaries had given the name 
 of David, at first seemed very dull, but at last his mind - 
 opened, and he was converted. He made rapid progress 
 after this and was soon put at work in a printing office. 
 About this time a number of white spots appeared upon his 
 body, and it was soon apparent that he had been seized 
 by leprosy. He was sent to the hospital and placed in 
 a tent by himself. Here he used to lie alone for hours: 
 but when the time for worship came, he would crawl to 
 the door of his tent, and get as near as he could to the 
 company, that he might hear the missionary’s voice, and 
 join in the worship of God. One day, the missionary and 
 his wife went into his tent to see him, and found him lying 
 on his back, seemingly in deep thought. His Testament was 
 close to his side, and his hymn book open in his hand. They 
 feared to disturb him, so at once they went away. In a 
 little while the missionary returned. Everything was just 
 as before, the tent door open, the Testament, the hymn- 
 book, all as they were. But his bright spirit had taken its 
 
76 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 flight to heaven. No human hand was there to smooth his 
 pillow, or give the slightest help. Alone and in silence, the 
 young leper died. The missionary was greatly affected by 
 the sight, and looking down upon the open hymn book, his 
 eye caught these words. 
 
 < 
 
 “Of all that decks the field or bower, 
 Thou art the fairest, sweetest flower; 
 Thou, blessed Jesus, let not me 
 In Thy kind heart forgotten be. 
 
 “Day after day, youth’s joys decay, 
 Death waits to seize his trembling prey; 
 Then, blessed Jesus, let not me 
 In Thy kind heart forgotten be.” 
 
 The lad had seemed to die with this prayer trembling on 
 his lips. 
 
 No. 87. 
 “HOW HAPPY IS THE PILGRIM’S LOT.” 
 
 Rev. Jonn Westey, 1703—1791. 
 
 A Methodist preacher traveling in Indiana was, with his 
 family suffering deep poverty. A settler who loved him, 
 being a large landholder, presented him with a title deed 
 of many acres. He went home, glad at heart, in freedom, 
 as he thought, from his difficulties. Three months after 
 this he came to his friend, the kind-hearted settler. He was 
 welcomed; but he soon drew out the parchment. 
 
 “Here, sir,” said he, “I want to give you back your title 
 deed.” 
 
 “What’s the matter?” said the other, “any flaw in it?” 
 
 sINTO, 7 
 
 “TIsn’t it good land?” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 77 
 
 “Good as any in the state.” 
 
 “To you think I repent the gift?” 
 
 “T have not the slightest reason to doubt your generosity.” 
 
 “Why don’t you keep it then?” 
 
 “Well sir,” said the preacher, ‘you know I am very fond 
 of singing, and there is one hymn in my book, the singing 
 of which is one of the greatest comforts of my life. I have 
 not been able to sing it with my whole heart since I have 
 been here. A part of it runs this way: 
 
 “ ‘No foot of land do I possess, 
 No cottage in this wilderness, 
 A poor wayfaring man, 
 I lodge awhile in tents below, 
 Or gladly wander to and fro, 
 Till I my Canaan gain.’ 
 
 “Take your title deed,’ he added, “I would rather sing that 
 hymn than own America.” 
 
 He went on his way, and sang his hymn, fulfilling his min- 
 istry, and confiding in Him to Whose service he had sacri- 
 ficed himself. Nor did he or his family ever lack bread. 
 He is gone now to his “abiding home.” 
 
 Rey. S. W. CHriIsToPHErs. 
 
 No. 88. 
 “NOT ALL THE BLOOD OF BEASTS.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Warts, 1674-1748. 
 
 Some time ago a Christian lady was looking out of her 
 parlor window in the city of London, when she saw a poor 
 blind beggar in front of her house. He had a violin in a bag 
 hanging from his neck. In his right hand he had a cane or . 
 staff to lean on, while his left hand held a string that was 
 
78 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 fastened to the collar on the neck of his dog—his only guide, 
 as he groped his way in darkness through the crowded 
 streets of that busy city. The poor man looked cold, 
 hungry, and sad. The lady pitied him, and sent her servant 
 to ask him to come into the house, to get warmed, and 
 rested, and have something to eat. The servant led the 
 blind man and his dog up the steps into the dining room, 
 and gave him a nice warm place by the fireside. As he sat 
 there, with his dog lying beside him, the blind beggar showed 
 his thankfulness by the smile that brightened his face, while 
 the poor dog tried to say, “Thank you! thank you!” as well 
 as he could by wagging his tail. While he was eating his 
 dinner, the good lady sat by and talked with the poor man. 
 
 “How long have you been blind, my friend?” 
 
 “Fifteen years, ma’am. I had an attack of smallpox, and 
 it took away my eyesight.” 
 
 “And have you been begging all that time?” 
 
 “No ma’am; only a few years. I had two brothers who 
 kindly took care of me; but they both died three years ago, 
 and now I have no one to do anything for me; so I have to 
 go out and beg.” 
 
 “Can you play any hymns, or psalms, or sacred pieces?” 
 
 “No, ma’am, I only know two pieces, and they are both 
 songs, or ballads. An old sailor taught me both of them.” 
 
 “But there are many beautiful hymns and sweet psalm 
 tunes that would sound well in the streets. People would 
 like to hear them, and you would get more pennies in your 
 little basket for singing them.” 
 
 “T do not know any hymns, ma’am; I wish I did.” 
 
 “Well, while you are getting your dinner, I will repeat one 
 of my favorite hymns to you, and then I’ll sing it; and when 
 you have done, you must see if you can play it and sing it: 
 will you?” 
 
 “Yes, ma’am, I will, and thank you for it.” 
 
 ' Then the lady recited this hymn of Dr. Watts’s. She | 
 repeated the hymn slowly and deliberately several times. 
 Then she sang it to a very sweet tune. She had a fine full 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 79 
 
 voice. The blind man stopped eating to listen. With 
 his face uplifted to the ceiling, he rolled his sightless 
 eyeballs in evident delight. Even the dog seemed to for- 
 get his crumbs and his bones, and wagged his tail 
 vigorously. 
 
 “Would you please sing it for me again, ma’am?” said the 
 blind man. 
 
 She sang it again and again. He seemed to take in every 
 word of the hymn, and every note of the music. When he 
 had finished his dinner, he took his violin, and standing in 
 the middle of the room, he struck up the tune the lady had 
 been singing and went through the whole hymn. The lady 
 was delighted, and so was the poor blind fiddler. Then he 
 repeated it, so as to be sure he had it right, and thanking 
 the lady for her kindness, he went on his way. 
 
 About two months after this, the blind beggar with his 
 dog called again at that lady’s house. She shook hands 
 with him and said, “Well, my friend, I’m glad to see you; 
 how does the new music answer?” 
 
 “Wonderfully well, ma’am. I’ve just called to tell you 
 about it; but I don’t know how. The day I called here— 
 oh! that blessed day! and several days after I sang pretty 
 well; but one day I couldn’t sing at all.” 
 
 “Why, had you taken cold?” 
 
 “No, ma’am,. but I had a guilty conscience. I was, as 
 that hymn says, all stained with sin. The oftener I sang 
 those lines, the worse I felt. The verses described my case 
 exactly. I was indeed a penitent. I remained in the house 
 all day in great sorrow. My dog knows when I’m in trouble, 
 and he would come and put his paws on my knee, saying, 
 as plain as he could, ‘What’s the matter, master?’ . I thought 
 about the verses, though I could not play them nor sing 
 them; but the last verse led me to trust in Jesus, and now, 
 indeed, I can sing: 
 
 - “We bless the Lamb with cheerful voice, 
 And sing His bleeding love.’ 
 
80 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 Before that, my soul was blind as well as my body; but now 
 I have new eyes. Jesus has opened the eyes of my soul. I 
 see Him as my Saviour, my Lord, and my God. I thank 
 you for calling me in that day, and teaching me that precious 
 hymn. That was a blessed day to me.” 
 
 Rev. Ricuarp Newton, D.D. 
 
 Rev. J. D. Reardon, speaking of himself, said, heavily 
 laden with guilt and fear, and groping for a long while in 
 darkness, he was in a moment brought into the light and 
 liberty of God’s people by the quoting of the third verse of 
 this hymn. His pastor had been unfolding the way of salva- 
 tion to him and other inquirers, when to impress the truth 
 of the Bible contained in this verse, he reached out his hands 
 just as the ancient priest was supposed to do when placing 
 the sins of the people upon the scapegoat, and said, “Sinner, 
 it is just this, only this, for you to do, and say: 
 
 ““My faith would lay her hand 
 On that dear head of thine, 
 While like a penitent I stand, 
 And there confess my sin.’ 
 
 “My eyes opened at: once to see it. I burst out with 
 laughter; I couldn’t help it. My heart in a moment was 
 filled with joy and has been ever since.” 
 
 No. 89. 
 “AWAY WITH OUR SORROW AND FEAR”—1744. 
 
 Rev. Cuarues WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 A minister once lost his way, while traveling in Nebraska. 
 Late at night and in the midst of a pelting storm, he sought 
 shelter in the cabin of a lonely Irish settler. He was warmly 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 81 
 
 welcomed, and they spent the evening pleasantly in con- 
 versation. At the close of the evening his Irish host said to 
 him, “Now, sir, will you please sing something before we 
 go to rest? Can you sing John White’s hymn?” 
 
 “John White’s hymn? No, I never heard of it. What 
 is it?” 
 
 “Tt’s this, sir: 
 
 “‘Away with our sorrow and fear, 
 We soon shall recover our home; 
 The city of saints shall appear, 
 The day of eternity come.’ 
 
 “O yes! I’ve sung that good old hymn many a time. But 
 why do you call it ‘John White’s hymn?’ ” 
 
 “T’ll tell you, sir. When we were young people in old 
 Ireland, my wife and I, we attended a meeting, where we 
 learned to love Jesus. The minister was a young man 
 named John White. He spent all his time among the people, 
 telling them of the love of Jesus, and trying to persuade 
 them to love and serve Him. He was often persecuted on 
 account of his religion, but he never answered those who 
 troubled him, except by singing some of the verses of this 
 blessed hymn. My wife and I learned to sing it together, 
 and it has been the greatest comfort to us. We have had 
 many sorrows to bear, but when we sing this sweet hymn, 
 and think of the dear, loving Saviour, it always lightens our 
 burdens and makes us happy. A few years after we settled 
 here, our little boy, our only child, lay dying. That was a 
 heavy blow. The mother stood on one side of the cradle, 
 and I on the other. We watched the death-drops gather on 
 that patient little face. Then my wife looked up to me and 
 said, ‘O, Pat, sing John White’s hymn.’ So softly, and with 
 a choking voice, I sang: : 
 
 ‘Away with our sorrow and fear, 
 We soon shall recover our home.’ 
 
82 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 And we closed the little eyes that were never more to look 
 into ours, until that glad day of eternity comes. A few 
 months after this, sir, came the greatest trial of my life. 
 My dear wife, who had always been such a comfort to me, 
 was taken very ill. The doctor said she could not live. As 
 I sat by her bedside, overwhelmed with sorrow, she put her 
 arm around my neck, and drawing my face down close to 
 hers, she gently whispered, ‘Good-by Pat, dear, I’m going 
 home. Sing John White’s hymn for me, once more before 
 I go.’ So, with her cold hand clasped in mine, I tried to 
 sing: 
 ‘Away with our sorrow and fear, 
 We soon shall recover our home.’ 
 
 And the Lord took away my sorrow and fear. My dear 
 patient wife was quite happy till she fell asleep in Jesus.” 
 Then the Irish settler wiped away the tears from his eyes, 
 and while the storm was howling without, he and the min- 
 ister, as they sat by the blazing fire sang once more John 
 White’s hymn: 
 “Away with our sorrow and fear.” 
 Rev. RicHarp Newton, D.D. 
 
 Some years ago, Mr. Brewster, a Methodist missionary, 
 when traveling in Newfoundland, turned aside to visit an 
 old settler whom he had heard of. He found him living 
 with his daughters; and soon the talk turned upon the old 
 country. 
 
 “And have you ever seen the Shannon?” said the old man; 
 “and do ye know the river?” 
 
 “No,” was the reply, “I don’t know it.” 
 
 The old man then told the story, how he had left the 
 banks of the Shannon, and how, when all were sad and 
 sighing as they parted from their friends, his little wife 
 sang: 
 
 ‘Away with our sorrow and fear, 
 We soon shall recover our home.’ 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 83 
 
 and then, how they started on their journey; how, when 
 they came to the shore and were ready to embark and to 
 leave the old country behind, the tears came, but his little 
 wife again sang: 
 
 “Away with our sorrow and fear!” 
 
 They dried their tears, and were soon on board. By and 
 by a storm came, and all was terror. The captain and 
 sailors gave up all for lost. But the little wife, she was 
 happy, and began to sing: 
 
 “Away with our sorrow and fear!” 
 
 The captain plucked up courage; the sailors went to the 
 pumps; the storm passed, and all was well. They landed at 
 length; and when they found themselves left in the wilder- 
 ness, their hearts were sad and heavy; but the little wife, 
 she sang again: 
 
 “Away with our sorrow and fear!” 
 
 and then they bestirred themselves; built their hut, and 
 soon got over their difficulties. ‘But,” said the old man, 
 “and have you never seen the Shannon?” The family grew 
 up; and then “the little wife” sickened; and while they were 
 around her dying bed, the hymn she loved so well was on 
 her lips, and she died singing: 
 
 “Away with our sorrow and fear! 
 We soon shall recover our home.” 
 
 Rev. S. W. CHRISTOPHERS. 
 
84 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 No. 90. 
 “THERE IS A FOUNTAIN FILLED WITH BLOOD.” 
 WiuuiamM Cowper, 1731—1800. 
 
 There was once a man who had been a very great sinner. 
 He had long been in the way of committing all sorts of 
 wickedness. But at last he grew weary of his evil ways, 
 and wanted to become a Christian. But he thought his sins 
 were too great to be forgiven. A Christian man talked and 
 prayed with him. To encourage him he repeated the first 
 verse of this hymn. But the poor man shook his head, and 
 said, ‘“‘There’s nothing in that for me. My sins are too 
 great to be washed away.” Then his friend repeated the 
 second verse: 
 
 “The dying thief rejoiced to see 
 That fountain in his day; 
 And there may I though vile as he, 
 Wash all my sins away.” 
 
 “That means me,” said the penitent sinner. 
 
 While Mr. Ralph Wells was once hurrying to meet a 
 train, a Sunday school teacher hailed him, saying: “I have 
 just come from the hospital, where I found on one of the 
 beds, one of my scholars, a lad who sent for me. I found 
 that he had met with a terrible accident, and had nearly 
 severed both his limbs from his body. 
 
 “O teacher!” he said, “I have sent for you. I am glad 
 you have come before I die. I have something to ask of 
 you. I want you to tell me a little more about Jesus.” 
 
 “Well, my dear boy, have you a hope in Him?” 
 
 “Yes, teacher, thank God, I have had it for six months.” 
 
 “Why, you never said anything to me about it.” 
 
 “No, I did not, teacher, but I have had it, and I find it 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 85 
 
 sustains me in this hour. I have only a few minutes to live, 
 and I would like you to sing to, me.” 
 “What shall I sing?” 
 
 “O, sing: 
 ‘There is a fountain filled with blood, 
 Drawn from Immanuel’s veins, 
 And sinners plunged beneath that flood, 
 Lose all their guilty stains.’ ” 
 
 The teacher began to sing. The dying lad joined in the 
 song with a sweet smile on his countenance. 
 
 “It was that hymn,” said he, “among other things, on 
 which my heart rose to Christ.” 
 
 He then put his arms up and said, “Teacher, bend your 
 head.” He bent it down. The dying boy kissed him. 
 
 “That is all I have to give you,” said he. ‘“Good-by,” 
 and he was gone. 
 
 Dr. Prime relates that in the Fulton Street prayer meet- 
 ing, in New York, a man once rose to speak and said, “I 
 bless God for the fountain hymn. Fourteen months ago I 
 was a poor sinner, a very profane man, and a miserable 
 prodigal. I was invited into a meeting where God’s people 
 were praying for poor outcasts like me. As I entered, I 
 heard them singing of the “fountain filled with blood,” and 
 that song went to my heart. I felt that if ever a man 
 needed cleansing I did, and so I sought the prayers 
 of Christians in my behalf, and I was soon rejoicing in 
 Christ.” 
 
 Lieutenant G——, an officer in the U. 8. Army, having 
 received his death wound in a gallant charge at the head of 
 his regiment, was visited in the hospital by the chaplain, 
 who inquired how he felt. He said he had always been 
 cheerful, and was now ready to meet God in peace. He 
 thus proceeded, “Chaplain, I was once passing through the 
 
86 - STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 streets of New York on a Sunday, and heard singing. I 
 went in and saw a company of poor people. They were 
 singing: 
 
 ‘There is a fountain filled with blood.’ 
 
 I was overpowered with the impression the hymn made 
 upon me, and I gave my heart to God. Since then I have 
 loved Jesus, and I love Him now.” 
 
 That was his last speech. As the chaplain listened, the 
 voice faltered, and the minister said, ‘Trust Jesus.” 
 
 The officer whispered, “I do trust Jesus,” and then 
 expired. 
 
 During a great revival in Ireland, Belfast had a large 
 share in its blessing. Soon after it began, the curate of the 
 parish visited one of the factories in which two hundred 
 girls were employed. On his entering the building with the 
 manager, a young woman near the door, seeing her minister, 
 began to sing with a very sweet voice: 
 
 “There is a fountain filled with blood.” 
 
 The girl next to her took it up, and so onward it ran down 
 the mill, till all the girls joined with deep and heartfelt 
 fervency. Great as was the noise of the looms, the tender 
 and subduing voice of praise rose above the din and clatter 
 of machinery. They wanted no books to sing through that 
 hymn, it was well known to nearly all there. The manager, 
 a Manchester man, and an infidel, and ever on the watch to 
 make ridicule of religion, was so completely overcome by 
 that outburst of psalmody that he ran out of the mill. 
 Meeting the curate afterwards, he said, “I never was so 
 hard put to it as this morning; it nearly broke me down.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 87 
 
 No. 91. 
 
 “OH! WHY SHOULD THE SPIRIT OF MORTAL BE 
 PROUD?” 
 
 Wiii1aM Knox, 1789—1825. 
 
 This poem was scarcely known until President Lincoln 
 called attention to it. Said President Lincoln, “There is a 
 poem that has been a great favorite with me for years, to 
 which my attention was first called, when a young man, by 
 a friend, and which I afterwards saw, and cut from a news- 
 paper, and carried it in my pocket till by frequent reading 
 I had it by heart.” He then repeated eleven verses of this 
 poem. 
 
 No. 92. 
 “JOY TO THE WORLD; THE LORD IS COME!” 
 Rey. Isaac Watts, 1674—1748. 
 
 A hymn book for skeptics was published in England in 
 1838, entitled “Social Hymns for the use of Friends of the 
 Rational System of Society,” sometimes called “Hymns for 
 the New Moral World.” It contains no recognition of God; 
 but Nature, Light, and Moral Nature, take His place. The 
 first hymn in that book is a perversion of this hymn. Here 
 is the first stanza: 
 
 “Joy to the world! the light is come! 
 The only lawful King: 
 Let every heart prepare it room, 
 And moral nature sing!” 
 
88 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 98. 
 
 “OH! SAY CAN YOU SEE, BY THE DAWN’S EARLY 
 LIGHT.” 
 
 Francis Scott Kry, 1779—1843. 
 
 When Fort McHenry was bombarded by the British fleet 
 in 1814, Mr. Key was, by authority of President Madison, 
 sent to the British fleet under a flag of truce to secure the 
 release of his friend, Dr. Beanes, who had been captured by 
 the enemy and was detained on board the flagship, on the 
 charge of violating his parole. He met General Ross 
 and Admirals Cockburn and Cochrane, and with difficulty 
 secured from them a promise of the gentleman’s release, but 
 was at the same time informed that they would not be-per- 
 mitted to leave the fleet until after the proposed attack on 
 Fort McHenry, which the admiral boasted he would carry 
 in a few hours. The ship on which himself, his friend and 
 the commissioner who accompanied the flag of truce were 
 detained, came up the bay and was anchored at the mouth 
 of the Patapsco, within full view of Fort McHenry. They 
 watched the flag of the fort through the entire day with an 
 intense anxiety, until night prevented them from seeing it. 
 During the night they remained on deck, noting every shell 
 from the time it was fired until it fell. While the bombard- 
 ment continued it was evidence that the fort had not sur- 
 rendered, but it suddenly ceased some time before day, and, 
 as they had no communication with any of the enemy’s 
 ships, they did not know whether the fort had surrendered 
 or the attack had been abandoned. They paced the deck 
 for the rest of the night in painful suspense, watching with 
 intense anxiety for the return of the day. As soon as it 
 dawned, their glasses were turned to the fort, and, with a 
 thrill of delight, they saw that “our flag was still there!” 
 The song was begun on the deck of the vessel, in the fervor 
 of the moment when he saw the enemy hastily retreating to 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 89 
 
 their ships, and looked upon the proud flag he had watched 
 for so anxiously as the morning opened. He had written on 
 the back of a letter some lines, or brief notes, that would 
 aid him in recalling them, and for some of the lines as he 
 proceeded he had to rely on his memory. He finished it in 
 the boat on his way to the shore, and wrote it out as it now 
 stands immediately upon reaching Baltimore. In an hour 
 after it was placed in the hands of the printer, it was on the 
 streets hailed with enthusiasm, and at once took its place 
 as a national song. 
 
 No. 94. 
 “JUST AS I AM WITHOUT ONE PLEA.” 
 
 Miss CHARLOTTE Etiott, 1799—1871. 
 
 After the revolution of 1868 in Spain, when Queen Isabella 
 had fled, one of the first acts of the Central Junta at 
 Madrid, was the proclamation of a bill of rights including 
 religious liberty. Before, it had been unlawful to hold 
 Protestant religious services or to have or read the Bible. 
 But both had been secretly done by the few faithful ones 
 who “obeyed God rather than man.” Within a few Sab- 
 baths after the flight of Isabella, the first Protestant service 
 was held in Madrid. The room, an upper chamber, was 
 crowded. The service was an adaptation from the Episcopal 
 prayer book. The singing was congregational. For the 
 solemn musical service of the Roman Catholic Mass was 
 substituted that simple and beautiful hymn: 
 
 “Just as I am, without one plea, 
 But that Thy blood was shed for me, 
 And that Thou bid’st me come to Thee, 
 O Lamb of God! I come, I come!” 
 
 The melody, one of Luther’s grand old tunes, was caught 
 up by many voices. It welled out through the open win- 
 
90 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 dows, stopped many a passer-by, and invited him to enter. 
 “Come,” it seemed to say, “for all things are now ready.” 
 One might imagine it the voice of new Spain proclaiming its 
 allegiance to Him who in all this wonderful revolution is 
 the emancipator of them that were bound. 
 
 Rev. LyMANn ABBOTT. 
 
 Mr. Thomas Atkinson, a delegate of the Christian Com- 
 mission, tells the following: ‘The morning after Mr. Moody 
 and I reached Nashville, we stood upon the hotel steps 
 debating whither we should go. Thinking there was no 
 time to be lost, we separated and went in different direc- 
 tions, he going to Hospital No. 3, and I to No. 8. It was 
 my first venture into army work. I scarcely knew what to 
 say or do. Entering the first floor of the large ward, I stood 
 irresolute. Surgeons and nurses were moving hither and 
 thither. A half doubt came to me whether I could do this 
 work which the Lord had put upon me. Suddenly I noticed 
 a man observing me attentively from a distant cot; I turned 
 my eyes away from his, and letting them wander about the 
 room awhile, looked at him again. He was watching me 
 still. Putting up a silent prayer to God, I went to him. 
 His name was John Hays. He had a wife and five children. 
 
 “*You seem to be very low, John,’ I said. 
 
 as) OS. Styl ame 
 
 “ “Are you a Christian?’ 
 
 “No, sir, ’m not, but my wife is. And I was just asking 
 the Lord this morning, to send me some one to tell me how 
 I could get to be like her. When I saw you standing over 
 there, I thought, “Maybe the Lord has heard me. Maybe 
 this is the man he has sent to help me.’ ” 
 
 “The soldier’s earnestness, my former indecision, the 
 blessed opening evident, made me strong in faith: ‘Yes, 
 John, I am the Lord’s messenger; and, moreover, I have 
 come to tell you that you are to become a child of God.’ 
 
 ““Do you think so, sir? Then thank God for it!’ 
 
 “T told him of the only way by which he could come to 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 91 
 
 the cross. He waited as if I were going to say more, but I 
 
 only asked him if he would accept the offered Atonement. 
 ““Why, sir,’ said he, ‘I didn’t think that was the way. I 
 
 thought I had to be sorry a long time—and—and—’ and 
 
 here he stopped because he hardly knew what more to say. 
 “ Listen,’ said I; then I repeated: 
 
 “Just as I am without one plea, 
 But that Thy blood was shed for me, 
 And that Thou bid’st me come to Thee, 
 O Lamb of God, I come, I come’ ” 
 
 ““And will He save me just for nothing at all?’ 
 “ “Ves,” T went on: 
 
 ““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!’ 
 
 ““T never knew it before, sir. I never knew it was so 
 easy. Thank God! Thank God!’ There was a nurse 
 standing by. The soldier turned to him and said, ‘Nurse, 
 when this gentleman goes away, I want you to write to my 
 wife and tell her that I have found out how to trust Jesus. 
 Thank God! Thank God.’ He never faltered for a mo- 
 ment, during the five days that intervened before his death, 
 in his simple, childlike attachment to Christ. At last the 
 morning came when his cot was empty. I asked the nurse 
 about-him. Arrangements had been made by the dying man 
 for the prompt transmission of his remains to his home. 
 They were already upon the road. Then I discovered that 
 the nurse had neglected the soldier’s request to send a letter. 
 The first intimation to the wife, of her husband’s decease, 
 would be the arrival of the casket which contained the body. 
 
92 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 It was a sad mistake, but could not be remedied. I wrote 
 her a letter, giving full particulars of her husband’s trium- 
 phant departure. The answer was one of very precious 
 interest: 
 
 “sir, didn’t think there were any earthly words which 
 could comfort me as did those in your letter. I am afraid I 
 sinned against God yesterday as I stood by my husband’s 
 grave. I know I had hard rebellious thoughts.- No one 
 knew about them but myself and God. As the minister 
 said, ‘Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust,” I almost 
 thought I could stand it no longer. It was hard to be sep- 
 arated from him thus, and to know so little—nothing about 
 how he died. When I got back to the house, your letter was 
 lying on the table. In it I learned that John had found 
 Jesus, and I cried for joy. Children, I said, “dry up your 
 tears. Your father is not dead. He is above in Heaven.” 
 Thank God! At the grave the war had seemed to me very 
 cruel and wicked. It is all changed now. I shall meet John 
 again; that is enough. Thank God Who saved my 
 husband.’ ” 
 
 
 
 Rev. W. T. Eva, relates that while ministering to the 
 wounded, after the battle of Gettysburg, away in the corner 
 of a shed crowded with wounded, he found a dying man. 
 His limbs were already cold and the death damp was upon 
 his brow. Fellow sufferers were thick enough about him, 
 yet he was dying alone. ‘He was still conscious when I 
 came to him, not only conscious, but happy in the love of 
 God. I can truly say that nowhere have I witnessed a more 
 triumphant peace than his. We prayed by his side, and 
 then sang: 
 
 “Just as I am, without one plea,” 
 with the chorus: 
 
 “Happy day! happy day! 
 When Jesus washed my sins away.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 93 
 
 As we prayed and sang, the Holy Spirit seemed to come 
 down not only upon the dying man, but on all in that 
 dolorous place; and here and there, from among the wounded 
 braves as they lay upon the floor, was uttered aloud the 
 earnest cry, ‘God have mercy on my soul!’ ” 
 
 While a pastor in St. Louis, Rev. Dr. McCook was sent 
 for, to see a young lady who was dying of consumption. 
 He soon found that she had imbibed infidelity through the 
 influence of a school teacher, and with ‘her keen intellect 
 was enabled to ward off all the claims of the Gospel. After 
 exhausting all the arguments he could think of during his 
 visits, he was extremely puzzled to know what more to do, 
 as she seemed unshaken in her doubts. She at length 
 seemed so averse to the subject of religion that when he 
 called one day, she turned her face to the wall and seemed 
 to take no notice of him. 
 
 Dr. McCook said, “Lucy, I have not called to argue with 
 you another word, but before leaving you to meet the issues 
 of eternity, I wish to recite a hymn.” He then repeated 
 with much emphasis the hymn, “Just as I am without one 
 plea,’ and then bade her adieu. She made no response. 
 He was debating for some time whether, after so much 
 repugnance on her part he should call again. But realizing 
 her nearness to the eternal world he concluded to make one 
 more visit. As he took his seat by her bedside she slowly 
 turned around in bed. Her sunken eyes shone with un- 
 wonted luster, as she placed her thin, emaciated hands in 
 his and said slowly, and with much emotion: 
 
 “ «Just as I am, without one plea, 
 But that Thy blood was shed for me, 
 And that Thou bid’st me come to Thee, 
 O Lamb of God, I come! I come!’ 
 
 “Q sir, I’ve come. I’ve come.” That hymn told the story. 
 It had decided her eternal destiny. It had done what all the 
 
94 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 arguments had failed to do. In a few days she crossed the 
 river. 4 
 
 Far out on the western prairies dwelt a father who had 
 not been to Church for fifteen years. After death laid some 
 of his family in the grave, God’s still small voice came to 
 him. “All alone,” said he, “out there on the prairie, with 
 no Christian teacher or friend, God spoke to me. I then 
 gladly went to hear a missionary preach in a schoolhouse. 
 Was this salvation for me? Could I, so long a wanderer, 
 come and be forgiven? While agitated with these thoughts, 
 they sang: 
 
 ‘Just as I am, without one plea, 
 But that Thy blood was shed for me.’ 
 
 and before it was ended I could say: ‘O Lamb of God, I 
 come.’ ” 
 
 “The Fulton Street Prayer Meeting has a hymn book of 
 its own. It is not a large volume, and its hymns are among 
 the oldest of our sacred songs. While the voices blend, the 
 hearts blend too, and many a man has been brought to his 
 feet to tell some story of the Lord’s goodness and mercy, 
 which the strains of a hymn have recalled. We had been 
 singing the words one day, ‘Just as I am, without one plea,’ 
 when a stranger arose and said, ‘That was the hymn that 
 brought me to Christ. I long felt that I was a sinner, but 
 I thought myself too bad for Jesus, so I endeavored to 
 improve myself a little; the more I tried to make myself 
 better, the worse I seemed to grow. Then I gave up all my 
 attempts in despair. But I heard that hymn sung one 
 day, and it shed light into my heart, and I saw that 
 I was to come to Jesus just as I was. I came—came just 
 as I was—and found pardon. That was a glad day for 
 me.’ ”) 
 
 Dr. PRIME. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 95 
 
 In one of the refuges for poor fallen women, one was 
 admitted who had been brought up a Roman Catholic, but 
 she was most anxious to conceal that fact lest it might lead 
 to her exclusion, for she had neither home nor friends. Her 
 conscience was callous and her prejudices intense; but 
 through the influence of this hymn, she became a humble 
 and penitent believer in the Lord Jesus Christ. It was 
 brought about in this way. There was a short service every 
 week in the chapel of the institution for the inmates; a 
 hymn was sung and prayer offered. On one occasion the 
 minister gave out that touching hymn: 
 
 “Just as I am, without one plea, 
 But that Thy blood was shed for me,” 
 
 and, contrary to his custom, read it through, each verse 
 ending, 
 “OQ Lamb of God, I come! I come!” 
 
 These last words reached her heart, the stone was taken 
 away, the unspeakable love of Jesus, which she had long 
 resisted, softened her into tenderness and deep contrition, 
 and the language of her soul was, “May I, so vile a sinner, 
 come? Does Jesus bid me come? Will He wash my every 
 sin away in His blood?” She doubted no more, but believed. 
 
 No. 96. 
 “WHILE ON THE VERGE OF LIFE I STAND.” 
 
 Rev. Purr Dopprince, 1702—1751. 
 
 This hymn was suggested to the author by a remarkable 
 dream which he had after a conversation with his early 
 friend and patron, Dr. Samuel Clark, on the state of the 
 soul after death. He dreamed that he died, and his spirit 
 soared away into the regions beyond the stars. As he ap- 
 
96 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 proached the borders of heaven, an angel met him, who 
 conducted him to a beautiful palace which was assigned for 
 his abode. There, in an inner apartment, he saw a golden 
 cup with a large grape vine embossed upon it, which he 
 learned signified the living union of Christ with His people. 
 While he was still talking with the angel, a gentle knock 
 was heard, and before him, through the opening door, he 
 saw the Redeemer. The enraptured disciple fell at the feet 
 of his glorified Lord, but was lifted up with sweet assurance 
 of His favor. Then taking the cup, and first drinking of it 
 Himself, the Savior put it into the hands of His disciple, 
 who declined the honor, but was told, “If thou drink it not, 
 thou hast no part with Me.” Then the Savior left him for 
 a time; and looking about him, lo! on the walls were pic- 
 ture illustrations of scenes in his earthly life—scenes of 
 trial, and deliverance, of conflict and victory. A burst of 
 joy broke the enchantment of his celestial dream; and 
 amidst a flood of tears he woke to the consciousness that 
 he was still in the body. 
 Rev. R. T. Ropinson. 
 
 No. 96. 
 “HOW SAD OUR STATE BY NATURE IS!” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Warts, 1674—1748. 
 
 “The way of salvation is perfectly plain to me now,” 
 remarked a lady once to her pastor. ‘The darkness is all 
 gone. Everything is clear to me now. I do not know how 
 or why it is so. But you read a hymn the other night with 
 these words: 
 
 ‘A guilty weak and helpless worm, 
 On Thy kind arms I fall; 
 
 Be Thou my strength and righteousness, 
 My Jesus and my all!’ 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 97 
 
 I saw then at once that I had nothing to do but to trust in 
 Jesus. I sat all the evening just thinking of those lines. 
 I did not hear your prayer, nor your text, nor a word of 
 your sermon. I thought of nothing but those lines then and 
 ever since. I am so contented and happy. Why, sir, don’t 
 you think that the reason why we do not get out of our 
 darkness sooner is that we don’t believe?” From that 
 evening on that lady had no difficulty with the way of 
 salvation. 
 
 No. 97. 
 “THOU SON OF GOD, WHOSE FLAMING EYES”—1767. 
 
 Rev. CHaryes Wesiey, 1708—1788. 
 
 Many years ago a revival was in progress in a little vil- 
 lage called Pendeen, near Land’s End, England. It hap- 
 pened that at that time there was a little band of men who 
 were great chums, and in a good position in society, in fact 
 they were regarded as influential men in the parish. One 
 evening they were all together at an hotel in the neighbor- 
 ing town of Penzance, and, as men do on such occasions, 
 they were drinking, and talking all kinds of nonsense, and 
 not unfrequently all kinds of profanity. One happened to 
 say, “I wonder what the people are doing just now over at 
 Pendeen?”’ 
 
 Another replied, “I suppose they are all getting converted 
 as fast as possible.” 
 
 “Well,” said one to a third, “I say, Captain B., I will tell 
 you what it is. When I see you converted, I will begin to 
 think there is something in it,” and there was a roar of 
 laughter from the whole company at the thought of Cap- 
 tain B’s conversion. 
 
 The man thus referred to was a mine agent, occupying a 
 very influential position, and a large employer of labor. As 
 the laughter died away, he arose from his seat. His com- 
 
98 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 panions did not notice how pale was his cheek. One thought 
 only had flashed across his mind, when he heard his friend’s 
 remark, and the roar of laughter. which it provoked. It was 
 this, “Is my salvation so utterly hopeless that these worldly 
 men can afford to regard me as they do? Do my compan- 
 ions think me altogether lost—for time and eternity?” 
 
 He started up and darted out of the room. The company 
 thought they had offended him. Another moment, and he 
 was in the hotel yard, and crying to the hostler, “Saddle my 
 horse!”” He rode to his home as fast as he could ride. His 
 wife could not understand what was wrong with him; he 
 was so agitated. He took no food but immediately set out 
 for the place at which the meetings were being held. He 
 was the last man expected to be seen there. He came 
 boldly forward and took his seat in the front of the con- 
 gregation, in full view of many whom he was employing. 
 He had overcome his moral cowardice. The preacher gave 
 out the third stanza of this hymn: 
 
 “Ts there a soul that knows Thee not, 
 Nor feels his need of Thee, 
 A stranger to the blood which bought 
 His pardon on the tree? 
 Convince him now of unbelief; 
 His desperate state explain’; 
 
 As he uttered these last words, “His desperate state ex- 
 plain!” a cry was heard. The Captain was prostrate on his 
 knees, and was sending up the thrilling prayer, before the 
 eyes and ears of all, “God be merciful to me a sinner.” It 
 need hardly be told that he went home rejoicing. His con- 
 version moved the whole neighborhood, and was the com- 
 mencement of the most remarkable work of grace that ever 
 occurred in those parts. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 99 
 
 No. 98. 
 
 “HOW FIRM A FOUNDATION YE SAINTS OF THE 
 LORD.” 
 
 At the Fulton Street prayer meeting in New York, a city 
 missionary one day said that he brought with him one day 
 an unconverted man and his wife. They had come to New 
 York on a pitiful errand—to identify the body of a mur- 
 dered son. As they were without the consolation of the 
 Gospel in this hour of their need and trial, the missionary 
 friend felt deeply for them and induced them to attend the 
 prayer meeting with him. Among the hymns sung was the 
 one commencing with the above lines, and it was sung to 
 the old familiar tune, “Portuguese Hymn.” The sorrowing 
 father’s heart was touched. He had not heard these words 
 sung for well nigh fifty years, when his mother used to sing 
 them and to the same old tune. He was deeply touched and 
 the missionary hoped not without good results. 
 
 Rev. 8S. I. Primes, D.D. 
 
 No. 99. 
 “AND MUST I BE TO JUDGMENT BROUGHT’—1763. 
 
 Rev. Cuartes WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 One of the habitual attendants at the Fulton Street 
 prayer meeting, New York, relates that while passing 
 through a down-town street in that city one day, he caught 
 sight of the office of an old employer, and determined to 
 make a call. He found there two young men, who entered 
 the office when they were boys and were only boys when 
 he left. When they saw him, they greeted him as “the old 
 Methodist Captain.” He was not a Methodist, he told 
 them, but they persisted that he knew a number of Metho- 
 
100 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 dist hymns and must sing them one with a chorus. He did 
 not feel prepared to sing just then, but-who could say that 
 this might not be an opportunity to sing home the Gospel 
 to their hearts? So with this thought in his mind he prayed 
 God to direct him, and commenced singing these solemn 
 lines: 
 
 “And must I be to judgment brought, 
 And answer in that day 
 
 For every vain and idle thought, 
 And every word I say?” 
 
 At the end of each verse, he sang as a chorus, “The judg- 
 ment day is rolling round,” ete. When he had finished the 
 first verse, he noticed that the young men were very still; 
 at the second the tears were in their eyes; and when the 
 third was sung both seemed deeply moved, and at least one 
 besought him to pray for him. 
 
 Rev. 8. I. Primp, D.D. 
 
 No. 100. 
 
 “°"MID PLEASURES AND PALACES THOUGH WE MAY 
 ROAM”—1823. 
 
 JoHN Howarp Payns, 1792—1852. 
 
 In 1864, a number of Union prisoners of war, who had 
 been paroled, passed over a railroad in Maine on their way 
 to their homes. Among their number, was a blue-eyed, 
 pale-faced boy of not more than seventeen years, whose 
 shoulders seemed scarcely equal to the task of carrying a 
 forty-pound knapsack. For some time he had been looking 
 intently out of the window, and suddenly, as the train was 
 approaching Biddeford, he jumped up and with his face all 
 aglow and eyes sparkling with delight, exclaimed, “Boys, 
 there’s my father’s chimney.” As if by a simultaneous 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 101 
 
 inspiration the soldiers all sprang from their seats and sang, 
 “Home, Sweet Home,” and more than one bearded man 
 looked out of the windows as an excuse to hide his tears. 
 
 A gentleman, now a Christian minister, relates how the 
 music of a hymn proved the means of his salvation. Hav- 
 ing run away as a prodigal from his father’s home in Vir- 
 ginia, when a young man, he had had little regard for the 
 broken-hearted parents that he had forsaken, until one 
 Christmas night, when in the fourth story of a Philadelphia 
 hotel, he was awakened by the chiming bells of an Episcopal 
 Church near by. The tune of “Home, Sweet Home,” 
 was being played. As in the quiet of the midnight hour the 
 sound of this hymn floated over the city, thoughts of his 
 forsaken home began to echo through the chambers of his 
 soul. A father’s plaintive voice, and a mother’s streaming 
 eyes seemed to beckon him home again. His pillow soon 
 became wet with tears of penitence. At the repetition of 
 the tune he could no longer remain in bed. His own heart 
 was now yearning for “Home, sweet, sweet home,” and soon 
 his hands were packing up to start for home, and not long 
 after his feet were hastening down the flights of stairs, up 
 Chestnut street, down Broad street, and at the Baltimore 
 depot he took the first. train of cars for home. 
 
 Rev. E. M. Lone. 
 
 One who had recently returned from a sea voyage relates 
 the following: “On one of the delicious afternoons in Feb- 
 ruary, peculiar to the West Indies, as the sun was declining 
 below the western horizon, the ship lay in a calm near the 
 Island of Cuba. The sea was uncommonly smooth, and the 
 sails lay listless against the masts. The sun was setting, 
 and the whole ocean seemed of liquid gold. At this hour a 
 few of the officers assembled on the forecastle to contem- 
 plate the scene; and recalling the joys of other days, to 
 hold that converse which in a small degree alleviates the 
 privations of a seaman’s life. The father dwelt in tender- 
 
102 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 ness on his distant family; the brother recalled the unbidden 
 assiduities of a sister’s love; and the son felt his heart soft- 
 ened by the recollections of a mother’s care. Such was the 
 state of feeling when a clear melodious voice slowly poured 
 forth the first line’ of that exquisite song, ‘Home, Sweet 
 Home!’ We had often heard that song, but never had it 
 come so thrillingly as then. The singer continued. As the 
 song drew to a close, his emotion increased with that of 
 every one who listened. At length, as the line, ‘There’s no 
 place like home,” rose on the stillness of the hour for the 
 last. time, a rush of feeling was evident and in many showed 
 itself in tears. Oh! it was good to look on men whom I had 
 considered hardened in iniquity, thus throwing open the 
 flood gates of long pent affections, that they might once 
 more gladden and purify the soul! No one spoke; and after 
 a few moments in which all else was banished by the one 
 dear thought of the distant home we had exchanged for our 
 home on the deep, each one sought his pillow, I doubt not 
 a better and purer man.” 
 
 No. 101. 
 “ROCK OF AGES, CLEFT FOR ME.” 
 
 Rev. Aucustus Montacue Topuapy, 1740—1778. 
 
 In how many instances was the precious Gospel brought 
 to the soldiers, in the strains of music set to Psalms and 
 hymns. In camp and hospital, on march and field, the 
 sweet songs of Zion wooed many a prodigal back to the 
 Father’s loving embrace. None possibly was more effectual 
 than that familiar hymn, “Rock of Ages.” We first heard 
 it sung in the army on the beach at Fortress Monroe, by 
 some delegates of the Christian Commission, just beneath 
 the “Lincoln Gun.” Its grateful truth, borne on the winds, 
 fell upon the ears of a soldier on the parapet; not only so, 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 103 
 
 but touched his heart, andi in time led him to build on the 
 “Rock of Ages.” 
 
 Again we heard the same hymn at Yorktown, sung by 
 some of the same delegates. After its singing, as we were 
 returning to our quarters, one of the delegates was over- 
 taken by a soldier, who belonged to the “Lost Children.” 
 He asked, ‘““Won’t you please tell me how I may build on 
 the ‘Rock’ you sang about? I was thinking of it while on 
 guard the other day.” He told his story in brief: He was 
 from New York City, and received his mother’s dying 
 blessing. Before she breathed her last, she sang this 
 hymn, and said, “George, my son, I would not feel so badly 
 about your enlisting, if you were only built upon that 
 sRecks 2) 
 
 These sacred memories were revived by the singing of 
 the hymn; and as the delegate and soldier knelt on the 
 dusty roadside, beneath the stars, the wanderer lost his 
 weariness and thirst for sin, in the shadow of the “Rock of 
 Ages.” Eighteen months after this incident, the same dele- 
 gate, going to Fortress Monroe, on a boat which had as 
 part of her passengers a gay and happy company of the 
 Signal Corps, conversed, sang and prayed with them. He 
 related to them the foregoing incidents, sang “Rock of 
 Ages” and retired to his stateroom. Soon after, a gentle tap 
 called him to the door, where he found a tall, graceful lieu- 
 tenant, who, with tears streaming down his face, said, “O 
 sir! I could not let you go to bed tonight until I had told 
 you what you have done. As I sat, with my head leaning 
 against a spar, and listened to your words and to that 
 hymn, you brought back my dead mother with all her 
 prayers and love. I have been a wanderer until this night, 
 and now by God’s grace I want to hide myself in that 
 ‘Rock of Ages.’ ” 
 
 Rev. GrorcE BRINGHURST. 
 
 Rev. George Bringhurst says, “Passing through the 
 woolen factory at Fredericksburg after the battle, my _ 
 
104 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 immense parish of wounded, dying men, I heard a low, 
 mournful voice singing: 
 
 ‘While I draw this fleeting breath, 
 When mine eyelids close in death, 
 When I rise to worlds unknown, 
 And behold Thee on Thy throne,— 
 Rock of Ages, cleft for me, 
 
 Let me hide myself in Thee.’ 
 
 There were some pauses in the verse, as if strength were 
 failing the singer. A look, as I passed on my errand, told 
 me that the soldier was dying. Next morning, the last 
 ‘fleeting breath’ had been drawn, the eyelids were ‘closed in 
 death,’ and the life that had gone was hid with Christ in 
 God.” 
 
 After one of the battles of the war of the Rebellion, a 
 chaplain relates, “Afar off, under the machinery of a mill, 
 I heard the voice of singing. It reminded me of Paul and 
 Silas singing their praises in the guarded dungeon. I 
 walked over and leaned upon the ponderous wheel. Near 
 me there rose a voice, sweet and clear, and the holy strains 
 were: 
 
 ‘While I draw this fleeting breath.’ 
 
 But soon the earth receded from the eyes of, the soldier-boy, 
 and the lips that gave forth so sweet a strain were still; 
 while the spirit of the man walked in the light of the angels 
 over the crystal pavement of the New Jerusalem.” 
 
 It was a sultry day in June. The scorching beams of the 
 noonday sun came slanting through the broad, uncurtained 
 windows, falling directly on the operators and “sewing girls 
 ranged along the room, making their heads throb and ache 
 almost to bursting. Wearily the machines turned, and the 
 tired eyes of the girls glanced now and then at the clock 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 105 
 
 noting the moments as they dragged heavily by. The calls 
 on the ice cooler had been frequent that morning, and now 
 at one o’clock the water was spent. One after another had 
 gone to it, expecting to get a cooling drink, but had turned 
 away disappointed. The merry song was hushed, the 
 laughing jests were dropped, and tired hands toiled on, 
 longing for the close of the day, that they might find rest 
 and water. Suddenly, in the deep hush, came the sweet low 
 voice of an operator, singing: 
 
 “Rock of Ages, cleft for me, 
 Let me hide myself in Thee.” 
 
 One after another joined in forgetting their burning thirst, 
 until the whole fifty girls were singing. Grandly the closing 
 stahza rang out: 
 
 “Whilst I draw this fleeting breath, 
 When my eye-strings 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.” 
 
 No more sadness, no more weary looks or anxious glances 
 - at the clock. Hymn after hymn was sung, and almost too 
 soon came the six o’clock bell.” 
 
 American Messenger. 
 
 A minister in Wales gave the following account of his 
 conversion after the battle of Alma, during the Crimean 
 war, in which he was engaged as a soldier. 
 
 “T had,” said he, “gone down a hill to get some water. 
 In consequence of the number of men lying dead on the 
 field, the water there was not fit to drink, so I had to go a 
 long way to get some. After getting all I required I re- 
 traced my steps to the camp. As I stepped over the bodies 
 
106 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 now stiff and cold in death, my thoughts wandered to those 
 families in England who were deprived of a father, hus- 
 band or brother, when all at once the sound of singing 
 floated in the air. I drew near to the place and found a 
 company of soldiers singing in the Welsh language. In the 
 midst of them was a Welsh soldier whose sands of life were 
 nearly gone, and he had requested his comrades to sing: 
 
 ‘Rock of Ages, cleft for me.’ 
 When they sang the last verse: 
 
 ‘Whilst I draw this fleeting breath, 
 When my eye-strings break in death,’ 
 
 he lifted his eyes to heaven and faintly exclaimed, ‘Sing it 
 again.’ They did so. But before they had finished it his 
 soul left the tenement of clay for the home above. The 
 solemn scene had such an effect upon me that I began to see 
 the way of salvation, and am now a minister of the gospel.” 
 
 During revival services at Calvary Church, Cleveland, 
 Ohio, in 1870, the subject one evening was “The Prodigal 
 Son,” and a prodigal had been drawn in from the street. 
 The number of inquirers was great, and crowded the seats 
 set apart for their use so full that this one could not find 
 room and so he fell upon his knees in the aisle. An evening 
 or two later, as he arose to testify how he had been plucked 
 as a brand from the burning, he remarked that he found 
 great difficulty in drowning the echo of the rowdy songs he 
 had been accustomed to sing. “But,” said he, “I have suc- 
 ceeded by singing, ‘Rock of Ages,’ and today I have been 
 kept busy singing it from morning till night.” 
 
 It was at the death bed, not long ago, of a man who had 
 for many years been living a life of profligacy. For years 
 his friends knew nothing of him, but at last he was taken 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 107 
 
 sick and then he sought his home. His friends received him, 
 attended him with all kindness, and as he lay in that sick 
 bed Jesus came knocking at his heart and he received Him. 
 A few days before his death, I asked him on what: his hope 
 was resting. He stretched forth his hand for a hymn book, 
 and with his long, pale, wasted fingers, turned over its 
 leaves, and then handing it to me pointed to one of the 
 hymns, and said, “That is my hope.” It was “Rock of Ages, 
 cleft for me.” 
 Rev. E. M. Lone. 
 
 One Sabbath a poor drunken man walked into a church 
 with a fashionable congregation, and seated himself near the 
 pulpit, at the close of the first hymn. His shabby appear- 
 ance attracted general observation. The minister had 
 scarcely commenced preaching when the stranger had sunk 
 into a deep sleep and snored aloud, when one of the officers 
 of the church approached to lead him out. “Let him re- 
 main,” said the minister; “he does not disturb me. Try and 
 bear with him. I hope he may hear some word before he. 
 leaves which will persuade him to lead a new life. The 
 man is not in his senses; there is some influence which we 
 do not perceive which has led him here. I believe the Lord 
 sent him.” 
 
 He continued to sleep on, but more quietly. The pealing 
 of the organ and the singing of the choir at last aroused 
 him. He started in bewilderment and gazed around. It 
 was the old hymn “Rock of Ages,” which they were singing. 
 He sat down, buried his face in his hands, and listened to 
 the prayer which followed. The next Sabbath, he was again 
 in church, and soon afterwards, in a prayer meeting, he 
 arose and said he hoped he had become a Christian. On 
 the Sabbath when he first entered the church he had heard 
 the singing, and a voice seemed to bid him enter. He 
 thought it might be the voice of God speaking to him for 
 the last time. Half overcome with drink, and almost in 
 rags, he entered the church. He heard part of the hymn, 
 
108 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “Rock of Ages,” the hymn sung by his mother upon her 
 death bed. The prayer which followed seemed meant for 
 him. He resolved to leave off his old habit, and by the 
 grace of God he had kept his resolution. He became a 
 member of the church, and subsequently a deacon. “I do 
 not know,” said his pastor, “a man more earnest, or more 
 successful in doing good than he.” 
 
 G. J. STEVENSON. 
 
 No. 102. 
 “WE'RE TRAVELING HOME TO HEAVEN ABOVE.” 
 
 One morning, toward the close of July, 1862, Chaplain 
 Henries, passing through the rooms of the hospital at the 
 Navy Yard at Annapolis, placed on the vacant bed of a 
 soldier a single-paged tract entitled, “Will you go?” It was 
 a copy of the hymn bearing that name. Its first lines read: 
 
 “We're traveling home to heaven above; 
 Will you go? 
 
 To sing the Savior’s dying love; 
 Will you go?” 
 
 Other lines of it read: 
 
 “The way to heaven is straight and plain; 
 ‘Will you go? 
 Repent, believe, be born again: 
 : Will you go?” 
 
 Soon after the soldier came and sat down on his bed. He 
 picked up the hymn, looked at the title, read a few lines of 
 the invitation, and threw it down. Again he picked it up 
 and read a little, then threw it upon the floor. But the 
 invitation he was so unwilling to hear had reached him, 
 through this silent messenger of the Lord. Playing with the 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 109 
 
 tract for awhile with his foot, the soldier picked it up for 
 the third time, and now read it carefully through. It was 
 thrown down no more. The soldier read and reread it, and 
 then holding it thoughtfully awhile in his hand, as if listen- 
 ing to the solemn voice speaking to him, “Will you go?” 
 he drew a pencil from his pocket, and deliberately traced 
 round the margin of the tract these words: “By the grace of 
 God, I will try to go. John Waugh, Company G, 10th 
 Regt. P.R.V.C.” 
 
 A soldiers’ prayer meeting was held that night in the 
 hospital. Waugh came, and when opportunity was given— 
 with his wounded arm in a sling, and the little tract in his 
 other hand—he told his comrades of his conflict with that 
 bit of paper. He read the promise which he had written on. 
 the margin, and asked all to pray that he might keep it and 
 never be ashamed of his Savior, adding, “I’m not ashamed 
 of Christ now, but I am ashamed of myself for having been 
 so long ashamed of Him.” Some months later he was killed 
 in a skirmish in Virginia. 
 
 Rev. R. J. Parvin. 
 
 No. 103. 
 “NEARER MY GOD TO THEE”—1841. 
 
 Mrs. SARAH FLower ApAMs, 1805—1849. 
 
 At the siege of Fort Donelson, in 1862, a young soldier 
 was wounded, and left by his comrades, who pressed on in 
 the battle. When they returned, they found him resting 
 against a tree, dead, with a hymn book open in his hand at 
 this hymn: 
 
 “Nearer my God to Thee, nearer to Thee.” 
 
 The story is told of a girl who had been very sick and 
 whose disease had affected her eyes, so that she had to be 
 
110 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 kept in a dark room and it was feared she might lose her 
 sight. She could not believe it possible that so dread a 
 calamity could overtake her. While alone, one Sabbath 
 day, she said to herself, ‘““The Bible says we are not tried 
 above that we are able to bear, and I could not endure 
 that. Oh! no, I shall not be blind.” 
 
 While musing thus a low sweet voice near her said: 
 “Sister, may I come in?” 
 
 “Why, yes, if you want to.” 
 
 “T want to recite my hymn to you; it is some new 
 verses to ‘Nearer my God, to Thee,’ and I like them so 
 much.” 
 
 “Well, dear, say them; I don’t mind.” 
 
 “Tf where they led my Lord, 
 I, too be borne, 
 Planting my steps in His, 
 Weary and worn— 
 May the path carry me 
 Nearer my God, to Thee, 
 Nearer to Thee!” 
 
 “That’s not for me,” thought the sick girl, “it means the 
 old-time martyrs.” She tried to shake off the feeling. How 
 could the dark path bring her nearer to God? But the 
 childish voice continued: 
 
 “Tf Thou the cup of pain 
 Givest to drink, 
 Let not my trembling lips 
 From the draught shrink; 
 So by my woes to be 
 Nearer my God to Thee, 
 Nearer to Thee!” 
 
 “Never mind finishing it, sister, my head aches, and I 
 want to be alone.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 111 
 
 Once the thin, white hand was raised as if to dash the 
 “cup of pain” from her lips. Days passed. As her strength 
 came back the inflammation in her eyes decreased. She 
 no longer spoke of her hopes and fears. She looked more 
 and more calmly at her cross. The path, though dark, had 
 one ray of light, which, if followed, must bring her to her 
 Savior, for it came from Him. One day she cried, “O 
 mamma! I cannot wait; let the light in now,” but her 
 mother said, “Have patience, darling; the noonday is too 
 bright; I will promise you to let the morning sun into your 
 room.” 
 
 All day long she waited, her lips moving in prayer. The 
 morning dawned. “Open the blinds wide, mamma; let in 
 all the light you can before you take off the bandage.” 
 
 She turned toward the window; on her bare arms she 
 felt the warm sun and morning breeze, but no light came to 
 her eyes. 
 
 “Mamma, mamma, why are you so silent? Is the room 
 light?” ; 
 
 Her mother’s low pained voice answered, “My darling, 
 the sun shines in your face.” She sank upon her knees; the 
 clasped hands were uplifted, as if reaching for something 
 unattainable; the face quivered with inward anguish; but 
 the expression of her sightless eyes was more beautiful than 
 in their days of vision they had ever been. As her mother 
 bent over her she heard the pale lips whisper: 
 
 “So by my woes to be 
 Nearer my God, to Thee, 
 Nearer to Thee.” 
 
 A writer in the Nashville Christian Advocate, January, 
 1878, relates the following reminiscence of Bishop Marvin: 
 “The bishop, at a prayer meeting he had conducted, stated 
 that he had recently been traveling in the wilds of Arkan- 
 sas, his mind oppressed, and his heart sad. He had been 
 driven from his family and home by the invading foe, and 
 
112 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 could not hear of their welfare, and it seemed to him that 
 . clouds and darkness had completely enveloped him. In this 
 state of heart he approached an old log cabin in a very 
 dilapidated condition. As he drew nearer he distinguished 
 the sound of some female singing: 
 
 ‘Nearer my God to Thee.’ 
 
 He at once alighted and went in, for the sound seemed to 
 enter his very soul. He there found the singer, a poor old 
 widow woman, in the midst of poverty, but who was happy 
 in spite of her loneliness and want. He felt and said that if 
 an old widow in such want could sing such a song, that 
 certainly he could. He gave to the wind his fears, his ful! 
 confidence in an overruling Providence was brought into 
 lively exercise, and from that day he went on singing: 
 
 ‘Nearer my God, to Thee.’ 
 
 This simple personal narrative made a deeper impression 
 on my mind, than even the rich sermons he preached, and 
 with which I was delighted.” 
 
 No. 104. 
 | “WHEN I CAN READ MY TITLE CLEAR.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Warts, 1674—1748. 
 
 At the battle of Shiloh a Christian Captain was shot 
 through both thighs with a rifle bullet, a wound from which 
 he could not recover. While lying on the field, he suffered 
 intense agony from thirst. He supported his head upon his 
 hand, while the rain was falling around him. In a little 
 time, quite a pool of water collected in the hole made by 
 his elbow. If he could only get to that puddle he could 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 113 
 
 quench his thirst. He tried to get into a position to suck 
 up a mouthful of muddy water, but was unable to quite 
 reach it. Said he, “I never felt such disappointment before 
 —so needy, so near, and yet so helpless. By-and-by night 
 fell, and the stars shone out clear and beautiful above the 
 dark field; and I began to think of the great God, Who 
 had given His Son to die a death of agony for me, and that 
 He was up there—up above the scene of suffering, and above 
 those glorious stars; and I felt that I was going home to 
 meet Him, and praise Him there; and that I ought to 
 praise Him, here in my wounds and in the rain, and I began 
 to sing with my parched lips: 
 
 ‘When I can read my title clear 
 To mansions in the skies, 
 
 I'll bid farewell to every fear, 
 And wipe my weeping eyes.’ 
 
 There was a Christian brother in the brush near me. I 
 could not see him, but I could hear him. He took up the 
 strain; and beyond him another and another caught it up, 
 all over the battlefield of Shiloh; and long into the night 
 the echo was resounding, as we made the field of battle ring 
 with hymns of praise to God.” A writer in one of the maga- 
 zines thus threw the story into song: 
 
 “Through the terror of the stillness, 
 Through the anguish of the moans, 
 Come the words, half sung, half whispered, 
 In exultant, hopeful tones, 
 
 ‘When I can read my title clear 
 To mansions in the skies.’ 
 Heads are lifted, groans are stifled, 
 Wounded men forget their pain, 
 B’en the dying wait to listen 
 To that sweet and holy strain: 
 ‘T’ll bid farewell to every fear, 
 And wipe my weeping eyes.’ 
 
114 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 Dying men smile as they sing it 
 With their last drawn earthly breath, 
 And their souls go out in music 
 To the shadow land of death,” 
 ‘Let cares like a wild deluge come, 
 And storms of sorrow fall, 
 May I but safely reach my home, 
 My God, my heaven, my all!’” 
 
 No. 108. 
 “HOW SWEET THE NAME OF JESUS SOUNDS.” 
 Rev. JouN Newton, 1725—1807. 
 
 Major Whittlesey, of Gen. Howard’s staff, tells of a chap- 
 lain who had been very attentive to a wounded soldier for 
 several days, trying, if possible, to save his limb. It was 
 decided that the leg must be taken off. The soldier was 
 anxious that his chaplain should be present during the 
 operation, but he felt as if he could not bear the sight. 
 So, when the suffering man was put upon a stretcher and 
 borne to the amputating table, the chaplain remained behind. 
 How surprised and electrified was he, as he waited sadly 
 for the result, to hear the voice of his friend sounding forth 
 from the room of pain, singing those precious lines: 
 
 “How sweet the name of Jesus sounds 
 In a believer’s ear! 
 It soothes his sorrows, heals his wounds 
 And drives away his fear.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 115 
 No. 106. 
 “JESUS, LOVERZOBReMLY..cOUL.”* 
 
 Rev. CHARLES Westey, 1708—1788. 
 
 Rev. Norman Fox, chaplain of the Seventy-seventh New 
 York regiment tells the following story of the evening after 
 the battle of Rappahannock Station: “I found a young 
 man of the Tenth Massachusetts Regiment with his leg 
 crushed and mangled by a piece of shell. The shock had 
 been so severe that amputation was useless, and he was 
 sinking rapidly. I inquired concerning his religious history. 
 It was the old story—a bright hope, active church member- 
 ship, army life and irregularities, and the abandonment of 
 his profession. ‘And now,’ said he, ‘if there can be forgive- 
 ness for such a wanderer, pray for me.’ 
 
 “T confess I felt more backwardness than was right. 
 There stood a circle of rough soldiers surveying the solemn 
 scene with mere morbid curiosity. There stood another 
 group, more educated and refined—a knot of surgeons, some 
 of whom, I knew, had no belief in God or eternity, and 
 considered my interview with the dying man as at best but 
 amiable uselessness. But there lay the sinking sufferer, 
 and I wore the uniform of a minister of Christ. Bending 
 over the table where he lay, I asked the Good Shepherd 
 to pardon the returning wanderer. Murmured responses 
 throughout the prayer disclosed’ his own earnestness in the 
 petition; the smothered hope revived again; and faint at 
 first but growing brighter and brighter, there finally beamed 
 on him the full radiance of that faith which supports in the 
 stern hour. Meanwhile there stood by the table a noble look- 
 ing soldier, a little older than the dying man, moistening the 
 lips of the latter, affectionately smoothing his hair, but so 
 perfectly calm and collected that I supposed he was only a 
 hospital attendant. A casual remark startled my suspicion, 
 and I asked him, ‘Is he a friend of yours?’ 
 
116 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “He answered, ‘It is my younger brother.’ 
 
 “Stooping over him, the brother said, ‘What shall I tel! 
 mother for you?’ 
 
 “<Tell her I died for my country,’ was the prompt cheery 
 reply. 
 ““Give me a kiss for her,’ said the other; and the bronzed 
 face bowed down to the pale lips as tenderly as if they 
 had been an infant’s. More than one turned aside to hide 
 his tears; the brothers seemed least moved of all. The dying 
 boy sank rapidly, but all clouds vanished, and faith grew 
 bright and strong. I repeated, ‘I know that my Redeemer 
 liveth,’ ‘The Lord is my Shepherd,’ ‘In my Father’s house 
 are many mansions,’ the hymn ‘Rock of Ages, cleft for me,’ 
 and those lines, especially dear when the couch of dissolu- 
 tion was a rough board table in a dark, cold tent, with only 
 a knapsack to rest the head upon: 
 
 “Jesus can make a dying bed 
 Feel soft as downy pillows are.’ 
 
 He tried to repeat: 
 ‘Jesus, lover of my soul;’ 
 
 I finished it for him. This hymn seemed to strengthen him 
 even more than the others. But his voice was’ already be- 
 ginning to fail. Said he, ‘There’s a—silver—pencil—in—my 
 pocket—’ It was with the deepest regret that we saw 
 that he could not speak friendship’s last message. There 
 was but one Friend of Whom he could speak now. We 
 watched him silently, while he lay for some minutes motion- 
 less; I thought all was over; but rousing suddenly, he said, 
 ‘Jesus, Lover of my soul;’—Oh! repeat that again!’ My 
 voice choked up so that I could hardly speak. I know not 
 if he heard me, for before I reached the last verse, ‘the 
 storm of life’ was over, ‘the haven’ was reached, and ‘the 
 billows’ had died away in the eternal peace.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 117 
 
 A minister in America, who was a stranger to the church, 
 was on a certain occasion, called to officiate in a cold and 
 dreary church. When he entered it, the wind howled, and 
 loose clapboards and window shutters clattered. The pulpit 
 stood high above the first floor; there was no stove, but a 
 few persons in the church, and they beating their hands 
 and feet to keep them from freezing. He asked himself: 
 “Can I preach? Of what use can it be? What shall I do? 
 If I read a hymn, can these two or three in the gallery sing?” 
 He concluded to make the trial, and read: 
 
 “Jesus lover of my soul.” 
 
 “They commenced,” said the preacher, “and the sound 
 of a single female voice has followed me with an indescrib- 
 ably pleasing sensation ever since, and probably will while 
 I live. The voice intonation, articulation, and expression 
 seemed to be perfect. I was warmed inside and out, and ‘ 
 for the time was lost in rapture.” The minister preached 
 with unusual freedom and success, and learned never to 
 be discouraged by unfavorable appearances. 
 
 A chaplain in the United States Army, one morning found 
 Tom, the drummer boy, a great favorite with all the men, 
 and whom, because of his sobriety and religious example, 
 they called “The young deacon,” sitting under a tree. At 
 first he thought him asleep, but as he drew near, the boy 
 lifted up his head, and he saw tears in his eyes. 
 
 “Well, Tom, my boy, what is it; for I see your thoughts 
 are sad? What is it?” 
 
 “Why, sir, I had a dream last night, which I can’t get 
 out of my mind.” } 
 
 “What was it?” 
 
 “You know that my little sister Mary is dead—died when 
 ten years old. My mother was a widow, poor but good. 
 She never seemed like herself afterward. Im a year or 
 so she died too; and then I having no home and no mother, 
 
118 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 came to the war. But last night I dreamed the war was 
 over, and I went back to my old home, and just before 
 I got to the house, my mother and little sister came out 
 to meet me. I didn’t seem to remember they were dead. 
 How glad they were! and how my mother, in her joy, 
 pressed me to her heart! Oh! sir, it was just as real as 
 you are real now!” 
 
 “Thank God, Tom, that you have such a mother, not 
 really dead, but in heaven, and that you are hoping, through 
 Christ, to meet her again.” 
 
 The boy wiped his eyes and was comforted. The next 
 day there was terrible fighting, Tom’s drum was heard all 
 day long here and there. Four times, the ground was swept 
 and occupied by the contending armies. But as the night 
 came on both paused, and neither dared to go on the field, 
 lest the foe be there. Tom, “the young deacon,” it was 
 known, was wounded and left on the battlefield. His com- 
 pany encamped near by. In the evening, when the noise 
 of the battle was over, and all was still, they heard a voice 
 singing, away off on the field. They felt sure it was Tom’s 
 voice. Softly and beautifully the words floated on the 
 wings of the night air: 
 
 “Jesus, lover of my soul, 
 Let me to Thy bosom fly, 
 While the nearer waters roll, 
 While the tempest still is high! 
 Hide me, O, my Savior, hide, 
 Till the storm of life is past; 
 Safe into the haven guide, 
 O receive my soul at last! 
 
 “Other refuge have I none; 
 Hangs my helpless soul on Thee: 
 Leave, O, leave me not alone, 
 Still support and comfort me;” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 119 
 
 The voice stopped here, and there was silence. In the morn- 
 ing the soldiers went out, and found Tom sitting on the 
 ground, and leaning against a stump—dead! 
 
 Sunday School Times. 
 
 About twenty years ago, on a winter’s night, a heavy 
 gale set in upon the precipitous, rock-bound coast near 
 the British Channel. A little coasting vessel struggled 
 bravely, but in vain, with the tempest. One dark, fearful 
 headland could not be weathered—the bark must go ashore. 
 Then came the last desperate effort of the captain and his 
 ship’s crew. Their toiling at the oars was soon over, their 
 boat was soon swamped. ‘They were supposed to have all 
 sunk together; for, in the morning, they were all found 
 lying side by side upon a reedy rock. On visiting the 
 wreck, and going below to the cabin, there was found lying 
 on the table the captain’s hymn book, opened at the page 
 containing the hymn: 
 
 “Jesus, lover of my soul, 
 
 Let me to Thy bosom fly, 
 While the nearer waters roll, 
 While the tempest still is high.” 
 
 A fine, intelligent Virginia young man, while residing in 
 the west, became an infidel and a blasphemer of the name 
 of God. From this state he was delivered by reading the 
 work of Soame Jenyns; but while he acquiesced in the 
 truth of revelation, he did not yet feel its power. He 
 was attacked by a lingering and fatal disease, which led 
 him to reflection and prayer, but often made it difficult 
 for him to converse. Three Christian friends sometimes 
 visited him, to beguile the tedious hours by singing. They 
 one day entered the room, and, almost without any Digits 
 remarks, began the hymn: 
 
 “There is a fountain filled with blood.” 
 
120 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 He then said to them, “There is nothing I so delight to 
 hear as the first hymn you ever sung to me: 
 
 ‘Jesus, lover of my soul!’ ” 
 
 They began to sing it to the tune of “Martin,” and soon 
 the solemnity which had reigned in the little circle while 
 singing the former hymns began to be changed to weeping. 
 They struck the touching strains of the second stanza, and 
 the weeping became loud; the heart of him who had reviled 
 Christ broke, and they feared that to sing the remaining 
 stanzas, would be more than he could bear. When singing ~ 
 in his room a few days after, he said, “I don’t think I shall 
 ever hear ‘Jesus, lover of my soul’ sung again; it so excites 
 me that my poor body cannot bear it.’ 
 G. J. STEVENSON. 
 
 A party of Sunday school teachers and scholars went 
 
 out one summer’s day for a trip on Lake Winnepesaukee. 
 Quite suddenly there broke over them the most. terrific 
 storm of wind, rain, lightning, and thunder ever known 
 by the captain of the boat in an experience of twenty-five 
 years. Terror now took possession of nearly all, as well it 
 might. In a confusion amounting almost to a panic, all 
 rushed for the ship’s hold: Happening to be among the 
 last to leave the deck, and standing about midway on the 
 stairs, we witnessed a scene such as we had never beheld 
 before, and never wish to experience again. Women were 
 crying and fainting, children were frantic with fright, and 
 strong men stood pale and trembling. We tried to inspire 
 calmness and composure, but to very little purpose. Then 
 we sang: 
 
 “Jesus, lover of my soul, 
 Let me to Thy bosom fly.” 
 
 The lightning’s flash seemed almost to envelop us in a 
 sheet of flame, and the thunders seemed to shake the earth 
 and the sea. And then we sang: 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 121 
 
 “Other refuge have I none; 
 Hangs my helpless soul on Thee!” 
 
 The gallant boat, in whose palpitating bosom we had taken 
 refuge, met the storm bravely, but the gale was too mighty; 
 she was beaten back by the buffeting waves and winds, 
 and imperilled by hidden rocks; and then we sang: 
 
 “Thou, O Christ, art all I want; 
 More than all in Thee I find.” 
 
 But the heart of the hurricane began to be touched, and 
 the winds to relent; the lightning had a softer glare, and 
 the thunder fell more tenderly on our ears; and then there 
 was acalm. The hurricane had sped on with its accompani- 
 ment of flood and terror, and left us out in the clear sun- 
 shine. The singing saved us from a panic, and, saved from 
 that, we were saved from consequences we dared not con- 
 template. The twilight found us all safe at our homes. 
 G. J. STEVENSON. 
 
 No. 107. 
 “SWEET WAS THE TIME WHEN FIRST I FELT.” 
 
 Rev. JoHN Newton, 1725—1807. 
 
 A delegate of the Christian Commission relates that dur- 
 ing the gloomy time of the siege of Chattanooga, he was 
 riding down Waldorn’s Ridge, on his way to Bridgeport. 
 “The day was cold and wet, everything disheartening. It 
 seemed probable that we were about to abandon Chatta- 
 nooga, and that this would be my last trip over. the moun- 
 tains. Depressed with these thoughts and chilled with the 
 rain, I jogged along alone, until I overtook a cavalry man 
 riding solitarily, and seemingly as low in spirits as myself. 
 As I came abreast of him, so as to look into his face, I 
 saw his eyes were full of tears. In our conversation I let 
 
122 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 fall a word of Christian experience, when he turned to me 
 in an earnest way, and said, ‘Then you are a Christian. 
 Perhaps you can help me out of my difficulty?’ I expressed 
 my readiness to do anything I could. 
 
 ““T was just trying to repeat the first verse of a blessed 
 old hymn which I have been singing for years, but somehow 
 that fourth line I can’t get hold of this morning: 
 
 “Sweet was the time when first I felt 
 The Savior’s pardoning Blood 
 Applied to cleanse my soul from guilt,—” 
 
 Now there’s where I’m stopped; what’s the next line?’ 
 “T finished it up for him: 
 
 ‘And bring me home to God.’” 
 
 “<¢That’s it; thank you,’ said he; ‘that’s it. I wonder 
 I could have forgotten it.’ 
 
 “You looked troubled,’ said I, ‘when I first saw you; 
 your tears couldn’t have been over the loss of that fourth 
 line?’ ‘Oh, no,’ he replied; ‘it was the other three lines 
 that brought the tears. I was thinking of the time of my 
 conversion, and of the many times when I have “felt the 
 pardoning Blood” since that day.’” 
 
 No. 108. 
 “IN THE CHRISTIAN’S HOME IN GLORY.” . 
 
 Rev. SAMUEL YouNG Harmer, 1809—. 
 
 Rev. Horace C. Hovey, relates the following incident 
 which occurred after the battle of Fredericksburg: “A 
 brave cavalry officer was dying of his wounds. He was 
 delirious when I approached him. He imagined himself on 
 the field at the head of his gallant men, and fancied that 
 a heavy gun was just in front of them ready to be fired. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 123 
 
 His distress was great. At length he thought the gun had 
 been discharged, and his men, badly cut up, were retreating. 
 Here I interposed, saying, ‘There is no gun there; you are 
 safe among friends here in Fredericksburg.’ 
 
 ‘Let me alone,’ he sternly replied; ‘I must recover my 
 command and renew the attack.’ 
 
 ‘No,’ said I, ‘ let us not talk of battle-scenes. You 
 are soon to die. Let us talk of Jesus. The mention of 
 that Name seemed to exert the powerful influence I 
 had often heard ascribed to it. His agitation ceased at 
 once; his delirium passed away; a smile lit up his pallid 
 features. After a moment’s silence he said, in a low sweet 
 voice, ‘Jesus! Jesus! It is He Who said, “Come unto Me, 
 all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give 
 you rest.” I am weary; can you sing: 
 
 “There is rest for the weary?” ’ 
 
 “T complied with his wishes, and with failing, faltering | 
 tongue, he tried“to join in the song: 
 “In the Christian’s home in glory 
 There remains a land of rest.” 
 
 We sang the hymn entirely through, and when we closed 
 there was not a dry eye in all that ward. He died soon 
 after this, saying for his last words, ‘I have no father here 
 but my Heavenly Father.’ ” 
 
 No. 109. 
 
 “MINE EYES HAVE SEEN THE GLORY OF THE COMING 
 OF THE LORD.” 
 Mrs. Juri Warp Howe, 1819—1910. 
 
 Chaplain McCabe was confined in Libby Prison when 
 the news of the battle of Gettysburg was received there. 
 
124 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 He tells how the prisoners received it: “I had a relative 
 in Richmond, a staunch rebel. The day they received the 
 first tidings from Gettysburg he came to see me, his face 
 wreathed in smiles, saying: ‘Have you heard the news?’ 
 
 “ “What news?’ 
 
 “<‘Forty thousand Yankee prisoners on their way tp 
 Richmond!’ 
 
 “T was astounded. In dumb amazement I listened to 
 the Rebel officers speculating where the new prisoners should 
 be stowed away and how they were to be fed. I went up 
 stairs and told the news. Despondency settled down into 
 every heart. That night, as we assembled for ‘family 
 prayers’ and sang, as was always our wont, the long metre 
 Doxology, it trembled out from quivering lips up to Him 
 Who has said, ‘Glorify ye Me in the fires.’ We felt we 
 were so doing that night, if never before. 
 
 “T slept none that night, listening wearily to the watch 
 calling the hours and singing out as he did so, ‘AIl’s well.’ 
 When the day broke I waited for the footsteps of ‘Old 
 Ben,’ a character well known to every inmate of Libby. 
 
 Te was the prison news agent and sold papers at twenty- 
 five cents apiece. At last his footfall came. He pushed 
 the door ajar, looked round for a moment upon the sleepers, 
 and then raising up his arms, shouted, ‘Great news in de 
 paper!’ 
 
 “Did you ever see a resurrection? I never did but once. 
 Oh, how those men sprang to their feet; and what was the 
 news? The telegraph operator at Martinsburg, when put- 
 ting those cyphers to the four, had clicked his instrument 
 once too often. There was a mistake of only thirty-six 
 thousand! More yet! Lee was driven back; the Potomac 
 was swollen; the pontoons were washed away! I have stood 
 by when friends long parted meet again with raining tears 
 and fond embrace, but never did I witness such joy as 
 swept into those strong men’s faces, where the deepest 
 sorrow sat but a moment before. Well, what did we do? 
 Why, we sang as saved men do; sang till Captains Flynn 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 125 
 
 and Sawyer, immured in the lowest dungeon below and 
 doomed to die within ten days, heard us and wondered; 
 sang till the very walls of Libby quivered with the melody | 
 as five hundred of us joined in the chorus of Mrs. Julia 
 Ward Howe’s ‘Battle Hymn of the Republic’: 
 
 ‘Mine eyes have seen the Glory of the coming 
 of the Lord; 
 He is trampling out the vintage where the 
 grapes of wrath are stored; 
 He hath loosed the fateful lightning of His 
 terrible, swift sword; 
 His truth is marching on.’ ” 
 
 No. 110. 
 
 “O, FOR A CLOSER WALK WITH GOD.” 
 
 Witu1AmM Cowper, 1731—1800. 
 
 A gay and thoughtless young lady left her home on a 
 pleasure-secking tour to a fashionable watering place. She 
 arrived safely, but found amid the ceaseless hilarity, “an 
 aching void within.” Being seated near an open window, 
 she heard the soft, smooth voice of a servant girl as it 
 warbled forth the words of the hymn: 
 
 “OQ, for a closer walk with God 
 A calm and heavenly frame; 
 
 A light to shine upon the road 
 That leads me to the Lamb!” 
 
 As she listened her soul was drawn out in prayer with 
 the words she heard: 
 
 “The dearest idol I have known, 
 Whate’er that idol be, 
 Help me to tear it from Thy throne, 
 And worship only Thee.” 
 
126 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 She wept tears of penitence, trusted in Christ, and rejoiced 
 in peace. 
 
 No. 111. 
 “ONE SWEETLY SOLEMN THOUGHT”—1852. 
 
 Miss PHorse Cary, 1824—1871. 
 
 In Macao, China, near Hong Kong, the principal occupa- 
 tion of the inhabitants is gambling. Here, on a certain 
 occasion, a traveler found a company of gamblers in a 
 back room on the upper floor of a hotel. At the table near- 
 est him, there was an American, about twenty-five years 
 old, playing with an old man. They had been betting and 
 drinking. While the gray-haired man was shuffling the 
 cards for a new deal, the young man, in a swaggering care- 
 less way, sang, to a very pathetic tune, the words of the 
 hymn: 
 
 “One sweetly solemn thought 
 Comes to me o’er and o’er, 
 I’m nearer my home today 
 Than I’ve ever been before;” 
 
 Hearing the singing, several gamblers looked up in surprise. 
 The old man, who was dealing the cards, putting on a 
 look of melancholy, stopped for a moment, gazed stead- 
 fastly at his partner in the game, and then dashed the whole 
 pack of cards on the floor under the table. Then said he, 
 “Where did you learn that tune?” 
 
 The young man pretended that he did not know that he 
 had been singing. 
 
 “Well, no matter,” said the old man, “I’ve played my 
 last game, and that’s the end of it. The cards may lie till 
 doomsday, and I will never pick them up.” The old man, 
 having won money from the young man, about one hundred 
 dollars, took it out of his pocket, and handing it to the 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 127 
 
 young man said: “Here, Harry, is your money; take it 
 and do good with it. I shall with mine.” As the traveler 
 followed them down stairs, he saw them conversing by the 
 doorway, and overheard enough to know that the old man 
 was saying something about the song which the young man 
 had sung. 
 
 No. 112. 
 “AND AM I ONLY BORN TO DIE?” 
 
 Rev. CHARLES WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 A nobleman of great wealth, whose pleasure was drawn 
 from his riches, his honors and friends, had a daughter, who 
 was the idol of his heart. She was highly accomplished, 
 amiable in her disposition, and winning in her manners. 
 At length she attended a Methodist meeting in London, 
 was awakened, and soon happily converted. Afterward, 
 to her the charms of Christianity were overpowering. The 
 change was marked by her fond father with great solici- 
 tude, and was to him occasion of deep grief. He took her 
 on long and frequent journeys, and attended her in the 
 most engaging manner, in order to divert her mind from 
 religion; but she still maintained her integrity as a Chris- 
 tian. After failing in all his projects, he introduced her 
 into company under such circumstances that she must either 
 join in the recreation of the party or give high offense. It 
 had been arranged among his friends that several young 
 ladies should, on the approaching festive occasion, give a 
 song, accompanied by the piano. The hour arrived, the 
 party assembled. Several pieces had been performed to the 
 great delight of the company, who were now in high spirits. 
 At last she was herself called on for a song, and many 
 hearts beat high in hope of victory. Should she decline, 
 she was disgraced. Should she comply, their triumph was 
 complete. This was the moment to seal her fate. With 
 
128 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 perfect self-possession, she took her seat, ran her fingers 
 over the keys and commenced playing and singing, in a 
 sweet air, the following verses of the above hymn: 
 
 “No room for mirth or trifling here, 
 
 For worldly hope or worldly fear, 
 If life so soon is gone; 
 
 If now the Judge is at the door, 
 
 And all mankind must stand before 
 The inexorable throne! 
 
 “No matter which my thoughts employ, 
 A moment’s misery or joy; 
 
 But O! when both shall end, 
 Where shall I find my destined place? 
 Shall I my everlasting days 
 
 With fiends or angels spend?” 
 
 She arose from her seat. The whole party was subdued. 
 Not a word was spoken. Her father wept aloud. One by 
 one the company left the house. The father never rested 
 till he became a Christian. He lived an example of Chris- 
 tian benevolence, having given to various enterprises, up 
 to the time of his death, nearly half a million dollars. 
 
 No. 113. 
 “ALMOST PERSUADED NOW TO BELIEVE.” 
 
 Puiuie Buss, 1838—1876. 
 
 During the winter of 1873-1874 Mr. P. P. Bliss was urged 
 by Mr. D. L. Moody and other friends to give up his busi- 
 ness and devote his life to singing the Gospel. There was 
 much prayer and much hesitation on his part about taking 
 such a step. He doubted his ability to be useful in the work. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 129 
 
 At the same time Major D. W. Whittle was being urged to 
 do the same thing. He says concerning it, “A solemn provi- 
 dence that occurred at this time and very deeply impressed 
 both of us, is linked in the chain that drew us into the 
 work. A friend received a telegram announcing the drown- 
 ing of his four children in the loss of the Ville de Havre. 
 His wife, who was with the children, had been saved, and 
 sent the dispatch. He left at once for Europe to bring home 
 his wife, and upon his return, he urged the matter upon 
 us so as to lead us both to regard it as probable that we 
 should respond to the call. Shortly after our friend’s return, 
 and while we were still undecided, we were invited to hold 
 some meetings at Waukegan, Illinois, and agreed to go 
 there for three or four evenings as an experiment. If the 
 Lord blessed us and souls were converted, we would take it 
 as indicating His will, and that He called us into the work. 
 The first evening meeting was not an encouraging one, as 
 to attendance, and had no marked result, except the very 
 powerful impression upon our minds that the Lord was with 
 us. The next day it rained, and we looked for a still 
 smaller audience, but it was twice as large. Before the 
 meeting closed, there were blessed indications of the work 
 of the Holy Spirit, upon the people. The place became very 
 solemn, and as Bliss sang ‘Almost: Persuaded,’ every word 
 seemed filled with power. In different parts of the house, 
 sinners arose as he sang, presenting themselves for prayer, 
 and souls that night rejoiced in Christ. Our hearts were 
 very full, and a great responsibility was upon us. The next 
 afternoon we met and spent some hours in prayer. Bliss 
 made a formal surrender of everything to the Lord; gave up 
 his musical conventions; gave up his writing of secular 
 music; gave up everything, and placed himself, with any 
 talent he might have at the disposal of the Lord.” And 
 this hymn marks the turning point in its author’s own life 
 as well as in that of many others. 
 
130 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 114. 
 “HO! MY COMRADES SEE THE SIGNAL.” 
 
 Puiure Buss, 1838—1876. 
 
 During October, 1864, just before Sherman began his 
 famous march to the sea, while his army lay camped in 
 the neighborhood of Atlanta, the army of Hood in carefully 
 prepared movement passed the right flank of Sherman’s 
 army, and gaining his rear, commenced the destruction of 
 the railroad leading north, burning block houses, and cap- 
 turing the small garrisons along the line. Sherman’s army 
 was put in rapid motion, following Hood, to save the sup- 
 plies and larger posts, the principal of which was located 
 at Altoona Pass, a defile in the Altoona range of mountains, 
 through which ran the railroad. General Corse, of Illinois, 
 was stationed here with a brigade of troops, in all about 
 fifteen hundred men. A million and a half of rations were 
 stored here, and it was highly important that the earthworks 
 commanding the Pass and protecting the supplies should 
 be held. Six thousand men were detailed by Hood to take 
 the position. The works were completely surrounded and 
 summoned to surrender, General Corse refused, and sharp 
 fighting commenced. The defenders were slowly driven into 
 a small fort upon the crest of the hill. Many had fallen, 
 and the result seemed to render a prolongation of the fight 
 hopeless. At this moment, an officer caught sight of a white 
 signal flag, far away across the valley, twenty miles distant 
 upon the top of Kenesaw Mountain. The signal was an- 
 swered, and soon the message was waved across from 
 mountain to mountain: “Hold the Fort; I am coming. 
 W. T. Sherman.” Cheers went up; every man was nerved 
 to the full appreciation of the position; and, under a 
 murderous fire, which killed or wounded more than half 
 the men in the fort, they held the position for three hours, 
 until the advance guard of Sherman’s army came up, and 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 131 
 
 the enemy were obliged to retreat. Mr. Bliss heard this 
 incident related as an illustration of the inspiration derived 
 by the Christian from the thought of Christ as our Com- 
 mander, and of His coming to our relief. The song was 
 at once suggested to his mind and soon written. 
 
 No. 116. 
 “T HAVE A SAVIOR, HE’S PLEADING IN GLORY.” 
 
 Puiuip Briss, 1838—1876. 
 
 In 187-, Mr. Bliss, in company with Mr. Whittle, held a 
 series of revival meetings in Jackson, Michigan. At the 
 closing meeting, after the sermon, Mr. Bliss sang this hymn, - 
 with its sweet refrain, “For you I am praying, I’m praying 
 for you.” As was his habit in singing this hymn, he made 
 it his own prayer, and while he sang, more than a hundred 
 arose asking for prayer. Sometimes in singing this hymn, 
 Mr Bliss added a verse not given in the collections. 
 
 “And Jesus is calling, how can you reject Him? 
 He says He loves sinners so then He loves you. 
 O, friend, do believe it, arise and accept Him, 
 Give Jesus your heart while I’m praying for you.” 
 
 No. 116. 
 
 “°TIS THE PROMISE OF GOD FULL SALVATION TO 
 GIVE.” 
 
 Puiip Buss, 1838—1876. 
 
 While holding meetings at Peoria, Illinois, a little German 
 : boy of eight years was converted and interested Mr. Bliss 
 
132 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 greatly. After Mr. Bliss’ death the following letter was 
 
 received by Major Whittle: 
 Peoria, Illinois, 
 January 27. 
 
 Dear Brother Whittle: 
 
 I saw a piece in the Standard of you and Mr. Bliss. 
 I saw that you and the Rev. Mr. Morgan, of London, 
 were getting up a book of the life of Mr. and Mrs. Bliss, 
 and wanted to have letters from those who have been 
 blessed or converted by his songs. I can say that I was 
 converted when they were singing the second hymn, 
 “Hallelujah, ’tis done.” In singing the chorus of it, 
 I thought, “Do I believe on the Son?” and so, as you 
 gave the first invitation for all that were not Christians 
 and wanted to be prayed for to rise, and then asked 
 how many wanted to settle it now to rise, I was among 
 that lot that rose as there were forty or fifty, you said. 
 I saw five or six that rose that were right behind me. 
 I attended all of Mr. Bliss’ children’s meetings, as also 
 I attended all of yours. It was Thanksgiving night, 
 at the Centennial Hall, in which I was converted I 
 expect you to know me. I am eight years old. I re- 
 
 main, as ever, your friend. 
 Wiuu1aM B. HERSCHBERGER. 
 
 This hymn has a curious origin. In compiling “Gospel 
 Songs” in 1874, Mr. Bliss desired to use in it the well- 
 known hymn, “Hallelujah! Thine the glory,” then much 
 used in religious services, but the owners of the copyright 
 declined to give their consent, and “Hallelujah; ’tis done” 
 was written to supply the want. Hundreds of souls have 
 been led by this hymn to decide for Christ, and the church 
 has reason to rejoice at that refusal. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 133 
 No. 117. 
 “T AM SO GLAD THAT OUR FATHER IN HEAVEN.” 
 
 Puiuie Buiss, 1838—1876. 
 
 At one of the revival meetings held by Moody and 
 Sankey at Edinburgh, Scotland, a gay giddy girl attended. 
 She went late and was unable to get a seat, so she wan- 
 dered about in the hall outside. Inside the church they 
 were singing, led by Mr. Sankey: 
 
 “T am so glad that Jesus loves me 
 Jesus loves me, Jesus loves me.” 
 
 The words went to her heart and her conscience, and she 
 said, “I cannot sing that.’””’ When that meeting broke up, 
 she went to the meeting for anxious inquirers, and is now 
 a rejoicing Christian. 
 
 A missionary of the American Sunday School Union in 
 Missouri, after he had organized a Sunday School, sang to 
 them this hymn, with the chorus: 
 
 “T am so glad that Jesus loves me,” 
 
 and followed it with the question, “Are you glad? If not, 
 why?” He had hardly finished when a young man drose, 
 and rushing up to him, threw his arms around his neck, 
 sobbing, “Oh, sir, you must not leave here till I’m a 
 Christian!”’ Prayer was offered for him, and he was saved. 
 Then he exclaimed, “Oh, that song! I could not get away 
 from it, and it has saved me.” 
 D. W. WHITTLE. 
 
 A young woman in England went to a meeting where 
 she heard Mr. Sankey sing this hymn, with the chorus: 
 
 “T am so glad that Jesus loves me,” 
 
134 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 and while the hymn was being sung, began for the first 
 time in her life to feel that she was a sinner. All her sins 
 came up in array before her; and so numerous and aggra- 
 vated did her sins appear, that she imagined she could never 
 be saved. She said in her heart, “Jesus cannot love me. 
 He could not love such a sinner as I.” She went home in ~ 
 a state of extreme mental anguish, and did not sleep that 
 night. Every opportunity of obtaining more light was 
 eagerly seized. She took her place in the inquiry room. 
 There she found to her astonishment and joy that Jesus 
 could, did, does love sinners. She saw in God’s opened 
 Word that it was for sinners Jesus died, and for none 
 others. When she realized this, she too began to sing: 
 
 “T am so glad that Jesus loves me, 
 Jesus loves even me.” 
 
 Mr. Sankey relates that soon after he began teaching 
 some children’s singing classes in Chicago, a lady called 
 on him one day and said, “There is a little singing girl 
 belonging to one of your classes who is dying. She wants 
 you to go and see her.” Mr. Sankey says, “I went to her 
 home—a little frame cottage—and there I found a little 
 maid dying—one whom I had known so well in the Thurs- 
 day evening meetings. I said, ‘My dear child, how is it 
 with you?’. 
 
 “ “Will you pray for my father and mother as pak pray 
 for us?’ was the reply. 
 
 ““But how is it with yourself?’ I again asked. 
 
 ““Oh, sir,’ she answered, ‘they tell me I am about to 
 die, but I have found the Lord Jesus Christ.’ 
 
 “When did you become a Christian?” I inquired. 
 
 “Don’t you remember one Thursday when you were 
 teaching me to sing: 
 
 “Tam so glad that Jesus loves me, 
 Jesus loves me, Jesus loves me”; 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 135 
 
 and don’t you remember how you told us that if we only 
 gave our hearts to Him, He would love us?—and I gave 
 mine to Him.’ ” 
 
 No. 118. 
 
 “I GAVE MY LIFE FOR THEE, MY PRECIOUS BLOOD 
 I SHED.” 
 
 Francis R. Havercau, 1838—1876. 
 
 During a Western Sunday School convention, there arose 
 a cry of dissatisfaction, “A ring! A ring!” The strange and 
 false charge was made that the managers were conducting 
 the convention according to some arranged scheme. Quite 
 a discordant excitement ensued, during which a distinguished 
 singer who was present was called on to sing. He sang: 
 
 “T gave My life for thee, 
 My precious blood I shed 
 That thou might’st ransomed be, 
 And quickened from the dead; 
 All this I did for thee— 
 What hast thou done for Me?” 
 
 Through the song Christ seemed to whisper to the discor- 
 dant convention, “Peace, be still,’ and when the song had 
 ceased, a calm, Christ-like spirit had filled the convention 
 and continued with it to the end. 
 
 No. 119. 
 “lM BUT A STRANGER HERE.” 
 
 Rev. THomas Rawson Tay or, 1807—1835. 
 
 In an almshouse there was an old colored woman who 
 had no relatives in the world and no money but what visitors 
 
136 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 sometimes gave her. But she was a true Christian. She had 
 known sorrows, but Jesus had blessed her by giving her 
 comfort and strength to bear them. They called her 
 “Aunty.” She was too feeble to leave her room, and so she 
 used to hold services by herself on Sundays; and once a 
 month she was in the habit of taking the communion all 
 alone. A Christian lady, who sometimes visited that alms- 
 house, went there one Sunday morning. She generally 
 visited “Aunty” in her room. On hearing that this was 
 the day on which she took the communion by herself, she 
 asked the matron to let her stand outside the open door, 
 that she might see the good old Christian go through this 
 service, without knowing that anyone was near. This is 
 the account given by the lady of what she saw and heard: 
 “What I saw was a picture for a painter. The door, which 
 was partly open, was opposite a raised window. A vine 
 had climbed up the wire grating of the window, and was 
 filled with blossoms. The fragrance came in on the Sabbath 
 air with the bright sunshine. There on a bench sat the old 
 woman, not knowing that anyone was near. Her dress was 
 clean and neatly ironed, and the cap upon her head was 
 as white as snow. Before her was a little pine table, 
 covered with a clean white cotton cloth. There was nothing 
 on the table but a white earthen plate, on which were a 
 few small pieces of bread, and an earthen tea cup filled with 
 water, while at her side lay a Bible and a small hymn 
 book. She began the service by singing a few verses from 
 memory, of an old communion hymn. Then she opened the 
 Bible and read the story of the Crucifixion as given by 
 Matthew. At the close of the reading she reverently 
 repeated the words: ‘The Lord Jesus, the same night He 
 was betrayed took bread and blessed it;’ then holding the 
 plate of bread in her hands, upon the table, she bowed her 
 head in silent prayer. Then she went on with the Bible 
 words, ‘Take, eat; this is My body, given for you: Do 
 this in remembrance of Me.’ As she spoke these words, she 
 took a piece of bread from the plate, and with closed eyes, 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 137 
 
 in silence and in tears she ate the bread. Again she sang 
 a verse, ‘Nearer my God, to thee.’ Then she went on with 
 the Bible words, ‘After the same manner also He took the 
 cup, and gave thanks”; and with the tea cup of water in 
 her hand, she again offered prayer; but this time, though 
 her voice was low, almost a whisper, I was able to catch 
 her words. As I listened I lost sight of the aimshouse, and 
 felt almost as if I were in heaven. When her prayer and 
 thanksgiving were over she solemnly took the cup, and as 
 she lifted it to her lips, repeated the words of Jesus, ‘Drink 
 ye all of it; this cup is the new testament of my blood, shed 
 for the remission of sins: do this in remembrance of Me.’ 
 Then she drank from the cup, and setting it down on the 
 table, again bowed her head in silent prayer. Then suddenly 
 raising her head she exclaimed, ‘Hallelujah! Glory to God!’ 
 —a sweet smile like that of an angel lighting up her dark 
 face. ‘I sees de gates,’ she said, looking up to the ceiling 
 of the room. ‘I sees de door ob Heben open! I hears de 
 angels singing! Yes, I’s on de road! I’s almost home! 
 Hallelujah!’ Then she sang: 
 
 ‘I’m but a stranger here, 
 Heaven is my: home; 
 Earth is a desert drear, 
 Heaven is my home: 
 Danger and sorrow stand 
 Round me on every hand; 
 Heaven is my fatherland— 
 Heaven is my home.’ 
 
 At the close of the service she turned and saw me standing 
 at the door. ‘Why, chile,’ she said, ‘I didn’t know you was 
 dere. I thought there was no one near ole “Aunty” but 
 de blessed Lord and de angels.” 
 
138 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 No. 120. 
 “FREE FROM THE LAW, OH, HAPPY CONDITION.” 
 Purp Briss, 1838—1876. 
 
 A gentleman in Edinburgh was in great distress of soul, 
 and happened to linger in a pew after the noon meeting. 
 The choir had remained to practice, and began: 
 
 “Free from the law, oh happy condition! 
 Jesus hath bled, and there is remission”’; 
 
 Quickly the Spirit of God carried that truth home to the 
 . awakened conscience, and he was at rest in the finished 
 work of Jesus. 
 
 NO el, 
 “THROUGH THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW I MUST GO.” 
 Puiu Buss, 1838—1876. 
 
 When Moody and Sankey were holding meetings in 
 Boston, a young lady came into the inquiry room one eve- 
 ning in great distress, saying she had been seeking for 
 years for forgiveness of her sins, but had kept the matter 
 very secret and never intended to confess Christ till He 
 had given her abundant light and assurance. She would 
 not promise to make known her seeking to her companions, 
 and went away as dark as she came, carrying with her, 
 however, the verse, “He that believeth not God maketh him 
 a liar.” She returned in a few nights, and while Mr. Sankey 
 was singing: 
 
 “There’s a light in the valley, 
 There’s a light in the valley for me, 
 And no evil will I fear, 
 While my Shepherd is so near; 
 There’s a light in the valley for me,” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 139 
 
 she said, “I will do anything for such a Savior,” and peace 
 
 came to her at once. In the inquiry room she arose and 
 said, “I will take Jesus.” 
 
 No. 122. 
 “SOWING THE SEED BY THE DAYLIGHT FAIR.” 
 
 Mrs. Emity S. Oakry, 1828—1883. 
 
 The following letter was written to Major Whittle after 
 the death of Mr. Bliss. 
 
 Chicago, March 8, 1877. 
 
 At the breaking out of the war in 1861, I homecned 
 to take service in the army, and soon after was ap- 
 pointed a First Lieutenant in the regular army. At that 
 time I was not yet eighteen years of age, and never had 
 been away from home influences. I had never tasted 
 any kind of intoxicating liquor, and did not know one 
 eard from another. The regiment to which I was as- 
 signed was principally officered by young men, many of 
 whom were old in dissipation. The new life was an 
 attractive one, and I entered upon it with avidity. 
 In a very few months I became a steady drinker and a 
 constant card player. I do not remember to have made 
 any attempt to resist the encroachments of vice; on 
 the contrary I took a mad delight in all forms of dissi- 
 pation. I laughed at the caution of older heads, and 
 asserted with all the egotism of a boy, that I could 
 abandon my bad habits at any time. But the time 
 speedily came when I recognized the fact that my evil 
 desires had obtained the complete mastery of my will, 
 and that I was no longer able to exercise any control 
 over myself. From that hour I knew no peace. The 
 years that followed were a succession of struggles 
 against the dominion of my appetite, and a repetition of 
 failures. With each failure, I lost something of my 
 power of resistance and gained something of evil. In 
 
140 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 1870, I resigned my commission and returned to civil 
 life, determined to make one last stand against my pas- 
 sions by breaking away from my old associations and 
 beginning a new life. The result was attained in my 
 condition a few months ago. I do not like to recall the 
 past six years. They are as a frightful dream, from 
 which, thank God! I was awakened; but the recollection 
 of which will always bring sorrow and remorse. When ° 
 the Tabernacle was opened, last fall, I was in Chicago, 
 presumably on my way to Minnesota. Only a few 
 weeks before, I had left my family, promising with my 
 last words that I would stop drinking, and try once more 
 to be a sober man. I did not keep the promise five 
 minutes; I could not. I stopped here actuated by a 
 desire to indulge, unrestrained, my appetite for liquor 
 and cards, and in those few weeks I had taken a fearful 
 plunge downward. At last I had made up my mind that 
 there was absolutely no hope for me, and I wanted the 
 end to come quickly. I gave myself up to the wildest 
 debauchery, and speculated with a reckless indifference 
 on how much longer my body could endure the fearful 
 strain. In anticipation of sudden death, I carefully 
 destroyed all evidences of my identity, so that my 
 friends might never know the dog’s death I had died. 
 It was while in this condition that I one day wandered 
 into the Tabernacle and found a seat in the gallery. I 
 looked at the happy faces about me, and I hated them. 
 I had all the vindictive feeling of a wild animal hunted 
 to his last covert and waiting in impotent rage the 
 final blow that is to end his miserable life. I did not 
 pay much attention to the service. I was drowsy and 
 stupefied with liquor. But after a while there was a 
 perfect stillness, out of which presently rose the voice of 
 Mr. Sankey in the song, “What shall the harvest be?” 
 The words and music attracted my attention, and I 
 straightened up to listen. They stirred me with a 
 strange sensation, and when presently he sang: 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 141 
 
 “Sowing the seed of a lingering pain, 
 Sowing the seed of a maddened brain, 
 Sowing the seed of a tarnished name, 
 Sowing the seed of eternal shame, 
 
 Oh, what shall the harvest be?” 
 
 The words pierced me like an arrow. My deadened 
 conscience was aroused, and with one swift glance 
 memory recalled my bright boyhood, my wasted man- 
 hood, and showed me my lost opportunities. Every 
 word of the song was true of my own case, and 
 in bitter agony I was reaping the harvest my mis- 
 deeds had brought me. I thought of my old mother, 
 my loving, faithful wife and children, and of how 
 they, too, were compelled to reap of my harvest of 
 dishonor. My awakened conscience lashed me as with 
 a whip of scorpions, and I rushed from the Tabernacle 
 and sought to drown its voice in more whiskey. But 
 it was of no use. Wherever I went, whether to the bar 
 of the saloon, or to the gaming table, or to the solitude 
 of my own room, before my eyes in letters of fire were 
 always the words, “What shall the harvest be?” For 
 two weeks I endured this torture, having no rest, until 
 at last on my knees I cried to God for mercy, and He 
 heard my prayer. Broken, weak, and vile and helpless, 
 I came to Him, trusting that His love and compassion 
 would regard even me. And I have not trusted in vain. 
 
 No. 128. 
 “SHALL WE GATHER AT THE RIVER?” 
 
 Rev. Rosert Lowry, 1826—. 
 
 The following incident is given by an American lady 
 writing from Cairo, Egypt. “The three hours we could 
 stay were full of work for heart and hand. One boy from 
 
142 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 a Highland regiment especially excited my interest. He 
 had lost a limb, and could not, the surgeon said, live through 
 the night. I stopped at his side to see if there was any- 
 thing I could do for him. He lay with closed eyes, murmur- 
 ing ‘Mother,—mother!’ I dipped my handkerchief in a 
 basin of ice-water, and bathed his forehead where the fever 
 flushes burned. ‘Oh, that is good!’ he said opening his 
 eyes. Seeing me bending over him, he caught my hand 
 and kissed it. “Thank you, lady,’ he sdid, and smiled. ‘It 
 minds me o’ my mother.’ ‘Could I write to your mother?’ 
 T asked. 
 
 ““No,’ he said, ‘the surgeon promised to do that; but 
 could you, would you sing to me?’ 
 
 “T hesitated a moment and looked around. The gleam 
 of the sun on the yellow water of the Nile, as the western 
 rays slanted down, caught my eye, and suggested the river 
 whose streams make glad the City of God. I began to 
 sing in a low voice the hymn, ‘Shall we gather at the river?’ 
 Eager hands were raised around us to listen more intently, 
 while bass and tenor voices, weak and tremulous, came in 
 on the chorus: 
 
 ‘Yes, we’ll gather at the river, 
 The beautiful, the beautiful river— 
 Gather with the saints at the river 
 That flows by the throne of God.’ 
 
 When the song was ended, I looked into the face of the 
 boy—he was not over twenty—and said: ‘Shall you be 
 there?’ 
 
 “Yes” he answered, with his blue eyes shining, while 
 the light, that never was on land or sea, irradiated his 
 face, ‘I’ll gather with the saints at the river.’ 
 
 “The tears gathered in my eyes as I thought of the 
 mother, in her far off Scottish home, watching and waiting 
 for tidings of her soldier boy who was breathing away his 
 life in an Egyptian hosptial; and I sang: 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 143 
 
 ‘In the sweet by-and-by, 
 We shall meet on that beautiful shore.” 
 
 then stooped and kissed his white forehead. 
 
 ““Come again, lady, come again,’ I heard on all sides, 
 as we left the barracks. I shall go, but I shall not find my 
 Scottish laddie, for by tomorrow’s reveille he will have 
 crossed the river.” ; 
 
 No. 124. 
 “BEGIN, MY TONGUE, SOME HEAVENLY THEME,” 
 Rev. Isaac Watts, 1674—1748. 
 
 On one occasion when William Dawson, the Yorkshire 
 preacher, was giving out a hymn, he suddenly stopped, and 
 said, “I was coming once through the town of Leeds, and 
 saw a poor little half-witted lad rubbing at a brass plate, 
 trying to rub out the name; but the poor lad did not know 
 that the harder he rubbed, the brighter it shone. Now, 
 friends, let us sing: 
 
 “Engraved as in eternal brass 
 The mighty promise shines; 
 Nor can the powers of darkness raze 
 Those everlasting lines.” 
 
 Then, as though he saw the devil rubbing, he said, “Satan 
 cannot rub it off”— 
 
 “His Hand hath writ the Sacred Word 
 With an immortal pen.” 
 
144 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 125. 
 “HOW SWEET AND AWFUL IS THE PLACE.” 
 Rev. Isaac Warts, 1674—1748. 
 
 Rev. Robert Moffat many years ago sent home an 
 -account of a visit he paid to Borigelong, one of his out- 
 stations. On the Sabbath that he was there, one hundred 
 and fifteen native converts joined with him in partaking of 
 the Lord’s Supper. It happened that at the very same time, 
 certain heathen ceremonies were being observed by the 
 heathen at Borigelong. Outside the little chapel, there were 
 shouting and dancing, and croaking, and grunting, and all 
 kinds of wild noises. Inside, a band of Christians were 
 quietly and solemnly seated around the table, on which 
 stood the bread and wine, showing forth the broken Body 
 and poured out Blood of their Savior; the sweet hymn rose 
 upon their blended voices: 
 
 “Why was I made to hear Thy voice, 
 And enter while there’s room; 
 
 When thousands make a wretched choice, 
 And rather starve than come?” 
 
 Here and there tears were seen rolling down the dark 
 cheeks; and here and there the sigh of gratitude and love, 
 or of pity, was heard, as they, who sat within that happy 
 Christian fold, listened to the uproar of the wicked idolaters 
 without and thought to themselves “And such were we! but 
 we are washed, but we are sanctified, but we are justified.” 
 
 No. 126. 
 “T WAS A WANDERING SHEEP.” 
 
 Rey. Horatirus Bonar, 1808. 
 
 During a revival in a female seminary in Massachusetts, 
 many of the pupils had shown the natural “enmity” of the 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 145 
 
 “carnal mind” to spiritual things. Helen B—— was among 
 those who noticed the Spirit’s work only by a curling lip 
 and a scornful laugh. It seemed in vain to talk with her, 
 or seek to induce her to attend a prayer meeting. Christians 
 could do nothing more than to pray for her. One evening, 
 however, as a praying band had gathered, the door opened, 
 and she entered. Her eyes were downcast and her face was 
 calm and very pale. There was something in her look that 
 told of an inward struggle. She took her seat silently, and 
 the exercises of the meeting proceeded. A few lines were 
 sung, two or three prayers offered, and then as was their 
 custom, each repeated a few verses of some favorite hymn. 
 One followed another in succession until it came to the 
 turn of the newcomer. There was a pause, and a perfect 
 silence, and then, without lifting her eyes from the floor, 
 she commenced: 
 
 “T was a wandering sheep, 
 I did not love the fold.” 
 
 Her voice was low, but distinct, and every word, as she 
 uttered it, thrilled the hearts of the listeners. She repeated 
 one stanza after another of that beautiful hymn and not an 
 eye save her own was dry, as, with sweet emphasis, she 
 pronounced the last lines: 
 
 “No more a wayward child, 
 I seek no more to roam; 
 I love my heavenly Father’s voice, 
 I love, I love His home.” 
 
 That single hymn told all. The wandering sheep, the proud 
 and wayward child had returned. 
 
146 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 127. 
 
 “DEPTH OF MERCY, CAN THERE BE?” 
 
 Rev. CuHarues Wesiey, 1708—1788. 
 
 During the Moody and Sankey meetings in Edinburgh, 
 Scotland, in 1874, some ladies began to occupy the time 
 between the morning and afternoon Sabbath services, in 
 singing to a very destitute class, in a public institution, 
 which is a sort of cross between a poorhouse and a prison. 
 All the inmates are sufferers, some from poverty and sick- 
 ness only, and some from something worse. The ladies have 
 received a welcome that has filled them with delight. The 
 poor creatures literally weep for joy on their entrance. One 
 woman who has been stricken by a paralysis partly physical 
 and partly mental, and has not spoken a word for three 
 years, was observed by the matron to be saying something 
 after the ladies retired. She was repeating over and over 
 again to herself: 
 
 “Depth of mercy, can there be 
 Mercy still reserved for me?” 
 
 No. 128. 
 “A MIGHTY FORTRESS IS OUR GOD.” 
 
 Rev. Martin Lutuer, 1483—1546. 
 
 About four miles north of the village of Herkimer, New 
 York, there lay in the days of the Revolutionary war, and 
 remains to this day, a wealthy little German settlement 
 called Shell’s Bush. Its principal proprietor was John 
 Christian Shell. This pious and fearless patriot, had a wife 
 who equalled him in courage and nobility, and six children, 
 the youngest two of whom were twins but eight years old. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 147 
 
 Shell built a blockhouse for his defence against Indians, a 
 large, substantial structure, two stories high. The first had 
 no windows, only a strong door and small loopholes through 
 which the inmates could thrust their rifles. The second 
 story was well lighted and was built out two or three feet 
 over the first with loopholes and trap doors in the projecting 
 floor, so that shots could be fired or heavy missiles dropped 
 upon any close assailants. On the afternoon of August 6, 
 1781, a large band of Indians under Donald McDonald, a 
 savage Scotch refugee, made a sudden descent on the village 
 of Shell’s Bush. Most of the inhabitants, alarmed by 
 rumors, had fled for refuge to Fort Dayton, now Herkimer. 
 But Shell himself would not move a foot in flight. He said 
 every man’s house was his castle, and he should defend his 
 to the last. He was at work with his sons in the field when 
 the Indians sprang from the woods with fierce yells. The 
 two little boys were so far from the house that the enemy ~ 
 seized them ere they could reach it, but the father and his 
 remaining sons got inside the door, and had it firmly barri- 
 caded when the Indians rushed up. It was two o’clock when 
 the battle began, and it raged fiercely till nightfall. The 
 Indians hurled themselves furiously against the blockhouse, 
 but were driven back by a volley, every shot of which laid 
 a warrior low. Astonished at their reception, the enemy 
 drew off to consider; but knowing there could be only a 
 handful within, they charged again, and again were repulsed 
 with heavy loss. They had not reckoned on the whole of 
 their host, for the German’s wife, whom they had not 
 thought of was equal to several men. She loaded the rifles 
 while her men folks fired, and she was so expert that they 
 were never empty handed. Maddened by their losses the 
 savages made desperate onslaughts once and again through 
 the long summer afternoon, the German’s rifles doing fearful 
 work among them as they battered and shrieked against 
 the house. At length they charged in a new form, led by 
 McDonald with a crowbar in his hand. They sprang 
 against the door, and while the Scotchman plied his bar 
 
148 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 vigorously, the Indians covered him with their bodies. The 
 door began to grow weak, but none of the defendants could 
 leave to defend it. Their place was aloft, whence they 
 poured down the shot on the infuriated mass below. So 
 deadly was their fire that the Indians wavered and broke. 
 Shell drew a bead on McDonald thus exposed, and shat- 
 tered his leg. The assailants fled, and rushing down to the 
 door, the patriots drew the wounded leader in before he 
 could escape. Weakened, and confused, the Indians drew 
 off for a space to consult. It was a welcome respite for the 
 little garrison, which sorely needed rest. But Shell had his 
 own ideas as to how the time should be occupied. He was 
 a Godly German, a lover of Luther, and like Cromwell’s 
 “Tronsides,”’ he was a hymn-singer in hours of conflict. His 
 first thought now was of gratitude to God. So calling his 
 family to bless the Lord, their strength, who taught their 
 hands to war and their fingers to fight, he mounted to the 
 upper story and began, with a deep, powerful voice, to sing 
 the noble hymn of Luther, that song of castles, that battle 
 song, the song of trust and triumph. Suddenly on the calm 
 summer air, which had so lately rung with noise of war and 
 battle shriek, rose the strong words from the depths of the 
 beleaguered blockhouse: 
 
 “A mighty fortress is our God, 
 A bulwark never failing; 
 
 Our helper, He, amid the flood 
 Of mortal ills prevailing. 
 
 For still our ancient foe 
 
 Doth seek to work us woe; 
 
 His craft and power are great, 
 
 And armed with cruel hate, 
 On earth is not his equal.” 
 
 Again the contest was renewed and assault after assault 
 was met and repulsed, until at last the savage foe fled to 
 the woods carrying with them the two little prisoners. But 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 149 
 
 as they went the brave, God-trusting German, lifted his 
 voice once more in the closing burst of the mighty hymn: 
 
 “Let goods and kindred go, 
 This mortal life also: 
 The body they may kill: 
 God’s truth abideth still, 
 
 His kingdom is forever.” 
 
 Among the German dwellers in Herkimer, Shell’s memory 
 is green to this day. There, too, may be heard a rude ballad 
 of his exploits, composed at the time, and which closes with 
 these quaint words: 
 
 “Come all you Tryon country men, 
 And never be dismayed; 
 But trust in the Lord, 
 And He will be your aid. 
 
 “Trust in the Lord with all your might, 
 And call upon His Name; 
 And He will help you as He did Shell, 
 To His immortal fame.” 
 —Christian Weekly. 
 
 No. 129. 
 “MAXWELTON’S BRAES ARE BONNIE.” 
 
 Mr. Dovetas. 
 
 Just at evening on the night before the attack on the 
 Great Redan, the Scottish soldiers in the Crimea joined in 
 the familiar ballad-song of “Annie Laurie.” A few began 
 it outside the tents, but in a very little while hundreds 
 came forth through the whole camp, and, with the manliest 
 
150 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 of voices aud tenderest of hearts, struck in, hardy old vete- 
 rans as they were, unused to the melting mood, yet subdued 
 at times even to tears as they sang. The voices on the 
 earlier lines of the verses were gentle and plaintive; but 
 when they reached the closing chorus it seemed as if they 
 could hardly sing strongly enough. Great waves of sound 
 rolled across the plain, over the trenches, and up against the 
 walls of the moonlit citadel. The enthusiasm was intense; 
 there seemed but the throbbing of one mighty heart, the 
 beating of one pulse through all the battalions. 
 
 No. 130. 
 “SINGING FOR JESUS, SINGING FOR JESUS.” 
 
 Mrs. Fanny J. VAN ALSTYNE, 1823. 
 
 The singing of this hymn by its author, on one occasion 
 in the Effingham Theater, Whitechapel, London, caught. the 
 ear of a poor, despairing man who was on his way to the 
 docks to drown himself. It reminded him of a mother’s 
 prayers in boyhood’s days, and brought him a penitent to 
 the Savior. 
 
 No. 131. 
 “LORD, I AM THINE, ENTIRELY THINE.” 
 
 Rev. SAMUEL Daviss, 1723—1761. 
 
 A Christian captain, who had a Christian crew, was 
 caught near a rocky shore, in a driving storm. They were 
 being driven rapidly toward the rocks, when he ordered 
 them to cast anchor. They did so but it broke. He ordered 
 them to cast the second. They did so but it dragged. He 
 then ordered them to cast the third and last. They cast it 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 151 
 
 while the captain went down to his room to pray. He fell 
 on his knees and said, “O Lord, this vessel is Thine, these 
 noble men on deck are Thine. If it be more for Thy glory 
 that our vessel be wrecked on the rocks, and we go down in 
 the sea, Thy will be done. But if it be more for Thy glory 
 that we live to work for Thee, then hold the anchor.” 
 Calmly he arose to return to the deck, and as he went, he 
 heard a chorus of voices singing: 
 
 “Lord, I am Thine, entirely Thine, 
 Purchased and saved by blood divine; 
 With full consent Thine would I be, 
 And own Thy sovereign right in me.” 
 
 It seemed like an angel song. Reaching the deck, he found 
 his brave men standing with their hands on the cable, that 
 they might feel the first giving of the anchor, on which hung 
 their lives, and looking calmly on the raging of the ele- © 
 ments, as they sang the hymn. The anchor held till the 
 storm was past, and they anchored safe within the bay. 
 “Trophies of Song.” 
 
 No. 132. 
 
 “SHOW PITY LORD, O LORD FORGIVE.” 
 Rey. Issac Watts, 1674—1748. 
 
 At an inquiry meeting, an old gentleman once said, “Over 
 forty years ago, during a revival in Virginia, a young prodi- 
 gal felt it was time for him to start home. He had never 
 been accustomed to pray and felt afraid to venture near 
 the Majestic Ruler of the universe. He was then attending 
 an academy, a mile distant from his father’s home. Taking 
 a short cut through the fields to his home, he thought he 
 could possibly find some suitable place to unburden his 
 heavily laden heart in prayer. As he saw a retired place in 
 a fence corner, he concluded to open his lips there. But his 
 
152 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 courage failed him, and he said to himself, ‘In the distance 
 is a big oak tree; that will shield me.’ But when under the 
 tree his stubborn will would still not yield. A fork in the 
 road, and nearly a dozen other places he tried, but when he 
 drew near to them, the tempter also drew near, and caused 
 postponement, until at length he got to the gate at the head 
 of the lane leading to the house. This was the last resort 
 where he could pray unseen. It seemed to him as the turn- 
 ing point. As he sank at Jesus’ feet, a hymn came to his 
 lips as the language of his heart, and so he cried out: 
 
 ‘Show pity, Lord, O Lord forgive; 
 Let a repenting sinner live.’ 
 
 The six verses of that hymn-prayer decided his destiny. 
 He became a minister and is now the old man you see 
 before you.” 
 
 The daughter of a wealthy infidel, during his absence, 
 stole away to a revival meeting. As the loving heart of 
 Jesus was unfolded in the sermon, she wept aloud. On 
 reaching home she told her mother where she had been and 
 how she felt. Her mother became very angry and said, 
 “Your father will banish you if you persist.” The next 
 evening found her at the same place of prayer in spite 
 of her mother’s threats. At the close of the sermon she 
 cried for mercy and poured out her heart in sobs and 
 fervent prayers. Hymn after hymn was sung, and many 
 prayers offered on her behalf. The last hymn was being 
 sung. It was the one beginning: 
 
 “Show pity Lord, O Lord, forgive’; 
 The last verse was reached. 
 
 “Yet save a trembling sinner, Lord, 
 Whose hope, still hovering round Thy word, 
 Would light on some sweet promise there, 
 Some sure support against despair.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH Ee oS 
 
 As the last strain sounded in the ear of the penitent, she 
 gently threw back her head and opened her calm, blue eyes, 
 yet sparkling with tears, but they were tears that told of 
 sins forgiven. Word reached her father, and as he reached 
 home the daughter ran to the gate to meet him with a 
 kiss, but he seized her rudely by the arm, and with his 
 horsewhip whipped her out of the gate, telling her to begone, 
 and with many curses forbade her return. Sadly she went 
 weeping down the lane. A poor widow took her into her 
 house. There she spent the night in prayer. Her father 
 in great anguish did the same, for he could not sleep. He, 
 too, sought and found mercy and sent for his daughter. 
 whom he met and embraced at the same gate, saying, “I 
 give you my heart and hand to go with you to heaven.” 
 The mother followed, and all became united in Christ. 
 
 IT was seated at the table of a boarding house, at which 
 were some fifteen guests. One of these was a gentleman ~ 
 full of animation, and whose vivacity created the impres- 
 sion that whoever else might be affected by the solemnities 
 of the time he was not. On a Sunday morning, Rev. Dr. 
 Perrine preached an effective sermon on the consequences 
 of a life of sin. _Full of unction and tenderness, its vivid 
 pictures of the torments of hell produced a most solemn 
 effect. As we were sitting at the dinner table, and remarks 
 were freely passing in regard to the morning sermon, the 
 young man above-mentioned expressed in strong terms his 
 disapprobation of the sermon, and added, “Such preaching 
 only hardens me and makes me worse.” 
 
 I replied, “It is possible you think it makes you worse, 
 when it only makes you conscious of sin that was before 
 slumbering in your heart.” 
 
 “No,” said he, “it hardens me. I am at this moment 
 less susceptible to anything like conviction for hearing that 
 discourse. I feel more inclined to resist everything like 
 good impressions than usual.” 
 
 “Yet,” I rejoined, “good impressions are those which are 
 best adapted to secure the desired end; and I am greatly 
 
154 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 mistaken if an increase of the effect which you feel would 
 not be greatly useful to you. If, for instance, you should — 
 read now the fifty-first Psalm, ‘Show pity, Lord, O Lord, 
 forgive,’ it would take a deep hold on your heart.” “Not 
 the least,” said he, “I wish I had the book, I would read 
 it to you.” 
 
 “We have one,” said our landlady, who was fully aware 
 of the excitement under which he was laboring; and the 
 book was handed him, opened at the place. He commenced 
 to read, with compressed lips, and firm voice: 
 
 “Show pity, Lord, O Lord forgive; 
 Let a repenting rebel live: 
 
 Are not Thy mercies large and free, 
 May not a sinner trust in Thee?” 
 
 Toward the last part of the stanza a little tremulousness 
 of voice was plainly discernible. He rallied again, how- 
 ever, and commenced the third verse with more firmness: 
 
 “Q wash my soul from every sin, 
 
 And make my guilty conscience clean; 
 Here on my heart the burden lies, 
 And past offenses pain my eyes.” 
 
 At the last part of this stanza his voice faltered more 
 manifestly. He commenced the next verse with great 
 energy, and read in a loud sonorous voice, the whole com- 
 pany looking on in breathless silence: 
 
 “My lips with shame my sins confess.” 
 As he read the second line: 
 “Against Thy law, against Thy grace,” 
 
 his lips quivered, and his utterance became difficult. He 
 paused a little, and entered upon the third line with an 
 apparently new determination: 
 
 “Lord, should Thy judgmeats grow severe,” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 155 
 
 Yet before he came to the end his voice was almost totally 
 choked; and when he began upon the fourth line: 
 
 “T am condemned, but Thou art clear;” 
 
 an aspect of utter discouragement marked his countenance, 
 and he could only bring out, in broken sobs, “I am con- 
 demned,” when his utterance changed to a heart-broken 
 cry of grief, and he, rising at the same time, rushed from 
 the room, as a deeply convicted sinner. 
 
 Dr. BELCHER. 
 
 No. 133. 
 “STAND UP! STAND UP FOR JESUS!”—1858. 
 
 Rey. GrorcE DurFFiELp, 1818—1888. 
 
 During meetings in Pennsylvania, during the year 1858, 
 when this hymn was written, it was often sung and referred 
 to. One morning the parents of a little girl were awakened 
 by the repeated call of their little girl from her crib, whose 
 pleading voice kept saying, “Papa! Mama! Papa! Mama! 
 Mis-ser Long say, ‘Tan up—tan up for Jesus.’” This little 
 stammering voice went so deep down into the hearts of 
 the parents, that in the same evening they did “stand up 
 for Jesus” and became earnest and decided soldiers of the 
 cross. 
 
 No. 134. 
 “COME, SACRED SPIRIT FROM ABOVE!” 
 
 Rev. Puimre Doppriner, 1702—1751. 
 
 A prayer meeting of a country village was attended by 
 but few during a season of coldness. The pastor was absent, 
 
156 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 his place being supplied by one of his deacons, who, for 
 months had been deeply mourning in secret the sad decline. 
 The hymn he selected with which to commence the service 
 was the one commencing, in the most recent collections, 
 with the line above given. As first written, however, this 
 is the first line of the second verse, and the first verse began: 
 
 “Hear, gracious Sovereign, from Thy Throne, 
 And send Thy various blessings down,” 
 
 and it was with this verse that the deacon began. The last 
 verse of the hymn reads: 
 
 “In answer to our fervent cries, 
 Give us to see Thy Church arise; 
 Or if that blessing seem too great, 
 Give us to mourn its low estate.” 
 
 While reading this verse, the good man paused: it did not 
 accord with the feelings of his heart: it was not the expres- 
 sion of his prayer. He indulged a moment’s thought—swift 
 and excellent; an alteration suggested itself—his eye spar- 
 kled with joy, and out it came: 
 
 “In answer to our fervent cries, 
 Give us to see Thy Church arise; 
 That blessing, Lord, is not too great 
 Though now we mourn its low estate.” 
 
 Every heart was arrested, and sudden emotion so over- 
 powered all in the little assembly that they could scarcely 
 sing the words; but each in silence gave to the sentiment 
 his own earnest amen. They happily proved it to be true. 
 From that evening a revival began; the church arose from 
 its slumber to new faith and works; and very soon the 
 windows of Heaven were opened, and plentiful blessing 
 came. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 157 
 No. 135. 
 “JESUS I MY CROSS HAVE TAKEN.” 
 
 Rev. Henry F. Lyte, 1793—1847. 
 
 In the “Holland Purchase” a log church was built by 
 Methodist pioneers. It flourished well for years, but even- 
 tually some of the members died, and others moved away, 
 till only one was left, when preaching also ceased. This 
 mother in Israel sighed over the desolations in Zion. She 
 loved the old forsaken sanctuary, and still kept going there 
 on the Sabbath to worship God and plead the promises. 
 At length it was noised abroad that she was a witch, that 
 the old church was haunted with evil spirits, and that she 
 went there to commune with them. Two young men, to . 
 satisfy their curiosity, secreted themselves in the loft to 
 ‘watch her. On her arrival she took her seat by the altar. 
 After reading the Bible, she announced the hymn: 
 
 “Jesus, I my cross have taken, 
 All to leave, and follow Thee.” 
 
 and sang it with a sweet but trembling voice, then kneeled 
 down and poured out her heart in fervent prayer. Her 
 pleadings broke the hearts of the young men. They began 
 to weep and cry for mercy. She invited them down from 
 their hiding place. They obeyed, and there at the altar, 
 where in other days she had seen many conversions, they 
 too knelt, and sought and found the Savior. From that 
 hour the meetings were resumed, and a flourishing church 
 grew up, and the old meeting house was again made to 
 resound with the songs of God’s people. 
 Dr. STRICKLAND. 
 
158 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 136. 
 “SWEET IS THE WORK, MY GOD, MY KING.” 
 Rev. Isaac Warts, 1674—1748. 
 
 During the war between the United States and Great 
 Britain, in 1812, there lived in the Northern Neck, Vir- 
 ginia, a man named Deacon Epa Norris. Being captured 
 and taken to a British vessel, they sought in vain to obtain 
 from him the position and numbers of the American army. 
 The commandant of the ship gave a dinner to the officers 
 of the fleet, and did Mr. Norris the honor to select him 
 from the American prisoners of war to be a guest. The 
 deacon, in his homespun attire, took his seat at the table 
 with the aristocracy of the British navy. The company 
 sat long at the feast; they drank toasts, told stories, laughed, 
 and sang songs. At length Mr. Norris was called on for 
 a song. He desired to excuse himself, but in vain: he must 
 sing. He possessed a fine, strong musical voice. In an 
 appropriate and beautiful air, he commenced singing: 
 
 “Sweet is the work, my God, my King, 
 To praise Thy Name, give thanks, and sing: 
 To show Thy love by morning light 
 And talk of all Thy truth by night.” 
 
 Thoughts of home, and of lost religious privileges, and of 
 his captivity, gave an unusual pathos and power to his 
 singing. When he had done, a solemn silence ensued. At 
 length the commandant broke it by saying: “Mr. Norris, 
 you are a good man, and shall return at once to your family.” 
 The commandant kept his word; for in-a few days Mr. 
 Norris was sent ashore with a handsome present of salt— 
 then more valuable in the country than gold. 
 Dr. BELCHER. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 159 
 
 Now 137. 
 “BLEST BE THE TIE THAT BINDS.” 
 
 Rev. JoHN Fawcert, 1739—1817. 
 
 After many years of separation, the Old and the New 
 School divisions of the Presbyterian Church met in conven- 
 tion in separate churches at Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in 
 1869. The act of reunion is thus described: 
 
 “The two bodies having met in two churches, after- 
 ward formed on opposite sides of the street, and then moved 
 along one block, when a halt was made. The two modera- 
 tors, who headed their respective columns, then approached 
 and grasped each other’s hands, which example was fol- 
 ~ lowed by the two opposite ranks, until amidst welcomes, 
 thanksgivings, and tears, they locked arms, and thus 
 marched as one united host, to the temple of God, where 
 they sang, ‘All hail the power of Jesus’ Name,’ and. then 
 blended their voices in the grand old doxology, ‘Praise 
 God, from Whom all blessings flow.’ The tide of feeling 
 gradually rose till it reached its culmination, when Dr. 
 Fowler, the moderator of the New School body, turned to 
 Dr. Jacobus, the moderator of the Old School body, saying, 
 ‘My dear brother moderator, may we not, before I take 
 my seat, perform a single act, symbolical of the union which 
 has taken place between the two branches of the church. 
 Let us clasp hands.’ This challenge was immediately re- 
 sponded to, amid prolonged and deafening applause. After 
 which the thousands present, amid flowing tears and swelling 
 hearts, joined in singing: 
 
 ‘Blest be the tie that binds 
 Our hearts in Christian love; 
 The fellowship of kindred minds 
 Is like to that above.’ ” 
 
160 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 138. 
 “HOW TEDIOUS AND TASTELESS THE HOURS.” 
 
 Rev. Joun Newton, 1725—1807. 
 
 During the Crimean war, a soldier was placed on guard 
 as a picket several nights in succession, and became so 
 forlorn by being night after night exposed to the mud, fog, 
 and rain, in the darkness of the night, that he resolved to 
 end his misery by committing suicide. While retiring to 
 a secluded spot to execute his purpose, he heard some one 
 in the dark tramping through the mud and rain cheerfully 
 singing a hymn. As he listened he found it came from a 
 Christian whose faith enabled him to sing even amid sur- 
 rounding gloom. The soldier was singing: 
 
 “Content with beholding His Face, 
 My all to His pleasure resigned, 
 No changes of season or place, 
 Would make any change in my mind.” 
 
 The despondent soldier went back to his beat resolved to 
 make the best of his circumstances. 
 
 No. 1389. 
 “FROM THE CROSS, UPLIFTED HIGH.” 
 
 Rev. THomas Hawetrs, 1732—1820. 
 
 Recently, says Mr. Ralph Wells, we admitted six mis- 
 sion children from our school into the Church. When the 
 session came to examine the candidates, one of the elders 
 asked a little girl of twelve years, “Maggie, what first 
 interested your heart in the Savior?” 
 
 “Tt was one of those large hymns, sir, one of the printed 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 161 
 
 hymns they use in the school.”” The hymn was that beauti- 
 ful one: 
 “From the cross uplifted high, 
 Where the Savior deigns to die, 
 What melodious sounds I hear 
 Bursting on my ravished ear! 
 Love’s redeeming work is done, 
 Come and welcome, sinner, come 
 
 1 
 
 “Oh, sir!” said this child, fresh from her tenement home, 
 “it, was those kind words: ‘Come and welcome, sinner, 
 come.’ I said to myself that means ME; for, if it means 
 
 . . . . q 
 ‘sinner’ it is for poor Maggie.” 
 
 No. 140. 
 
 “PRAISE GOD FROM WHOM ALL BLESSINGS FLOW.” 
 BisHop Tuomas Ken, 1637—1710. 
 
 In the great cotton famine in England, which desolated 
 Lancashire for long and weary months, the conduct of the 
 operatives was the admiration of the world. ‘There were 
 no riots and no excess of crimes. The people, men and 
 women, went into the Sunday-schcol houses and prayed. 
 They had been taught to do so, and they were upheld in 
 the time of trial by the truths they had learned. When 
 the first wagonload of cotton arrived, the people unhooked 
 the horses and drew it themselves, and, surrounding it, 
 began to sing. What do you think they sang? They sang 
 the grand old doxology, while the tears came flowing down 
 their cheeks: 
 
 “Praise God from Whom all blessings flow, 
 Praise Him, all creatures here below; 
 Praise Him above, ye heavenly host; 
 Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.” 
 Rev. Wm. M. Taytor. 
 
162 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 Chaplain McCabe says that while the prisoners of the 
 Union army were incarcerated in Libby Prison, day after 
 day they saw comrades passing away, and their number 
 increased by fresh, living recruits for the grave. One 
 night, about ten o’clock, through the stillness and the 
 darkness, they heard the tramp of coming feet, that soon 
 stopped before the prison door, until arrangements could 
 be made inside. In the company was a young Baptist 
 minister, whose heart almost fainted as he looked on those 
 cold walls and thought of the suffering inside. Tired and 
 weary, he sat down, put his face in his hands and wept. 
 Just then a lone voice sung out from an upper window: 
 
 “Praise God from Whom all blessings flow;” 
 and a dozen manly voices joined in the second line: 
 “Praise Him all creatures here below”; 
 
 and then by the time the third line was reached, more than 
 a score of hearts were full, and these joined to send the 
 words on high: 
 
 “Praise Him above, ye heavenly host”; 
 
 and by this time, the prison was all alive, and seemed to 
 quiver with the sacred song, as from every room and cell 
 those brave men sang: 
 
 “Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.” 
 
 As the song died out on the still night that enveloped in 
 darkness the city, the young man arose and happily said: 
 
 “Prisons would palaces prove 
 If Jesus would dwell with him there.” 
 
 In company with her father and some friends, a little 
 girl of ten years, rode on horseback one summer day, to the 
 
r 
 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 163 
 
 top of Mount Washington. On that rugged summit nothing 
 grew but some pale green moss; but the view all around was 
 vast and impressive. Below, stretching outwards in all 
 directions, lay a deep, silver sea of clouds, amid which 
 lightnings were seen to part, and writhe like gilded serpents, 
 whilst the roar of the thunder came pealing up to the moun- 
 tain. top. The rain was pouring in torrents below, but 
 above the sun shone in cloudless splendor. The eye wan- 
 dered like Noah’s dove, but there was no resting place 
 in that wide space. ‘Well, Lucy,” said her father, “there 
 is nothing to be seen here, is there?” 
 
 The child paused, clasped her hands, and then said 
 reverently,—‘‘O papa! I see the doxology; all around seems 
 to say: 
 
 ‘Praise God from Whom all blessings flow, 
 Praise Him all creatures here below.’ ”’ 
 
 Pleased with his child’s observation, the father himself 
 
 caught a fresh inspiration. 
 G. J. STEVENSON, 
 
 No. 141. 
 “CENTLE JESUS, MEEK AND MILD.” 
 
 Rev. Cuartes WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 John B. Gough relates the following in one of his lectures: 
 “T went one day with a friend away up to a small garret 
 room. A feeble voice said, ‘Come in,’ and we went in. 
 There was no light, but as soon as our eyes were dilated 
 to the gloom, we saw, lying on a heap of chips and shavings, 
 a boy about ten years of age, pale, but’ with a’ singularly 
 sweet face. We asked the boy, ‘What are you doing there?’ 
 ‘Hush, hush! I am hiding.’ 
 
 ry Hiding? What for?’ 
 
 “The child showed his white delicate arms, covered with 
 bruises and swollen. ‘Who was it beat you like that?’ 
 
 “<Aush! don’t tell him; my father did it.’ 
 
164 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “What for?’ 
 
 ““Poor father got drunk, and beat me because I wouldn’t 
 steal.’ 
 
 ““T)id you ever steal?’ 
 
 “Ves, sir, I was a thief once.’ 
 
 “<Then, why don’t you steal now?’ 
 
 “ “Because I went to ragged school, and they taught me 
 “Thou shalt not steal,’ and told me about God in heaven. 
 I will not steal, sir, if my father kills me.’ 
 
 ““My friend said, ‘I don’t know what to do with you. 
 Here is a shilling. I will see what I can do for you.’ 
 
 “The boy looked at it a moment, and then said, ‘But, 
 please, sir, wouldn’t you like to hear my little hymn?’ We 
 thought it strange that lying there, without fire, without 
 - food, bruised and beaten, he could sing a hymn. How 
 could he sing the Lord’s song in a strange land? But we 
 said, ‘Yes, we will hear you.’ And then in a low sweet 
 voice, the child sang: 
 
 ‘Gentle Jesus, meek and mild, 
 Look upon a little child; 
 
 Pity my simplicity, 
 
 Suffer me to come to Thee. 
 
 ‘Fain I would to Thee be brought; 
 Dearest God, forbid it not: 
 
 Give me, dearest God, a place, 
 
 In the kingdom of Thy grace.’ 
 
 “<That’s my little hymn; goodbye.’ 
 
 “We went again in the morning, mounted the stairs, 
 knocked at the door—no answer; opened it and went in. 
 The shilling lay on the floor, and there, too, lay the boy, 
 with a brave smile on his face, as if to make the best of 
 it; and so he had, for he was dead. In the night he had 
 gone home.” 
 
 In an institution for feeble-minded children was placed 
 a little girl from Virginia, who had been speechless from her 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 165 
 
 birth. She was familiarly known as “Becca.” Dr. Parish, 
 the superintendent, describes her as one afraid of every 
 living thing. Blocks and sticks she would nurse, but if-a 
 nicely dressed doll were presented, she would scream with 
 fear. She loved nobody, and seemed fond of hurting little 
 children and destroying their playthings. Little by little 
 her antipathies and coldness of disposition gave way, and 
 she began to show affection for her matron. She soon 
 began to love to sit in the school room with children and 
 listen to their little songs and hymns. In her eighth year 
 she would steal away and make sounds when alone in some 
 hiding place. One summer evening her nurse had put her 
 to bed early. The birds were singing in the tree by her 
 window; the sun had just gone away and left its golden 
 shadows on the. western sky; and in this sweet hour of 
 twilight the imprisoned soul of the little child broke its 
 bands, her tongue was loosed, and she lifted her voice 
 and sang. The nurse, hearing the sound, hastened up the 
 stairway, and, listening outside the bedroom door, was 
 rejoiced to hear “Becca” commingling her voice with that 
 of the birds without, and as her first utterance the appropri- 
 ate language of the hymn she had heard the other children 
 sing: 
 
 “Gentle Jesus, meek and mild, 
 
 Look upon a little child! 
 
 Pity my simplicity; 
 Suffer me to come to Thee.” 
 
 No. 142. 
 “MY FAITH LOOKS UP TO THEE.” 
 
 Rev. Ray Paumegr, 1808—1887. 
 
 Dr. Palmer, the author of this hymn, states that while 
 a pastor at Albany, New York, a young man who had been 
 
166 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 accustomed to attend upon his ministry came one Sunday 
 morning to his church some time before the time of service; 
 and to pass away the time he opened a hymn book that 
 lay in the pew. His eyes fell at once upon the words: 
 
 “My faith looks up to Thee, 
 Thou Lamb of Calvary, 
 Savior divine!” 
 
 It was just the language suited to his sin-burdened heart. 
 While reading the hymn, the Spirit applied the truth with 
 divine power, so that he looked at once to Jesus and lived. 
 Calling afterward at the residence of Dr. Palmer to tell 
 him how he had found the Savior, he learned to his great 
 joy, for the first time, that the one to whom he was telling 
 the story of his conversion had written the hymn. 
 
 No. 148. 
 “ALL HAIL THE POWER OF JESUS’ NAME.” 
 
 Rev. Epwarp PrErRRONET, 1726—1792. 
 
 Rey. E. P. Scott, while laboring as a missionary in India, 
 saw on the street one of the strangest looking heathen his 
 eyes had ever rested on. On inquiry, he found that he 
 was one of the inland tribes that lived away in the moun- 
 tain districts, and which came down once a year to trade. 
 Upon further investigation he found that the Gospel had 
 never been preached to them, and that it was very hazard- 
 ous to venture among them because of their murderous 
 propensities. He was stirred with earnest desire to break 
 unto them the bread of life. He went to his lodging place, 
 fell on his knees, and pleaded for divine direction. Arising 
 from his knees, he packed his valise, took his violin, with 
 which he was accustomed to sing, and his pilgrim staff, 
 and started in the direction of their mountain home. As 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 167 
 
 he bade his fellow missionaries farewell, they said: “We 
 shall never see you again. It is madness for you to go.” 
 
 “But,” said he, “I must carry Jesus to them.” For two 
 days he traveled, meeting scarcely a human being, until at 
 last he found himself in the mountains, and suddenly sur- 
 rounded by a crowd of savages. Every spear was pointed 
 instantly at his heart. He expected that every moment 
 would be his last. Not knowing of any other resource, he 
 tried the power of singing the name of Jesus to Linens 
 Drawing forth his violin, he began with closed eyes to sing 
 and play: 
 
 “All hail the power of Jesus’ name, 
 Let angels prostrate fall: 
 
 Bring forth the royal diadem, 
 And crown Him Lord of all.” 
 
 Being afraid to open his eyes, he sang on till the third 
 verse, and while singing the stanza: 
 
 “Tet every tribe and every tongue, 
 That bound creation’s call, 
 Now shout in universal song, 
 The crownéd Lord of all,” 
 
 he opened his eyes to see what they were going to do, 
 when lo! the spears had dropped from their hands, and the 
 big tears were dropping from their eyes. They afterward 
 invited him to their homes. He spent two and a half years 
 among them. His labors were so richly rewarded that when 
 he was compelled to leave them by reason of impaired 
 health, and return to this country, they followed him 
 between thirty and forty miles. “Oh! missionary,” said 
 they. when parting, “come back to us again. There are 
 tribes beyond us which never heard the glad tidings of 
 salvation.” He could not resist their entreaties. After 
 visiting America he went back again to his labors and died 
 among them. 
 
168 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 About forty years ago, William Dawson, a Methodist 
 local preacher, a farmer, but an original genius, and a 
 striking and popular preacher, was speaking in London on 
 the Divine offices of Christ. After setting Him forth as 
 the great Teacher and Priest, he showed Him in His glory 
 as the King of Saints. He proclaimed Him as King in His 
 own right, and then proceeded to the coronation. His 
 ideas were borrowed from scenes familiar to his hearers. 
 The immense procession was marshalled. Then it moved 
 toward the great temple to place the insignia of royalty 
 upon the King of the universe. So vividly was all this 
 depicted that those who listened thought they were gazing 
 upon the long line of patriarchs, kings, prophets, apostles, 
 martyrs, and confessors of every age and clime. They 
 saw the great temple filled; and the grand and solemn act 
 of coronation was about to be performed. By this time 
 the congregation was wrought up to the highest pitch of 
 excitement, and while expecting to hear the pealing anthem 
 rise from the vast assembly upon which they seemed to 
 gaze, the preacher lifted up his voice and sang: 
 
 “All hail the power of Jesus’ name! 
 Let angels prostrate fall; 
 Bring forth the royal diadem, 
 And crown Him Lord of all!” 
 
 The effect was overwhelming. The crowd sprang to their 
 feet, and sang the hymn with a feeling and a power which 
 seemed to swell higher and higher at every verse. It was 
 a jubilant multitude paying harmonious homage to their 
 Sovereign Lord -and Savior. 
 
 Rey. 8. W. CHRISTOPHERS, 
 
 A faithful Christian, who was dying, turned to his daugh- 
 ter who was bending over his bed and said, “Bring—” then 
 his strength failed him. 
 
 “What shall I bring, father?” said the girl. 
 
HYMNS. OF THE CHURCH 169 
 
 “Bring—” said he, and paused again for lack of strength. 
 
 The daughter, in an agony of desire to know her father’s 
 last request, said, “Dear father, do try to tell me what you 
 want; I will do anything for you.” 
 
 The dying man rallied all his strength, and said, “Bring 
 —forth—the—royal—diadem—A nd—crown—Him—Lord— 
 of—all,” and then, as the last word passed from his lips, 
 he ceased to breathe. 
 
 No. 144. 
 
 “COME TO JESUS, COME TO JESUS.” 
 
 One Saturday night, during a Sunday school teacher’s 
 meeting, a sudden rap was heard at the lecture-room door 
 of a church in St. Louis. The pastor, Rev. Dr. McCook, 
 was sent for in haste to see a little dying boy. He found 
 it was at the home of a noted gambler. This man was on 
 bended knees beside his child. Said he, “Pray for him. 
 Do anything you can.” After prayer, the boy’s lips were 
 observed to move. They found he was trying to say, “Sing! 
 sing!” So Dr. McCook sang the words: 
 
 “Come to Jesus, come to Jesus, 
 Come to Jesus, just now, 
 Just now, come to Jesus, 
 Come to Jesus, just now.” 
 
 As the words “just now” were being repeated, the boy would 
 fix his dying eyes on his father and try to emphasize by 
 saying as loudly as he could, “now, now, now,” whenever 
 the word occurred in the hymn. Next morning, as the father 
 stood on one side of the corpse and Dr. McCook ‘on the 
 other, the latter re-echoed in the ears of the father, that 
 emphatic “now” that so earnestly escaped from the pale 
 lips that lay silent between them. That gambler opened 
 his heart to the sound and became a devoted Christian. 
 KE. M. Lone. 
 
170 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 146. 
 “O DO NOT BE DISCOURAGED.” 
 
 “One morning I had occasion to be in a Christian family 
 at Norristown, Pennsyivania, which had keenly felt the 
 pressure of hard times. They had gotten down to the 
 scrapings of the barrel. They had nothing left for break- 
 fast but the crumbs of other days. These were all gathered 
 on one plate and placed in the centre of the table. All 
 the family gathered around the scanty meal except two 
 little boys, who were absorbed with their playthings in one 
 corner of the room. After the father had given thanks, 
 tears rolled down the cheeks as their eyes gazed upon the 
 empty plates. During the sad silence that followed, the 
 two boys dropped their toys, arose to their feet, and as if 
 led by angel hands, marched forward to the table and sang: 
 
 ‘O do not be discouraged 
 
 For Jesus is your friend; 
 
 He will give you grace to conquer, 
 And keep you to the end.’ 
 
 Tears fled as dewdrops before the rising sun. An unexpected 
 Providence brought relief, and never since have tear drops 
 fallen on empty dishes.” 
 
 Rev. E. M. Lone. 
 
 No. 146. 
 “FROM EVERY STORMY WIND THAT BLOWS.” 
 
 Rev. HueuH SToweE.u, 1799—1865. 
 
 When the flames seized the house of worship of the First 
 Baptist Church, in the Great Chicago fire, brethren who 
 had labored hard to save it, said one to another, “Our 
 house must go, but let us have one more prayer within its 
 
 a i a 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 171 
 
 walls.” And they bowed before God in the face of the 
 coming flames, while one who had been wont to lead in the 
 fire and thunder of battle led the cry of these faithful 
 heroes before the mercy seat. Then, rising to their feet, 
 they sang as they retreated: 
 
 “From every stormy wind that blows, 
 From every swelling tide of woes, 
 There is a calm, a sure retreat; 
 
 ’Tis found beneath the mercy seat.” 
 
 No. 147. 
 “DAUGHTER OF ZION! FROM THE DUST.” 
 
 JAMES Montcomery, 1771—1854. 
 
 The pastor of the New England Congregational Church 
 of Chicago relates that at the time after the fire, when 
 they were most afflicted by the loss of their edifice, a 
 singular circumstance became known, which greatly cheered 
 and encouraged them to put forth the most strenuous efforts 
 to rebuild. It seems that among the ruins of their church 
 were found two bits of paper, one of which proved to be 
 the only remaining fragment of a Bible, and the only 
 legible portion was this verse, from II Corinthians 5:1— 
 “For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle 
 were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not 
 made with hands eternal in the heavens.” The other was 
 a scrap from the hymn book, upon which were these words 
 of the hymn: 
 
 “Daughter of Zion! from the dust 
 Exalt thy fallen head; 
 Again in thy Redeemer trust; 
 He calls thee from the dead. 
 
172 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “Awake, awake, put on thy strength, 
 Thy beautiful array; 
 The day of freedom dawns at length, 
 The Lord’s appointed day. 
 
 “Rebuild thy wells, thy bounds enlarge, 
 And send thy heralds forth:” 
 
 No. 148. 
 “COME, HUMBLE SINNER, IN WHOSE BREAST.” 
 
 Rev. EpMunp JoNEs, 1772—1765. 
 
 Rev. Henry Ward Beecher says, “I remember once hear- 
 ing a sermon preached by Mr. Nettleton, under which I 
 shivered and quivered like an aspen leaf; I remember going 
 away and trying to pray, and waiting for a change to come 
 which should translate me; and I remember taking this 
 hymn, and singing, and singing, and singing it, and finding 
 it a great comfort, though it did not bring me through. It 
 may seem very little to you; but I tell you that hymn was 
 like the day of judgment to me, so full of anguish was I.” 
 
 No. 149. 
 “Q’ER THOSE GLOOMY HILLS OF DARKNESS.” 
 
 Rey. Wiuu1am WituiAMs, 1717—1791. 
 
 A negro woman in Jamaica was very fond of singing 
 this hymn at missionary meetings, and sang it with great 
 fervor. But whenever the plates went around for contribu- 
 tions she always sang with her eyes on the ceiling. On 
 one occasion, however, the plate reached her just as she 
 was singing with great earnestness, and with eyes as usual 
 on the ceiling: 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 173 
 
 “Fly abroad, eternal gospel, 
 Win and conquer, never cease”; 
 
 The colored brother who carried the plate, had apparently 
 had experience with this sort of singing, and so he touched 
 the good sister with the plate and said, “Sissy, it’s no use 
 for to sing ‘Fly abroad’ with your eyes on the ceiling; it’s 
 no use for you to sing ‘fly’ at all, unless you give something 
 to make it fly.” 
 
 No. 150. 
 “WHEN I SURVEY THE WONDROUS CROSS.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Watts, 1674—1748. 
 
 In a church in London, this hymn was sung after a 
 collection had been taken. When it ended, the preacher 
 slowly repeated the verse: 
 
 “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.” 
 
 And then added, “Well, I am surprised to hear you sing 
 that, for do you know that altogether you have only put 
 fifteen shillings into the plate this morning?” 
 
 No. 181. 
 
 “COME HOLY SPIRIT, HEAVENLY DOVE.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Warts, 1674—1748. 
 
 Rev. R. V. Lawrence relates the following incident as 
 occurring in New Jersey: “A minister was called to take 
 charge of a congregation that his predecessor had left in 
 
174 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 a state of revival, with hearts all aglow with the heavenly 
 fire. At the first prayer meeting service he began to read 
 the hymn: 
 
 ‘Come Holy Spirit, heavenly Dove, 
 With all Thy quickening powers; 
 Kindle a flame of sacred love 
 In these cold hearts of ours.’ 
 
 As he read the last two lines, a brother called out, ‘Dear 
 pastor, that hymn does not suit us. Our hearts are not 
 “cold” 
 
 As the preacher still proceeded to read the next verse: 
 
 ‘Look how we grovel here below 
 Fond of these earthly toys; 
 Our souls can neither fly nor go, 
 
 To reach eternal joys.’ 
 
 another brother responded, ‘We can “fly” and “go” and 
 “reach eternal joys.” The confused pastor, however, per- 
 sisted in reading the third verse: 
 
 ‘In vain we tune our formal songs, 
 In vain we strive to rise; 
 
 Hosannas languish on our tongues, 
 And our devotion dies.’ 
 
 When being told again that their songs were not ‘formal,’ 
 that their ‘hosannas’ did not ‘languish,’ he closed by saying, 
 ‘Well, that’s my condition, if it is not yours.’ And asked 
 the prayers of the warm-hearted brethren on his behalf.” 
 
 A young man, who had been the leader in gaiety among 
 the middle ranks of the place in which he dwelt, went to 
 a Scripture reading at the persuasion of a friend; and the 
 Word of God went like an arrow to his heart. To stifle his 
 convictions, he went to a neighboring public house, where 
 several young men spent their evenings in revelry. His 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 175 
 
 talent for singing made him doubly welcome amongst them. 
 In the midst of singing a song, the words vanished from 
 his mind; he tried in vain to recall them; the only lines 
 he could remember were these: 
 
 “Come, Holy Spirit, heavenly Dove, 
 
 With all Thy quickening powers; 
 
 Come, shed abroad a Savior’s love, 
 And that shall kindle ours.” 
 
 He left the house deeply wounded in spirit, his pride hum- 
 bled; and, seeking earnestly for pardon till he found it, he 
 spent the rest of his life in the service of God. 
 
 No. 152. 
 “JESUS! THE NAME HIGH OVER ALL.” 
 
 Rev. CHARLES WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 In a narrow alley in Boston, noted for its poverty and 
 haunts of vice, a young gas-fitter was sent one winter eve- 
 ning in 1873, to repair a gas pipe. Near by was the North 
 End Mission Chapel, surrounded by dance halls and tip- 
 pling shops. The alley was very foggy and still, and the 
 music of harps and fiddles seemed to echo in strange con- 
 trast with the inspiring strains of “Coronation” and other 
 familiar tunes that issued from the house of God. The 
 young gas-fitter was weary and paused at times in this extra 
 work to listen to the commingling of musical sounds. At 
 last there was a loud outburst of song in the chapel. 
 Through the crisp evening air echoed the words of Wesley’s 
 hymn: 
 
 “Jesus; the name high over all, 
 In hell, or earth, or sky; 
 
 Angels and men before it fall, 
 And devils fear and fly.” 
 
176 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 He listened to the singing of three stanzas heartily sung, 
 but could not distinguish the words. The music affected 
 him strangely. There was something in the tinkling sound, 
 coming out of the beer rooms that told him of the emptiness 
 of earth’s follies. “I wish I was a true Christian,” said 
 the young man, as he resumed his work in the basement. 
 'As the bell was striking nine he again paused and went 
 to the basement window and listened. The chapel seemed 
 silent, but there was a mingling of people, and a murmuring 
 of voices out on the street, and the tinkling of instruments 
 in the dance halls still went on. He stood thinking, and 
 the old thoughts returned with greater force, that there 
 was no hope or promise in any pursuits or pleasures which 
 were destitute of God. The music and the sounds of laughter 
 seemed a mockery. He again said, as he was about to 
 resume his work, “I would like to be a Christian.” Some- 
 thing detained him a moment more at the window. A low 
 bent form flitted through the misty ring of light at the head 
 of the alley, and approached with a pattering step in the 
 deep shadows. It was an old woman returning from the 
 chapel. She was singing. It was the hymn which he had 
 imperfectly heard. He waited for the refrain: 
 
 “Jesus, the Name high over all, 
 In hell, or earth, or sky; 
 Angels and men before it fall, 
 And devils fear and fly. 
 
 O how I love Jesus, 
 
 O how I love Jesus, 
 
 O how I love Jesus, 
 Because He first loved me.” 
 
 The old woman passed on and disappeared through one 
 of the dark doors at the foot of the alley. She knew not 
 the sermon her song had preached. Then and there the 
 young man saw what he wanted to make him happy—what 
 the world wants to make it happy—the love of Jesus. On 
 the following day he arose in the Young Men’s Christian 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 177 
 
 Association rooms, related the above story, and asked their 
 prayers. 
 
 No. 153. 
 “HOW HAPPY EVERY CHILD OF GRACE.” 
 
 Rev. CHartes Wesuey, 1708—1788. 
 
 About the year 1854, the unusual scene of a court room 
 in tears was witnessed in Exeter Castle, England. A good 
 woman had been set upon by a villain on her way from the 
 Sunday school and was left for dead by the roadside. On 
 being discovered, she was restored to consciousness so far 
 as to identify the perpetrator of the crime; and then she 
 died, singing this triumphant anthem of hope: 
 
 “How happy every child of grace, 
 Who knows his sins forgiven! 
 
 ‘This earth,’ he cries, ‘is not my place; 
 I seek my place in heaven; 
 
 “<A country far from mortal sight; 
 Yet O, by faith I see 
 The land of rest, the saints’ delight, 
 The heaven prepared for me. 
 
 ““To that Jerusalem above 
 With singing I repair; 
 While in the flesh, my hope and love, 
 My heart and soul are there.’ ” 
 
 The counsel for the prosecution at the murderer’s trial, 
 in his appeal to the jury, described the death scene and re- 
 hearsed the hymn, a part of which the dying girl sang on her 
 upward flight. The jury, all but the prisoner, wept. Who 
 could help it? To hear in that solemn court, the youthful 
 martyr’s song of glory! And such a song! 
 
178 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 154. 
 “JESUS, KEEP ME NEAR THE CROSS.” 
 
 Mrs. FANNY JANE VAN ALSTYNE: 
 
 A small boy was run over by a car on the Third Avenue 
 line in New York, and taken to a hosptial. A few moments 
 before his death he said, “May I sing?” After clasping 
 his little hands and saying the Lord’s prayer, he broke 
 out in singing the hymn: 
 
 “Jesus, keep me near the cross, 
 There a precious fountain, 
 
 Free to all—a healing stream, 
 Flows from Cavalry’s mountain.” 
 
 His voice gradually grew weaker as he sang: 
 
 “Near the cross I’ll watch and wait, 
 Hoping, trusting ever, 
 Till I reach the golden strand, 
 Just beyond the river.” 
 
 And with these words he crossed the river. 
 
 No. 155. 
 “SAFE IN THE ARMS OF JESUS.” 
 
 Mrs. FANNY JANE VAN ALYSTYNE. 
 
 One summer evening the author of this hymn was present 
 at a meeting in the Water Street Mission in New York 
 when a number of sailors were present. One of their 
 number arose and said that for many years he had lived 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 179 
 
 far from God a reckless life, until strolling along the streets 
 the first Sunday after his vessel had come into port, he 
 happened to hear music proceeding from that building. He 
 stopped and listened and was induced to enter while they 
 were singing: 
 
 “Safe in the arms of Jesus.” 
 
 It so stirred his soul that he rested not till he was “safe 
 in the arms of Jesus” himself. 
 
 No. 156. 
 “DEAR CHRISTIAN PEOPLE, NOW REJOICE.” 
 
 Rev. Martin LuTHEr. 
 
 Martin Luther knew the power of song. Hymns could 
 go where neither he nor his brother preachers could go, and 
 so he began at the very outset of his work to embody his 
 doctrines in song. This is the second hymn he wrote— 
 his version of the forty-sixth Psalm being the first—and 
 this is almost a complete epitome of his doctrine of salva- 
 tion through faith in Christ. It flew all over Germany 
 as if the very winds carried it, and with it went the great 
 doctrine of the Reformation. “The whole people,” wrote 
 a Romish priest, “is singing itself into this Lutheran doc- 
 trine.” A number of princes who had adopted the Lutheran 
 faith were together at Frankfort soon after this hymn was 
 written, and wished to have an evangelical service in one 
 of the churches. A large congregation assembled, but the 
 pulpit was occupied by a Roman Catholic priest, who 
 proceeded to preach according to his own views. After 
 listening for some time in indignant silence, the whole con- 
 gregation arose and began singing this hymn, till they fairly 
 sang the priest out of the church. 
 
 Miss CATHERINE WINKWORTH. 
 
180 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 No. 1857. 
 
 “AS I GLAD BID ADIEU TO THE WORLD’S FANCIED 
 PLEASURE.” 
 
 A young gentleman, tenderly attached to a young lady, 
 was obliged to take a journey. During his absence she 
 became a follower of Christ. He heard of the change and 
 wrote her a letter full of invectives against religion and 
 its gloomy professions. Having a good voice and playing 
 well on the piano, she had been accustomed to entertain him 
 with her music, especially in performing one song, of which 
 he was very fond, the refrain of which was, “Ah, never! 
 ah, no.” At their first interview after his return, he taunt- 
 ingly said, “I suppose you cannot sing me a song now?” 
 “Oh, yes,” was her response, “and I will;” and, proceeding 
 to her piano, she sang a hymn she had composed to his 
 favorite tune: 
 
 “As I glad bid adieu to the World’s fancied pleasure, 
 You pity my weakness; alas! did you know 
 The joys of religion, that best hidden treasure, 
 Would you bid me resign them? Ah, never! Ah, no! 
 
 “You will surely rejoice when I say I’ve received 
 The only true pleasure attained here below. 
 I know by experience in whom I’ve believed: 
 Shall I give up this treasure? Ah, never! Ah, no! 
 
 “In the gay scenes of life I was happiness wooing; 
 But ah! in her stead I encountered a woe, 
 And found I was only a phantom pursuing; 
 
 Never once did I find her. Ah, never! Ah, no! 
 
 “But in these bright paths which you call melancholy, 
 I’ve found those delights which the world does not 
 know. 
 Oh, did you partake them, you’d then see your folly, 
 Nor again bid me fly them. Ah, never! Ah, no! 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 181 
 
 By hearing these lines, his prejudices gave way, his feet 
 entered the narrow path, and they became a truly happy 
 pair. 
 
 Dr. BELCHER. 
 
 No. 158. 
 “LORD OF HEAVEN! LONE AND SAD.” 
 
 On a cold dark night, when the wind was blowing hard, 
 Conrad, a worthy citizen of a little town in Germany, sat. 
 playing with his flute, while Ursula, his wife, was prepar- 
 ing supper. They heard a sweet voice singing outside: 
 
 “Foxes to their holes have gone, 
 Every bird into its nest; 
 But I wander here alone, 
 And for me there is no rest.” 
 
 Tears filled the good man’s eyes as he said, “What a 
 pity it should be spoiled by being tried in such weather. 
 I think it is the voice of a child.” 
 
 “Let us open the door and see,” said his wife, who had 
 lost a little boy not long before, and whose heart was 
 opened to take pity on the little wanderer. 
 
 Conrad opened the door and saw a ragged child who 
 said: “Charity, good sir, for Christ’s sake.” 
 
 “Come in, my little one,” said he, “you shall rest with 
 me for the night.” 
 
 The boy said, “Thank God,” and entered. The heat of 
 the room made him faint, but Ursula’s kind care soon re- 
 stored him. They gave him some supper, and then he told 
 them that he was the son of a poor miner and wanted to 
 be a priest. He wandered about and sang and lived on the 
 money people gave him. His kind friends would not let 
 him talk much, but sent him to bed. When he was asleep 
 they looked in upon him, and were so pleased with his 
 
182 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 pleasant countenance that they determined to keep him if 
 he was willing. In the morning they found that he was only 
 too glad to remain. They sent him to school, and afterward 
 he entered the monastery. There he found the Bible, which 
 he read’ and from which he learned the way of life. The 
 little voice of the little singer became the strong echo of the 
 good news, “Justified by faith, we have peace with God 
 through our Lord Jesus Christ.” Conrad and Ursula, when 
 they took that little singer into their house, little thought 
 that they were nourishing the great champion of the Refor- 
 mation. The poor child was Martin Luther! The following 
 is the whole of the song which Luther sang on that mem- 
 orable night: 
 
 “Lord of heaven, lone and sad, 
 I would lift my soul to Thee; 
 Pilgrim in a foreign land, 
 Gracious Father, look on me. 
 I shall neither faint nor die 
 While I walk beneath Thine Eye. 
 
 “T will stay my faith on Thee, 
 And will never fear to tread 
 Where the Saviour-Master leads; 
 He will give me daily bread. 
 Christ was hungry, Christ was poor, 
 He will feed me from His store. 
 
 “Foxes to their holes have gone, 
 Every bird into its nest; 
 But I wander here alone, 
 And for me there is no rest; 
 Yet I neither faint nor fear, 
 For the Saviour-Christ is near. 
 
 “Tf I live He’ll be near me, 
 If I die to Him I go; 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 183 
 
 He’ll not leave me, I will trust Him, 
 And my heart no fear shall know. 
 Sin and sorrow I defy, 
 For on Jesus I rely.” 
 Home Words. 
 
 No. 159. 
 “MUST JESUS BEAR THE CROSS ALONE?” 
 
 In one of the Armenian schools (for there are.some schools 
 among the Armenians; and they have had more since the 
 missionary work began among them than before) it became 
 noised among them that there were some Protestants. Protes, 
 as they are called, in the school; but the teacher did not 
 want any such element there ; and he said, “If there are any 
 boys here who are Protes, let them come upon the floor.” 
 
 He did not suppose any one would arise; but four or five 
 boys from ten to twelve years of age marched “out upon the 
 floor, declaring themselves Protes. He was a good deal con- 
 Peed “Hardly knowing what to say, he turned to the boys 
 and said, “Do you believe in the Church?” 
 
 “Yes, ” they replied, “but we believe in the Bible more.’ 
 
 Then The turned to the school and said, ‘““What shall we do 
 to these boys for refusing to obey the Church?” 2 3 
 
 For a moment there was a pause. At last, one said, “Let 
 
 us spit in their faces.” So the teacher, thinking that a fine 
 suggestion, called on the school to pass before the boys and 
 each one to spit in their faces. They filed by, each one 
 spitting as they passed along. Then feeling that they had 
 triumphed over the boys, the teacher turned to the school 
 and said, “Let us sing.” And they’sang a patriotic song! 
 The boys stood silent, and did not sing; and the teacher 
 turned to them and said, “Why do you not sing?” 
 
 They said, “We will, if you will sing a spiritual song.” 
 
 Said he, “You may sing anything you wish to.” And 
 they sang these words: ~ 
 
184 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “Must Jesus bear the cross alone, 
 ‘And all the world go free? 
 
 - No, there’s a cross for every one, 
 And there’s a cross for me. 
 
 “The consecrated cross I’ll bear, 
 Till death shall set. me free; 
 And then go home my crown to wear, 
 For there’s a crown for me.” 
 
 % This incident was related at Plymouth Church, Brooklyn, 
 
 H 
 i 
 \ 
 
 New York, by Rev. Mr. Parmelee, missionary among the 
 
 \ Armenians. 
 
 ALL GLORY, LAUD, AND HONOR.” 
 
 THEODULPH. 
 
 It was on a Palm Sunday, about seven hundred and fifty 
 years after the midnight song of Paul and Silas at Philippi, 
 that the Emperor Louis, “the debonnaire” and his court, 
 were on their way to the cathedral at Metz, in full pro- 
 cession, when, passing a dungeon, there issued from the 
 prison bars a hymn, which as translated by Dr. Neale 
 began: 
 
 “All glory, laud and honor 
 To Thee, Redeemer, King! 
 To Whom the lips of children 
 Made sweet hosannas ring.” 
 
 The author was a prisoner behind those bars, and was sing- 
 ing the hymn he had written. The Emperor was so touched 
 
 —~ 
 
 by the hymn, that he ordered the captive Bishop to be at 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 185 
 
 once liberated, and directed that the hymn should be made 
 the processional hymn for Palm Sunday. And so the hymn 
 of praise, written behind prison bars, became a hymn of 
 deliverance to the one who wrote it. 
 
 No. 161. 
 “COME, LET US ANEW OUR JOURNEY PURSUE.” 
 
 Rey. CHartes WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 A little girl, belonging to the Scotch Church, was per- 
 mitted by her father to go to the watch night service of the 
 Methodists in Aberdeen, on condition that she remember 
 the text, and repeat it on her return home. At the end 
 of the service the accustomed hymn was sung: 
 
 “Come, let us anew our journey pursue, 
 Roll round with the year,” etc. 
 
 This was to her a novelty, and so fixed in the child’s mind 
 a love towards Methodism, that she ultimately became a 
 member of that Society, and the wife of one of their minis- 
 ters. The text failed to influence her mind seriously, but 
 the last hymn did so effectually. 
 
 G. J. STEVENSON. 
 
 No. 162. 
 “BLEST BE THE DEAR UNITING LOVE.” 
 
 Rev. Cuartes Wesiey, 1708—1788. 
 
 John B. Gough records an incident of the use of the 
 hymn of which this is the first line. He says: “I was twelve 
 years of age, and my father being unable to furnish the 
 premium necessary to my. learning a trade, and having no 
 
186 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 prospect for me other than to be a gentleman’s servant, 
 made an agreement with a family of our village, who were 
 about to emigrate to America, that they, in considera- 
 tion of ten guineas paid by him, should take me with them, 
 teach me a trade, and provide for me until I was twenty- 
 one years of age. After much hesitation, my mother, from 
 a sense of duty, yielded to this arrangement. I, boy-like, 
 felt in high glee at the prospect before me. My little 
 arrangements having been completed, on the fourth of June, 
 1829, I took, as I then supposed, a last view of my native 
 village. The evening I was about to depart, a neighbor 
 invited me to take tea at her house, which I accepted. My 
 mother remarked to me afterwards, ‘I wish you had taken 
 tea with your mother, John’; and this little circumstance 
 was a source of much pain to me in after years. The part- 
 ing from my beloved parents was bitter. My poor mother 
 folded me to her bosom; then she would hold me off at arm’s 
 length, and gaze fondly on my face, through her tearful eyes, 
 reading, as only a mother could, the book of futurity to me. 
 She hung up, on the accustomed peg, my old cap and jacket, 
 and my school bag, and there they remained until years 
 after she quitted the house. At length the parting words 
 were spoken, and I left the home of my childhood, perhaps 
 forever. A touching scene it was, as I went through the 
 village toward the coach office that evening. As I passed 
 through the streets, many a kind hand waved a farewell, 
 and not a few familiar voices sounded out a hearty ‘God 
 bless you.’ On the tenth of June, everything being arranged, 
 we sailed from the Thames in the ship Helen. Passing 
 Dover, we arrived off Sandgate, when it fell a dead calm, 
 and the ship’s anchors were dropped. I afforded some 
 amusement to those around me by the eagerness with which 
 I seized a telescope, and the positiveness with which I 
 averred that I saw my old home. During that day, boat 
 after boat came off to us from the shore, and friends of the 
 family I was with, paid them visits; but I was unnoticed; 
 my relatives did not come. After long and weary watching, 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 187 
 
 I saw a man standing up in a boat, with a white band round 
 his hat. - ‘That’s he! That’s my father!’ I shouted. He 
 soon got on deck and almost smothered me with his kisses— 
 from which I somewhat shrank, as his beard made very 
 decided impressions on my smocth skin. I heard that my 
 mother and sister had gone to a place of worship, at some 
 distance from Sandgate, which I regretted much. When 
 evening came on, our visitors from the shore repaired to 
 their boats, which, when a few yards from the ship, formed 
 in a half circle. Our friends stood up in them, and o’er the 
 calm waters floated our blended voices, as we sang: 
 
 ‘Blest be the dear uniting love, 
 That will not let us part: 
 Our bodies may far off remove, 
 We still are one in heart.’ 
 
 Boat after boat then vanished in the gloomy distance, and 
 I went to bed. About midnight I heard my name called, 
 and going on deck I there found my beloved mother and. 
 sister, who hearing on their return that I was in the offing, 
 had paid half a guinea (money hard earned and with 
 difficulty procured, yet cheerfully expended on a boatman 
 to row them to the ship. They spent an hour with me and 
 oh, how short it seemed!) then departed with many tears.” 
 
 No. 163. 
 “COME, LET US JOIN OUR CHEERFUL SONGS.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Warts, 1674—1748. 
 
 A sailor, at the approach of death, was aroused at the 
 prospect before him. He was ill, had no Bible, nor even 
 the power to read one. In his mental darkness, he remem- 
 bered two verses of Watts’s hymn commencing as above. 
 Even his recollection was imperiect, but as he repeated to 
 himself the line: 
 
188 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “Worthy the Lamb That died,’ they cry, 
 To be exalted thus.’ ” 
 
 the next ones flashed upon his memory, 
 
 “Worthy the Lamb!’ our hearts reply, 
 ‘For He was slain for us.’ ” 
 
 This phrase, “slain for us,” gave him a glimpse of the way 
 of salvation, revived old lessons received in the Sunday 
 school, and brought him at last to pardon and peace. 
 
 It is related of Rev. Paxton Hood, that once when he 
 had engaged to preach at a strange chapel, as he entered 
 the pulpit, the deacon who announced the hymn was just 
 giving out the lines: 
 
 “My thoughts on awful subjects roll, 
 Damnation and the dead.” 
 
 when Mr. Hood started up and in his shrillest tones ex- 
 claimed: “Stop! Stop! My thoughts do not roll on any 
 such subject. 
 
 “Come, let us join our cheerful songs, 
 With angels round the throne, 
 : Ten thousand, thousand, are their tongues, 
 But all their joys are one.’ ” 
 
 No. 164. 
 
 “GOD MOVES IN A MYSTERIOUS WAY.” 
 
 WILLIAM CowPeERr. 
 
 A business man entered the Fulton Street Prayer Meeting 
 one day, heavily burdened and sadly cast down. He had 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 189 
 
 hardly taken his seat, when the leader called for two verses 
 of the hymn commencing as above. The meeting sang the 
 verses: 
 
 “God moves in a mysterious way, 
 His wonders to perform; 
 
 He plants His footsteps in the sea, 
 And rides upon the storm. 
 
 “Judge not the Lord by feeble sense, 
 But trust Him for His grace; 
 Behind a frowning providence 
 He hides a smiling face.” 
 
 The man felt that he was certainly walking beneath a 
 frowning providence, but he had not felt assured of the 
 smiling face beyond. The song cheered his heart, however, 
 and strengthened his faith. He went away determined to 
 look for the smiling face and soon it appeared to him, from 
 out of the cloud; God helped him. 
 
 Dr. PRIME. 
 
 The late Rev. Hugh Stowell, of Manchester, England, 
 relates an incident concerning this hymn: “One of the Lan- 
 cashire mill-owners, who had struggled hard and long to 
 keep his hands employed during the cotton famine arising 
 from the American war, in 1865, at last found it impossible 
 to proceed; and calling his work people together, told them 
 that he should be compelled, after the usual notice to close 
 his mills. The news was received with sadness and sympa- 
 thy; to them it meant privation and suffering, to him it 
 might be ruin. None cared to speak in reply; when sud- 
 denly arose the voice of song from one of the girls, who 
 was a Sunday-school teacher; she, feeling it to be an occa- 
 sion requiring Divine help and guidance, gave out the verse 
 of Cowper’s hymn: 
 
190 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 ‘Ye fearful saints fresh courage take; 
 The clouds ye so much dread 
 
 Are big with mercy, and shall break 
 In blessings on your head.’ 
 
 All the mill-hands joined in singing the verse amidst deep 
 emotion, sympathy and tears.” 
 
 No. 165. 
 “LORD I HEAR OF SHOWERS OF BLESSING.” 
 
 Mrs. EvizABETH COoDNER. 
 
 The singing leader in an American Sunday school, was a 
 man of skeptical tendencies—moral and upright, though far 
 from being a Christian. One Sunday, this hymn was com- 
 menced as usual, but when the leader came to the passage: 
 
 “Pass me not, O gracious Saviour, 
 Let me live and cling to Thee”; 
 
 his voice quivered, his frame shook, and in anguish he cried 
 out, “Pray for me!” It was a scene of thrilling interest, 
 and earnest prayers then went up from teachers and 
 scholars, that he who had so long sung the sweet songs of 
 Zion without feeling their power, might now sing with the 
 spirit and the understanding also. He was happily con- 
 verted and is now a faithful Christian. 
 
 No. 166. 
 “QO WHERE SHALL REST BE FOUND?” 
 
 JAMES MontcoMery, 1771—1854. 
 
 In the Fulton Street, New York, Prayer Meeting, a young 
 man said that he had gone the downward road until he was 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 191 
 
 sick of sin, and of himself. He resolved to do away with 
 himself, and stood at the edge of the wharf, pistol in hand, 
 ready to shoot himself, and then to tumble over into the 
 water. Just then, there flashed across his mind the words: 
 
 “°Tis not the whole of life to live, 
 Nor all of death to die.” 
 
 The words served to stay him in his mad purpose, and from 
 that hour he began to seek a better way, and soon found 
 the way of life. 
 
 Sabbath Reading, January, 1886. 
 
 No. 167. 
 “HOW CAN I SINK WITH SUCH A PROP?” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Watts, 1674—1748. 
 
 The leader of the Fulton Street, New York, Prayer Meet- 
 ing, one noon said that he was present for the last time. 
 He was about to seek a permanent home in Kansas. He 
 had often been in the meeting before, but upon one occasion 
 his attendance was fraught with eternal results. He came 
 in a helpless, hopeless, lost man. He had been a sad slave 
 to dissipation. Friends had long since ceased to indulge the 
 hope of his improvement, and he just felt that he was sink- 
 ing into ruin, here and hereafter. He sat near the leader’s 
 desk, despondent—aye, despairing. Who could help him? 
 He could not sink much lower on earth, but with no one to 
 pity and no one to save, he must soon sink into the hell, 
 that seemed greedily gaping to receive him. Never more 
 miserable, just then his ear was arrested by the words of a 
 verse of a hymn, called for by the friend in the chair: 
 
 “How can I sink with such a prop 
 As my eternal God?” 
 
192 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 These were all the words he caught, but they set him to 
 thinking—thinking that possibly the Lord had led him to 
 the meeting, and that there was yet hope’for him. Next 
 day he presented his request for prayer, and ere long was 
 rejoicing in Christ as his Savior. 
 
 No. 168. 
 “VAIN, DELUSIVE WORLD ADIEU.” 
 
 Rev. CHARLES WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 In the year 1783, it was announced at Rood, a little 
 country village in England, that “the boy preacher” was to 
 preach, and all the young men and women resolved to hear 
 him. They crowded the preaching room, and listened to the 
 sermon with profound attention; the place was still as death. 
 At the close of the sermon the preacher gave out the hymn: 
 
 “Vain, delusive world adieu, 
 With all of creature good! 
 Only Jesus I pursue, 
 Who bought me with His Blood: 
 
 “All the pleasures I forego; 
 I trample on thy wealth and pride; 
 Only Jesus will I know, 
 And Jesus crucified.” 
 
 The fine voices of the young people produced a solemn 
 effect; the last two lines were repeated at every verse, and 
 at the end all those present were deeply moved. The young 
 preacher paused, spoke of the delightful effect of the singing, 
 but arrested their attention by an earnest appeal to follow 
 out the teaching of the hymn by taking up their baptismal 
 vows and yielding their hearts to God that day. The appeal 
 was so earnest, so affectionate, that thirteen young persons 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 193 
 
 that night and at the prayer meeting early next morning 
 gave their hearts to God. The preacher was Dr. Adam 
 Clarke, and fifty years after, one of those young persons 
 called on him, and reminded him of the hymn sung and 
 preached that day at Rood. 
 
 No. 169. 
 “COMMIT THOU ALL THY GRIEFS.” 
 
 Rey. Paut GEeRHARDT, 1606—1676. 
 
 In a little village near Warsaw there used to stand a 
 house, and over the door an iron tablet on which was carved 
 a raven with a ring in its beak and underneath one stanza 
 of this hymn: 
 
 “Thou everywhere hast sway 
 And all things serve Thy might! 
 Thy every act pure blessing is, 
 Thy path unsullied light.” 
 
 How came it there? There lived in that village a pious 
 German peasant whose name was Dobry. He had fallen 
 far in arrears with his rent and the landlord threatened to 
 evict him. It was winter. All his entreaties for longer time 
 had been in vain and next day his family would be turned 
 out into the snow. The church bell called to evening prayer 
 and Dobry kneeled among the rest. They sang this hymn: 
 
 “Commit thou all thy griefs 
 And ways into his hands,” 
 
 and as they sang something made a noise upon the window 
 close by where Dobry knelt. Opening the window he found 
 a raven which his grandfather had tamed and set at liberty. 
 In its bill was a finger ring set with precious stones. -Dobry 
 took it from the bird and it was found to have been one lost 
 
194 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 by the King. It was taken to him and he rewarded Dobry 
 so that he had no need and built for him a house of his own 
 and to commemorate the wonderful occurrence of that 
 wintry night this iron plate was put over its door with its 
 raven and its ring and its song engraved upon it. 
 
 No. 170. 
 “Q HAPPY DAY THAT FIXED MY CHOICE.” 
 
 Rev. Puinie Doppringr, 1702—1751. 
 
 The late Duncan Mathieson has related that on one of 
 his evangelistic visits to Dundee, at the fair held there, he 
 was preaching in the street, when two young women stopped 
 to hear the singing, which began with: 
 
 “QO happy day that fixed my choice 
 On Thee, my Saviour and my God! 
 
 Well may this glowing heart rejoice, 
 And tell its raptures all abroad.” 
 
 Said one of the girls to the other, “Come away, we shall be 
 too late for the fair.” 
 
 The Spirit of God had already arrested the attention of 
 the other girl, with the words “happy day” and she replied, 
 “T dare not gang.” The flighty one fled in haste and was 
 not saved; the other remained, and that day gave her heart 
 to God. 
 
 NOS 
 “COME WE WHO LOVE THE LORD.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Watts, 1674—1748. 
 
 Rev. Andrew Kinsman met a young clergyman with Rev. 
 George Whitefield, at the Tabernacle house, just before 
 

 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 195 
 
 Whitefield’s departure for America. There was after dinner 
 a tremendous storm of thunder and lightning. Mr. Kins- 
 man, supposing the clergyman “to be a serious person,” put 
 his hand on his shoulder, and quoted a stanza of this hymn, 
 which is not in our later collections: 
 
 “The God that reigns on high, 
 And thunders when He please, 
 
 That rides upon the stormy sky 
 And manages the seas.” 
 
 ending with the next stanza 
 
 “This awful God is ours, 
 Our Father and our Love.” 
 
 It resulted in the conversion of his companion. 
 
 No. 172. 
 “MIGHTY GOD! WHILE ANGELS BLESS THEE.” 
 
 Rev. Ropert Rosprnson, 1735—1790. 
 
 Robert Robinson was a poor boy, too poor to get the 
 education for the Church that his mother wanted him to 
 have; so at fourteen years of age he was apprenticed to a 
 barber in London, who often had to find fault with him for 
 paying more attention to his book than to his work. When 
 seventeen, he went with some companions one Sunday for a 
 holiday. They found an old fortune teller and made her 
 drink to hear her maudlin talk. She predicted for Robinson 
 that he would see his children and his children’s children. 
 _ This struck his quick mind and he determined to store his 
 memory with things that might interest his family in later 
 _ years. To make a beginning he went to hear George White- 
 
196 — STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 field preach that night. Whitefield was preaching on 
 Matthew 3:7, and his words produced such an impression 
 on young Robinson that he found little comfort until nearly 
 three years later he became a Christian. Three years later 
 he began to preach, and afterward became a Baptist. He 
 was quite eccentric and was by turn a Wesleyan, Indepen- 
 dent and Baptist, and at last a Unitarian. One day a little 
 boy was sitting on Mr. Robinson’s knee, and while sitting 
 . there, Mr. Robinson wrote a hymn for the little boy, and 
 after reading it to him placed it in his hand for him to call 
 his own. It began: 
 
 “Mighty God, while angels bless Thee, 
 May an infant lisp Thy Name.” 
 
 It was set to music by Dr. Randall. 
 
 No. 178. 
 “COME, THOU FOUNT OF EVERY BLESSING.” 
 
 Rev. Ropert Ropinson, 1735—1790. 
 
 In the latter part of the author’s life he seemed to have 
 lost much of his piety and often indulged in a levity not 
 befitting his profession. He was once traveling in a stage 
 coach with a lady, who soon perceived that he was familiar 
 with religious subjects, although she had no suspicion as to 
 who he was. She had just been reading this hymn, and she 
 asked his opinion of it. He tried to waive the question and 
 to turn the conversation into other channels, but she told 
 how much and how often she had been helped by the hymn, 
 and pressed him for his opinion of it, until at last he burst 
 into tears and exclaimed, “Madam, I am the poor unhappy 
 man who composed that hymn many years ago, and I would 
 give a thousand worlds, if I had them, to enjoy the feelings 
 I then had.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 197 
 No. 174. 
 “AWAKE, MY SOUL, TO MEET THE DAY.” 
 
 Rev. Puitie Dopprincr, 1702—1751. 
 
 The author gave to this hymn the title “A Morning Hymn 
 to be Used at Awaking and Arising,” and this was the pur- 
 pose for which he himself used it. It was his habit to arise 
 at five o’clock in the morning winter and summer, and his 
 first act was to sing this hymn. Indeed tradition says that 
 he began the singing while still in bed, and that when he 
 reached the line “As, rising now I seal my vows,” which was 
 in the sixth stanza, he sprang out of bed. 
 
 No. 175. 
 “THINE EARTHLY SABBATH, LORD, WE LOVE.”—1736. 
 
 _ Rev. Puiwire Dopprivce, 1702—1751. 
 (See No. 34 for custom of writing hymns for sermons.) 
 
 This hymn was written to be used at the end of a sermon 
 preached January 2, 1736, from the text, ‘““There remaineth 
 therefore a rest to the people of God.” Hebrews, 4:9. 
 
 Dr. Gardiner Spring, of New York, wrote in his diary 
 under date of May 25, 1851. He had been under some 
 affliction and says that until that day he had not opened 
 his piano to sing, since it occurred. Then he wrote, “I felt 
 that while all God’s works praise Him, my voice also should 
 be vocal with His praise. How beautiful is this green earth 
 on a Sabbath day! I could only give utterance to the 
 words: 
 
 “<Thine earthly Sabbaths, Lord, we love, 
 But there’s a nobler rest above.’ ” 
 
198 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 I remember one delightful Sabbath in the home of Dr. 
 C. L. Goodell. We gathered in the morning and sang the 
 hymn: 
 
 “Thine earthly Sabbaths, Lord, we love, 
 But there’s a nobler rest above.” 
 
 The doctor said, “We have sung this hymn every Sabbath 
 morning for eighteen years. On the sea, in foreign lands, 
 at home; we have never omitted it when together.” The 
 sentiment of the hymn pervaded the home life that day. It 
 went with us to the house of God, where it seemed to give 
 - power to prayer and praise, and to wing with love the spoken 
 truth. It was present in the little group of friends at the 
 evening meal: and when the day closed, which had been 
 filled with loving ministries, its memory remained in the 
 household like a benediction.” 
 
 Rev. A. E. Duniya, D.D., in Congregationalist, 
 January 3, 189—. 
 
 No. 176. 
 “JERUSALEM, THE GLORIOUS.” 
 
 Bernarp or Ciuny; Twelfth Century. 
 
 A small part of a Latin poem of three thousand lines, 
 written by Bernard, a monk of Cluny in France. Five or 
 six hymns in common use among us are taken from this 
 poem. It is curious that about the time when St. Bernard 
 was abbot of the Monastery of Cluny, monks from that 
 place were sent over to England to occupy a priory just 
 built at Castleacre, in Norfolk. So that the hymns of their 
 leader, which within the last thirty years we are just learn- 
 ing to sing again, were no doubt sung in a few English 
 churches seven hundred years ago. Would you like to know 
 something of this old Catholic monk who lived in the forest 
 of France eight hundred years ago? Here is a glimpse of 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 199 
 
 him. He would be walking with his brother monks in the 
 cloisters or the garden, when sometimes he would stop and 
 say, “My brothers, I must go! there is some one waiting for 
 me in my cell.” That some one was Jesus, and he would 
 leave his companions among the flowers while he went to 
 meet Him and talk with Him in his cell. 
 
 No. 177. 
 “MY DAYS ARE GLIDING SWIFTLY BY.” 
 Rev. Davi Nexson, 1793—1844. 
 
 The author of this hymn owned and operated a plantation 
 in Missouri, on which negro slaves were employed. After 
 listening to an address on slavery he declared, “I will live 
 on roast potatoes and salt before I will hold slaves.” He 
 became an ardent advocate of the plan of colonizing the 
 slaves in Africa, and called a meeting to discuss the subject 
 at the close of a camp-meeting service. By this he incurred 
 the displeasure of the slave-holders, and was driven from 
 his home by a band of armed men. After three days and 
 nights of wandering, he at last reached the Mississippi River 
 opposite Quincy, Illinois, and was able to make known his 
 condition to friends in that city. Hiding there in the bushes, 
 with enemies behind and the river gliding swiftly by before, 
 and on its other shore the soil of a free state where were 
 friends and safety, he wrote on the backs of old letters he 
 had in his pockets, the words of this hymn: 
 
 “My days are gliding swiftly by, 
 And I, a pilgrim stranger 
 
 Would not detain them as they fly, 
 These hours of toil and danger. 
 
 “For, oh, we stand on Jordan’s strand, 
 Our friends are passing over; 
 
 And just before, the shining shore, 
 We may almost discover.” 
 
200 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 You will not be satisfied to have the author left where he 
 wrote the hymn, and so I will add that in the dusk of an 
 evening, a boat paddled across the river, and a fisherman 
 cast his line in the water, while the boat floated along with 
 the current, until the almost starved poet was discovered, 
 when having caught the fish he was, after, the boat was 
 paddled back to the Illinois side. 
 
 So much for the song and its writer; now for the tune. 
 George F. Root the composer, the same who wrote, “Tramp, 
 tramp, tramp, the boys are marching,” and “The Battle Cry 
 of Freedom,” used to spend his summers on a place called 
 Willow Farm, near North Reading, Massachusetts, prepar- 
 ing work for the singing classes which he used to teach in 
 winter. One summer day in 1854 he was working away at 
 this sort of work, when his mother came into the room and 
 handed him a clipping she had cut from a newspaper, say- 
 ing, “George, I think that would be good for music.” 
 
 He looked at it, and as he read it a melody sang itself 
 into his mind and he jotted it down, and went on with his 
 work. Later, when he took it up again to harmonize it, it 
 seemed so simple and commonplace that he thought at first 
 it was hardly worth spending time on. But thinking it 
 might be of use to some one, it was completed, and some 
 months later printed. He says that in later years, when he 
 knew the song was being sung in all the churches and Sun- 
 day schools, and in mission fields, he wondered why it 
 should be so. 
 
 No. 178. 
 “SQ FADES THE LOVELY BLOOMING FLOWER.” 
 
 Miss ANNE STEELE, 1717—1778. 
 
 In 1831, a young man in Salem, Massachusetts, sat down 
 to read a story by Theodore Hook, entitled, “Passion and 
 Principle.” It was a sad story and ended sadly. When 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 201 
 
 through it he laid down the book and sat thinking of what 
 he had read, and as he thought there came into his mind a 
 stanza of this hymn: 
 
 “Then gentle patience smiles on pain 
 And dying hope revives again! 
 Hope wipes the tear from sorrow’s eye 
 And faith points upward to the sky.” 
 
 And with the words there came an unbidden melody, and 
 stepping to a piano in the room, he harmonized the melody, 
 and put it upon paper and threw it into a drawer of his 
 desk. Two years after, Lowell Mason came to Salem and 
 opened a singing school. Toward the close of the course he 
 asked if any of the class had ever attempted to compose any 
 music. The tune in the desk drawer came into mind, and 
 it was gotten and handed to Dr. Mason, who liked it so 
 well that he asked leave to use it in a collection he was 
 publishing. A name had to be given it, and the composer 
 wished to use the name of his wife, Sally Cook, but all his 
 efforts failed to poetize the words, and so he took the name 
 of the street on which she lived when he wooed and married 
 her. 
 
 The Peace Jubilee held in Boston in 1872, under the direc- 
 tion of Patrick S. Gilmore, was one of the greatest musical 
 festivals ever known in this country. A grand coliseum was 
 erected for its meetings capable of holding an audience of 
 forty thousand people, and ten thousand picked singers and 
 players from the choirs and musical societies of the country 
 rendered the music. It was Gilmore’s custom to close each 
 day’s program with a hymn tune. One day during the 
 festival was named “President’s Day,” because on that day 
 General Grant, then President of the nation, honored it with 
 his presence. The tune for the day was “Federal Street.” 
 Every available spot in the building was occupied and more 
 than ten thousand people were in the orchestra and choir. 
 When the time came for the closing hymn, the leader beck- 
 
202 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 oned to an old gentleman who sat among the singers, and 
 when he came forward, he handed to him his baton, and 
 Henry K. Oliver led that enormous choir, perhaps the largest 
 that ever joined in the rendering of a musical composition, 
 in singing the piece he had composed and named for this 
 girl more than forty years before. 
 
 No. 179. 
 “TO THY TEMPLE WE REPAIR.” 
 
 James Montcomery, 1771—1854. 
 
 A Moravian minister living in a little town in Ayrshire, 
 Scotland, had a little boy whom his parents intended should 
 be a minister like his father. But he began to write poetry 
 as early as ten years of age, and showed such a love for it, 
 that the intention to make a minister of him was abandoned. 
 When sixteen he went to work in a retail store, but soon tiring 
 _ of this, he set out with only a few shillings in his pocket, 
 to try his fortune in the world. When twenty-one his wan- 
 derings brought him to Sheffield, and this was ever after his 
 home. He went to work for a printer, and later became the 
 owner and editor of a paper. He wrote and published a 
 political song which was distasteful to the party in power, 
 and was imprisoned for it. He was the friend of every good 
 enterprise; of missions, of churches, of Sunday schools, and 
 wrote hymns for them all, so that he won for himself the 
 title of “The Poet of the Sanctuary.” He never married, 
 and died while asleep. . 
 
 No. 180. 
 “LET PARTY NAMES NO MORE”—1769. 
 
 Rev. BengAMIN Beppome, 1717—1795. 
 
 The story is told that Rev. John Wesley was at one time 
 much troubled over the final disposition of the different 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 203 
 
 sects and the probability as to the future home of each. 
 While giving to this question much thought, he had a dream 
 one night in which he was carried to the gates of hell. 
 “Are there any Roman Catholics here?” asked he. Saad: 
 sir,’ was the reply. “Any Episcopalians?” “A great 
 many.” “Any Presbyterians?” “Yes.” “Any Congrega- 
 tionalists?” “Yes.” “Any Baptists?” “Yes.” “Any Meth- 
 odists?” and this he thought would be a clincher; but still 
 the reply came back as before, “Yes,” and away went the 
 
 great founder of Methodism in high dudgeon. And then his 
 : dream transferred him to the gate of heaven, and again he 
 | 
 
 
 
 put the same questions: “Are there any Roman Catholics 
 here?” “Not one,” was the reply. “Any Episcopalians?” 
 “None.” “Any Presbyterians?” “Not any.” “Any Con- 
 gregationalists?” “None.” “Any Baptists?” “No.” “Any 
 Methodists?” “None.” “Well, then,” exclaimed the great 
 Methodist, “who are they inside?” “All Christians!” came 
 out the jubilant reply. 
 
 No. 181. 
 
 “THOUGH TROUBLES ASSAIL, AND DANGERS 
 AFFRIGHT.” 
 
 Rev. Joon Newton, 1725—1807. 
 
 Written in February, 1775, and first appeared in the 
 Gospel Magazine, January, 1777. John Newton had a 
 remarkable experience. He was born in London, and min- 
 gling with idle and wicked boys, he soon became as idle and 
 bad as his companions. While a young man he became an 
 infidel in his opinions and a profligate in his conduct. He 
 became a sailor, deserted his ship, was brought home in 
 irons and publicly whipped. Then he went to the coast of 
 Africa and entered the service of a slave trader and suffered 
 great hardships, and became as wicked and depraved as a 
 human being could well become. In his epitaph written by 
 
 
 
 
 
204 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 himself he described himself as “once an infidel and liber- 
 tine and a servant of slaves.” At length he escaped and on 
 his homeward voyage he read a religious book, and the 
 thought struck him, “What if these things should be true?” 
 A review of his life followed, and he became a Christian. 
 
 No. 182. 
 “WHEN MARSHALLED ON THE NIGHTLY PLAIN” 
 
 Henry Kirke Wuite, 1785—1806. 
 
 A Mr. James Miller and a Mr. Clarke were talking of 
 Scotch melodies, and Miller expressed an ardent ambition 
 to be able to compose a Scottish air. Mr. Clarke partly by 
 way of a joke told him to keep his fingers on the black keys 
 of the instrument and preserve some sort of rhythm, and 
 what he played would be a Scottish air. Whether Miller 
 followed the directions or not I do not know, but at any 
 rate within a few days he had composed the air we know as 
 “Bonnie Doon.” 
 
 In the town of Nottingham, England, there was a little 
 boy who helped his father at his work which was that of a 
 butcher. When fourteen he was set at work at a stocking 
 loom, with the hope that he might later on get employment 
 in a hosiery store. A year later he entered a lawyer’s office, 
 to run his errands and pick up at odd moments the rudi- 
 ments of law. When a butcher’s boy, and while at the loom 
 he had not been idle, but had won at fifteen years of age a 
 silver medal and a pair of globes for a translation from 
 Horace, and at seventeen he was writing for papers and 
 magazines, and was urged to publish a volume of poems. 
 He was at first a skeptic in religion, but gradually changed 
 his views and became a Christian. He then left the lawyer’s 
 office, and began to study for the ministry. He won a high 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 205 
 
 place at Cambridge University, but his excessive study 
 ended his life, and he died at twenty-one, of consumption. 
 He wrote ten hymns. This one describes his own condition 
 as a skeptic, and his progress to Christian faith. We always 
 sing it to the tune of “Bonnie Doon.” 
 
 No. 183. 
 “ALWAYS WITH US, ALWAYS WITH US.” 
 
 Rev. Epwin Henry Nevin, 1814. 
 
 Many of our hymns have been written with no thought 
 that they would be used in the public worship of Christians, 
 and so they were written using the singular pronoun instead 
 of the plural. This is one of them, and if we should sing it 
 in this way I am not sure but it would be to each of us more 
 expressive than as it is here written. It is based on the 
 words of Christ, “Lo, I am with you alway.” (Matthew, 
 28:20) and if we look upon that sentence as addressed to 
 each one of us singly it May assume a new place as a 
 -Inessage of encouragement. Let us sing it so. 
 
 
 
 No. 184. 
 | “FATHER BY THY LOVE AND POWER”’—1936. 
 
 Pror. JosepH Ansticr, 1808—1836, 
 
 
 
 
 
 This hymn will have an added interest when we know 
 ‘that its author dictated it to his wife at the very “evening 
 hour” it describes; and that it expressed the thought of a 
 feeble, dying man. Prof. Anstice, although only twenty- 
 eight years old, had almost reached the end of life, and yet 
 he devoted nearly the whole of each day to the students 
 
 of the college in which he had been a teacher. Then when 
 
206 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 the evening hours came on, weary with the work, and suffer- 
 ing intensely from his disease, he sat down with his wife 
 and composed a hymn. In this way he wrote fifty-two 
 pieces, most of which are to be found in the hymn collec- 
 tions of today. 
 
 No. 185. 
 
 “I AM SO GLAD THAT OUR FATHER IN HEAVEN.” 
 Purr Buiss, 1838—1876. 
 
 A ragged son of a drunkard, who had been drawn into a 
 Sunday school and found Christ there, was so charmed with 
 his new love and joy that unconsciously he kept humming 
 over, “I am so glad that Jesus loves me!” 
 
 “Stop that!” roared his father; and the child stopped, but 
 soon forgot himself, and was at it again. This time he was 
 ordered to bed. But the words kept ringing in the father’s 
 ears, and in the middle of the night the boy heard, “Willie, 
 Willie, wake up and sing that again!” Half awake he 
 found that it was his father burdened with his sins, and 
 begging the child to sing and pray for him. He was soon 
 an earnest believer himself. 
 
 No. 186. 
 
 “NEARER MY GOD TO THEE.” 
 Mrs. Saran Fiower Apams, 1805—1849. 
 
 Sarah Flower Adams was a Unitarian, and it is objected 
 by some to this hymn that no mention is made in it of 
 Christ, and that the cross of which it sings 1s her own cross, 
 and this is in keeping with the last stanza in which it is her 
 own woes that are to lift her nearer to God; and to remedy 
 this alleged defect in the hymn, Rev. Arthur Tozer Russell, 
 a clergyman of the Church of England, has written another 
 stanza as follows: 
 

 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 207 
 
 “Christ alone beareth me, 
 Where Thov dost shine: 
 Joint-heir He maketh me 
 Of the Divine: 
 In Christ my soul shall be 
 Nearer, my God, to Thee 
 Nearer to Thee.” 
 
 Still the hymn as originally written finds a response in 
 Christian hearts and is accepted, while the added stanza is 
 usually rejected as not in keeping with the other verses and 
 not needed to complete the writer’s thought. 
 
 No. 187. 
 “WITH TEARFUL EYES I LOOK AROUND.” 
 
 Miss CHARLOTTE ELLiotT, 1789—1871. 
 
 One needs but to be reminded of it, to notice how closely 
 this hymn and the more celebrated hymn by the same 
 author beginning, “Just as I am, without one plea,” are 
 related to each other. In this one, each stanza ends with an 
 invitation from Christ, “Come to Me!” while in that, each 
 stanza ends with the response, “O Lamb of God, I come! 
 I come!” As the hymns are both of the same meter, they 
 can be sung antiphonally: 
 
 “With tearful eyes I look around. 
 Just as I am, without one plea.” 
 
 “Tt tells me of a place of rest. 
 Just as I am, though tossed about.” 
 
 “When against sin I strive in vain. 
 Just as I am and waiting not.” 
 
208 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “When nature shudders, loath to part. 
 Just as I am, poor, wretched, blind.” 
 
 “Come, for all else must fail and die. 
 Just as I am—Thy love unknown.” 
 
 No. 188 
 “JUST AS I AM, WITHOUT ONE PLEA.” 
 
 Miss CuHarLoTTE ELLIOTT, 1789—1871. 
 
 A minister (Dr. Cesar Malan) was once visiting (1822) 
 at the house of a friend in Brighton, England. One evening 
 he said to the daughter: of his host, “I wish you were a 
 Christian woman.” She resented his speaking to her on this 
 subject, and it was dropped; but what he had said, dis- 
 turbed her, until she at last returned to him, and referring 
 to what he had said before, said she would like to be a 
 Christian, but she didn’t know how. He talked with her a 
 little and at last said, “You must give yourself to God just 
 as you are.” j 
 
 “What! just as lam? You surely don’t mean that God 
 will accept me just as I am?” 
 
 “T mean just that,” was the reply. 
 
 Nothing more was said then and soon the visitor left for 
 his home in Switzerland. She became a Christian, and to | 
 describe how it was done she wrote a hymn, “Just as I am.” 
 
 A counterpart or reply to this hymn was written by Rev. 
 Russell Sturges Cook and sent by him to Miss Elliott. It 
 was published in the American Messenger, March, 1850. 
 The relation between the reply and the hymn is made all 
 the closer from the fact that the wife of Mr. Cook was the 
 daughter of Rev. Cesar Malan. It begins, “Just as thou 
 art, without one trace.” Miss Elhott herself also wrote a 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 209 
 
 hymn which bears the relation to this hymn of invitation to 
 acceptance. The hymn begins, “With tearful eyes I look 
 around”: and each stanza ends with the invitation, “Come 
 to Me!” (See No. 187.) 
 
 No. 189. 
 “JESUS, THY BLOOD AND RIGHTEOUSNESS.” 
 
 For authorship see No. 63. 
 
 Sunday schools on the continent of Europe have been 
 known but comparatively a few years. The first German 
 Sunday-school superintendent died in 1865, at Carlsruhe. 
 At his funeral the first four lines of this hymn were read, 
 as containing the creed of the man who had gone. In these 
 later days, when the creeds of the churches are the subject 
 of so much debate, private Christians can, I think, feel safe 
 if they can adopt as their own the simple creed of this 
 German Sunday-school superintendent. 
 
 No. 190. 
 “HOW HAPPY IS THE PILGRIM’S LOT.” 
 
 Rev. JoHN Wes.ey, 1703—1791. 
 
 In the western part of England, many years ago, there 
 lived a fellow not much more than half witted, whom 
 everyone called “Foolish Dick.” One morning Dick was 
 on his way to a well for water, when an old Christian man 
 who was leaning over his garden gate accosted him, “So 
 you are going to the well for water, Dick?” 
 
 “Yes, sir!” 
 
 “Well, Dick, the woman of Samaria found Jesus Christ 
 at the well.” 
 
 “Did she, sir?” 
 
210 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “Yes, Dick!” 
 
 Dick passed on his way; but a new thought had entered 
 his dull mind and thrilled it with new life; and when he 
 came to the well he said to himself, “Why shouldn’t I find 
 Jesus at the well? Oh, that I could find Him!” Such a 
 prayer never goes unanswered, and when Dick left the well 
 his heart was as full as his pitcher, for he had found the 
 Lord. From that time on he gave up all other occupation 
 and spent all his time in telling to neighbors and friends 
 the story of his conversion. His mind developed, and from 
 talking to a few he came to preaching to the many. His 
 memory showed a wonderful power, for a chapter in the 
 Bible or a hymn once repeated in his hearing was his forever 
 after, and he could quote from it at will. He went about 
 the country as an itinerant evangelist, without money or 
 means of support, but he always found shelter and food 
 and clothing. He not only preached, but he sang, and this 
 hymn was his favorite song. And when he sat by the fire- 
 side of some humble home where he had been received for 
 the night, he would sit and wave to and fro, and sing: 
 
 “No foot of land do I possess, 
 No cottage in this wilderness, 
 A poor wayfaring man, 
 
 I lodge awhile in tents below, 
 Or gladly wander to and fro, 
 Till I my Canaan gain.” 
 
 No. 191. 
 “COME ALL YE CHOSEN SAINTS OF GOD”—1757. 
 
 Rev. JosepH Harr, 1712—1768. 
 
 Of this hymn the author says, “The week before Easter, 
 1757, I had such an amazing view of the agony of Christ 
 in the garden as I know not how well to describe. I was 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 211 
 
 lost in wonder and adoration, and the impression was too 
 deep, I believe, ever to be obliterated. I shall say no more 
 of this, but only remark that, notwithstanding all that is 
 talked about the sufferings of Jesus, none can know any- 
 thing of them but by the Holy Ghost: and I believe that he 
 that knows most knows but very little. It was then I made 
 the first part of my hymn on the Passion: 
 
 “Come all ye chosen saints of God.” 
 
 No. 192. 
 “COME, YE SINNERS, POOR AND WRETCHED.” 
 
 Rev. JosepH Hart, 1712—1768. 
 
 About the year 1775, a young girl by the name of Abigail 
 Binnell lived in the village of Shawbury, England. Her 
 parents were strongly opposed to evangelical religion, but 
 on one occasion she overheard some of the children of the 
 village singing the hymn commencing: 
 
 “Come, ye sinners poor and wretched, 
 
 Weak and wounded, sick and sore: 
 Jesus ready stands to save you, 
 
 Filled with pity, love and power.’ 
 
 By the Holy Spirit these words were applied to the young 
 girl’s soul as a call to a new and spiritual life. Her memory 
 caught hold of them, and her mind was awakened to their 
 import, and following the light they gave her, she became a 
 follower of Christ. At home she was persecuted, and for a 
 time even driven from her father’s house. She was after- 
 ward, however, earnestly invited to return, and later be- 
 came the wife of Rev. Thomas Harris, a well known Meth- 
 odist preacher. 
 
212 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 193. 
 “COME, HOLY SPIRIT, COME! LET THY——” 
 
 Rev. JosepH Hart, 1712—1768. 
 
 The author of this hymn had a somewhat remarkable 
 experience. He was the son of Christian parents, and well 
 educated. Shortly after his conversion he fell into the 
 delusion that he now had perfect liberty to do anything he 
 wanted to. Nothing that he could do would be sin. This 
 period in his life he himself describes very graphically: 
 “In this abominable state I continued a loose backslider, 
 an audacious apostate, a boldfaced rebel, for nine or ten 
 years, not only sinning myself, but infecting others with 
 the poison of my delusions.” But then came a change in 
 his life and he became an earnest Christian, a faithful 
 preacher, and a good hymn writer. 
 
 No. 194. 
 “GRANDER THAN OCEAN’S STORY.” 
 
 W. F. Suerwin, 1826. 
 
 Written during a vacation rest on one of the beaches 
 near New York City, while the author was lying under the 
 shade of a tree watching the ocean. 
 
 No. 195. 
 “LORD WHEN WE BEND BEFORE THY THRONE.” 
 
 Rev. Joun Dacre Cariyis, 1759—1804. 
 
 The inspiration for this hymn was found in Asia. In 
 1799, the author, Rev. John Dacre Carlyle, accompanied 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 213 
 
 the English ambassador to Turkey, the object of his visit 
 being to see what literary treasures there might be in the 
 public library of Constantinople. He extended his journey 
 into Asia Minor. What he saw in his travels inspired his 
 muse, and on his return he published a small book of 
 “Poems Suggested Chiefly by Scenes in Asia Minor,” ete. 
 (1805.) This hymn is contained in that book. 
 
 No. 196. 
 “SAVIOR BREATHE AN EVENING BLESSING.” 
 
 JAMES EpMESTON, 1791—1867. 
 
 It is to me a constant source of wonder how trivial 
 things lead to important results. The author of this hymn 
 was a surveyor and architect. One day he was reading a 
 book of travels in Abyssinia, and came to a description 
 of the pitching of the travelers’ tent in the evening after 
 the march of the day was over, and in it occurred these 
 words: “At night their short evening hymn, ‘Jesus forgive 
 us,’ stole through the camp.” And so the thought af an 
 evening hymn which should be a prayer alike for pardon 
 and protection came into his mind, and he amplified it into 
 this hymn, which has become one of our most popular and 
 valued evening hymns. 
 
 No. 197. 
 “1 LOVE THY KINGDOM, LORD.” 
 
 Rev. Trmoruy Dwicut, 1752—1817. 
 
 Here is a beautiful hymn by a busy man. He had made 
 headway enough in his studies to enter Yale at fourteen 
 years of age, and from that right on he was hard at work 
 
214 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 at his books at early morning hours, and by light of a 
 candle late at night. He soon injured his eyes, so that 
 they troubled him all his life, and for years he could only 
 use them a few minutes at a time in any writing or read- 
 ing; but he went right on as if nothing had happened; 
 became a chaplain in the army, wrote patriotic songs and 
 religious hymns, was elected President of Yale College, and 
 pushed its work with such vigor that it advanced in pros- 
 perity more rapidly than ever before; wrote works of 
 theology and volumes of sermons; and in his devotion and 
 zeal and untiring activity in all church affairs fully exem- 
 plified the words of this hymn. 
 
 No. 198. 
 “COME GRACIOUS SPIRIT, HEAVENLY DOVE.” 
 Rev. Simon Browne, 1680—1732. 
 
 Simon Browne began to preach before he was twenty 
 years of age. When about forty years old, he was attacked 
 by a highway-robber, and in the struggle which ensued 
 Browne killed the robber. ,This event caused him great 
 distress of mind and brought on a curious hallucination. 
 He believed that God had annihilated in him the thinking 
 substance and divested him of all consciousness, that he 
 really had no soul. And yet, while in this condition he 
 did some of the best work of his life. He was the author 
 of a dictionary of the English language and wrote a 
 commentary on First Corinthians which was a continua- 
 tion of the work left unfinished by Matthew Henry when 
 he died; and all this while he stoutly maintained that he 
 had no power to think. One of his contemporaries, how- 
 ever, said of him that instead of having no soul, he wrote 
 and acted as if he had two. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 215 
 
 No. 199. 
 “BLEST BE THE TIE THAT BINDS.” 
 Rev. Jon Fawcert, 1739—1817. 
 
 John Fawcett was settled as pastor of a Baptist church 
 | at Wainsgate, England, in 1765, and after seven years of 
 labor there was invited to the pastorate of a prosperous 
 church in London and decided to accept the call. His 
 farewell sermon had been preached, his household goods 
 stood upon wagons at the door, and his people gathered 
 about to bid him farewell, mingling with their parting 
 words entreaties to remain. At last, as the story goes, 
 the minister and his wife sat down and wept, and Mrs. 
 Fawcett said, “O John, John, I cannot bear this! I know 
 not how to go!” 
 
 “Nor I either,” replied he, “nor will we go. Unload the 
 wagons and put everything in the place where it was before.” 
 A letter was sent to London explaining the circumstances, 
 Dr. Fawcett settled down to work again on his salary of 
 less than two hundred dollars a year, and this hymn com- 
 memorates *the event. 
 
 a) 
 Ps 
 
 No. 200. 
 “AWAKE AND SING THE SONG.” 
 Witu1AM Hammonp, 1719—1783. 
 
 We who think three or four stanzas of a hymn quite 
 enough to sing in our religious services, would not have 
 enjoyed the practice of Christians of a century or two 
 ago, I fear. Here is a hymn which, as its author wrote 
 it, contained fourteen stanzas, and its title was, “Before 
 Singing of Hymns, by way of Introduction:” and we may 
 imagine perhaps how much time they devoted to the 
 “Singing of Hymns,” if they sang fourteen stanzas “by 
 way of Introduction.” . 
 
216 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 201. 
 “JESUS MY ALL TO HEAVEN IS GONE.” 
 
 Rev. Joun Cennick, 1717—1755. 
 
 A gay boy, who attended dances and theatres, while 
 walking along Cheapside, London, was convicted of sin. He 
 became greatly depressed and reformed so far as to give 
 up his gay practices; but he turned downward instead of 
 upward—skeptical and weary of life, and prayed for death. 
 He tried austerity and says, “I even ate acorns, leaves of 
 trees, crabs, and grass, and wished often heartily that I 
 could bring myself to live only upon roots and_ herbs.” 
 One day while thus trying to earn salvation for himself, 
 he came upon the words, “I am thy Salvation.” The words 
 came to him like a revelation and led to his accepting 
 Christ as his Savior. Soon after he began telling his expe- 
 rience to others, and soon took up the regular work of 
 a minister of the gospel. This experience of seeking to 
 climb up some other way, and then of accepting Jesus as 
 “the way, the truth and the life,” and then ofg telling to 
 all around what a dear Savior he had found,” he com- 
 memorates in this hymn. 
 
 No. 202. 
 
 “WHEN HE COMETH, WHEN HE COMETH.” 
 Grorce F. Roor, 1820. 
 
 “WHAT A FRIEND WE HAVE IN JESUS.” 
 Rev. Horatius Bonar, 1808. 
 
 A minister in the steerage of an English steamer asked, 
 “What shall we sing? It must be something that we all 
 know, and there are people here from nearly every country 
 in Europe.” 
 

 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 217 
 
 “Then it will have to be an American hymn-tune,” 
 said the master of the steerage. “Try ‘His Jewels,’ ” 
 
 So they started up, “When He cometh, when He cometh 
 to make up His jewels.” It was written by George F. - 
 Root, the same who wrote “The Battle Cry of Freedom,” 
 “Tramp, Tramp, Tramp, the Boys are Marching,” “Rosalie 
 the Prairie Flower,” ete. 
 
 “What next?” said the minister. 
 
 “What a friend we have in Jesus,” was the answer; and 
 people speaking three or four languages joined in singing 
 this song, the tune also written by an American, Mr. C. C. 
 Converse. The words are by Horatius Bonar, of Scotland. 
 It was the tune that had given to the words a language 
 that all could sing. 
 
 No. 208. 
 
 “THE LORD’S MY SHEPHERD, I’LL NOT WANT.” 
 
 Francis Rouse. 
 
 @ -- 
 
 This piece, out of the old “Rouse’s Version,” well illus- 
 
 _ trates the power of early impressions. A child only three 
 
 years old used to be put to bed with his grandfather, and 
 
 _ never until he died forgot the fervor with which he prayed, 
 
 nor the feeling with which he used to repeat this para- 
 
 phrase of the Twenty-third Psalm; and he particularly 
 
 remembered the last stanza: 
 
 “Goodness and mercy all my life 
 Shall surely follow me; 
 
 And in God’s house for evermore 
 My dwelling-place shall be.” 
 
 This is the testimony of Dr. John Wilson, who for fifty 
 years was a philanthropist and scholar residing in the East. 
 
218 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 204. 
 “TIME IS WINGING US AWAY”—1812. 
 
 Joun Burton, 1773—1822. 
 
 John Burton was a Baptist Sunday school teacher in 
 Nottingham, England, and was ereatly interested in the 
 general welfare of Sunday schools. He wrote many hymns 
 for their use, and compiled a hymn book for the same 
 purpose. When about thirty years of age, he prepared 
 a eareful plan for checking disorder in Sunday schools, 
 which suggests a possible difference between the Sunday 
 schools of that day and of this; and another difference 
 between the work done in Sunday schools then and now 
 is suggested by the fact that he prepared a Sunday school 
 spelling-book which had a very large sale. This is one 
 of his hymns written for Sunday schools. 
 
 No. 205. 
 “TEAVE GOD TO ORDER ALL THY WAYS.” _ 
 
 Grorc NeuMARK, 1621—1681. 
 
 In the year 1641, a young man of twenty years was 
 traveling with a party of merchants from Leipzig to 
 Lubeck. He was trying to work his way to a German 
 University where he hoped to be able to study. After 
 passing through the town of Magdeburg, the party was 
 plundered by a band of highway robbers who took every- 
 thing the young man had except his prayer book and a 
 little money that he had sewed up in his clothes. He went 
 back to Magdeburg but could get no employment there; 
 then to Luneburg and could get nothing there; and so 
 from town to town hunting for work and finding none, 
 until in the middle of winter he reached the town of 
 

 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 219 
 
 Keil and fell in with one of the pastors of that town who 
 befriended him; but still day after day passed on, and he 
 could get no work, and he was living on the kindness of 
 his new-found friend; but after nearly a month of this, 
 a tutor in the family of a judge in the city fell suddenly 
 into disgrace and ran away, and by the help of the minister 
 _ the young man secured the position, “which good fortune” 
 as he himself wrote concerning it, “coming suddenly and 
 as if fallen from heaven, greatly rejoiced me, and on that 
 _ very day I composed to the honor of my beloved Lord, this 
 _ here and there well-known hymn, and had certainly cause 
 enough to thank the Divine compassion for such unlooked- 
 for grace shown me.” 
 
 No. 206. 
 “COME, SAVIOR, JESUS, FROM ABOVE.” 
 MapaME ANTOINETTE BouriGNnon, 1616—1680. 
 
 Tr. by Rev. John Wesley or J. Byrom. 
 
 The author of this hymn was a French woman. Her 
 father had urged her to accept in marriage some one of 
 the many suitors who had offered themselves; but she 
 refused, and to escape her father’s anger she left her home 
 —a wanderer, and wrote this hymn, expressive of her 
 determination to live for Christ. There are many allusions 
 in it to the circumstances that called it forth. 
 
 No. 207. 
 “FROM ALL THAT DWELL BELOW THE SKIES.” 
 
 Rey. Isaac Watts, 1674—1748. 
 
 By decree of the British Government, the slaves of the 
 West India Islands were emancipated on the first of August, 
 
220 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 1834. Many predicted that the emancipation would be 
 attended with pillage and blood; but these predictions 
 were not verified, as no law was broken, no violence or 
 insult offered to any one. “On the evening of the thirty- 
 first- of July” the negroes crowded into the chapels and 
 remained there, engaged in exercises of devotion, until the 
 day of their freedom dawned. 
 
 “T waited last night,” wrote Mr. William Wedlock, a 
 Methodist. missionary, “for the clock to strike twelve, with 
 deep emotion. Peace prevails throughout the whole of these 
 western parishes, and, I believe, throughout the island. Joy 
 is depicted on every countenance. I preached three times 
 today to free persons. This is the first time a preacher 
 could, with entire freedom, explain the fourth commandment 
 to them. Thousands who have been prevented for years 
 from keeping the Sabbath have now an opportunity of 
 doing so.” 
 
 A few days after, he wrote: “Could the friends of free- 
 dom at home have seen the thousands of clean, well-dressed, 
 and well-behaved Negroes who poured into the town, they 
 would have heartily rejoiced. Our large chapel was literally 
 crammed, and many stood in the yard exposed to the rays 
 of a scorching sun; so anxious were the newly liberated 
 people to express their thankfulness to God for the great 
 deliverance He has wrought. On Friday afternoon I 
 preached from I Samuel 12:22; afterward I read to them 
 the Governor’s excellent letter of advice; then I announced 
 the noble intention of the Bible Society to present every 
 freed Negro with a Testament. Upon every face a smile 
 gleamed, and tears of joy trickled down not a few swarthy 
 cheeks. The multitude then arose in a mass, and shouted, 
 rather than sang: 
 
 “ternal are Thy mercies, Lord; 
 Eternal truth attends Thy word; 
 Thy praise shall sound from shore to shore, 
 Till suns shall rise and set no more.’ ”’ 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 221 
 
 Thus peacefully and delightfully did the memorable first 
 of August pass away at Montego Bay and throughout the 
 West Indies. 
 
 Wesleyan Methodist Magazine, October, 1867. 
 
 No. 208. 
 “LORD IN THE MORNING THOU SHALT HEAR.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Warts, 1674—1748. 
 
 Our Service of Song owes a double debt to Isaac Waits. 
 He was the first to overcome by the beauty and the grace 
 of his poetic hymns the authority of the Established Church 
 and the prejudice of the people against the use of anything 
 but paraphrases of the Psalms in the public service of 
 the Church; and he was also the first to render these same 
 Psalms in language adapted to the Christian era. He 
 himself explains that it is his view that the Psalms “ought 
 to be translated in such manner as we have reason to 
 believe David would have composed them if he had lived 
 in our day.” Comparing this new plan with the literal 
 paraphrases of those who had worked before him he says, 
 “What need is there that I should wrap up the shining 
 honors of my Redeemer in the dark and shadowy language 
 of a religion that is now forever abolished.” So this hymn, 
 which is his imitation of the Fifth Psalm, makes direct 
 reference to Christ. 
 
 No. 209. 
 “BEHOLD THE GLORIES OF THE LAMB.” 
 
 Rey. Isaac Watts, 1674—1748. 
 
 When about twenty years old Watts, who had been study- 
 ing in London, returned to his father’s house at Southamp- 
 
222 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 ton to continue his studies there. He attended church 
 with his parents and complained to his father of the poor 
 quality of the hymns they used. His father was a deacon 
 of the church, a man of taste himself, and knew something 
 of young Isaac’s poetic skill, for he had tried and failed to 
 whip it out of him when a child. So the father suggested 
 that he try his hand at making better ones. Before the 
 next Sunday this hymn was written ready for their use; 
 and go was begun the hymn writing of the man who has for 
 now almost two hundred years stood at the head of the 
 Poets of the Church. This is the tradition as to the origin 
 of this hymn, and the language of the first stanza supports 
 it. 
 
 No. 210. 
 
 “WHY SHOULD THE CHILDREN OF A KING?” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Watts, 1674—1748. 
 
 Over a hundred years ago, on one of Mr. Wesley’s visits — 
 to Chesterfield, he had commenced an out-door service in — 
 the market place. During the first prayer the constable came 
 and demanded his presence before a magistrate. The prayer 
 ended, the man of authority marched off with the preacher; 
 but before doing so the man of prayer showed his faith by 
 saying to his hearers, “Friends, sing a hymn while I am ~ 
 gone. I shall soon be back;” and he gave out the couplet: : 
 
 “Why should the children of a King 
 Go mourning all their days?” 
 
 Mr. Wesley returned, and preached, before the hymn had 
 been sung through a second time. 
 
 (See No. 34.) This hymn was written to be sung at the 
 close of a sermon from Romans 8:14-16, and Ephesians 
 1:13-14. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 223 
 
 No. 211. 
 “COME WE WHO LOVE THE LORD.” 
 Rev. Isaac Warts, 1674—1748. 
 
 As written by Watts this hymn contains ten stanzas and 
 two of the ones usually admitted in recent collections have 
 some incidents connected with them. They are as follows: 
 
 “The God that rules on high 
 And thunders when He please, 
 That rides upon the stormy sky 
 And manages the seas: 
 
 “This awful God is ours; 
 Our Father and our love. 
 
 He will send down His heavenly powers 
 To carry us above.” 
 
 In 1831, a Mr. James Martin, of Liverpool, was a passenger 
 on board the ship Rothsay Castle when she was wrecked 
 between Liverpool and Beaumavis, and most of the passen- 
 gers were lost. He, with a few others, caught a plank and 
 floated with it, until one after another he saw the others 
 swept away by the dashing waves. He was a Christian 
 man, and there alone amid the roaring seas, he thought of 
 this hymn and repeated these stanzas. He was afterward 
 rescued, and little wonder that he renewed his vows to con- 
 secrate to the service of God the life that God had saved. 
 
 No. 212. 
 “DIVINE AND MORAL SONGS.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Warts, 1674—1748. 
 
 When Dr. Watts was nearly forty years old, he was so 
 often sick as to be practically an invalid, and a gentleman 
 
224 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 who knew him well, after one of his attacks, invited him 
 to his home to recuperate. Of this invitation Watts after- 
 ward said, “This day thirty years I came hither to the 
 house of my good friend, Sir Thomas Abney, intending to 
 spend but one single week under his friendly roof, and I 
 have extended my visit to the length of exactly thirty years.” 
 He stayed six years after that and then died. While on 
 this visit, the friend at whose house he was staying sug- 
 gested to him that he write some hymns for children, and 
 this led him to the preparing of one of the most remarkable 
 books which at that time had ever been published: “Divine 
 and Moral Songs for the use of Children.” (1715.) Millions 
 upon millions of copies of this little book have been sold 
 both in England and America, and it has been translated 
 into many other languages. It contained that good old 
 cradle song with which many even of us were sung to 
 sleep by mothers who now sing in heaven: 
 
 “Hush, my dear, lie still and slumber, 
 Holy angels guard thy bed.” 
 
 and it contained that wonderful apostrophe to industry: 
 
 “How doth the little busy bee 
 Improve each shining hour, 
 
 And gather honey all the day 
 From every shining flower.” 
 
 and that equally wonderful exhortation to good behavior: 
 
 “Let dogs delight to bark and bite 
 For God hath made them so; 
 Let bears and lions growl and fight 
 For ’tis their nature to. 
 
 “But children you should never let 
 7 day = Py AS 
 Your angry passions rise; 
 Your little hands were never made 
 To tear each others’ eyes.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 225 
 
 And it contained besides some beautiful hymns that have 
 outlived a great many later born ones, and are still found 
 in our hymnals. The following hymns are some of these: 
 
 “Great God, to Thee my voice I raise.” 
 “Blest be the wisdom and the power.” 
 “Great God, with wonder and with praise.” 
 “Happy the child whose tender years.” 
 “When we devote our youth to God.” 
 “Youth when devoted to the Lord.” 
 
 “How glorious is our heavenly King.” 
 
 “Let love through all your actions run.” 
 “Lord how delightful ’tis to see.” 
 
 “O, write upon my memory Lord.” 
 
 “Lord, I aseribe it to Thy grace.” 
 
 “My God Who makes the sun to know.” 
 “O ’tis a lovely thing for youth.” 
 
 “Our tongues were made to bless the Lord.” 
 “The praises of my tongue.” 
 
 “There is a God Who reigns above.” 
 
 “This is the day when Christ arose.” 
 
 “We sing the almighty power of God.” 
 “What blest examples do I find.” 
 
 No. 218. 
 “JESUS, MY STRENGTH, MY HOPE’—1742. 
 Rev. Cartes Wesiey, 1708—1788. 
 
 There are seven stanzas in the original hymn as Wesley 
 wrote it, and the last five of them begin with the words, © 
 “T want.” The last stanza is never used because of its 
 last four lines, which are, to say the least, peculiar. They 
 read as follows: 
 
226 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “T want, I know not what! 
 I want, my wants to see; 
 I want, alas! what want I not, 
 When Thou art not in me.” 
 
 No. 214. 
 “SEE HOW GREAT A FLAME ASPIRES.” 
 
 Rev. CHARLES WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 “The colliers at Newcastle thronged to hear Charles 
 Wesley, felt the power of truth and were converted. Upon 
 one occasion, when he was preaching there, nine or ten 
 thousand attentive people listened to his word. He became 
 himself so earnest that he preached two hours. ‘Many years 
 of suffering,’ he said, “were compensated by that one service.’ 
 The country was lighted up with blazing fires, which gleamed 
 on the faces of the preacher and people from every quarter. 
 This gave rise to this exquisite hymn which alludes to the 
 rapid spread of religion from small beginnings by means of 
 revival.” 
 
 No. 218. 
 “Q JOYFUL SOUND OF GOSPEL GRACE!” 
 
 Rev. Cuartes Westey, 1708—1788. 
 
 In a letter by Rev. Richard Reece on the subject of his 
 late visit to America, published in the Wesleyan Methodist 
 Magazine for January, 1825, occurs the following: “It is 
 customary in New York and elsewhere, immediately after 
 the sermon, while the stewards are making the usual col- 
 lection, for the choir to sing a few verses. The last time 
 1 preached in that city, I was much charmed and affected. 
 My subject had been the glorious privilege of true believers 
 

 
 
 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 227 
 
 to have Christ living in them by His Spirit. A spirit of 
 prayer was poured upon the congregation, and a special influ- 
 ence of God accompanied the word of His grace, and much 
 affected us all. At this moment the singers, joined by most 
 of the people, in sounds as much resembling the melody 
 of heaven as I expect to hear on earth, began: 
 
 ‘O ioyful sound of Gospel grace, 
 Christ shall in me appear; 
 
 I, even I, shall see His Face, 
 I shall be holy here.’ 
 
 The impression made, I shall never forget. The words so 
 well chosen, so aptly turned, so accordant with the feelings 
 of the congregation: the voices, male and female, so melo- 
 dious and yet so impassioned: and the tune so soft and 
 devotional that the blessing of perfect love seemed to be 
 within the reach, or rather in the possession of every wor- 
 shipper. Seasons like these ought to be recorded. They 
 are to me times of refreshing from the presence of the 
 Lord. If our singers were everywhere pious and had judg- 
 ment to adapt the words to the subject and to the state of 
 feeling in the congregation, such a custom would greatly 
 heighten the effect produced by the sermon.” 
 
 No. 216. 
 “ARM OF THE LORD, AWAKE, AWAKE!” 
 Rev. CHartes WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 The first chapel built by the Methodists was at Bristol, 
 the first stone being laid on May 12, 1739, and the first 
 meeting being held in it June 3, only three weeks later. 
 
 John Wesley was present and expounded) the passage, 
 “Marvel not if the world hate you:” and they sang: 
 
228 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “Arm of the Lord, awake, awake! 
 Thine own immortal strength put on.” 
 
 “And God,’ Mr. Wesley wrote, “even our own God, gave 
 us His blessing.” 
 
 No. 217. 
 “JESUS, LOVER OF MY SOUL.” 
 
 Rev. CHARLES WESLEY, 17 08—1788. 
 
 A big Philadelphia policeman noticed a little boy crying 
 piteously on the streets one day just after noon, and rightly 
 surmised that the child was lost. 
 
 “Hello, Johnny, what’s the matter?” he asked, kindly. 
 
 The boy looked scared to death at the sight of the big 
 policeman but managed to sob out, “I want my mamma!” 
 
 The queer little waif was taken to the Nineteenth District 
 Police Station. He was well dressed, wore a smart cap, 
 and looked unusually intelligent. A volley of questions 
 could not extract from him where he lived, and all he cared 
 to say was, “My name is Joseph Edwards Reason, and I 
 am five years old.” 
 
 He had a clear voice and spoke with unusual distinct- 
 ness. In a few minutes he had forgotten his troubles and 
 was making friends with the station-house cat. Then he 
 walked up to a big sergeant and said, “I can sing. Can 
 you?” 
 
 The sergeant was so astonished at his little questioner 
 that he only stared in reply, but none of the officers laughed. 
 They were too astonished. 
 
 “T ean sing you one of my Sunday-school songs,” said 
 the small boy. Then without waiting for an invitation, his 
 clear voice, full of sweetness, rang out the words of 
 
 “Jesus, Lover of my soul.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 229 
 
 The effect was startling, and every one listened respect- 
 fully. Men off duty came tiptoeing down stairs, and soon 
 the little singer had a group of officers about him. Lumps 
 came up in their throats, pipes were laid down, and eyes 
 became suspiciously moist. 
 
 The prisoners who were waiting for the patrol wagon to 
 take them to jail stopped their wrangling and listened. 
 
 The little warbler could do nothing but sing; and, to 
 provide him with an all-night lodging, he was taken to 
 the Central Police Station. His eyes danced as he saw 
 the brilliantly lighted apartment, and he let go the patrol 
 sergeant’s hand cautiously to inspect the cells. In the first 
 cell was a surly-looking man who was awaiting a hearing 
 before Magistrate Clement for burglary. In the other cells 
 - were two “hard” characters. 
 
 “Hello, sonny! What are ye in fur?” said one of the 
 prisoners, making a desperate attempt at a joke. 
 
 The boy looked curiously at the uninviting face through 
 the iron bars, and said, “Mister, I can sing.” 
 
 The burglar drew back abashed. Then the boy sang. 
 His voice swelled like a bird’s, and the big reserves who 
 
 were waiting for the magistrate were spellbound. 
 
 To the astonishment of everybody, the prisoners joined; 
 and the burglar supplied the harmony with his deep basso. 
 Then the boy sang other hymns, and at last ran and gave 
 the prisoners a drink of water at their request. As the 
 prisoners walked to face the magistrate, the little singer 
 went to sleep like a tired wanderer. 
 
 Golden Days. 
 
 No. 218. 
 “EQUIP ME FOR THE WAR”—1741. 
 Rey. Cuartes Wester, 1708—1788. 
 
 One of his “Hymns on God’s Everlasting Love.” For 
 the circumstances that occasioned these hymns see No. 38. 
 
 >. 
 
230 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 The intense aversion felt. by Mr. Wesley for the Calvinistic 
 doctrines, as well as the methods used by him and his 
 opponents as well, in the theological contests of the times, 
 are well illustrated in some stanzas of this hymn which are 
 quite properly omitted in our collections. Here is one of 
 them: 
 “Increase, (if that can be) 
 The perfect hate I feel 
 To Satan’s horrible decree, 
 That genuine child of hell: 
 Which feigns Thee to pass by 
 The most of Adam’s race 
 And leave them in their blood to die, 
 Shut out from saving grace.” 
 
 No. 219. 
 “YE SIMPLE SOULS THATS Si RAY: 
 Rev. CHARLES WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 John Wesley was never more calm and fearless than im 
 the hour of danger. He was preaching at a certain time 
 when the mob, maddened with fury, tore up the floor, while 
 others on the outside pulled out the windows and doors of 
 the house. Mr. Wesley walked out, looked them full in 
 the face, and fixed his piercing eye upon them, when the 
 mass of the people parted asunder, so that a broad way 
 was made for him, and he passed through his enemies un- 
 harmed. Then he wrote the hymn commencing: 
 
 “Ye simple souls that stray.” 
 
 and containing the stanza: 
 “Angels our servants are, 
 And keep us in our Ways; 
 And in their watchful hands they bear 
 The sacred sons of grace.” 
 
 “Anecdotes of Wesley,” page 134. 
 
 
 

 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 231 
 No. 220. 
 “COME, O THOU ALL VICTORIOUS LORD”—1746. 
 
 Rev. Cartes WesLey, 1708—1788. 
 
 At Portland, in Dorsetshire, England, are extensive quar- 
 ries of stone, from which large quantities have been taken 
 for many years for building purposes. St. Paul’s Cathedral 
 at London is built of stone from Portland. Many laboring 
 men find employment here, and as the place is isolated, they 
 are uncultured and rough, and often degraded. Just such 
 communities as this Charles Wesley loved to seek, and so 
 it is not strange that late one night—it was the fourth of 
 June, 1748—after a weary journey he and his horse drew 
 up at a house in Portland. Two days later he preached as 
 he records it, “to a housefull of staring, loving people. Some 
 wept, but most looked quite unawakened. At noon and 
 night I preached on a hill in the midst of the Island. Most 
 of the inhabitants came to hear, but few as yet feel the 
 burden of sin or the want of a Savior.” That was on 
 Friday, and on Sunday he preached again, and as he writes 
 it, “after evening service we had all the islanders that were 
 able to come. I asked, ‘Is it nothing to you, all ye that 
 pass by?’ About half a dozen answered, ‘It is nothing to 
 us!’ by turning their backs, but the rest hearkened with 
 greater signs of emotion than I had before observed.” And 
 then he made his prayer to God, amid the quarries and the 
 stony hearted quarrymen, with the din of their hammers 
 in his ears: 
 
 “Come, O Thou all victorious Lord, 
 Thy power to us make known! 
 Strike with the hammer of Thy Word 
 And break these hearts of stone!” 
 
 And the Lord answered that prayer and made known His 
 power; for the next day Wesley wrote again: “Now the 
 
232 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 power and blessing came; my mouth and their hearts were 
 opened. The rocks were broken in pieces and melted into 
 tears on every side.” 
 
 No. 221. 
 “ALL THANKS BE TO GOD.” 
 
 Rev. CHARLES WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 On one of his wandering trips in search of people needing 
 the Gospel, Charles Wesley found his way into Cornwall 
 in the south-western part of England, among the tin mines. 
 He was somewhat uproariously received by the roughs of 
 the neighborhood who serenaded him with the couplet: . 
 
 “Charles Wesley is come to town 
 To try to pull the churches down.” 
 
 There is in this place a very curious pit, resembling not a 
 little an old Roman circus, with circular seats or terraces 
 rising all around it one above the other. This was an audi- 
 ence room quite to the liking of Mr. Wesley, and here he 
 began to preach. He wrote of it that “On Sunday the tenth 
 of August, 1746, at Gwennap, nine or ten thousand by com- 
 putation listened with all eagerness, while I commended 
 them to God and to the word of His Grace. For near two 
 hours I was enabled to preach repentance toward God 
 and faith in Jesus Christ. I broke out again and again in 
 prayer and exhortation. I believed not one word would 
 return empty. Seventy years sufferings were overpaid by 
 one such opportunity. 1 expressed the gratitude of my 
 heart in the following thanksgiving:” And then he gives 
 this hymn, written there, as his song of thanks for so great 
 an opportunity to preach the Gospel. 
 

 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 233 
 No. 222. 
 
 “CHRIST WHOSE GLORY FILLS THE SKIES.” 
 Rev. Cuartes Westey, 1708—1788. 
 
 There was once a poor old man, poor in this world’s 
 goods, but whose manners and appearance gave every evi- 
 dence that he had learned the secret of a happy life. A 
 person called on him once and supposed that he should 
 touch the secret by a single question. “TI suppose, sir,” 
 said he, “ that the first thing you do in the morning is to 
 pray?” “No.” “No! what is it then?” “Praise,” said he. 
 “Praise is my first act, and when the day begins with praise, 
 you soon learn the happy art of turning the bright side of 
 things toward yourself, of looking at God’s goodness until 
 it cheers you, of marking the blessings of each hour as it 
 passes, and of communing with a happy future until you 
 find it possible to ‘rejoice evermore, to pray without ceasing 
 and in everything to give thanks!’ and go the day passes, 
 and from hour to hour the heart keeps up its music like a 
 sweet peal of bells.” : 
 
 “Thank you, thank you, for your lesson on morning 
 music. You must have some favorite morning hymns.” 
 
 “Oh, yes, sir, many a one; and they bring their own 
 tunes with them, for no sooner does a hymn come into my 
 mind, than some suitable tune for it flows from my tongue. 
 Scarcely a morning passes, sir, but these verses come up 
 from my heart and out from my lips: 
 
 ‘Christ Whose glory fills the skies,’ ” 
 
 No. 228. 
 “O, FOR A THOUSAND TONGUES TO SING.” 
 
 Rev. CHARLES Wes.Ley, 1708—1788. 
 
 Tradition, probably truthful, says that Charles Wesley 
 wrote this hymn in May, 1729, a year after his own conver- 
 sion and that of his brother John, and that it was written 
 
234 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 to celebrate the anniversary of that event. Tts title was 
 “For the anniversary of one’s conversion.” It had eighteen 
 stanzas beginning “Glory to God, and Praise and Love.” 
 and this begins with the seventh stanza. Peter Bohler was 
 a Moravian minister often consulted by the Wesleys, and 
 Charles had asked his opinion of offering praise to Christ. 
 Bohler replied, “Had I a thousand tongues, I would praise 
 Him with them all.” This memorable utterance Charles 
 Wesley has enshrined in the opening of this hymn. It is 
 placed first in all Methodist Church hymnals. 
 
 In 1757, Mr. Alexander Mather, one of Wesley’s itin- 
 erants, was at Nottingham and learned of a prisoner who 
 was to be executed the following day and who was filling 
 the air with curses and threatenings against all who had 
 given evidence against him. Mr. Mather obtained leave to 
 visit him, but was repulsed with the reply, “Give yourself 
 no trouble about me. By this time tomorrow, | shall be 
 a devil, and then I will come and tear that villain in pieces.” 
 By means of the prayers and earnest appeals of Mr. Mather 
 he was apparently converted, asked for forgiveness of the 
 jailor and others for his terrible threats, and acknowledged 
 the justice of his sentence. Next day he asked and obtained 
 permission to walk with Mr. Mather to the place of execu- 
 tion, instead of being carried there in the cart. While on 
 the way, in company with Mr. Mather, he sang this hymn. 
 He especially thought that the fourth stanza was intended 
 for him: 
 
 “He breaks the power of cancelled sin, 
 He sets the prisoner free! 
 
 His Blood can make the foulest clean 
 His Blood availed for me.” 
 
 Armenian Magazine, March, 1780. 
 
 The whole hymn, as Wesley wrote it, contains eighteen 
 stanzas, one of which, not given here, reads as follows: 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 235 
 
 “See all your sins on Jesus laid, 
 The Lamb of God was slain: 
 
 His Soul was once an offering made 
 For every soul of man.” 
 
 One of the most celebrated preachers of his time was 
 “Billy Dawson,” an eccentric layman, possessed of a vivid 
 imagination and splendid oratorical powers. He delighted 
 in imagery of terrible vividness and in startling sentences. 
 Once while preaching a sermon entitled “Death on the 
 White Horse,” he gave out to be sung, this hymn. In 
 reading it, when he reached this stanza, he eried out, “See! 
 What? Come and see! what? I do not ask you to come and 
 see the preacher or to hear the voice of thunder, but to 
 come and see yourselves your sins, and your Savior: 
 
 “See all your sins on Jesus laid! 
 The Lamb of God was slain: 
 His soul was once an offering made 
 
 For every soul of man.” 
 
 The effect upon the audience was instantaneous. 
 
 No. 224. 
 “GOD MOVES IN A MYSTERIOUS WAY.” 
 
 Wiui1AM Cowper, 1731—1800. 
 
 Cowper’s title to this hymn was “Light Shining Out of 
 Darkness.” What that darkness was, the life of the author 
 reveals. Cowper had at one time been placed in an asylum 
 as a lunatic. Later he so far recovered as to be taken 
 from the asylum and allowed his freedom, but even then 
 he was subject to fits of deep depression. In one such 
 attack he became possessed of the delusion that it was 
 
236 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 God’s will that he should drown himself at a particular 
 spot in the River Thames at London. In pursuance of this 
 delusion he one evening called a carriage and ordered the 
 driver to take him to the Tower wharf, intending as he 
 records, “to throw myself into the river from the custom 
 house quay. I left the coach upon the Tower wharf intend- 
 ing never to return to ‘t. But I found the water low, and 
 a porter seated on some goods as if on purpose to prevent 
 me. This passage to the bottomless pit being mercifully 
 shut against me, I returned to the coach and ordered the 
 man to drive me back to my home.” Then, it is said, he 
 sat down and wrote this hymn. 
 
 Dr. R. R. Meredith relates that when his mother lay on 
 her death bed and the forces of life were ebbing away 
 in a current of almost unendurable pain, @ son, bending 
 over her, said, “Mother, I cannot understand why God 
 should let you suffer so.” Calmly came the reply: 
 
 “Blind unbelief is sure to err, 
 And sean His work in vain; 
 
 God is His own Interpreter, 
 And he will make it plain.” 
 
 No. 226. 
 “| THINK, WHEN I READ THAT SWEET STORY OF OLD.” 
 
 Mrs. Jemima Luks, 1813. 
 
 Our hymns have been composed in curious places. Charles 
 Wesley wrote as he jogged along the roads of old England 
 on the back of his steady old horse. J ohn Henry Newman 
 wrote on an orange-laden ship in the Mediterranean Sea. 
 
 “Christ for the world we sing, 
 The world to Christ we bring,” 
 

 
 
 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 237 
 
 was composed while its author was walking along the streets 
 of Cleveland on his way home from a meeting. Neander 
 wrote hymns in a cave, and here is a hymn written in a 
 stage coach, to be sung by a village school in England. 
 
 No. 226. 
 “HEAR MY PRAYER, O HEAVENLY FATHER.” 
 
 Miss Harriet Parr, 1828. 
 
 Here is a hymn by an author who never wrote another 
 and had no intention of furnishing this one for the use that 
 is being made of it. Charles Dickens was at one time 
 editor of a periodical called Household Words. Every year 
 at the holiday season, an extra Christmas number was 
 published, and in this issue of Household Words for 1856 
 there appeared a story entitled “The Wreck of the Golden 
 Mary.” The story relates how the Golden Mary, on her 
 voyage to California, struck an iceberg, and the passengers 
 and crew were obliged to take to the boats, in which they 
 suffered great privations for many days. To beguile the 
 time away, they told stories. One of the crew, Dick Tarrant 
 by name, had been disappointed in love and had become a 
 wild youth and had at last been shipped off to California 
 by his friends on the Golden Mary to get him out of the 
 way. After telling in a touching way some of his experi- 
 ences, he goes on: “What can it be that brings all these 
 old things over my mind? There’s a child’s hymn I and 
 Tom used to say at my mother’s knee, when we were little 
 ones, keeps running through my thoughts. It’s the stars, 
 maybe! there was a little window by my bed that I used to 
 watch them at—a window in my room at home in Cheshire! 
 and if I was ever afraid as boys will be after reading a good 
 ghost story, I would keep on saying it till I fell asleep.” 
 
 “That was a good mother of yours, Dick! could you say 
 
 
 
238 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 that hymn now, do you think? Some of us might like to 
 hear it.” 
 
 “Tt’s as clear in my mind this minute as if my mother was 
 here listening to me,” said Dick. And then he repeated this 
 hymn. Both story and hymn were entirely the creation of 
 the author of the tale. 
 
 No. 227. 
 “BENEATH MORIAH’S ROCKY SIDE.” 
 
 Rev. Ropert Murray McCHEYNE, 1813—1843. 
 
 The author of this hymn only lived thirty years, but in 
 this time he endeared himself to a very large circle of friends 
 by his preaching and pastoral work. In 1839, when he was 
 twenty-six years old, he had already so overworked as to 
 break down in health, and he joined a party of travelers to 
 Palestine. While there he wrote a letter to a friend at home 
 dated at Mount Carmel, June 26, 1839, and in it he writes, 
 “Another favorite spot was the Fountain of Siloam, farther 
 down the Valley of Jehoshaphat. It flows so softly from 
 under the Temple, that you cannot hear the ripple of its 
 waters. You descend a great many steps in the rock, and 
 drink its delightful waters. I send you a small hymn on 
 the other side, which will imprint it on your memory” And 
 this is the hymn. 
 
 No. 228. 
 “CQ HOLY FATHER JUST AND TRUE”—1837. 
 
 Joun GREENLEAF WHITTIER, 1808—1892. 
 
 Our Quaker poet Whittier was greatly interested in the 
 abolition of slavery in the United States, and did much to 
 mold the public sentiment that at last. brought it about. 
 ’ He was apparently never more delighted than when asked 
 

 
 
 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 239 
 
 to write for some occasion connected with this reform. The 
 emancipation of the slaves in its colonies by the English 
 Government which went into effect on the first of August, 
 1834, gave a new impulse to the anti-slavery movement in 
 this country, and for many years this day was celebrated. 
 The third anniversary, August 1, 1837, was celebrated by a 
 great assembly at Broadway Tabernacle, New York, and 
 Whittier wrote this hymn for that occasion, and it was first 
 used then. 
 
 No. 229. 
 “WE SPEAK OF THE REALMS OF THE BLEST.” 
 
 Mrs. ExizaserH Miiis, 1805—1829. 
 
 The forty-fourth verse of the one hundred and nineteenth 
 Psalm reads as follows: “So shall I keep Thy law continu- 
 ally forever and ever.” An English writer on the Psalms 
 (Bridges) commenting on this verse, uses the exclamation, 
 “We speak of heaven, but oh! to be there.” Mrs. Mills, the 
 young wife of a member of the English Parliament, had 
 been reading this book, and this sentence fixed itself in her 
 mind: “We speak of heaven, but oh! to be there,” and the 
 thought of the writer she wove into this hymn. New interest 
 is added to its use when we know that in.a few weeks after 
 she wrote it, she herself, only twenty-four years old, had 
 passed into the “realms of the blest” of which she sang. 
 
 No. 230. 
 “OUR FATHER, GOD, WHO ART IN HEAVEN.” 
 
 Rev. ADONIRAM JuDsSON, 1788—1850. 
 
 The first missionaries sent out by the American Board 
 of Commissioners for Foreign Missions sailed from Salem, 
 
240 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 Massachusetts, February 19, 1812, for Calcutta, India. 
 Adoniram Judson and his wife were in the party. The story 
 of his life and adventures in India aroused such an interest 
 in America that twenty-five thousand copies of his memoirs 
 were sold in the first sixty days after their publication. In 
 1824 war was raging between Burmah and the British Gov- 
 ernment, and Judson was thrown into the prison at Ava in 
 which those were confined who were condemned to die. For 
 nine months in this prison he was shackled with three pairs 
 of fetters, and then for two months more with five pairs. 
 During this time he was only kept from starving by his 
 wife who daily came and fed him through the prison bars. 
 And here in this prison, like Paul and Silas, he sang songs, 
 and this hymn was written there and bears the date, “Prison 
 Ava, March, 1825.” It is a verification of The Lord’s 
 Prayer. It contains fewer words than the original Greek, 
 and only two more than the common English translation. 
 
 No. 231. 
 “FOR WHAT SHALL I PRAISE THEE?” 
 Miss Caroutne Fry, 1787—1846. 
 (Afterward Mrs. Caroline Wilson.) 
 
 Caroline Fry was a farmer's daughter. The extent and 
 character of her reading when a child, may be gathered from 
 the fact that when fourteen years old, she had written a 
 “History of England in Verse.’ This hymn of hers has this 
 peculiarity of origin that it was written to please a pious 
 sister, before the author herself had embraced the Christian 
 faith. So that it is in no sense a hymn of her own experi- 
 ence, although we can make use of it in expressing ours. 
 

 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 241 
 
 No. 232. 
 “OQ THOU TO WHOM IN ANCIENT TIME”—1824. 
 
 Rev. Joun Prerpont, 1785—1866. 
 
 I wonder whether any of you remember the reading books 
 you used when children at school. If you happened to be 
 born in New England, long enough ago, it is not unlikely 
 that you read from “The American First. Class Reader”; 
 and perhaps a little later from “The National Reader.” I 
 remember them both very well, and could even now recite 
 some of the pieces they contained. They were prepared by 
 the author of this hymn. It was printed for the dedication 
 of a Unitarian Church, in Salem, Massachusetts, December 
 7, 1824. When the war of the Rebellion in the United States 
 broke out, Mr. Pierpont was seventy-five years old, but he 
 could not content himself to remain at home and the Gov- 
 ernor of Massachusetts appointed him Chaplain of a regi- 
 ment. His failing strength, however, was not equal to the 
 hardships of the camp and he soon resigned, 
 
 No. 233. 
 “FATHER OF LIFE AND LIGHT.” 
 “LORD AS A FAMILY WE MEET.” 
 
 SAMUEL FLeTcHeER, 1785—1863. 
 
 The author of these hymns was a wealthy merchant, liv- 
 ing near Manchester, England. He was inclined toward 
 poetry, and on one occasion when sickness prevented his 
 attending to business, he occupied the leisure by making a 
 collection of hymns for use in his family, and inserted in 
 
242 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 the collection a few of his own composition, these being two 
 of that number. What sort of man he was may be inferred 
 from the fact that for many year's he gave away from thirty 
 to forty per cent of his income, and from this little extract 
 from his diary: “This day I removed with my family to 
 Chatham Hill, and took possession of a house more spacious 
 and costly than I ever expected. I pray to God that my 
 heart may not be lifted up on this account, and that I may 
 not be permitted to indulge proud and vain thoughts of my 
 own sufficiency and stability, and disposed to be less earnest 
 in seeking ‘a building of God; a house not made with hands, 
 eternal in the heavens.’ ” 
 
 No. 234. 
 “FATHER OF MERCIES! CONDESCEND.” 
 “GO AND THE SAVIOR’S LOVE PROCLAIM’—1818. 
 
 Rev. Tuomas Moretu, 1781—1840. 
 
 At the opening of this century the sending out of mis- 
 sionaries to heathen lands was an event more noticeable 
 than it is today. The voyages were longer and more peri- 
 lous; the dangers to be encountered among the people to 
 whom they went were greater; the means of communication 
 with home less frequent and regular; and a greater sacrifice 
 of self was requisite on the part of those who went. 
 
 A young man who was a member of Mr. Morell’s church 
 bad devoted himself to this work, and in 1818 a service was 
 held in his pastor’s church at which he was ordained to the 
 ministry and set apart for the work of a missionary in India. 
 Tt is not strange that his pastor deemed it an occasion 
 worthy of special note, and he wrote these two hymns to be 
 first sung at this solemn service. 
 

 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 243 
 No. 236. 
 “WHEN ABRAHAM’S SERVANT TO PROCURE”—1773. 
 
 Rev. JoHN Ryuanp, 1753—1825. © 
 
 Dr. Ryland lived in Northampton, and once upon a time 
 when a brother minister was passing through the town, he 
 detained him quite against his will, to preach for him. The 
 preacher, possibly as a sort of revenge for being pressed to 
 stop and preach when he desired to go on, took for his text 
 the words of Abraham’s servant recorded in Genesis, 24:56, 
 “Hinder me not:” and while he preached, Dr. Ryland wrote 
 this hymn, each stanza except the first containing the words 
 of the preacher’s text. The hymn usually begins, “In all my 
 Lord’s appointed ways.” 
 
 No. 236. 
 “LORD YVIEACHZACLITILE:CHIED #?OePRAY.> 
 
 Rev. Joun Rytanp, 1753—1825. 
 
 This hymn was written for a little girl of six years, who 
 was dying. Her father, himself a minister (Rev Andrew 
 Fuller) asked Dr. Ryland to write a hymn for the sick little 
 girl, and this was written in response to that request. It 
 was often repeated to her, and she told her father that she 
 used often to pray over it. 
 
 No. 2837. 
 “MY TIMES OF SORROW AND OF JOY’—1778. 
 
 Rev. BENJAMIN BeppoMg, 1717—1795. 
 
 This hymn was written to be sung at the close of a sermon 
 on the text, “My times are in Thy Hand,” (Psalm, 31:15) 
 
244 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 and it is rather remarkable that the resignation to the will 
 of God that it expresses was so well timed, for the author’s 
 son died of a fever in Edinburgh, on the very day he 
 preached this sermon, and read for the first time this hymn. 
 
 No. 238. 
 “COME, OH COME! IN PIOUS LAYS.” 
 
 Grorce WITHER, 1588—1667. 
 
 Here is a hymn writer who sang himself into prison and 
 sang himself out again, and whose reputation as a poet, 
 either good or bad, once saved his life. He wrote a political 
 poem entitled, “Abuses stript and whipt:” and made King 
 James I so angry by it that he threw him into prison. 
 While here in prison he kept right on writing poetry of one 
 sort or another, and by and by he wrote what he called a 
 “Satire to the King;” and signed the preface, “His Majesty’s 
 most loyal subject, and yet prisoner in the Marshalsea.” 
 This procured him his release. Later he was a captain of 
 cavalry and fought against the Covenanters in Scotland, and 
 later while still a soldier he was made prisoner by the enemy 
 and was about to be hung, when Sir John Denham, who was 
 also a poet and hymn writer, requested that his life be 
 spared, “because,” as he put it, “so long as George Wither 
 lives, Denham will not be accounted the worst poet in 
 England. 
 
 No. 239. 
 “MY HOPE IS BUILT ON NOTHING LESS.” 
 
 Epwarp Motes, 1797—1874. 
 
 Of the origin of this hymn the author says: “One 
 morning it came into my mind as I went to labor, to write 
 

 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 245 
 
 an hymn on the ‘Gracious Experience of a Christian.’ As I 
 went up Holborn I had the chorus: 
 
 ‘On Christ the solid Rock I stand, 
 All other ground is sinking sand.’ 
 
 In the day I had the four first. verses complete, and wrote 
 them off. On the Sabbath following I met brother King as 
 I came out of Lisle Street Meeting, who informed me that 
 his wife was very ill, and asked me to call and see her. I 
 had an early tea and called afterward. He said that it was 
 his usual custom to sing a hymn, read a portion, and engage 
 in prayer, before he went to meeting. He looked for his 
 hymn book but could find it nowhere, I said, ‘I have some 
 verses in my pocket,’ and if he liked we would sing them. 
 We did; and his wife enjoyed them so much, that after 
 service he asked me, as a favor, to leave a copy of them for 
 his wife. I went home, and by the fireside composed the 
 last two verses, wrote the whole off, and took them to sister 
 King. As these verses so met the dying woman’s case, my 
 attention to them was the more arrested, and I had a thou- 
 sand printed for distribution.” 
 
 No. 240. 
 “GOD WHO MADEST HEAVEN AND EARTH’—1644. 
 
 Henry ALBerti, 1604—1668. 
 
 The author of this hymn, although he wrote some hymns, 
 is better known as a musician and composer than as a writer 
 of hymns. 
 
 A tailor was once (1685) at work in the house of a Jew 
 in Hamburg, and as he sewed he sang the stanzas of this 
 hymn. The Jew’s daughter heard the song, and the words 
 of the third stanza attracted her attention: 
 
246 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “Tet the night of sin depart 
 As this earthly night hath fled: 
 Jesus take me to Thy Heart; 
 In the Blood that Thou hast shed 
 Is my help and hope alone, 
 For the evil I have done.” 
 
 She was led to make inquiry as to the Jesus of Whom the 
 tailor sang, and at last to accept Him as her Savior. 
 
 No. 241. 
 
 “HIGH LET US SWELL OUR TUNEFUL NOTES.” 
 “MY GOD AND IS THY TABLE SPREAD.” 
 
 Rev. Putire Dopprings, 1702—1751. 
 
 These hymns have had a rather singular history. They 
 have been interlopers within the covers of the Church of 
 England Prayer Book for three quarters of a century. It 
 happened about the year 1820 that the printer of the Prayer 
 Book was a dissenter. There were a few blank leaves at 
 the end of the Prayer Book, and he took the liberty of 
 filling these up with a few hymns which he thought would 
 be acceptable. Among others he used these two by Dr. 
 Doddridge. The hymns having thus gotten in, even though 
 uninvited and unauthorized, have stayed in ever since, 
 because although not cordially welcomed by the Church- 
 men, their bishops could scarcely find a good reason for 
 putting them out. 
 
 No. 242. 
 “Q ZION, AFFLICTED WITH WAVE UPON WAVE.” 
 
 JAMES GRANT. 
 
 The author of this hymn was a Scotchman in the iron 
 business. He was very fond of the Scotch melodies, but 
 

 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 247 
 
 ashamed of the disreputable words usually sung to them, 
 and his object in writing hymns was to provide Christian 
 words for these melodies. This hymn was written in this 
 way to provide religious words for the air of the “Yellow- 
 haired Laddie.” 
 
 No. 243 
 “I ONCE WAS A STRANGER TO GRACE AND TO GOD.” 
 
 Rev. Ropert Murray McCueynp, 1813—1243. 
 
 A youth of eighteen years records of himself that on July 
 8, 1831, “I lost my beloved and loving brother, and began 
 to seek a Brother Who cannot die.” Four years later he 
 began to preach, and eight years after this he died, at thirty 
 years of age; and yet in this short time he had attained an 
 eminent position as a preacher, popularity as a writer, and 
 had endeared himself to a large circle of friends by his pas- 
 toral labor, and his untiring devotion. He wrote this hymn 
 in 1834, three years after he had begun to seek for the 
 Brother Who could not die, and it reveals what through that 
 short acquaintance of only three years this Brother had 
 become to him. . 
 
 No. 244. 
 
 “COMMIT THOU ALL THY GRIEFS.” 
 “GIVE TO THE WINDS THY FEARS.” 
 
 Rev. Paut Geruarpt, 1606—1676. 
 Translated by Rev. John Wesley, 1703—1791. 
 
 These are different parts of the same hymn. A German 
 Lutheran pastor in Berlin was deposed from his office and 
 ordered to quit the country because of his adherence to 
 Luther's faith. He was in poverty and started with his wife 
 on foot. One night they came to a village inn. Hig wife 
 
(248 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 was weary with the journey, and disheartened at their 
 - friendless situation, and sat down and began to weep. Her 
 husband tried to comfort her, and reminded her of the words 
 of the Bible: “Commit thy way unto the Lord; trust also in 
 Him and He will bring it to pass.” “God will provide,” said 
 he, “commit our trouble to Him.” He left his wife and went 
 into the inn garden, and sitting down under an arbor, the 
 Bible words he had just repeated to his wife formed them- 
 selves into verse: 
 
 “Commit thou all thy griefs 
 And ways into His Hands. 
 To His sure trust and tender care 
 Who earth and heaven commands.” 
 
 Candor compels me to add that after having been given 
 for many years as the origin of this hymn, a recent matter 
 of fact historian with a penchant for dates, spoils it all by 
 averring that the dates do not agree. The first word or two 
 of each stanza in the German, is from the Bible text, and I 
 have seen an English translation which followed the Ger- 
 man, so that by reading the first word or two of each stanza, 
 down the page, the text as it is in the Bible is given. 
 
 William Dawson, of Barnbow near Leeds, better known 
 as “Billy Dawson, the farmer preacher,” was at one time 
 much troubled about his farm and other anxieties. One day 
 he was at work on a hill top, and to divert his mind from 
 his anxieties he took from his pocket a lot of papers that 
 had accumulated there, and after reading them he tore them 
 up into little pieces and threw them into the air, and blown 
 by the wind they fluttered about like so many butterflies. 
 Instantly there came into his mind, and he repeated it aloud 
 and with it cheered his troubled mind: 
 
 “Give to the winds thy fears, 
 Hope and be undismayed! 
 God hears thy sighs and counts thy tears! 
 God shall lift up thy head.” 
 

 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 249 
 
 No. 248. 
 “HOW ARE THY SERVANTS BLEST, 0 LORD.” 
 
 JosepH Appison, 1672—1719. 
 For account of Addison and The Spectator, see No. 49. 
 
 This hymn appeared Saturday, September 20, 1712, at the 
 end of an article on “The Sea.” The hymn is entitled, “The 
 Traveler’s Hymn,” and purports to have been written “by a 
 gentleman upon the conclusion of his travels.” Addison had 
 embarked at Marseilles in 1700 for a foreign tour. While 
 sailing near the shores of Italy a great storm arose. And at 
 this time, while others gave up all for lost. and the captain 
 in despair was confessing his sins to a Capuchin friar, the 
 Christian poet was comforting himself by writing this hymn 
 of trust in the God who rules the waves. 
 
 No. 246. 
 “CREATOR, SPIRIT, BY WHOSE AID.” 
 
 JOHN Drypen, Translator, 1632—1700. 
 Vent Creator Spiritus, RasANus Maurus. 
 
 _ Here is one of the most celebrated of the Latin hymns, 
 
 whose author is not certainly known. If it was Rabanus 
 _ Maurus, as is now generally believed, he lived in the eighth 
 century and was an archbishop of the Roman Church in 
 Germany. As was the custom in those days he provided an 
 epitaph to be used when he died, which reads as follows: 
 “Quick was my mind, but slow my body, through weakness. 
 That which I could I have done, and what the Lord gave 
 me.” As an evidence that he did what he could, as he 
 claims, it is related that when, in 850, a terrible famine 
 
250 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 desolated Germany, during which starving people were 
 driven to the commission of many terrible deeds, he fed 
 three hundred people daily at his own door. So high was 
 this hymn held in the esteem of the people, that almost 
 miraculous powers were ascribed to it. Speaking of it one 
 writer said, “Whoever repeats this hymn by day or by night, 
 him shall no enemy visible or invisible assail.” In those 
 olden times the day was divided into eight parts of three 
 hours each, and a service was held in the churches at the 
 end of each of these periods. At nine o’clock in the morning, 
 the time at which, according to the Bible, the Holy Spirit 
 descended on the Day of Pentecost, they used to sing this 
 hymn. This might be called the world’s royal hymn, for it 
 has for hundreds of years been used in Europe at the Coro- 
 nation of Emperors and Kings, and it is also used at the 
 creation of Popes, the consecration of Bishops, and the 
 ordaining of Priests. 
 
 No. 247. 
 
 Puivire Buss, 1838—1876. 
 
 At Christmas time, in 1876, a father left his work to spend 
 the holidays with his children in a little town in Pennsyl- 
 vania. When the holidays were over, he with his wife 
 started on their way back to their home in Chicago. On 
 the way he busied himself in composing a new piece of 
 music. Suddenly there came a crash and eleven cars were 
 tumbled down an embankment through snow and ice into a 
 river below. The cars took fire and some were killed by 
 the fall, some were drowned, and others unable to extricate 
 themselves from the ruins of the wreck were burned to 
 death. The man who had been composing the music 
 escaped through a window, then tried to extricate his wife, 
 but she was fastened in the wreck and could not be rescued, 
 so he quietly stayed by her side and together they were 
 burned to death, and not so much as a shred ever found by 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 251 
 
 which to identify their remains. This was Philip Bliss the 
 composer, hymn writer, and Gospel singer. 
 
 No. 248. 
 
 Lupwic voN BrerHoveN, 1770—1827. 
 
 Handel loved music when a child, and was forbidden by 
 his father to play, but stole up into the attic when his father 
 was absent and learned to play by himself, on an old harpsi- 
 chord he found there. Beethoven was compelled to learn 
 music against his will. He hated it because his friends tried 
 to force it upon him, and he was sometimes beaten by his 
 father before he would sit down to the piano. But when he 
 was left alone to play as a recreation, he became absorbed 
 in music, and began to compose while only a boy. When a 
 young man he began to be deaf, so that after a while he 
 could hear but imperfectly, and at last not at all, the music 
 he was making; but it did not stop his composing, nor his 
 playing, for his mental ears were not deaf, and he knew the 
 sounds he was making and realized their harmony. He was 
 always poor, but always generous. A concert was once 
 given in aid of soldiers who had been wounded in battle. 
 He supplied the music and conducted the orchestra. When 
 he was offered pay for the service, he replied, “Say 
 that Beethoven never accepts anything when humanity is 
 concerned,” 
 
 No. 249. 
 
 FRANCIS JosepH Haypn, 1732—1809. 
 
 This tune was written by the musical composer whose 
 greatest musical achievement perhaps was the setting of 
 the first chapter of the Bible to music in the Oratorio we 
 know as “The Creation.” Many are the incidents that are 
 related of him. He lived for many years in Hungary where 
 
252 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 his duty was to write music for a prince and his court. One 
 day he was at a fair in a little village not far from where 
 he lived, and there he saw a great many musical toys for 
 sale. The children were trying them and the air was full 
 of the mingled sounds of whistles and little drums and tin 
 trumpets and a dozen other of the toys. A sudden idea 
 seemed to strike the great composer, and when he went home 
 from the fair he took with him one of each of the instru- 
 ments he had found for sale; drums, tin trumpets, whistles, 
 fiddles, bells, rattles, seventeen in all. For the next few days 
 his friends must have thought him mad, for he spent his 
 time in his room, and when any one went near they heard 
 him playing, one after another, on these toy instruments. 
 So the days went on, until by and by one day Haydn came 
 out from his seclusion with a symphony, into which he had 
 introduced in solo, or duet, or some other form, the music 
 of each of the seventeen toys he had found at the fair. It 
 was played at the court of the prince, and is often heard in 
 this country, especially at children’s festivals. 
 
 No. 2650. 
 
 Jouann C. W. A. Mozart, 1756—1791. 
 
 Mozart was a musical prodigy, perhaps the most wonder- 
 ful that ever lived. He played the harpsichord when three 
 years old; at four he played minuets to the delight of 
 friends; at five he began to compose music; when six he 
 astonished the Emperor Francis I at Munich by his mas- 
 terly rendering of concertos on the harpsichord ; and at seven 
 his genius was the theme of conversation among musical 
 people all over Europe. He was very sensitive; wanted to 
 be loved by those whom he loved himself. He was greatly 
 attached to his father. ‘Next to God, is papa!” he said. 
 He was deeply religious. “Friends who have no religion 
 cannot long be my friends,” he said. His last days were 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 253 
 
 sorrowful ones. The servant of an Austrian nobleman came 
 to him one day dressed in black and asked him to write a 
 requiem for which he promised a large price, but refused to 
 tell who it was for. Mozart was in ill health and he imag- 
 ined that the man in black was a messenger from the spirit 
 world and that the requiem was for himself, “I am writing 
 it for myself,” he said, and he spoke of it when it was done 
 as his own requiem, and almost as soon as it was completed 
 he died. 
 
 No. 251. 
 “THE MESSIAH.” 
 
 Grorcr FRepEricK HANnpDEL, 1685—1759. 
 
 In Great Britain, as you know, people were formerly 
 imprisoned for debt. A century and a half ago, a great 
 composer was in England who had been born in Halle more 
 than fifty years before. A messenger came to him from 
 Dublin: “Our prisons are filled with prisoners for debt. 
 Give us a concert and let the proceeds go for the opening 
 of the prison doors.” The composer’s heart was touched by 
 the appeal from the Irish people, and in England he com- 
 posed a great piece of music for the occasion. In speaking 
 afterward of his feelings while he wrote it, he said, “I did 
 think I saw all heaven before me, and the great God Him- 
 self. On the thirteenth day of April, 1742, at noon, in Dub- 
 lin, the concert was given. Its success surpassed that of 
 any composition that had preceded it. The hall could not 
 contain the people who flocked day after day to hear it, and 
 the Dublin ladies who were then wearing great crinolines in 
 their dresses agreed to leave their hoops at home to make 
 more room in the hall. Later, when it was given in England 
 before King George the Second, he forgot himself and leaped 
 to his feet, all the audience following his example. And so 
 it has been ever since the custom for audiences to rise and 
 
254 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 stand with bowed heads while certain parts of the Messiah 
 are being rendered. When it was first rendered in London, 
 a nobleman who felt disposed to patronize Handel its com- 
 poser, said to him, “You have given the audience an excel- 
 lent entertainment.” 
 
 “My Lord,” answered Handel, “I should be sorry if I had 
 only entertained them. I wish to make them better.” This 
 was the man, and this the spirit of the man who composed 
 this tune. 
 
 No. 252. 
 “ELIJAH—THE ORATORIO.” 
 
 Feurx Mrenpeissoun Bartuoupy, 1809—1847. 
 
 “There was one thing in music that Mendelssobn never 
 could do,” said an old German musician. 
 
 “What was that?” 
 
 “Play a congregation out of church.” And they say that 
 was literally true. Crowds thronged the churches when he 
 was announced to play, and the music which was intended 
 to play the audience out, only held it more firmly in. Once 
 the attendants at St. Paul’s Cathedral, when he was play- 
 ing, were impatient for the audience to be gone that they 
 might get their suppers. But Mendelssohn kept on playing 
 and the audience made no move to go. “There is only one 
 way,” said one of the attendants to the other. 
 
 “What is that?” 
 
 “To stop the bellows:” and they did. 
 
 There was to be a great National Festival in Birming- . 
 
 ham, England, and Mendelssohn was invited to compose for 
 it a new Oratorio. He accepted the task and threw all his 
 energy into the work. It was a grand occasion when it was 
 first produced. It was in the summer of 1846. People of 
 all ranks, from far and near, flocked to Birmingham to hear 
 the great work. And when at its completion Mendelssohn 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 255 
 
 moved. away from the stage, the eyes of the audience fol- 
 lowed him until he disappeared, and cheer upon cheer of 
 praise greeted his ears. This was the “Oratorio of Elijah,” 
 now so celebrated. But the production of this masterpiece 
 shattered his nerves and consumed his life. He played and 
 worked but little more, and in a year he was dead. 
 
 No. 253. 
 
 “BEHOLD A STRANGER AT THE DOOR.” 
 Rev. JosepH Grice, 1728—1768. 
 
 Of many men who lived as long ago as Joseph Grigg and 
 who did far less of good we know far more. I can give you 
 in a few words all that is known of him. His parents were 
 poor. He wrote the hymn beginning, “Jesus and shall it 
 ever be,” when ten years old. He was a laboring mechanic ; 
 he gave this up to become the assistant pastor of a Presby- 
 terian Church; he retired from this and married a rich wife. 
 In an elegy written upon his death, he is called “The friend 
 of the poor, the charm of the social circle, and the attrac- 
 tive and useful preacher.” In 1756, when England was 
 trembling in fear of the invasion of her coast, he preached 
 a sermon on that subject, closing with a hymn ending with 
 a stanza which will give a good idea of his poetic power: 
 
 “Britons shall feel, and feeling own 
 
 God is her shield, and God alone: 
 
 And heart and voice and life shall sing 
 To God the Universal King.” 
 
 No. 254. 
 
 “MT. BLANC” (Tune.) 
 
 “The melody in part, of Mt. Blanc, was sung to me by 
 Mrs. George Little, (now singing in Paradise) a sister of 
 
256 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 Hon. Hugh McCulloch. She was the sweetest singer I ever 
 heard, and this melody she had heard among the Second 
 Adventists in Maine. It had the repetition in the last line. 
 I added a little to the melody and harmonized it, and wrote 
 the words at Ft. Wayne, Indiana. When I was in Geneva, 
 a lady took me out to ride and sang this hymn in full view 
 of Mt. Blanc, of which she seemed very fond; my sister, 
 Mrs. Stowe, sang with me. Hence the name.” 
 Letter from Rev. CHARLES BEECHER. 
 
 No. 258. 
 “OLMUTZ.” 
 “HAMBURG.” 
 
 CGrecory THE Great, 540—604. 
 
 Almost fifteen hundred years ago a rich young Roman 
 gave away his fortune to establish monasteries, and then 
 entered one himself as a monk. Later he was elected Pope. 
 One day he was passing through the market in Rome, where 
 slaves were sold, and he saw’ among the slaves some boys 
 who were white of body with fair forms and handsome faces, 
 and he asked the merchant from what country he had 
 brought them, and was told that they came from the Island 
 of Britain, and that all the habitants of that country had 
 the same beauty of face. Then the Pope asked, “Are those 
 Islanders Christians?” and was told that they were still 
 Idolaters. “Alas!” said the Pope, “that the Prince of Dark- 
 ness should own those splendid faces! what is the name of 
 their tribe?” he asked; and the merchant replied, “They are 
 called Angli,” and the Pope exclaimed, “They are well called 
 Angli, for if they were but Christians they would be angels.” 
 These were our ancestors he was talking about, and they 
 were being sold as slaves on the streets of Rome. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 257 
 
 Gregory, for this was his name, wrote some hymns, and 
 introduced a new method of singing into the church, which 
 was called after him, “The Gregorian Chant.” He estab- 
 lished a singing school in Rome to teach his new method, 
 and taught in it himself, Among the curiosities of the 
 Astor Library in New York is a copy of a facsimile volume 
 of manuscript music of Gregory’s which was discovered 
 Some years ago in an old monastery. This is one of his 
 chants, altered to adapt it to our present mode of singing. 
 We owe a great deal to Gregory and ought, I think, to sing 
 the music written by his hand with a feeling that he is some- 
 thing nearer to us than most of the men who lived so long 
 ago. For he it was who sent out from Rome a missionary 
 band of nearly forty monks to Christianize the Pagans of 
 Britain, that is to say, our ancestors. 
 
 No. 256. 
 “TE DEUM LAUDAMUS.” 
 
 Here is a story that dates back to the third century after 
 Christ. It was Easter Sunday in Milan, April 25, 387. At 
 sunrise throngs of people were hurrying through the streets 
 to the cathedral to celebrate the Festival of the Resurrec- 
 tion. There was to be a baptism in the church that day, and 
 of those to whom the rite was to be administered one was a 
 convert from heathenism. He had been a dissipated boy 
 and his mother had prayed for his conversion for many 
 years. The church was famous for its music, and was known 
 as the “Singing Church of Milan.” Its Bishop was himself 
 a musician, and he had composed an anthem for this bap- 
 tismal service which was to be first sung on this Easter day. 
 It has come down to us as his work. St. Ambrose was his 
 name, and the boy convert at whose baptism it was first 
 sung was St. Augustine. We call the anthem the “Te 
 Deum.” The story may be true, but it can scarcely be 
 
258 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 called veritable history. It comes down to us that it was 
 sung in alternate parts by St. Ambrose, its composer, and 
 St. Augustine, while Augustine was being baptized. 
 
 There is a story that Rev. Robert Hall had composed a 
 sermon on a text that had impressed itself upon him by its 
 erandeur and power. When the sermon was completed he 
 took up his concordance to find the text, but it was not to be 
 found. It was not in the Bible. It was a sentence from the 
 “Te Deum.” “All the earth doth worship Thee, the Father 
 everlasting.” . 
 
 No. 2657. 
 “AND NOW ANOTHER DAY IS GONE.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Warts, 1674—1748. 
 
 A good man in his old age once said that the first book in 
 which, as a child, he took an interest, was a small edition of 
 Watts’s “Divine and Moral Songs” for children. Each hymn 
 was headed by a woodcut, and one especially was his 
 favorite. It represented a little boy, something like himself, 
 as he thought, leaning at an open window, looking with a 
 calm, happy face at the setting sun, which was throwing its 
 parting light upon a quiet country scene. Many of the 
 hymns, and that one in particular, had been read often, until 
 they lived in his soul. But as he grew up, the impressions 
 were worn off by more exciting and less pure thoughts and 
 pursuits. He fell into a course of dissipation and vice, and 
 seemed for a time to be given up to sin, and devoted to ruin. 
 Worn down at last, and threatened with consumption, he 
 was ordered into the country for change of air; and after 
 some time spent in quietness and retirement, far away from 
 the scenes of old temptations, he wandered out one evening 
 about sunset, and hanging pensively over a gate, he watched 
 the sun as it sank behind the tree, and was throwing its last 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 259 
 
 beams upon the silent and peaceful hillside. There was a 
 hush upon his spirit, and suddenly, as if sketched by an 
 unseen hand before his inward eye, the little picture which 
 used to interest his boyish mind lived again, and the hymn 
 which it illustrated seemed to be spoken sweetly to his 
 heart: 
 
 “And now another day is gone, 
 I'll sing my Maker’s praise.” 
 
 The tears started) He had seen many of his days gone, 
 but as yet his Maker had never heard an evensong from his 
 lips or from his heart. What an ungrateful life his had 
 been! The “remembrance was grievous. But his heart 
 was broken, and there and then the softened man made his 
 vows of return to God, and offered the prayer which was 
 answered in blessings which filled both the mornings and 
 evenings of his mature life with hymns and songs of thanks- 
 giving and praise.” 
 
 No. 258. 
 “HOW VAIN ARE ALL THINGS HERE BELOW.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Watts, 1674—1748. 
 
 Like most young men, Watts fell in love, and with a poet 
 like himself. Watts was a little man, and the story is told 
 that once in company, a stranger was introduced to him, 
 who could not keep back the not altogether courteous excla- 
 mation, “What! is this the great Watts!” To which Watts, 
 accustomed from his childhood to the making of rhymes, 
 improvised this reply: 
 
 “Wad I an arm to reach the pole, 
 Or grasp old ocean with a span, 
 I must be measured by my soul, 
 The mind’s the standard of the man.” 
 
260 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 Well, Watts fell in love, and the young lady measured 
 him by his soul, but she measured him by his little body 
 too, and replied to his suit, that “while she loved the jewel 
 she could not admire the casket.” The doctor rebelled at 
 her decision and sent back to her the message that “flesh 
 and blood could not bear the denial,” to which the lady 
 replied that if flesh and blood couldn’t bear it “skin and 
 bones must,” for she would not marry him. Now did Watts 
 go off and drown himself, or pine away because of his dis- 
 appointment? Not he; but if the tradition is to be trusted 
 he went straight away and wrote a hymn: 
 
 “Wow vain are all things here below, 
 How false and yet how fair! 
 
 Each pleasure hath its poison too, 
 And every sweet a snare.” 
 
 And gave to it the title, “Love to the Creatures is 
 Dangerous.” 
 
 So he turned away from all the loves of earth, and by the 
 last stanza of the hymn devoted himself to the cultivation 
 of a love for Christ, and for the beauty to be found in Him. 
 
 No. 259. 
 “LO! ROUND THE THRONE, A GLORIOUS BAND.” 
 
 Rev. Rowianp Hit, 1744—-1833. 
 
 John Berridge, when in his old age, wrote a letter to a 
 young friend who was just beginning to preach: 
 
 “My dear Rowley: 
 
 “When I began to itinerate, a multitude of dangers 
 seemed to engulph me. My friends were up in arms, 
 my college was provoked, my bishop incensed, the clergy 
 on fire, and the Church canons were pointing their ghastly 
 mouths at me; my first diocesan told me that I should 
 
_ HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 261 
 
 soon be either in Bedlam or in jail. But, through the 
 blessing of my God, I am yet in possession of my senses, 
 my tithes, and my liberty; and He Who has hitherto 
 delivered, I trust will yet deliver me from ecclesiastical 
 fires, and the paw of the worldly bears. I have suffered 
 from nothing except from lapidations and pillory treats, 
 which yet have proved more frightful than hurtful. If 
 you are invited to go out, and feel yourself inclined to do 
 so, take a lover’s leap, neck or nothing, and commend 
 yourself to Jesus. Ask no man’s leave to preach Christ; 
 that is unevangelical and shameful. Seek not much advice 
 about it; that is dangerous. Such advice, I find, generally 
 comes the wrong way—heels uppermost. Most preachers 
 love a snug church and a whole skin, and what they love 
 they will prescribe. If you are determined to be evangeli- 
 cally regular, that is, secularly irregular, then expect, 
 wherever you go, a storm will follow you, which may 
 fright you, but will bring no real harm. Make the Lord 
 your whole trust, and all will be well.” 
 
 
 
 “Rowley” was the Rev. Rowland Hill, the author of most 
 of this hymn. He followed the advice of his friend, and no 
 man more than he ever had the courage of his convictions. 
 Like Berridge, he was a member of the Church of England, 
 but like Berridge, he would not be bound by ecclesiastical 
 rules or limited by parish bounds. He was once complained 
 of by other clergymen of the Church for this course, and 
 entered as his defense this reply: “My field is the world, and 
 I stick to my parish,” and that ended the matter. 
 
 No. 260. 
 
 “JERUSALEM DIVINE! WHEN SHALL I.” 
 Rev. BENJAMIN Ruopgs, 1743—1815. 
 
 An old Englishman tells the story how there used to come 
 into his neighborhood a man to preach. Of him he says: 
 
262 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “He was a good man and a good preacher; but I can mind 
 his singing much better than his sermons. He used to 
 preach not far from where I lived; and when I saw the 
 people flocking to the chapel, I used to go to hear the famous 
 singer. Ah, he was a singer! And I believe one great secret 
 of his music was, that his heart was in it. His voice was 
 like an angel’s, as they say, though I never heard an angel 
 sing; but I can scarcely think that an angel, or any other 
 singer, could beat that happy looking preacher. He was a 
 man with a long face, and a high, bald head. And his eyes 
 used to sparkle as he sang, as if the hymns were coming up 
 from his soul; and so they did. There was one hymn I 
 always liked to hear him sing; he would sing it after the 
 sermon; it was one of his own composing, and the tune was 
 his too. I learned to sing it myself, and I taught my boy 
 to sing it; and sometimes, long after that singing preacher 
 was gone to his own ‘Jerusalem divine,’ my boy and I, and 
 three or four more, used to get together of an evening, and 
 sing it in full harmony. Oh, it was so rich; and it seemed 
 to lift one toward heaven while we sang. This was the 
 hymn.” 
 
 No. 261. 
 “GOD OF MY LIFE, TO THEE.” 
 
 Rev. CuarLes Westey, 1708—1788. 
 
 Charles Wesley nearly always celebrated his birthdays by 
 writing ahymn. This is one of his birthday hymns, recount- 
 ing the goodness of the Lord, and it contains one very curi- 
 ous allusion. If you will turn to the thirty-fourth chapter 
 of the book of Deuteronomy, the fifth verse, you will read: 
 “So Moses the servant of the Lord died there in the land of 
 Moab, according to the word of the Lord:” or translated 
 literally, ‘at the mouth of Jehovah;” and based on this Bibli- 
 cal statement that Moses died ‘at the mouth of Jehovah,” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 263 
 
 there is a very beautiful old Jewish tradition, that God 
 drew the soul of Moses out of his body with a kiss. Wesley 
 evidently knew of this tradition, and so he writes in one 
 verse of this hymn: 
 
 “Then when the work is done, 
 
 The work of faith with power, 
 Receive Thy favorite son 
 
 In death’s triumphant hour. 
 Like Moses to Thyself convey, 
 And kiss my raptured soul away.” 
 
 Dr. Watts had already given poetic form to the same idea 
 in a poem on the death of Moses in which he writes: 
 
 “Softly his fainting head he lay 
 Upon his Maker’s breast; 
 
 His Maker kissed his soul away 
 And laid his flesh to rest.” 
 
 No. 262. 
 “DAILY, DAILY SING THE PRAISES.” 
 
 Rev. SABINE BarInG-GouLp, 1834. 
 
 Written in 1865 and printed on a card for the use of St. 
 John’s Mission, Hosbury Bridge, Yorkshire. 
 
 The young man who succeeds Mtesa, as King of Uganda, 
 has shed the blood of three young converts of the Church 
 Missionary Society. Like his predecessor, he is easily 
 swayed. The captain of the royal body guard, Mugasi, was 
 the ringleader in the persecution which fortunately did not 
 last long. It was he who directed the execution of the three 
 Christian lads. Their arms were first cut off; then they 
 
264 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 were bound to a scaffolding, under which a fire was made, 
 and they were slowly burned to death. Mugasi and his men 
 mocked them and bade them pray now, if Isa Masiya (Jesus 
 Christ) would rescue them from his hands. The lads clung 
 to their faith, and in the fire they sang the hymn: 
 
 “Daily, daily, sing the praises.” 
 
 New York Independent, December 10, 1885. 
 
 No. 263. 
 “FAR FROM THE WORLD, O LORD I FLEE.” 
 
 WILLIAM Cowper, 1731—1800. 
 
 When William Wilberforce, the statesman, was quite 
 advanced in life, and had sat in Parliament for twenty- 
 eight years, his friends induced him to contest the election 
 for York. The poll was open, according to English custom, 
 for fifteen days. None of the candidates had less than ten 
 thousand votes. Daily, Mr. Wilberforce addressed meet- 
 ings, and entertained friends at his house. But it was 
 noticed that, in the midst of the excitement about him, he 
 was singularly calm, and one of his agents relates that, as 
 he met him, day after day, on his return to his home, he 
 would hear him repeating something to himself. As this 
 seemed to be in the same words always, the agent finally 
 contrived to catch what he said, and found it to be a stanza 
 from this hymn: 
 
 “The calm retreat, the silent shade, 
 With prayer and praise agree, 
 And seem by Thy sweet bounty made, 
 For those who follow Thee.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 265 
 No. 264. 
 “WHEN MARSHALLED ON THE NIGHTLY PLAIN.” 
 
 Henry Kirke Wuite, 1785—1806. 
 
 During one of his tours, which were so blessed to the 
 conversion of men, Rey. Dr. Nettleton stopped at a house in 
 the region of the Catskill Mountains. While conversing 
 with the older members of the family, he heard two young, 
 sweet and clear voices in a room above warbling the ex- 
 quisitely beautiful air of “Bonnie Doon.” “Ask them,” said 
 he to their parents, “to come down and sing it to me; for I 
 am ardently devoted to music.” The request was complied 
 with, and he listened with delighted attention till the close 
 of the song, when, kindly turning to the young ladies, he 
 said, “I think I can teach you some far better words to that 
 tune,” and then sang to them that almost matchless hymn: 
 
 “When marshalled on the nightly plain, 
 The glittering host bestud the sky, 
 One star alone of all the train, 
 Can fix the sinner’s wandering eye.” 
 
 and proceeded so touchingly and tenderly to call their atten- 
 tion to the beauty of its sentiments, that tears soon flowed 
 from their eyes; and these two young girls were among the 
 first fruits of a revival which resulted from his labors. 
 
 The late Rev. Alfred Cookman, who perished in the 
 steamship President, is said to have been a most excellent 
 singer. A writer says: “There was no place for a choir 
 where Cookman sang. His voice was melody itself. The 
 session of Congress was about to close upon the administra- 
 tion of President Van Buren. Mr. Cookman had all his 
 arrangements made to visit England, on the steamer Presi- 
 dent. The next Sabbath he was to take leave of the mem- 
 
266 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 bers of Congress in his farewell sermon. The day came. 
 An hour before the usual time, the crowd was seen filling the 
 pavements of the avenue, and pressing up the hill to Repre- 
 sentative Hall, which was soon filled to overflowing. Unable 
 to get seats, many went away disappointed. The whole 
 space on the rostrum and steps was filled with Senators and 
 Representatives. The moment had come, Mr. Cookman, 
 evidently much affected, kneeled in a thrilling prayer, and 
 arose with his eyes blinded with tears. His voice faltered 
 with suppressed emotion as he gave out the hymn: 
 
 “When marshalled on the nightly plain, 
 The glittering host bestud the sky, 
 One star alone of all the train, 
 Can fix the sinner’s wandering eye.” 
 
 It was sung by Mr. Cookman alone. I ean yet, in imagina- 
 tion, hear his voice as it filled the large hall, and as the last 
 sounds, with their echoes, died away in the dome. 
 
 No. 268. 
 “AND LET THIS FEEBLE BODY DIE.” 
 
 Rev. CHARLES WesLeEy, 1708—1788. 
 
 Many years ago, a pious young lady in ill health was 
 resting on her couch, and by her side sat a beloved brother, 
 himself scarcely well, and utterly without a feeling of love 
 to God. His sister, as descriptive of the emotions of her 
 soul, repeated to him, with remarkable emphasis, the lines: 
 
 “O what hath Jesus bought for me! 
 Before my ravished eyes 
 Rivers of life divine I see, 
 And trees of paradise: 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 267 
 
 “I see a world of spirits bright, 
 Who taste the pleasures there; 
 They all are robed in spotless white, 
 And conquering palms they bear.” 
 
 Scarcely had she uttered these words before he began to 
 think seriously of the state of his soul, and asked himself, 
 “Has He bought nothing for me?” His sister soon had the 
 happiness of having him as a companion on the Christian 
 course; and both brother and sister, with another brother, 
 not long after, departed for missionary fields in the island 
 of Ceylon. 
 
 No. 266. 
 “MY THOUGHTS ON AWFUL SUBJECTS ROLL.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Watts, 1674—1748. 
 
 When the late Rev. Sylvester Hutchinson was stationed 
 on Salem Circuit, New Jersey, his first station, and while he 
 was yet a boy, he was sitting in his temporary boarding 
 house waiting for the hour of preaching, when two young 
 women came in to have some sport with the boy preacher. 
 They began to ridicule his size and his insignificant appear- 
 ance, when, suddenly lifting up his head from a reclining 
 posture, he repeated, in slow and solemn tones: 
 
 “My thoughts on solemn subjects roll, 
 Damnation and the dead, 
 What horrors seize the guilty soul, 
 Upon a dying bed!” 
 
 His voice, his countenance, his manner, were all adapted to 
 make them feel that 
 
 “Tis not the whole of life to live, 
 Nor all of death to die.” 
 
268 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 The words of the preacher were “like nails fastened in a 
 sure place by the Master of assemblies.” Tears rolled down 
 their cheeks; they left the room, and rested not till they 
 found a refuge in the Son of God. 
 
 No. 267. 
 “I THINK WHEN I READ THAT SWEET STORY OF OLD.” 
 
 Mrs. JEMIMA Luks, 1813. 
 
 A newsboy in New York was one day heard crying, 
 “Bank-Note Reporter, sir? Three more banks down!” The 
 little fellow had not known half a score of years, but his 
 eyes were bright, his tongue fluent, and his manners attrac- 
 tive. Stepping into a counting house, with his bundle of 
 papers under his arm, he saw two gentlemen sitting in front 
 of a fire, engaged in trifling conversation, and proposed to 
 one of them his inquiry, “Bank-Note Reporter, sir?” 
 
 “No,” replied one of the gentlemen; “we don’t want any. 
 But stop! If you will sing us a song we will buy one of 
 your Reporters.” 
 
 The boy agreed to the terms, and the gentlemen, with an 
 air which showed that they anticipated sport, placed the 
 little fellow on a high stool and told him to proceed to sing. 
 They evidently expected to hear some jovial song, when to 
 their astonishment he began the beautiful hymn: 
 
 “T think when I read that sweet story of old, 
 When Jesus was here among men, 
 How He called little children as lambs to His fold, 
 I should like to have been with Him then.” 
 
 The effect upon his listeners was at once perceptible, and 
 before he had sung through the four verses they were both 
 in tears. When he had finished, one of the gentlemen 
 inquired, ‘Where did you learn that hymn?” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 269 
 
 “At Sabbath school,” replied the boy. The reader will, of 
 course, expect to hear that the gentlemen bought the Re- 
 porter, and will not be sorry to learn that, in addition to 
 this, they presented him with a sum of money, and after 
 they had obtained his name and residence they allowed him 
 to go on his way. 
 
 No. 268. 
 “’M A POOR SINNER AND NOTHING AT ALL.” 
 
 In a parish in England, there was an old sailor who went 
 by the name of Jack. In going along the street one day he 
 heard a number of women singing: 
 
 “T’m a poor sinner and nothing at all; 
 But Jesus Christ is my all in all.” 
 
 The man gave up his drunkenness, and very soon gave up 
 his wickedness. At last he went to she minister and asked 
 to be admitted to church members?:p. The minister asked, 
 “What is your experience?” 
 
 “T have none,” said Jack. 
 
 “Well then, John, I cannot admit you.” 
 
 “Well,” said Jack, “I have no experience but that: 
 
 ‘I’m a poor sinner, and nothing at all, 
 But Jesus Christ is my all in all.’ ” 
 
 “Well,” said the minister, “I will ask the deacons about 
 your admission; but you will be expected to state your 
 experience.” 
 
 The deacons were assembled, and Jack was called on to 
 answer their questions, to which he always replied: 
 
 “T’m a poor sinner, and nothing at all, 
 But Jesus Christ is my all in all.” 
 
270 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 Says the old deacon, “That is not enough; tell us your 
 doubts and fears, and why you seek admission.” 
 
 “Nay,” says Jack, “I have no doubt at all that 
 
 ‘’'m a poor sinner, and nothing at all, 
 But Jesus Christ is my all in all.’ 
 
 and I don’t fear anything either, but 
 
 ‘’'m a poor sinner, and nothing at all, 
 But Jesus Christ is my all in all.’” 
 
 Jack was admitted and to the end led a Christian life. 
 
 No. 269. 
 “IN THINE OWN WAY, O GOD OF LOVE.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Watts, 1674—1748. 
 
 A beautiful fact in connection with singing is told of the 
 excellent George Whitefield. During the delivery of a ser- 
 mon in Boston on the wonders of creation, providence, and 
 redemption, a violent tempest of thunder and lightning came 
 on, which so alarmed the congregation that they sat in 
 breathless awe. The preacher closed his notebook, and step- 
 ping into one of the wings of the desk, fell on his knees, and 
 with much feeling, and fine taste, repeated from Dr. Watts: 
 
 “Hark, the Eternal rends the sky, 
 A mighty voice before Him goes, 
 A voice of music to His friends, 
 But threatening thunder to His foes. 
 
 “Come, children, to your Father’s arms, 
 Hide in the chambers of My grace, 
 
 Till the fierce storms be overblown, 
 And my revenging fury cease!” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 271 
 
 “Let us devoutly sing to the praise and glory of God this 
 hymn, Old Hundred.” The whole congregation immedi- 
 ately arose and poured forth the sacred song. By the time 
 the hymn was finished, the storm was hushed, and the sun, 
 bursting forth, showed the magnificent arch of peace. Re- 
 suming the desk, the preacher quoted, with admirable tact, 
 “Look upon the rainbow: praise Him That made it. Very 
 beautiful is it in the brightness thereof! It compasseth the 
 heaven about with a glorious circle; and the Hands of the 
 Most High have bended it.’’ The episode added intense 
 interest to the service. 
 
 No. 270. 
 “JESUS! THE NAME HIGH OVER ALL.” 
 
 Rev. CuHartes Wester, 1708—1788. 
 
 There was a little girl, a Sunday-school scholar, severely 
 scalded. She was taken to the hospital, and only survived 
 a short time. There lay the little sufferer, all her last night 
 on earth, in the doleful sick ward of that hospital; nothing 
 was heard to break the stillness of the hour, but the ticking 
 of the great clock. By and by there rose from her bed a 
 low, but sweet and beautiful melody: 
 
 “Jesus! the Name to sinners dear, 
 The Name to sinners given; 
 It scatters all their guilty fears; 
 It turns their hell to heaven.” 
 
 All was still again; nothing was heard but the ticking of the 
 great clock in the ward. At length the voice broke out 
 again, and even more sweet than before: 
 
 “Happy, if with my latest breath, 
 I may but gasp His Name; 
 Preach Him to all, and cry in death, 
 Behold, behold the Lamb!” 
 
272 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 The nurse hastened to the bedside, but she was too late; 
 angels had been there before, and the happy spirit of the 
 child had gone from singing “Behold the Lamb!” on earth, 
 to see Him in His glory above. 
 
 “Biblical Treasury.” 
 
 No. 271. 
 “GOD IS THE REFUGE OF HIS SAINTS.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Warts, 1674—1748. 
 
 An impressive scene took place in Tremont Temple, 
 Boston, a few days after the great fire in that city. The 
 meeting was in the main an assemblage of the city govern- 
 ment, the merchants, and the solid men of Boston. It was 
 opened by religious exercises, one of which was the singing 
 of ahymn. The selection was an impressive one, and it was 
 sung alike by cultivated voices and by voices unused to 
 singing, by men whose merchant palaces were still smoking 
 only a few steps from where they were uplifting their voices 
 in reverential awe to God. The hymn opened as follows: 
 
 “God is the Refuge of His saints, 
 When storms of dark distress invade; 
 Ere we can offer our complaints, 
 Behold Him present with His aid. 
 
 “Tet mountains from their seats be hurled 
 Down to the deep and buried there, 
 Convulsions shake the solid world, 
 Our faith shall never yield to fear.” 
 
 Thus far the hymn had rolled out fully and grandly, with 
 a majesty suited to the gravity of the occasion. But lower, 
 sweeter notes followed, and there was moisture in strong 
 men’s eyes. The stanza, so soothing, so tender, so refreshing, 
 yet full of feeling, began: 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 273 
 
 “There is a stream whose gentle flow, 
 Supplies the city of our God, 
 
 Life, love and joy, still gliding through, 
 And watering our divine abode.” 
 
 A little way from that place the hot streets, guarded by 
 soldiers, lay smoking in the noontide sun. The scorching 
 ashes, fanned anon by the complaining autumn wind filled 
 all the broad area from the foot of Beacon Hill to the 
 harbor. Marble columns lay broken and blackened, and 
 granite walls lay crumbling in the dust. Yet, weary with 
 watching the parched ground, the still consuming desolation 
 of fire, the merchants whose millions had vanished could 
 unite in a common bond of sympathy, and sing this verse 
 of confidence and faith. 
 
 No. 272. 
 “WE'RE TRAVELING HOME TO HEAVEN ABOVE.” 
 Rev. CHARLES WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 At the close of a prayer meeting at Charleston, in a public 
 hall, the pastor urged all who were present to join their 
 Christian band and march with them to the home of the 
 faithful and blest, and requested the congregation to sing 
 this hymn. It was sung with earnestness and power, and 
 as it rose and filled the hall, it reached the ears of a husband 
 and wife who were sleeping in a room above, and after lis- 
 tening to several verses, the woman sat up in bed and said, 
 “Yes, I will go.” 
 
 No. 273. 
 “COME WE WHO LOVE THE LORD.” 
 Rev. Isaac Watts, 1674—1748. 
 
 A young boy of twelve, named Arthur, had been con- 
 verted, and had lived a Christian life several months, when, 
 
274 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 one day, he yielded to passion, and threw a stone which 
 nearly killed a little playmate. His sufferings from remorse 
 and penitence for that harm that he had done and the dis- 
 honor he had cast upon his Savior were intense, and at the 
 class meeting several days after, his sorrow was still so deep 
 that he could not speak when called upon, and his father 
 spoke for him. During the meeting the hymn had been 
 sung, in which occurs the verse: 
 
 “The hill of Zion yields 
 A thousand sacred sweets,” 
 
 Just before the meeting closed, Arthur said, earnestly, 
 through his tears, “I’m trying to climb up that Zion’s hill.” 
 This incident was the basis of the familiar Sunday-school 
 hymn: 
 “Y’m trying to climb up Zion’s hill, 
 For the Savior whispers ‘Love me.’ ”’ 
 
 The Rev. Joseph Slattarie, of Chatham, England, was 
 once walking in that town, when his attention was arrested 
 by a youthful voice singing: 
 
 “The sorrows of the mind 
 Be banished from the place! 
 Religion never was designed 
 To make our pleasures less.” 
 
 Pleased alike with the sweetness of the voice and the 
 cheerful tones in which the verse was sung, he looked around 
 to see whence the singing proceeded; but for some time he 
 looked in vain. At length he saw a little sweep with his 
 head popping out of a chimney and waving with a sort of 
 triumph his brush over his head. ‘Oh,’ said the venerable 
 minister, in relating the incident, “It made me weep in 
 gratitude to think how singing the praises of God con- 
 tributes to make even a poor chimney-sweep happy.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 275 
 
 “Some impressions,” says a young man, who went out as 
 a missionary to the heathen, “of the importance and neces- 
 sity of true religion, were made upon my mind, at a very 
 early period. The first particular one that I recollect was, 
 I think, when I was about five years of age. There hap- 
 pened one day a very vivid storm of thunder and lightning 
 in our neighborhood; on which occasion a few Christian 
 friends, who lived near us, terrified by its violence, came 
 into my father’s house. When under his roof, in a moment 
 there came a most vivid flash, followed by a dreadful peal 
 of thunder, which much alarmed the whole company, except 
 my father, whe, turning toward my mother and our friends, 
 with the greatest composure, repeated those words of Dr. 
 Watts: 
 
 “The God That rules on high, 
 And thunders when He please, 
 That rides upon the stormy sky, 
 And manages the seas. 
 
 “This awful God is ours, 
 Our Father and our Love, 
 He shall send down His heavenry powers 
 ‘To carry us above.” 
 
 These words, accompanied by such circumstances, sunk 
 deep into my heart. I thought how safe and happy are 
 those who have the great God for their Father and Friend; 
 but being conscious that I had sinned against Him, I was 
 afraid He was not my Father, and that instead of loving 
 me, He was angry with me. And this for some time after 
 continued to disturb and grieve my mind. He then pro- 
 ceeds to say that those early impressions were succeeded by 
 others which terminated in his conversion.” 
 
 “Arvine’s Cyclopedia.” 
 
276: STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 274. 
 “THE GOD OF ABRAM PRAISE.” 
 
 Rev. THomas OLtivers, 1725—1799. 
 
 The late Rev. T. M. Eddy, D.D., passing through the 
 streets of Baltimore, saw an aged and feeble colored man 
 sawing some hard wood by the side of the road. Feeling 
 that the colored man’s lot was a hard one, as he contrasted 
 his age and feebleness with the hardness of the work to be 
 done, he approached him to speak a few kind and encourag- 
 ing words. But drawing near he heard the old man singing 
 softly and sweetly the words: 
 
 “The God of Abram praise, 
 
 Whose all-sufficient grace 
 
 Shall guide me all my happy days 
 In all His ways: 
 
 He calls a worm His friend, 
 
 He calls Himself my God! 
 
 And He shall save me to the end, 
 Through Jesus’ Blood.” 
 
 The Doctor passed on, saying, “He is rich; he has a better 
 friend than I could be, and he is safe.” 
 
 No. 275. 
 “HOW HAPPY EVERY CHILD OF GRACE.” 
 
 Rev. CHarLes WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 A little girl, sobbing as though her heart would break, 
 while the warm gushing tears rolled down her cheeks, 
 went forward to, and knelt down at, an altar, saying, 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 277 
 
 “T’m so wicked, I want you to pray for me.” Soon after 
 she arose, her face shining with a heavenly radiance, and 
 sang: 
 “How happy every child of grace 
 Who knows his sins forgiven!” 
 
 People said, “She is only a child, she will soon get over 
 it.” But she did not. She kept on singing. And some 
 time afterward, when her mother had company, she came 
 into the room as happy as a lark, singing this same hymn. 
 Her mother said, “You ought not to sing in company.” 
 But she replied, “I can’t help it; it sings itself.” 
 
 No. 276. 
 “NOW THAT THE SUN IS GLEAMING BRIGHT.” 
 
 Rey. Joun Henry Newman, 1801. 
 
 It adds interest to the translation of this hymn to know 
 that the original was sung by the death-bed of William 
 the Conqueror, in the year 1087. His closing hours formed 
 a night of half sleep, half stupor, the struggling expiring 
 body taking a dull, painful, broken rest before its long 
 earthly repose; but as the sun was just rising above the 
 horizon, shedding brightness on the walls of the apartment, 
 William was aroused by the tolling of the great cathedral 
 bell, and inquired what the sound meant. “It is the hour 
 of praise,” was the answer of his attendants. Then were 
 the priesthood in full choir welcoming with voices of glad- 
 ness the renewed gift of another day, in the words of the 
 hymn which Cardinal Newman translates as above, but 
 before the close of the hymn William the Conqueror was 
 dead. 
 
278 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 277. 
 
 “LATE, LATE, SO LATE! AND DARK THE NIGHT AND 
 CHILL.” 
 
 ALFRED TENNYSON, 1809—1892. 
 
 This hymn with its refrain, “Too late! Ye cannot enter 
 now,” was sung in a certain church and deeply impressed 
 a lady who heard it. The next night in coming to the meet- 
 ing, she was late, and the crowd was so great that she 
 could not get in. The Spirit seemed to whisper to her, 
 “What if this was the door of heaven, and you—too late?” 
 She went home deeply thoughtful, and that night gave her 
 heart to God and became a happy Christian. 
 
 No. 278. 
 “JESUS LOVES ME THIS I KNOW.” 
 
 Miss ANNA WarRNER, 1822. 
 
 One Sunday a man came into a Sunday school at the 
 Boston North End Mission, drawn by the sweetness of 
 the children’s singing. He remained until the close, and 
 came again that evening to the prayer meeting. When 
 the customary invitation to seek the Savior was given, he 
 came forward and found peace in believing. To a few 
 of the workers who remained to pray with the penitent 
 seekers, he said, “My friends, I feel that I’m a saved man, 
 and I owe it to your children’s singing, ‘Jesus loves me,’ 
 this afternoon. I couldn’t realize it, I’ve been such a 
 miserable sinner: but after I went away I thought it 
 over, ‘Jesus loves me;’ and then I thought of the next line, 
 ‘For the Bible tells me so,’ and I tried to believe it, and 
 I came here this evening to get you to pray for me.” He 
 became a regular attendant at the Mission, and while there 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 279 
 
 gave the clearest evidence of a genuine change of heart. 
 He afterward felt called to enter the ministry, and after 
 preparation, did so and became an active pastor of a 
 Massachusetts church. 
 
 Dr. E. TourJEs. 
 
 No. 279. 
 “MY LATEST SUN IS SINKING FAST.” 
 
 Rev. JEFFERSON: Hascauu, 1807. 
 
 “Once I was detained after prayer-meeting with a few 
 others, to converse and pray with a young woman who was 
 under deep conviction, and who refused to go away from 
 the place of prayer until she had found Jesus. It seemed 
 to be all in vain that I talked with her, explaining the 
 atonement, quoting the simplest and strongest promises of 
 the Gospel, and urging her to an immediate and simple 
 faith; it was all in vain that I prayed with and for her. 
 At last, because, as it seemed, I could do nothing else, I 
 began to sing that little hymn, the last verse of which goes: 
 
 “O bear my longing heart to Him 
 Who bled and died for me; 
 Whose Blood now.cleanses from all sin, 
 And gives me victory.” 
 
 We had sung the whole hymn through and were hushed 
 into silence by the Spirit. . During the singing of the last 
 stanza, our friend had lifted her weeping face toward mine, 
 and was looking intently and eagerly at me, as though she 
 would fain drink in the words and power of the song. And 
 now, in the hush that was upon us, reaching out both her 
 hands to me, she said, in a plaintive kind of whisper, 
 “Please sing that last verse again.” And again we sang 
 softly and tenderly: 
 
280 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “OQ, bear my longing heart to Him 
 Who bled and died for me; 
 
 Whose Blood now cleanses from all sin, 
 And gives me victory.” 
 
 As the words and melody died away, the expression of 
 her face changed; the darkness was overpast, and the 
 light and gladness of His peace had come in the place of 
 it; and with a cry of joy she turned and flung herself into 
 the arms of her sister, who was standing near, exclaiming, 
 “T am saved! I am saved ! Oh blessed Jesus.” 
 
 Rev. G. F. PENTECOST. 
 
 No. 280. 
 “JESUS, LOVER OF MY SOUL.” 
 
 Rev. CHartes WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 A poor woman, who had no hope in Christ, was dying 
 in the attic of one of the tenement houses of New York. 
 A minister was sent for, but his words and prayers failed 
 to give her hope. She said again and again as he talked to 
 her, “It’s no use; I’m too wicked, and it’s too late.” 
 
 At length he began to sing, “Jesus, Lover of my soul,” 
 and sang two verses. Noticing her deep interest, he turned 
 to her and said, “Can’t you trust Him now?” 
 
 With a smile of joy she replied, “Other refuge have I 
 none.” Her happy face showed her acceptance of Jesus. 
 
 Several years ago a ship was burned near the English 
 Channel. Among the passengers were a father, mother, 
 and their little child, a daughter not many months old. 
 When the discovery was made that the ship was on fire, 
 and the alarm was given, there was great confusion, and the 
 family became separated. The father was rescued and 
 taken to Liverpool; but the mother and infant were carried 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 281 
 
 overboard by the crowd, and, unnoticed by those who were 
 doing all in their power to save the sufferers still on the 
 ship, they drifted out of the Channel with the tide, the 
 mother clinging to a fragment of the wreck with her little 
 one clasped to her breast. Late in the afternoon of that 
 day, a vessel bound from Newport, Wales, to America, was 
 moving slowly along in her course. There was only a 
 slight breeze, and the captain was impatiently walking 
 the deck when his attention was called to an object some 
 distance off, which looked like a person in the water. The 
 officers and crew watched it for a time, and as no vessel 
 was near from which anyone could have fallen overboard, 
 they thought it impossible to be a human being. The 
 captain sent a boat, which was watched with deepest inter- 
 est from the ship. As the boat approached the object 
 floating, suddenly the sound of a gentle voice was heard 
 so softly singing, and the sailors listened to the words of 
 the first verse: 
 
 “Jesus, Lover of my soul, 
 Let me to Thy bosom fly, 
 While the nearer waters roll, 
 While the tempest still is high! 
 Hide me, O my Savior, hide, 
 Till the storm of life is past; 
 Safe into the haven guide, 
 O receive my soul at last!” 
 
 Soon the rescued mother and child were safe on board the 
 ship, and ultimately reached America. The father joined 
 them four months afterward. 
 
 In the winter of 1872, Mr. Charles Trumbull White, being 
 engaged in hospital work of a religious character, visited 
 Bellevue Hospital, New York City. He was specially urged 
 by the attendant to see an English sailor in one of the wards, 
 who was near death. The man was found to be fast going, 
 
282 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 and unable to articulate. Mr. White, therefore, leaned 
 down and repeated, so that he might hear them, the words 
 of this hymn. To all appearance they were uttered to the 
 “dull cold ear of death,” and he departed, feeling as though 
 he had failed to secure the least response. About midnight, 
 however, of the same night, this unknown sailor seemed to 
 arouse. He sat up in his cot, and with a clearly audible 
 voice he spoke the words: 
 
 “Jesus, Lover of my soul, 
 
 Let me to Thy bosom fly,” 
 and continued until he had repeated the entire hymn. He 
 then added other verses of hymns for several minutes, but 
 ceased suddenly, fell back, and was dead. Who can tell 
 how great a bridge had been thrown by those familiar 
 words across the gulf of memory, and how great a comfort 
 they may have brought to his dying hour? 
 
 Rev. 8. W. Durriexp, 1x English Hymns. 
 
 Rey. Mr. Spurgeon relates that an ungodly stranger once 
 stepping into one of his services at Exeter Hall was brought 
 to the Cross by the words of Wesley’s hymn: 
 
 “Jesus, Lover of my soul.” 
 
 “Does Jesus love me?” said he. “Then why should I 
 live in enmity to Him?” And he became a Christian. 
 
 A party of Northern tourists formed part of a large 
 company gathered on the deck of an excursion steamer 
 that was moving slowly down the historic Potomac one 
 beautiful evening in the summer of 1881. A gentleman, who 
 has since gained a national reputation as an evangelist 
 of song, had been delighting the party with the happy ren- 
 dering of many favorite hymns, the last being the sweet 
 petition so dear to every Christian heart, “Jesus, Lover of 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 283 
 
 my soul.” The singer gave the first two verses with much 
 feeling, and a peculiar emphasis upon the concluding lines 
 that thrilled every heart. A hush had fallen upon the 
 listeners that was not broken for some seconds after the 
 musical notes had died away. Then a gentleman made his 
 way from the outskirts of the crowd to the side of the 
 singer and accosted him with, “Beg your pardon, stranger, 
 but were you actively engaged in the late war?” 
 
 “Yes, sir,’ the man of song answered courteously; “I 
 fought under General Grant.” 
 
 “Well,” the first speaker continued with something like 
 a sigh, “I did my fighting on the other side, and think, 
 indeed, am quite sure, I was very near you one bright 
 night eighteen years ago this very month. It was such a 
 night as this. If I am not mistaken, you were on guard 
 duty. We of the South had sharp business on hand, and 
 you were of the enemy. I crept near your post of duty, 
 my murderous weapon in my hand; the shadow hid me. 
 As you paced back and forth you were humming the tune 
 of the hymn you have just sung. I raised my gun and aimed 
 at your heart, and I had been selected by our commander 
 for the work because I was a sure shot. Then out upon 
 the night rang the words: 
 
 ‘Cover my defenceless head 
 With the shadow of Thy wing.’ 
 
 Your prayer was answered. I couldn’t fire after that, and 
 there was no attack made upon your camp that night. I 
 felt. sure when I heard you sing this evening that you were 
 the man whose life I was spared from taking.” 
 
 The singer grasped the hand of the Southerner and said 
 with much emotion: “I remember the night very weil, 
 and distinctly the feeling of depression and loneliness with 
 which I went forth to my duty. I knew my post was one 
 of great danger, and I was more dejected than I remember 
 
 ~to have been at any other time during the service. I paced 
 
284 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 my lonely beat, thinking of home and friends and all that 
 life holds dear. Then the thought of God’s eare for alt 
 that He has created came to me with peculiar force. If 
 He so cares for the sparrow, how much more for man 
 created in His own image; and I sang the prayer of my 
 heart and ceased to feel alone. How the prayer was 
 answered I never knew until this evening. ‘Jesus, Lover 
 of my soul’ has always been a favorite hymn with me; 
 now it will be inexpressibly dear.” 
 
 This incident is related by a lady who was one of the 
 party on the steamer. 
 
 London Freeman. 
 
 No. 281. 
 
 “LORD, I HEAR OF SHOWERS OF BLESSING.” 
 
 Mrs. EvizasetH CopNer. 
 
 Mrs. Codner is the wife of an English clergyman. In 
 the year 1860 some of her young friends had been greatly 
 interested in an account of revival work to which they 
 had listened. She was anxious that they themselves might 
 receive a blessing from it and wrote for them this hymn. 
 She says, “I longed to press upon them an earnest individual 
 appeal. - Without effort, the words seemed to be given me, 
 and they took the form of a hymn. I had no thought of 
 sending it beyond the limit of my own circle, but passing 
 it on to one and another, it became a word of power, and 
 I then published it as a leaflet, 
 
 No. 282. 
 “QO MASTER IT IS GOOD TO BE.” 
 
 Rev. ArtHurR PewryHN STaNuey, 1815—1881. 
 
 That is a very pretty and a very helpful story that is 
 told in “Tom Brown’s School Days,” of the new boy who 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 285 
 
 was made Tom’s chum, and whose name was Arthur. He 
 was a home-loving boy and nearly cried when Tom told 
 him he mustn’t talk about his home or his mother before 
 the other boys, because they would call him names if he 
 did. And then Arthur drew upon himself the attention of 
 the whole room full of boys by washing his face before 
 he went to bed. And then when he had washed and un- 
 dressed and put his night gown on, right there in the room 
 with its twelve beds and its twelve boys, all laughing and 
 talking, with the light burning brightly, Arthur kneeled 
 down beside his own bed and said his prayers. Tom’s back 
 was turned, and so at first he didn’t see what Arthur was 
 doing, but he heard the sneers and the laughs from the other 
 beds, and he saw a slipper come flying over from the middle 
 of the room, and then he saw it all; and in an instant the 
 boot he had just taken off went flying straight for the head 
 of the bully who had thrown the slipper. And then the 
 lights went out, and Tom lay thinking, and a great pano- 
 rama passed before his eyes. He saw his old home, and his 
 mother, and he heard her voice and his own, as he promised 
 her that he would never go to bed until he had knelt and 
 asked God to keep him; and he remembered how that 
 promise had been broken; and the next night he knelt too, 
 and then other boys did; and so by the courage of the little 
 newcomer Arthur, the whole school was changed. Arthur 
 grew up, and when he had become a clergyman of the Church 
 of England, he wrote this hymn. 
 
 No. 288. 
 “CAST THY BREAD UPON THE WATERS.” 
 
 Rev. Puorse A. HAanarorp, 1829. 
 
 The author of this hymn is a married lady and yet the 
 pastor of a Universalist church. She has a record quite 
 unique as a breaker down of traditional customs, She 
 
286 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 was the first woman who ever offered an ordaining prayer; 
 the first woman to exchange pulpits with her own son; the 
 first woman to officiate at the marriage of her own daughter; 
 the first woman regularly ordained to the ministry in 
 Massachusetts or in New England; the first woman to serve 
 as chaplain of the Connecticut Legislature; the first woman 
 to attend a Masonic festival and to respond by invitation 
 to a toast. I have no doubt she can truthfully add that 
 she is the first “woman minister,” as she calls herself, to 
 write a hymn. She wrote an autobiography and never 
 mentioned in it her husband’s name. 
 
 No. 284. 
 “I HEAR THE SAVIOR SAY.” 
 Mrs. Exvina Masen Hat, 1818. 
 
 I am afraid that the circumstances under which this 
 hymn was written will not increase your respect for its 
 author, even if it does not lessen your love for the hymn. 
 John Ryland composed a hymn while sitting in the pulpit 
 listening to a sermon by a brother minister whom he had 
 invited to preach for him, and it never seemed to me quite 
 courteous to the preacher, if it was respectful of the occa- 
 sion. But what shall we say of the author of this hymn, 
 who, in the spring of 1865, sat in the choir of a Methodist 
 church in Baltimore, and while the minister was praying, 
 scribbled the words on the fly leaf of a copy of the “New 
 Lute of Zion.” 
 
 No. 285. 
 “JESUS, THE NAME HIGH OVER ALL.” 
 Rev. CHartes Wester, 1708—1788. 
 
 Charles Wesley was once preaching in a little church in 
 Cornwall, England, among the miners, and was condemning 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 287 
 
 in no uncertain words the drunken revels of the people, 
 when a man arose in the congregation, and with some pro- 
 fanity disputed the preacher’s words. Mr. Wesley ex- 
 claimed, “Who is this that pleads for the devil!” and the 
 man stepped out boldly before the congregation. Mr. 
 Wesley immediately addressed his words tw this man him- 
 self, exposing and rebuking his wickedness in such withering 
 words as drove the man clear out of the room. This hymn 
 is said to have been written to commemorate this victory. 
 
 No. 286. 
 “WESLEY’S HYMNS FOR CHILDREN.” 
 
 In No. 212 will be found a note on Watts’ “Divine and 
 Moral Songs.” The Wesleys, who came a little later in 
 the century, bestowed rather faint praise on the children’s 
 hymns of Watts, by saying, “There are two ways of writing 
 or speaking to children; the one is to let ourselves down 
 to them, the other to lift them up to us.” Dr. Watts has 
 written in the former way, and has succeeded admirably 
 well, speaking to children as children, and leaving them as 
 he found them. And then they go on to describe a little 
 book of hymns they themselves have published with an 
 easy self-adulation that is quite refreshing. “The following 
 hymns,” they say, “are written on the other plan; they 
 contain strong and manly sense: yet expressed in such 
 plain and easy language as even children may understand. 
 But when they do understand them, they will be children 
 no longer, only in years and stature.” But the “Children’s 
 Hymn Book” of the Wesleys, even with their great name 
 and fame to help it, fell quite flat, and is now among the 
 very rare books only to be found in library collections, 
 while the “Divine and Moral Songs” of Watts, who “let 
 himself down to the children,’ can be bought today, a 
 century and a half after they were written, at almost any 
 book store. And yet some of Mr. Wesley’s hymns for 
 
288 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 children are good, and to be found in many of the hymnals 
 now in use. Here is a list of them all written by Rev. 
 Charles Wesley: 
 
 “And am I born to die?” 
 
 “And am I only born to die?” 
 
 “And must I be to judgment brought?” 
 “Captain of our salvation, take.” 
 
 “Come Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.” 
 “Glorious God, accept a heart.” 
 
 “Hail Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.” 
 “Loving Jesus! Gentle Lamb!” 
 
 “Maker, Savior of mankind.” 
 
 “O all-creating God.” 
 
 “O Thou That would’st not have.” 
 
 “Thou the great eternal God.” 
 
 “Thou my God art good and wise.” 
 “Where shall true believers go?” 
 “Young men and maidens raise.” 
 “Teacher, Guide of young beginners.” 
 “God is goodness, wisdom, power.” 
 “Holy Child of heavenly birth.” 
 
 “Let children proclaim their Savior and King.” 
 “O Father of all, the great and the small.” 
 “Gentle Jesus, meek and mild.” 
 
 “Come let us join the hosts above.” 
 “Happy beyond description he.” 
 
 “Come let us join with one accord.” 
 “Happy man whom God doth aid.” 
 _“But who is sufficient to lead?” 
 
 “Let all that breathe Jehovah’s praise.” 
 “Good Thou art and good Thou dost.” 
 
 = 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH ‘289 
 
 A great many years ago an English father, whose daugh- 
 ter was away from home at school, wrote in a letter to her, 
 “Buy of Mr. Evans, Mr. Wesley’s ‘Hymns for Children’ 
 and get them by heart. I will pay for the book and give 
 you a penny for each hymn you learn, which I believe will 
 amount to nearly four shillings. These hymns afforded 
 much comfort to your sister Peggy, who is now in heaven.” 
 
 No. 287. 
 “WHERE SHALL MY WONDERING SOUL BEGIN?” 
 “AND CAN IT BE THAT I SHOULD GAIN?”—1738. 
 
 Rey. CHARLES WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 The conversion of Charles Wesley marks an epoch in 
 the religious history of the world as remarkable as that 
 which dates from the conversion of “Saul of Tarsus.” It 
 occurred on May 21, 1728, and two days later he wrote 
 in his journal, “At nine I began a hymn on my conversion 
 but was persuaded to break off for fear of pride : 
 I prayed Christ to stand by me, and finished the hymn.” 
 Thus the spiritual life that became one of the mightiest 
 influences for good in Great Britain, and which in the great 
 denomination of which he was one of the founders, has 
 become a tremendous ‘religious power the world over, ex- 
 erted its first activity in composing a hymn; and this hymn 
 writing did not stop until the author had given to the world 
 nearly seven thousand more. 
 
 Both the hymns of which the first lines are named were 
 written at that time, and it is not known to which Wesley 
 referred in his journal. 
 
290 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 288. 
 “OQ, WHERE SHALL REST BE FOUND?” 
 “PEOPLE.OF THE LIVING GOD.” 
 
 JAMES MontcomeEnry, 1771—1854. 
 
 I place these two hymns together because each is the 
 expression of an actual experience of the author, and because 
 one answers a question which the other asks. When Mont- 
 gomery was about thirty-six years of age (in 1807) he was 
 in great distress of mind—dissatisfied with himself—at peace 
 neither with God nor with his own conscience. At this 
 time and in the midst of this experience he wrote the 
 hymn: 
 
 “O where shall rest be found 
 Rest for the weary soul?” 
 
 After seven years of doubt and uncertainty, he turned at 
 last back to the Savior of whom his pious parents had 
 taught him, and whom he himself had in his youth accepted, 
 and was readmitted into the church, of which he first be- 
 came a member while a boy. And then under the influence 
 of this new experience he wrote the words which answer 
 the question of his earlier hymn: 
 
 “People of the Living God, 
 I have sought the world around, 
 Paths of sin and sorrow trod, 
 Peace and comfort nowhere found. 
 Now to you my spirit turns— 
 Turns a fugitive unblest; 
 Brethren when your altar burns, 
 O receive me into rest.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 291 
 
 No. 289. 
 “GRACIOUS SPIRIT, DOVE DIVINE!” 
 
 JOHN STOCKER. 
 
 During the latter half of the last century there was 
 published at London a monthly called the Gospel Magazine. 
 Each number contained the portrait of some well-known 
 minister, articles of interest to the religious public, quite 
 often a hymn tune composed for it, and at the end of each 
 number there were several pages of religious poetry. In 
 one of the numbers of the year 1776 (the year this nation 
 was born) there appeared this hymn, signed J. Stocker. 
 The writer lived at Honiton, in Devonshire, and this is 
 all we know of him. Not quite all, though, for during that 
 ~ year and the next he sent to this magazine eight other pieces, 
 all good Gospel hymns, and two of them have found frequent 
 place in the hymn collections of the present day. From 
 these hymns we can gain some idea of their author’s talent, 
 his education, and his spirit. Draw for yourselves the 
 picture of John Stocker’s face while I read to you one of 
 his quaint old hymns that, for my part, I should very much 
 like to see restored to its place in our hymnals: 
 
 - 1. “Thy mercy, my God, is the theme of my song, 
 The joy of my heart, and the boast of my tongue; 
 Thy free grace alone, from the first to the last, 
 Hath won my affections, and bound my soul fast. 
 
 2. “Without Thy sweet mercy, I could not live here, 
 Sin soon would reduce me to utter despair; 
 But, through Thy free goodness, my spirits revive, 
 And He That first made me, still keeps me alive. 
 
 3. “Thy mercy is more than a match for my heart, 
 Which wonders to feel its own hardness depart; 
 Dissolv’d by Thy goodness, I fall to the ground, 
 And weep to the praise of the mercy I found. 
 
292 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 4. “The door of Thy mercy stands open all day 
 To the poor and the needy, who knock by the way; 
 No sinner shall ever be empty sent back, 
 Who comes seeking mercy for Jesus’ sake. 
 
 5. “Thy mercy in Jesus exempts me from hell; 
 Its glories I'll sing, and its wonders I’ll tell: 
 "Twas Jesus, my friend, when he hung on the tree, 
 Who opened the channel of mercy for me. 
 
 6. “Great Father of mercies! Thy goodness I own, 
 And the covenant love of Thy crucified Son: 
 All praise to the Spirit, Whose whisper divine, 
 Seals mercy and pardon and righteousness mine!” 
 
 No. 290. 
 
 “WHEN ISRAEL FREED FROM PHARAOH’S 
 HAND”—1712. 
 
 Rev. Isaac Warts, 1674—1748. 
 
 Every Saturday in the Spectator (for account of which 
 see No. 49), Joseph Addison published some religious article 
 usually ending with a hymn. These fell under the eye of 
 Dr. Watts, who wrote a letter to the editor in which he 
 said, “Upon reading the hymns that you have published in 
 some late dates, I had a mind to try yesterday whether I 
 could write one. The One Hundred and Fourteenth Psalm 
 appears to me an admirable ode, and I began to turn it 
 into our language. If the following essay be not too incor- 
 rigible, bestow upon it a few brightenings from your genius, 
 that I may learn how to write better or write no more.” 
 Then follows this rendering of that Psalm. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 293 
 
 No. 291. 
 “THERE IS A FOUNTAIN FILLED WITH BLOOD.” 
 
 WiuuiaM Cowper, 1731—1800. 
 
 A poor Sabbath scholar has fallen down a hatchway and 
 broken his hip. The doctor says he is internally injured, 
 and that he cannot help him. The boy’s teacher is sent for, 
 and is surprised at the greeting he receives. ‘Teacher, you 
 are just in time to hear my great joy; I am going home to 
 Jesus.” : 
 
 “T did not know you ever thought of such things, John; 
 how long have you felt so?” 
 
 “Dear teacher, you never asked me; I have been longing 
 to have you for six months. Now sing my favorite hymn 
 with me, dear teacher.” And while they sang the words: 
 
 “And sinners plunged beneath that flood, 
 Lose all their guilty stains.” 
 
 the messenger came to call the lad home. 
 
 “Full sweetly on the evening air, 
 Rang out the well-known strains, 
 ‘There is a fountain filled with blood 
 ~ Drawn from Immanuel’s veins, 
 And sinners, plunged beneath that flood, 
 Lose all their guilty stains.’ 
 
 “Thus sang a little company, 
 Whose hearts by grace renewed, 
 Had gathered in an upper room 
 ‘To tell their gratitude 
 To Him, by Whose atoning love, 
 Their sins had been subdued. 
 
294 
 
 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “A weary man who passed that way, 
 Bowed down with weight of sin, 
 Who long had asked how such as he 
 Relief and rest might win, 
 Heard the glad sound, so sweet, so clear 
 Amid the city’s din. 
 
 “A wand ’rer on that city’s streets, 
 And bound he knew not where, 
 He turned aside to seek the place, 
 Entered, and climbed the stair, 
 Intently list’ning as he rose, 
 To words, to him so rare. 
 
 “The dying thief rejoiced to see 
 That fountain in his day, 
 And there may I, . . . ‘O what is this! 
 A thief, a thief, they. say;’ 
 ‘And there may I, though vile as he, 
 Wash all my sins away.’ 
 
 “As thus he speaks, the room he finds, 
 And, e’er in prayer they bow, 
 He cries, ‘Oh, friends, for me so lost, 
 Plead you for mercy now.’ 
 They bid him pray; ‘Alas,’ he says, 
 ‘To pray, I know not how.’ 
 
 “But taught by loving lips the way, 
 He learns to pray at last, 
 And on the Saviour of the lost 
 His weight of guilt to cast; 
 As from his contrite heart goes up 
 The prayer of ages past— 
 
 ““O God, be merciful to me, 
 
 A sinner, Lord, am I; 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 295 
 
 In my despair and helplessness, 
 To Thee, O Lord, I ery: 
 
 Lost, helpless, ruined, hear my prayer, 
 Lord, save me, or I die.’ 
 
 “The God Who heard the publican, 
 Heard this heart’s honest prayer, 
 And he who came a child of wrath, 
 In sorrow and despair, 
 Went forth a free and happy man, 
 And God’s own’ child and heir. 
 
 “OQ ye who have the art of song, 
 The talent ye possess, 
 Ye well may consecrate to God; 
 How would you dare do less? 
 If used for Him, O who can say 
 How greatly He may bless?” 
 R. M. Orrorp, in New York Observer. 
 
 Dr. Dashiell, in his “Pastor’s Recollections,” tells an 
 affecting story ef the power of this hymn upon the heart of 
 a skeptic. He had been called to visit a family where the 
 little child had just died. He found the father a man 
 of violent prejudices against religion, especially against 
 clergymen, owing to the unworthy conduct of a former 
 ministerial friend. Persevering in his efforts to secure an 
 influence with this very unpromising person, Dr. Dashiell 
 relates that the first point of contact was this hymn. His 
 early associations had endeared it to him, and he had never 
 ceased to admire and love it in spite of his infidel opinions. 
 After a considerable length of time, the skeptic met with 
 a severe injury—his arm being drawn into machinery and 
 crushed so that amputation was necessary. It was at first 
 very doubtful if the patient would rally, but finally he was 
 heard to murmur something, and as Dr. Dashiell bent over 
 him to catch the words, he distinctly caught the language 
 of the stanza: 
 
296 STORIES OF TH GREAT 
 
 “The dying thief rejoiced to see, 
 That fountain in his day, 
 
 And there may I, though vile as he, 
 Wash all my sins away.” 
 
 It was a confession of faith on what seemed—though 
 
 providentially it was not—the very edge of death.” 
 “English Hymns.” 
 
 Rev. H. M. Gallaher, a Baptist minister, relates the 
 following incident. ‘During the War of the Rebellion in 
 America—and I know something about it—I stood and 
 looked at a dying soldier—not wounded, but perishing of 
 pneumonia. I asked him if I could do anything for him. 
 
 “He said, ‘I want you to read to me.’ 
 
 *T did so, and asked him what next. ‘Will you pray for 
 me?’ 
 
 “T prayed. Looking again, I saw his lips move, and had to 
 get very close to hear his answer. ‘Can I do anything else 
 for you?’ 
 
 “Yes, sir, Can you sing?’ So I sang for him: 
 
 ‘There is a land of pure delight, 
 Where saints immortal reign.’ 
 
 and then stopped. He was looking upward, and asked me 
 to continue. Then I sang: 
 
 ‘There is a fountain filled with blood, 
 Drawn from Immanuel’s veins.’ 
 
 He asked me: ‘Will you sing that over again?’ 
 
 “Supposing he meant the first one, I said, ‘Which? About 
 that “land of pure delight?” ’ 
 
 ““No, sir; sing that about the “fountain filled with 
 blood.’ ” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 297 
 
 At a meeting in City Road Chapel, London, to consider 
 the wants of the neglected poor of the great city, John 
 Boynton, a minister, related how a blaspheming scoffer 
 took his stand by the statue of Lord Bute in Cardiff, and 
 began an infidel harangue to a crowd of working men who 
 gathered about him. When he had finished, a railway porter 
 stepped up in front and said: “Aren’t you going to sing 
 before yOu go away?” 
 
 “Oh, no,” was the reply, “we don’t sing.” 
 
 “WwW ell, I do,” said the porter, and he struck up at once 
 a verse of Cowper’ s familiar hymn: 
 
 “The dying thief rejoiced to see 
 That fountain in his day; 
 And there have I, though vile as he, 
 Washed all my sins away.” 
 
 On the next night he met the same speaker and the same 
 assembly at the same place with a powerful accordion under 
 his arm. By the attractive and spiritual singing, with its 
 musical accompaniment, he entirely drew away the audi- 
 ence from the infidel speaker and sang to them the gospel 
 of Jesus Christ, to their delight and profit.” 
 
 St. Louis Christian Advocate, November 11, 1885. 
 
 i) Miranda N says a Christian pastor, was about eigh- 
 teen years of age, " much distinguished for personal beauty, 
 but more for uncommon sweetness of disposition and great 
 amiableness of deportment. There was not probably among 
 all the people of my charge, one whose case would have been 
 more promptly cited, and perhaps none so effectively, to 
 disprove the doctrine of the entire sinfulness of the unregen- 
 erate heart. She was deservedly a general favorite. She 
 seemed to entertain the kindest affection toward all, and 
 every one who knew her, loved her. One evening at an 
 inquiry meeting, held at my house, I noticed in a full room, 
 
 
 
298 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 a female in great apparent distress. The disturbance she 
 made by her loud sobs, and frequent and painful interrup- 
 tion of the silence of the room, induced me to pass by 
 others, and go to her at once. On coming to her seat, I 
 was not a little surprised to find myself by the side of 
 Miranda. The first inquiry I put to her was this: “What 
 has brought you here, Miranda?” 
 
 With emphasis sie replied, “My sins, sir.” 
 
 With a view to testing the reality~and depth of her 
 convictions, I then said, “But what have you done, which 
 makes either your heart or your life appear so heinously 
 sinful?” 
 
 At the second question she broke out in a voice that 
 reached the extreme part of the room and thrilled through 
 every heart, for she was known and loved by every person 
 there: “I hate God, and I know it. I hate Christians, and 
 I know-2t... I hate my own being; oh that I had never been 
 born!” As she uttered this acknowledgment, she arose and 
 left the room in irrepressible agony. Deeply as I was inter- 
 ested in her case, I could not follow her and leave the 
 many with whom | had yet to converse: but conducted her 
 across the hall into the opposite room, where Mrs. 8 
 was employed in attendance upon a sick child. The re- 
 mainder of the narrative I received from Mrs. S After 
 a little conversation, as I was informed, between Mrs. $ 
 and Miranda, who was walking the room in great distress, 
 her eye lighted upon a copy of “Village Hymns,” which lay 
 upon the sideboard. She eagerly caught it up and read at 
 the first page to which she opened, these words: 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 “There is a fountain filled with blood, 
 Drawn from Immanuel’s veins; 
 And sinners plunged beneath that flood, 
 Lose all their guilty stains.” 
 
 As she finished this verse she dropped the book and ex- 
 claimed, “I have found my Savior! This is the Savior I 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 299 
 
 need. O precious Savior.” And many other expressions of 
 the same kind. Her enmity to God was gone. Her burden 
 was removed. Christ was all in all to her.” 
 
 Arvine’s “Cyclopedia.” 
 
 “During the move on Atlanta, I was coming back from 
 the front, when I learned that there was no chaplain in 
 either of the two hospitals. I therefore determined to forego 
 business at Chattanooga and stop over. There were many 
 low cases, and among them an Indiana soldier sent for me in 
 the night. He was dying,—a fair-haired youth of eighteen 
 years. His leg had been cut off by a shell, and amputation 
 had prostrated him beyond recovery. He was a Sunday- 
 school boy. He wanted me to take his last words home 
 to his mother and sister. He gave me his memorandum and 
 pocketbook and a number of keepsakes; asked me to pull 
 the two rings from his hand and send to his sister, and 
 tell her that they were taken off after his hand was getting 
 eold. After prayer, we sang the hymn commencing: 
 
 ‘There is a fountain filled with blood.’ 
 
 
 
 He joined in, breaking the tune now and then with, ‘Yes, 
 yes, if he could trust Him, I can.’ ‘Yes, when I die.” ‘That 
 will be sweeter.’ ‘Power to save; power to save; I used to 
 sing that hymn at home, but it was never so good as this; 
 ‘“nower to save.”’ I gave him my hand for goodbye. He 
 drew me down for a kiss. And then we left him.” 
 
 “Annals of the U. 8. Christian Commission.” 
 
 No. 292. 
 “MY HEAVENLY HOME IS BRIGHT AND FAIR.” 
 
 Rev. Witu1aM Hunter, 1811—1877. 
 
 On January 10, 1860, the Pemberton Mill, a large cotton 
 factory at Lawrence, Massachusetts, suddenly fell in ruins, 
 
300 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 burying the operatives in the debris. Some were rescued 
 alive, the others would have been, but a broken lantern 
 set the buildings on fire, and the rescuers were driven from 
 their work. In one room there were three Mission Sunday 
 school children imprisoned. The neighbors and friends had 
 been working hard to get these children out and had got so 
 near to them that their voices could be heard when the fire 
 drove them back. Superhuman were the efforts made to 
 rescue the children; the men bravely fought back the flames; 
 but the fire gained fresh strength and returned to claim its 
 victims. Then piercing shrieks rose from the spectators 
 when they saw that the efforts of the firemen were hopeless. 
 The children saw their fate. They then knelt down and 
 commenced to sing this hymn: 
 
 “My heavenly home is bright and fair, 
 Nor pain nor death can enter there; 
 Its glittering towers the sun outshine; 
 That heavenly mansion shall be mine.” 
 
 One verse of this hymn is as follows: 
 
 “Let others seek a home below, 
 
 Which flames devour, or waves o’erflow, 
 Be mine a happier lot to own, 
 
 A heavenly mansion, near the throne.” 
 
 No. 2983. 
 “NEARER, MY GOD, TO THEE.” 
 
 Mrs. Saran Frowrer ApAms, 1805—1848. 
 
 “A child’s song in a New York hospital startled the 
 nurses and patients on Thursday last. On the night before, 
 an ambulance was called from Gouverneur Hospital to a 
 house in Hester Street for a burned child. She had been 
 
HYMNS OF HE CHURCH 301 
 
 sent by her parents to the cellar for firewood, and in de- 
 scending the steps she stumbled and dropped the lamp, 
 which exploded and set her clothing on fire. The surgeon 
 wrapped the poor, crisped, writhing form of the child in what 
 is known as a ‘prepared sheet,’ and told the driver to get 
 to the hospital quickly. There all was done for her that 
 science could do, but it was impossible to save her life. A 
 narcotic was given her, and she fell asleep. Waking after 
 some hours, she asked for water. The nurse immediately 
 called the doctor. In a minute he was beside the cot. He 
 felt the pulse, ominously shook his head, gave some more 
 instructions, and turned to go away. As he did so, the 
 little creature turned half around. The dim light of a 
 candle shone on the blackened face. The swollen lips 
 pursed out, and, in a clear, sweet voice, the dying child 
 began to sing the hymn: 
 
 ‘Nearer my God to Thee, nearer to Thee.’ 
 
 The doctor and nurse stood transfixed. The other patients 
 in the silent, darkened ward leaned on their elbows and 
 drank in the sweet melody.. The first verse completed, her 
 strength began to fail, and with it her voice, and only the 
 humming-like distant music of the air of the hymn could 
 be heard. That ceased, she heaved a sigh, and all was. 
 over. Her tuneful aspiration was granted to her.” 
 The Christian Herald, October 7, 1886. 
 
 A colporteur in Missouri, describing the labor of a single 
 day, relates that after traveling ten miles through an un- 
 broken prairie, he at last reached the door of a humble 
 cabin containing a poor, old, blind man and his son and 
 daughter. “Like many others they had sought for wealth 
 and found only poverty in the West. The only book their 
 house contained was an old torn United States History. 
 They had no money to buy any books, as I saw at a glance, 
 so I gave them two volumes of the Tract Society’s publica- 
 tions. The old man inquired if I could sing. I answered 
 
302 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 in the affirmative and proceeded to sing that divine song 
 so precious to every child of God, ‘Nearer my God to Thee.’ 
 He accompanied me on the accordion, on which he was a 
 skilful player. When I sang the third verse: 
 
 ‘There let the way appear, 
 Steps unto heaven; 
 All that Thou sendest me, 
 
 In mercy given; 
 Angels to beckon me 
 Nearer, my God, to Thee, 
 
 Nearer to Thee!’ 
 
 he stopped me with his sobs, and after a few moments sald, 
 his tearful eyes telling his sincerity, ‘Oh, sir, my blindness 
 is a heavy cross, but if it will only bring me nearer to 
 Jesus, I am no loser.’ We then prayed together and spoke 
 of our heavenly home, and remembered. with pleasure, ‘that 
 there is no night there.’ Though ten years in Missouri, 
 that family had not been to a religious service in the state.” 
 The Christian Weekly, March 16, 1872. 
 
 No. 294. 
 
 “OH SAY! CAN YOU SEE BY THE DAWN’S EARLY 
 LIGHT.” 
 
 Francis Scorr Kry, 1779—1843. 
 
 “It was my privilege to go into Richmond with Genera] 
 Grant’s army. There I saw the captives who were in Libby 
 prison. Many a time I wept for hours to hear what they 
 endured. Sometimes they got letters or messages that 
 loved ones were dying, and, of course, they could not go 
 home to see them in their dying hour. There they were in 
 prison one beautiful day in spring: the news had been kept 
 from them; they had not heard what was going on around 
 Richmond. One says while they were listening, ‘I heard a 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 303 
 
 band of music; they were playing the old battle tune of the 
 Republic; I think I hear the “Star Spangled Banner.”. I 
 say, boys, I believe Richmond is taken.’ By-and-by they 
 all listen and say, ‘It is so.’ Soon the Northern army 
 unlocked the gates, and three thousand men were set, free.” 
 D. L. Moopy. 
 
 During the War of the Rebellion, a young lady was 
 heard to say, “I wish I could do something for my country ; 
 I would willingly become a nurse in a hospital, but I have 
 not physical strength. What can I do?” 
 
 A friend replied, “You can sing.” 
 
 “Yes, I can sing, but what of that?” 
 
 “Go to one of the hospitals and sing for the soldiers.” 
 
 The idea pleased her. She accompanied a friend who was 
 long used to such visits, and who introduced her by saying 
 to the patients, “Here is a young lady who has come to sing 
 for you.” At the mere announcement every face was aglow 
 with animation, every eye was riveted upon her with expec- 
 tant pleasure. She sang a few songs, commencing with the 
 glorious “Star Spangled Banner.” As the thrilling notes 
 of that song ran through the apartment, one poor man, 
 who had been given up by the physician as an almost hope- 
 less case, raised himself in his cot, leaned his head upon his 
 hand, and drank in every note like so much nectar. The 
 effect. was electrical. From that moment he began to mend, 
 and finally recovered.” 
 
 Hacxert’s “Christian Memorials of the War.” 
 
 No. 298. 
 “WHAT MEANS THIS EAGER, ANXIOUS THRONG?” 
 
 Miss Erra CAMPBELL. 
 
 During the Moody and Sankey meetings in Great Britain, 
 a young man arose in one of the meetings, and said, “It 
 
304 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 was a few evenings ago, when Mr. Sankey was singing, 
 ‘Jesus of Nazareth passeth by,’ that I was made to feel 
 the need of a Savior; and when he came to the words, 
 “Too late, too late,’ I said to myself, ‘It must not be too 
 late for me,’ and I took Him to my heart then and there.” 
 
 No. 296. 
 “WHEN HE COMETH, WHEN HE COMETH.” 
 
 Rev. Wo. O. Cusuine, 1823. 
 
 In a Highland parish, in Scotland, a young man who had 
 lived far from God and seemed to his minister inaccessible 
 to the truth, was found one day deeply awakened. When 
 asked to what this was owing, he said it was the consequence 
 of hearing his little sister sing: 
 
 “When He cometh, when He cometh, 
 To make up His jewels.” 
 
 No. 297. 
 “SAFE IN THE ARMS OF JESUS.” 
 
 Miss Fanny J. Van ALSTYNE, 1823. 
 
 During the Moody and Sankey meetings at Liverpool, 
 England, a young man said, “I went into that hall only to 
 scoff at all I heard. I believed only in God and the devil; 
 the latter I thought I served well, and I sat laughing at 
 the fools about me. Mr. Sankey sang the hymn: 
 
 ‘Safe in the arms of Jesus, 
 Safe on His gentle breast.’ 
 
 A sudden thrill passed through my whole frame, and then 
 like a dart ran through my very heart. My feelings were 
 awful, but I listened to the second verse, and felt, “There 
 7s a Saviour. Who is He? Where is He? Instantly I 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 305 
 
 realized the truth. Jesus is the Saviour. I threw myself 
 into His loving arms, and here I am now, rejoicing in Him.” 
 
 No. 298. 
 “SOWING THE SEED BY THE DAYLIGHT FAIR.” 
 
 Puiuip Buss, 1838—1876. 
 
 One night during the Moody and Sankey meetings in 
 Philadelphia, the hymn, “Sowing the Seed,” was announced. 
 Mr. Sankey said, “Before we sing this song I will tell you 
 one reason why we should sing these hymns, and that is 
 that God is blessing them to many a poor wanderer who 
 comes into these meetings night after night. Last week, 
 a man who had once occupied a high position in life came 
 into this hall and sat down. While I was singing this 
 hymn, he took out his passbook and wrote down these 
 words: 
 
 ‘Sowing the seed of a lingering pain, 
 Sowing the seed of a maddened brain, 
 Sowing the seed of a tarnished name, 
 Sowing the seed of eternal shame, 
 
 O what shall the harvest be?’ 
 
 Last night in the inquiry room that man went down on his 
 knees and asked God to break the chain that had dragged _ 
 him down from such a high position to the lowest of the 
 low.” 
 
 No. 299. 
 “YET THERE IS ROOM.” 
 
 Rev. Horatius Bonar, 1808. 
 
 A young man who had been deeply impressed at one of 
 the Moody and Sankey meetings in Great Britain, but was 
 
306 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 yet unwilling to stay to the inquirer’s meeting and was 
 about to leave the church, was arrested at the door by 
 hearing the choir sing: 
 
 “Yet there is room! The Lamb’s bright hall of song, 
 With its fair glory, beckons thee along; 
 Room, room, still room! Oh, enter, enter now!” 
 
 He felt there was room for him, went back to the pew, and 
 after having had the truth clearly laid before him, received 
 Christ. 
 
 No. 300. 
 “FOREVER WITH THE LORD.” 
 
 James Montcomery, 1771—1854. 
 
 A little girl named Maggie, was very ill of a fever, and 
 the van had come to take her away to the infirmary. Maggie 
 was dressed and ready. “Maggie, it’s time for you to go,” 
 said her mother. 
 
 “Ye know, mother,” said Maggie, “T’ll maybe no come 
 back: will the man wait till I sing my hymn?” Even a 
 hard heart could not have refused, and so the man waited 
 while the little feeble voice sang: 
 
 “Here in the body pent, 
 Absent from Him I roam, 
 
 Yet nightly pitch my moving tent 
 A day’s march nearer home.” 
 
 And then they carried the dying child, with joyous thoughts 
 like these filling her young heart, to the infirmary, to make 
 from there the last stage of the journey from this to the 
 eternal world. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 307 
 
 No. 301. 
 “THE LORD’S MY LIGHT AND SAVING HEALTH.” 
 PsaALM 27. 
 
 A boy was brought to Christ when at a public school. It 
 became known among his school-fellows, and one day, when 
 he entered the playground, he found them drawn up in a 
 body to meet him; and as soon as they had him in their 
 midst, they assailed him with laughter and cries of con- 
 tempt. He was taken completely by surprise; his face 
 burned with shame and anger, and the ground seemed to be 
 reeling under his feet. It was a Monday morning, and the 
 first. exercise, after they had entered the school, was to 
 repeat some verses of a Psalm. A pupil was called up to 
 repeat them, and as the poor young Christian sat bewil- 
 dered among his persecutors, the first words which fell on 
 his ears were: 
 
 “And now even at this present time, 
 Mine head shall lifted be, 
 
 Above all those that are my foes, 
 And round encompass me.” 
 
 They seemed sent straight from heaven to him. They com- 
 pletely drove away his agitation, and made him calm and 
 happy. He knew it was his Father saying to him, “Be 
 strong, and of good courage”; and sorely did he need this 
 encouragement in his hour of confession. 
 
 No. 3802. 
 
 “MID PLEASURES AND PALACES THOUGH WE MAY 
 ROAM.” . 
 
 Joun Howarp PAYNE. 
 
 One night on the banks of the Potomac, during the War 
 of the Rebellion, as the Confederate and the Union armies 
 
308 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 lay opposite each other, the Union bands played “The Star- 
 spangled Banner,” ‘Hail, Columbia,” and other Union 
 songs; and the Confederates in contest played “Dixie,” and 
 other pieces of their side. It seemed that each would play 
 the other down. By and by a band struck up “Home, Sweet 
 Home!” The conflict ceased. The bands on the other side 
 struck up “Home, Sweet Home,” and voices from opposite 
 sides of the river joined the chorus, “There is no place like 
 
 home.” 
 
 No. 308. 
 “NOW ISRAEL MAY SAY AND THAT TRULY.” 
 
 PsaLmM 124. 
 
 This is known in Scotland, in its second version, as 
 “Durie’s Psalm.” James Melville, in his diary—date 1582 
 —gives an account of the incident which gave rise to the 
 name. John Durie had been banished from his pulpit and 
 from Edinburgh, for his boldness of speech in criticizing 
 some of the acts of James Sixth, but the feeling in his favor 
 was so strong that his sentence had to be reversed. He 
 says: “Within a few days after the petition of the nobility. 
 John Durie gat leave to gae hame to his ain flock in Edin- 
 burgh: at whase returning there was a great concours of 
 the haill toun, wha met him at the Nether Bow; and going 
 up the street, with bare heads and loud voices, sang to the 
 praise of God, and testifying of great joy mal consolation, 
 the one hundred and twenty-fourth Psalm—‘Now Térbel 
 may say and that trewly’ till heaven and earth resound it. 
 This noise, when the Due (of Lennox) being in the toun 
 heard, and ludging in the Hiegate looked out and saw, he 
 rave his beard for anger, and hasted him off the toun.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 309 
 No. 304. 
 “OH GIVE YE PRAISE UNTO THE LORD.” 
 
 Psaum 117. 
 
 The battle of Dunbar, between the English and the Scot- 
 tish armies, took place on the morning of September 3, 1650. 
 The Scotch Army was commanded by Lesley, and that of 
 England by Cromwell. The battle is thus described by the 
 historian Guizot: “Cromwell had just left a prayer meeting, 
 and mounted his horse, accompanied by Lambert, his major- 
 general. Surveying with his glass the positions of the Scot- 
 tish army, he was struck by the movement which was going 
 on among the enemy. Lesley was preparing to throw him- 
 self across the way with all his troops. Cromwell asked 
 nothing better than to fight. “The Lord delivers them into 
 our hands; they come!’ he exclaimed, and he proposed to 
 his officers to forestall the Scots and to march toward 
 them. Monk vigorously supported the general’s opinion, 
 and solicited the command of the infantry of the advanced 
 guard. The English spent the whole night in preparing for 
 the struggle. A dense fog prevailed at daybreak. T he first 
 engagements were not fortunate for Cromwell and his 
 troops. The men fought almost without seeing each other, 
 to the ery of ‘Covenant!’ among the Scots, and ‘The Lord of 
 Hosts!’ among the English. The Scottish lancers had 
 thrown the English advance guard into some disorder; 
 toward seven o’clock the regiment of Cromwell charged 
 sharply. At the same time the sun, dispersing the mists, 
 lit up the sea and mountains. ‘Let God arise!’ exclaimed 
 Cromwell, ‘and let His enemies be scattered!’ Inspired by 
 his enthusiasm, his soldiers redoubled their efforts; the Scot- 
 tish cavalry wavered; an infantry corps, which yet resisted, 
 was broken by the Ironsides. ‘They run! they run!’ cried 
 the English; a rout began. “They were now but stubble to 
 our swords,’ wrote Cromwell. At nine o’clock the battle was 
 
310 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 over; three thousand dead bodies and ten thousand prisoners 
 testified to the victory of the English general.” And on the 
 battlefield after the victory, the army of Cromwell sang as 
 their thanksgiving hymn, the one hundred and seventeenth 
 Psalm. 
 “O give ye praise unto the Lord, 
 All nations that be: 
 Likewise ye people all, accord 
 His name to magnify. 
 For great to us-ward ever are 
 His loving kindnesses; 
 His truth endures for evermore, 
 The Lord I do ye bless.” 
 
 No. 304a 
 
 “I AM WEARY OF MY SIN.” 
 
 In the Christian Work, Henry F. Thompson gives the 
 following incident: “I never could understand it. She was 
 one of the brightest sweetest, and most amiable young ladies 
 I ever knew; and yet she and her mother, who was a widow, 
 lived with her grandparents, who, with the mother and an 
 only uncle and an only brother, were the roughest people I 
 ever knew. And it was not only the exterior that was 
 rough. They would swear, and blackguard, and quarrel 
 with each other in public or in private. At a certain time, 
 when calling at the house, the young lady, at my request, 
 sat at the instrument and played and sang. Presently she 
 turned to a particular tune, and said: ‘I think this is so 
 beautiful,’ and, as she played, sang the accompanying 
 words: 
 
 ‘I am weary of my sin; 
 O, I long for full release; 
 Saviour, come and take me in, 
 With Thyself to dwell in peace. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 311 
 
 ‘I am weary of the earth, 
 Where the wicked spurn Thy love; 
 With Thy sons of heavenly birth, 
 Let me worship Thee above.’ 
 
 Pointing to the words, ‘I am weary of my sin; O, I long for 
 full release’; I said, ‘Is that true of you, Mary?’ and while 
 the quick tear trembled on the lid, she sweetly answered, 
 ‘Yes, I want: to follow Jesus.’ I said, ‘for such He waits, 
 and will receive and bless them.’ At the next communion 
 season she united with the church, and for four years 
 adorned her profession; till at the close of a Sabbath 
 evening, she was called to join the church above.” 
 
 No. 3085. 
 
 “COME YE DISCONSOLATE, WHERE’ER YE 
 LANGUISH.” 
 
 Tuomas Moors, 1779—1852. 
 
 At one time Mr. T. E. Perkins was sitting in the room of 
 the Howard Mission, New York, conversing with Rev. Mr. 
 Van Meter, when they were interrupted by the entrance of 
 a wild-looking man, who exclaimed: “Is Awful Gardner 
 here?” 
 
 “No,” replied Mr. Van Meter. 
 
 “Then I am lost,’ said the man in accents of despair. “If 
 Awful Gardner was here, he could save me; he would know 
 how, because he’s been the same road; but now I am lost”; 
 and drawing a bowie-knife from under his vest, he was 
 about to plunge it into his bosom, when Mr. Van Meter 
 sprang forward and caught his arm. Seeing that it would 
 be useless to attempt to wrest the knife from his grasp, Mr. 
 Van Meter sought to distract the man’s attention from his 
 
312 . STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 suicidal purpose, but the unfortunate creature was seized 
 with a fit of delirium tremens, and became unmanageable. 
 Mr. Perkins, not knowing what else to do, sat down at the 
 melodion, and began to play and sing: 
 
 - “Come, ye disconsolate, where’er ye languish. 
 Come, at God’s altar fervently kneel; 
 Here bring your wounded hearts, here tell your anguish; 
 Earth has no sorrow that heaven cannot heal.” 
 
 The effect was magical. The man became sufficiently calm 
 for Mr. Van Meter to march him up.and down the room, 
 while Mr. Perkins continued to play and sing. After 
 finishing the hymn he sang another: 
 
 “Jesus, to Thy dear arms I flee, 
 I have no other hope but Thee.” 
 
 The effect was still more marked. After singing that hymn 
 through Mr. Perkins commenced: 
 
 “Flee as a bird to your mountain.” 
 
 As the strains of this exquisite composition filled the room, 
 the maniac paused, sat down, covered his face with his 
 hands, and sobbed like a child, or rather like a broken- 
 hearted remorseful man. By this time Mrs. Van Meter, 
 who was present when the man first burst into the room, 
 came in with a bowl of strong coffee, which she had thought- 
 fully made, and as soon as the weeping stranger became 
 sufficiently composed she gave it to him. That quieted his 
 nerves and renewed his strength, and in a little while he 
 became completely restored to the possession of his faculties. 
 “Who is this man?” was the question which rose sponta- 
 neously to the lips of his deliverer, but all efforts to ascer- 
 tain seemed to prove fruitless. He persistently refused to 
 give his name, or to furnish any clue to his residence or 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 313 
 
 identity. Mr. Perkins accompanied him to the St. Nicholas 
 Hotel, where he took a room under an assumed name. As 
 in his conversation he had chanced to mention a clergyman 
 in Newport, Rhode Island, whom Mr. Van Meter knew, the 
 latter immediately wrote to the clergyman, stating the case. 
 The clergyman came by the first: boat, and at once recog- 
 nizing the unfortunate man, took him back again to his 
 home in Hartford, where, before the period of his dissipa- 
 tion, he had been a man of wealth and responsibility. He 
 threw off the thralldom of rum, and is now a respected 
 Christian man. 
 
 No. 306. 
 “ALL PEOPLE THAT ON EARTH DO DWELL.” 
 
 WILLIAM KeETHE. 
 
 A remarkable incident connected with this hymn, is that 
 of a Scottish youth, who learned from a pious mother to 
 sing the old psalms that were as household words to them 
 in the kirk and by the fireside. When he grew up, he wan- 
 dered away from his native country, was taken captive by 
 the Turks, and made a slave in one of the Barbary States. 
 But he never forgot the songs of Zion, although he sang 
 them in a strange land and to heathen ears. One night he 
 was solacing himself in this manner, when the attention of 
 some sailors on board of an English man-of war was directed 
 to the familiar tune of “Old Hundred” as it came floating 
 over the moonlit waves. At once they surmised the truth 
 that one of their countrymen was languishing away his life 
 as a captive. Quickly arming themselves they manned a 
 boat, and lost no time in effecting his release. 
 
 A celebrated Scotch doctor of divinity was invited to 
 preach where no singing was heard but by the choir. He 
 gave out to be sung the Hundredth Psalm: 
 
314 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “All people that on earth do dwell, 
 Sing to the Lord with cheerful voice, 
 Him serve with mirth, His praise forth tell, 
 Come ye before Him and rejoice.” 
 
 To the doctor’s surprise, nobody but the choir opened their 
 lips, and when they had concluded the performance, he arose 
 and good-humoredly said: “The choir has done very well; 
 let the congregation and me try it next.” And so saying, he 
 raised in fine style, the solemn tune of “Old Hundred.” The 
 result was that before the first stanza was ended, the whole 
 congregation had caught the enthusiasm of their leader, and 
 sent up a very shout of praise to Heaven in the appropriate 
 words of the psalm; and they found it to be so heart-stirring 
 an experience, when compared with their previous habit of 
 being mere listeners, that they never afterward abstained so 
 generally from joining in the psalmody. 
 JoHN B. Gouau, in Sunlight and Shadow. 
 
 No. 307. 
 “THERE IS A HAPPY LAND.” 
 
 ANDREW YouNG, 1807—1889. 
 
 A clergyman relates the following incident: “One day as 
 I was busily engaged in my study, a man about half drunk 
 very unceremoniously entered and handed me a note from 
 the teacher of the infant class of our Sabbath school, in- 
 forming me that the bearer was the father of one of her 
 scholars, that the child had met with an accident, and that 
 they lived in such a place she could not visit them, and she 
 wished me to see to it. I looked at the man: he was Irish, 
 very repulsive in his appearance, and he answered my ques- 
 tions with a rough brogue. ‘What is your name, sir, and 
 where do you live?’ 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 315 
 
 “ “My name is Pater M ; I live on an ould canal boat 
 at the fut of Harrison Street. I wint there whin I 
 was burnt out; and nobody at all at all has driv me 
 out of it.’ 
 
 ““And what is the matter with your child?’ 
 
 “‘Och! and is it Kitty, my own little darling Kitty, the 
 only child I’ve lift of the six that has been born til me? 
 Och! Kitty! she was playing about on a ship where I was: 
 til wark, and she fell down the hatchway and broke her leg 
 (saving your prisence) and poor Kitty’s leg is not set right, 
 your riverence, for I’ve no money til pay the doctor, Och! 
 poor Kitty! and I’ve nothing to give her to ate, your 
 riverence. 
 
 “Well, Peter, I will come down and see your Kitty, and 
 see what can be done for you.’ 
 
 “T did so, and found a wretched state of things. The poor 
 little suffering child was overjoyed to see me. I remem- 
 bered her countenance—a sweet, mild little girl, not yet five 
 years of age. She lay upon the locker or side-seat of an old 
 canal boat which had been laid up for the winter. There 
 was no fire, though it was a bitter cold day, no chair, no 
 bed, no food, scarcely an article of furniture or any comfort 
 whatever. I did what I could to relieve the wants of the little 
 sufferer. Nothing could be done for the parents: they were 
 both confirmed inebriates; and I found they had both been 
 drunk the night previous, and in a quarrel had unintention- 
 ally knocked the child off the seat and broken the limb after 
 it had been set. I obtained the services of a surgeon and 
 had the limb set again, and then sat down on the locker to 
 talk to little Kitty, and fed her with some nourishing food 
 which I had brought. I asked her if she could read., No, 
 she could not read a word; ‘but I can sing,’ said she. 
 
 “(What can you sing?’ 
 
 “ ‘Something I learned at Sabbath school.’ 
 
 “ Well, what is it you can sing, Kitty?’ In a moment her 
 sweet little voice broke out: 
 
 
 
316 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 ‘There is a happy land, 
 Far, far away. 
 
 Where saints in glory stand, 
 Bright, bright as day.’ 
 
 ““Well, Kitty, that is sweet. Where do you think the 
 land of Canaan is, Kitty? 
 
 ““Oh, I suppose it is up in the sky, where God lives and 
 where the angels live.’ 
 
 “Do you think you will ever go there, Kitty?’ 
 
 ““Tf ’'m good, and love God I shall.’ 
 
 “ “Now, Kitty, is there anything else you can sing for me 
 before I go?’ 
 
 ““Oh, yes, sir: I can sing a little piece of another.’ 
 
 “Well, what is that?’ 
 
 “All who love the Lord below, 
 When they die; to heaven will go, 
 And sing with saints above, 
 Oh! that will be joyful! 
 Joyful! joyful! 
 Oh! that will be joyful, 
 When we meet to part no more!’ 
 
 “Poor Kitty could not read, nor could either of her parents 
 read. She knew nothing of heaven and divine things except 
 what she had been taught at the Sabbath school, and most 
 of what she remembered was associated with the words of 
 the hymns she had learned to sing there.” 
 
 No. 308. 
 “PEACE, TROUBLED SOUL, THOU NEED’ST NOT FEAR.” 
 
 Rev. Samugen Ecxrine, 1757—1785. 
 
 The late Rev. James Haxley, about the year 1806, was 
 sent by a Methodist Conference to itinerate as a missionary 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 317 
 
 in Louisiana, then chiefly inhabited by French Catholics. 
 Jimmy, as he was familiarly called, had small expectations 
 of comfort without payment; and he seldom possessed any 
 money. He was one evening reduced to the very verge of 
 starvation: he had spent the preceding night in a swamp, 
 and had taken no food for thirty-six hours, when he reached 
 a plantation. He entered the house and asked for food and 
 lodging. The mistress of the house, a widow, with several 
 daughters, and several negro children playing about, recog- 
 nized his calling and insultingly refused his request. He 
 obtained, however, permission to warm himself for a few 
 minutes before the fire. As he sat thus, he felt the demands 
 of hunger and sleep, and looked forward to another night in 
 the swamp. Feeling this might prove his last night on 
 earth, he thought sweetly of the celestial city to which he 
 felt he was traveling; his heart swelled with gladness, and 
 he cheerfully sang one of his favorite hymns: 
 
 “Peace, troubled soul, thou need’st not fear: 
 Thy Great Provider still is near. 
 Who fed thee last will feed thee still; 
 Be calm, and sink into His will.” 
 
 He sang the whole hymn; and when he looked around him 
 the mother, daughters, and negroes were all in tears. “Here, 
 Sally,” said the mother, “get the preacher a good supper. 
 Peter, put up his horse: he shall stay a week, if he pleases.” 
 
 No. 309. 
 
 “THE MESSIAH.” 
 
 Grorce Freperick Hanne, 1685—1759. 
 
 In the last century, a Hungarian nobleman had lost, under 
 the most distressing circumstances, his only child, a beau- 
 tiful girl, who was on the eve of marriage. Although two 
 
318 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 years had elapsed since this bereavement, the unhappy 
 father remained in the most melancholy condition. From 
 the hour when he had taken the last look at the dead body 
 of his child, he had remained in the same room, shedding no 
 tears and uttering no complaints, but remaining in a speech- 
 less state of despair. The most celebrated physicians had 
 been consulted, and every means which could be thought of 
 used to rouse the Count from his lethargy of grief ; but all 
 in vain, and his physician became hopeless of his recovery. 
 Under these circumstances, a member of the family remem- 
 bered to have heard the distinguished Elizabeth Mara, for 
 ten years the first singer at the Prussian court, sing some 
 exquisitely beautiful sacred pieces, and became impressed 
 with the thought that, if any sound on earth could reach the 
 heart which was already buried in his daughter’s grave, her 
 voice, which seemed to be that of an angel rather than that 
 of a human being, would have that power. Arrangements 
 were at length made for the trial; and, to give every possible 
 effect to the powers of the singer, an anteroom, opening into 
 that where the Count sat, was prepared. Mara stood alone 
 in the foreground, yet in such a position that she could not 
 be seen in the next room, which was hung with black, and 
 only a faint shadowy twilight admitted, except a few golden 
 rays from a small lamp which burned in a niche before a 
 beautiful Madonna. Suddenly upon the solitude and silence 
 of that sick room there broke a wonderful harmony. Eliza- 
 beth had chosen Handel’s “Messiah,” and took her place, 
 deeply moved by the singular circumstances under which 
 she was called to exert her talents. At first the music and 
 that heavenly voice all seemed to be unheeded; but by de- 
 grees the desolate parent raised himself on his couch and 
 glanced with earnest longing toward the spot whence those 
 soul-moving sounds proceeded, At length when Mara sang 
 the words, “Look and see if there be any sorrow like to my 
 sorrow,” she appeared to be inspired by the sympathy she 
 felt; and the relatives of the Count, who listened with beat- 
 ing hearts, could not restrain their tears. Nor did these 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 319 
 
 alone bear witness to the singer’s power; happy sighs escaped 
 from the sufferer; large tears stood in those eyes which the 
 very extremity of grief itself had long forbidden to weep. 
 Crossing the room with feeble steps, he prostrated himself 
 before the image of that Heavenly One Who bore all our 
 griefs; and, when the full choir joined in the Hallelujah 
 Chorus, his voice of praise and thanksgiving mingled with 
 those strains. The recovery was complete and lasting, and 
 was the marvel of all Germany. 
 
 A lady had been in deep despondency for many months. 
 Her sins appeared so numerous and aggravated that she 
 dared not trust in the promises of the Gospel. These prom- 
 ises seemed very precious for others, but could not avail for 
 her. Conversations with her minister and with Christian 
 friends added to her gloom, instead of dissipating it. She 
 attended with great eagerness the means of grace, read her 
 Bible almost incessantly at home, and withdrew from all 
 gay companions, and even from the most innocent social 
 enjoyments. Her health began to suffer from extreme de- 
 pression of spirits, and her friends were apprehensive of an 
 early death. When she heard that Jenny Lind was to visit 
 the city near which she resided, her curiosity was excited 
 to hear her. She consulted her minister, and he advised her 
 to go on the evening when “The Messiah” was to be sung. 
 The rendering of those sublime passages, “I know that my 
 Redeemer liveth,” and “Come unto Me, all ye that labor 
 and are heavy laden,” by the Swedish songstress, quite over- 
 whelmed her. She was spellbound. The words seemed 
 clothed with a fulness of meaning she had never before dis- 
 covered. The fitness of Jesus to save sinners, and his in- 
 finite condescension and pity, melted her heart. She won- 
 dered that she had ever distrusted Him, and with a childlike 
 faith threw herself on the promises, knowing that in her 
 case they would not fail of fulfilment. From that hour her 
 gloom vanished, and she went forward in the path of 
 Christian duty with a joyous and obedient heart. 
 
320 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 310. 
 “THERE IS A GOD THAT REIGNS ABOVE.” 
 
 Rey. Isaac Warts, 1674—1748. 
 
 A poor wretched mother, religiously educated, but after- 
 ward abandoned to sin and misery, was struck with horror 
 at hearing her own child repeat, as soon as she could well 
 speak, some of the profane language which she had learned 
 from herself. She trembled at the thought that she was not 
 only herself traveling to eternal perdition, but was also 
 leading her child there. She instantly resolved that with 
 the first sixpence she could procure, she would obtain a copy 
 of Dr. Watts’ “Divine Songs for Children,” of which she 
 had some recollection from the days when she visited the 
 Sunday school and would teach them to her infant daughter. 
 She soon bought them; and on opening the book her eye 
 caught the striking verse: 
 
 “Just as a tree cut down that fell 
 To north, or southward, there it lies, 
 So man departs to heaven or hell, 
 Fix’d in the state wherein he dies.” 
 
 She read on. The Spirit of God impressed the words on her 
 heart; the event led to her entire conversion, and she lived 
 and died, a consistent professor of the religion of Christ. 
 No. 311. 
 “TO THEE I LIFT MY SOUL.” 
 King James Second was a Papist, and endeavored to com- 
 
 pel his subjects to become Roman Catholics. Under his 
 reign, the “Covenanters” of Scotland were persecuted and 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 321 
 
 in many cases driven from their homes to the moors and 
 mountain gorges, where alone they could worship the God 
 of their fathers in safety. And even in these retreats they 
 were not safe, for the spies of the king followed them, and 
 if any were caught attending meetings or conventicles, they 
 were arrested and punished. Margaret Wilson of Wigton, 
 a girl of eighteen years, with her sister Agnes, a child of 
 thirteen, was in the habit of attending these meetings. 
 Being informed on by a young man whom they took to be 
 a friend, they were thrown into prison. The terror-stricken 
 father, alarmed for the safety of his children, hastened to 
 Edinburgh, and by paying a heavy sum, obtained the libera- 
 tion of the younger daughter, but Margaret they would not 
 release. With an older woman named Margaret Lachlan, 
 she was condemned to be drowned for attending field and 
 house meetings, and on the morning of May 11, 1665, the 
 sentence was executed. They were tied to stakes between 
 high and low water, so that when the tide should come in 
 they would be drowned. The old woman was placed farthest 
 out, so that the tide should reach her first, and that the 
 sight of her struggles might perhaps terrify the other and 
 lead her to recant, but she was faithful unto death. As the 
 waters rose about her, she sang this psalm: 
 
 “To Thee I lift my soul, 
 O Lord I trust in Thee; 
 My God let me not be ashamed, 
 Nor foes triumph o’er me.” 
 
 No. 312. 
 “GO ON, GO ON, GO ON, GO ON.” 
 Dr. Stephen Fish gives the following account of a hymn 
 
 of one word. He says: “Many Bedouin Arabs have em- 
 braced the Christian religion. Mr. M. Roysce, of Jerusalem, 
 
322 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 gave me a very interesting account of the conversion of an 
 Arab whom he knew to be a poet. Soon after he was con- 
 verted, Mr. Roysce was anxious to see if he would write 
 religious poetry. He requested him to court the Muses, and 
 compose for him a poem on the duties of a Christian Mis- 
 sionary. He did so and wrote the following: 
 
 ‘Taiyib, taiyib, taiyib, taiyib, 
 Taiyib, taiyib, taiyib, 
 Taiyib, taiyib, taiyib, taiyib, 
 Taiyib, taiyib, taiyib.’ 
 
 Any trivial sentiment would not have borne repeating so 
 many times, but the translation of ‘Taiyib’ is ‘Go on,’ and 
 the Arab, zealous in his new life, could think of nothing but 
 going ahead in it and growing better and better.” 
 
 Christian Standard. 
 
 No. 318. 
 “IN EVIL LONG I TOOK DELIGHT.” 
 
 Rev. Joun Newton, 1725—1807. 
 
 Many of Newton’s hymns are autobiographic, and this is 
 one of that class. He seemed to delight in calling attention 
 to his own early profligacy and wickedness, but it was only 
 for the purpose of giving greater emphasis to some following 
 declaration of the mercy and grace which could stoop to 
 save so vile a wretch. This purpose is exhibited in the last 
 stanza of this hymn: 
 
 “Thus while His death my sin displays 
 In all its blackest hue, 
 Such is the mystery of grace 
 It seals my pardon too.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 323 
 
 Newton prepared an epitaph which he requested should be 
 used for himself after his death. It read as follows: 
 
 “John Newton, Clerk; once an Infidel and Libertine; A 
 servant of slaves in Africa was by the rich mercy of our 
 Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, preserved, restored, par- 
 doned, and appointed to preach the faith he had long 
 labored to destroy,” ete. 
 
 Here again in his epitaph as in so many of his hymns; 
 this contrast is shown of God’s “rich mercy” over against 
 his own great sinfulness. 
 
 No. 314. 
 “AND THEY SANG A NEW SONG.” Revelation 5:9. 
 
 One of the ministers of Leicester, England, in relating 
 some pleasing incidents in connection with his pastoral 
 work, gives the following: “On visiting one of the courts 
 of the town, I was requested by one of the poor people to 
 call on an old woman who had been bedridden for some 
 years, and who lived in the neighborhood. On reaching the 
 cottage, and finding no response to my knocking at the door, 
 I walked in and went to the foot of the stairs, when I soon 
 heard a faint voice requesting whoever it was to come up. 
 In a small room at the top there lay an aged but cheerful 
 invalid. I told her that I had been requested to call, and 
 that I was a minister of the gospel. She replied, ‘Well, then, 
 you are just the visitor I want, and you are come at the 
 right time; and taking up her hymn book, which lay upon 
 the bed, said: ‘Now, I have been searching for a long time 
 to see if I can find a hymn that will do to sing in Heaven 
 and I cannot. Now, can you?’ 
 
 “T took the bodk and found, ‘There is a land of pure 
 delight.’ ‘Surely that will do?’ 
 
 “Well, go on,’ she said; ‘read the hymn through.’ 
 
 “Presently I came to ‘Death like a narrow sea divides.’ 
 ‘Ah,’ she said, ‘that won’t do.’ 
 
324 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “T then mentioned, ‘There is a fountain filled with blood.’ 
 ““Go on,’ she said. I then read the last verse: 
 
 ‘Then in a nobler, sweeter song, 
 I'll sing Thy power to save, 
 
 When this poor lisping, stammering tongue 
 Lies silent in the grave.’ 
 
 ““That won’t do,’ she said, smilingly: ‘mine shan’t be a 
 poor lisping, stammering tongue there.’ I found others, but 
 all to no purpose. 
 
 ““No, no dear sir, shut the book; there will have to be a 
 hew one made.’ ‘And they sang a new song.’ ” 
 
 No. 8168. 
 “PILGRIM, BURDENED WITH THY SIN”—1785. 
 
 Rev. Grorce Crappe, 1754—1832. 
 
 It is quite curious to note from what surroundings some 
 of our hymns have been transferred to our song collections. 
 In the year 1785, there appeared in England a volume of 
 poems by the Reverend George Crabbe, a clergyman of the 
 Church of England. The pieces were all of a secular char- 
 acter. Among them was a poem entitled, “Sir Eustace 
 Grey.” It tells the story of a man, Sir Eustace Grey, who 
 passes through the experiences of a prosperous, worldly man, 
 loses his wealth and his family, and lands in a mad house. 
 Here he tells to a physician and a visitor the story of his 
 life, his prosperous days, the loss of property and the death 
 of dear ones, the wanderings in ways of vice, the sorrows of 
 heart and the troubles of mind, until at last, as the poem 
 relates, he “heard an heavenly Father speak and felt the 
 Sun of Mercy shine.” “TI hailed the Light,” he says, “the 
 Birth Divine! and then was sealed among the few!” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 325 
 
 “Now hark! the holy strains begin, 
 And thus the sainted Preacher cries, 
 ‘Pilgrim burthened with thy sin,’”’ ete. 
 
 The hymn is a literary curiosity. The fourth line of each 
 stanza contains four words, with one of which each of the 
 four following lines begins. 
 
 No, 316. 
 “ONLY WAITING TILL THE SHADOWS.” 
 
 Miss Frances Lavcuton, 1836. 
 
 An old pauper in an almshouse was asked, “What are you 
 doing now?” “Only waiting!” was his reply. A school girl 
 in a little town in Maine heard the story of the old pauper’s 
 reply, and made it the title of a little poem, which she sent 
 to the local paper of the town near by. The words were 
 copied from paper to paper, and soon found their way into 
 the hymn books. One stanza is usually omitted. Here it is: 
 
 “Only waiting till the angels 
 
 Open wide the mystic gate 
 
 At whose feet I long have lingered 
 Weary, poor, and desolate. 
 
 Even now I hear their footsteps, 
 And their voices far away. 
 
 If they call me I am waiting, 
 Only waiting to obey.” 
 
 No. 317. 
 
 “BEFORE JEHOVAH’S AWFUL THRONE.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Watts, 1674—1748 
 
 The singing of this hymn at the Music Hall in Surrey 
 Garden, London, is thus described: “An audience of eight 
 
326 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 to ten thousand people were worshiping under the guidance 
 of Rev. Charles H. Spurgeon. The prayer concluded, Mr. 
 Spurgeon announced the well-known hymn beginning: 
 
 ‘Before Jehovah’s awful throne.’ 
 
 He read it through, having first announced that the tune 
 would be the ‘Old Hundredth,’ and then read each verse sep- 
 arately before it was sung. It is scarcely possible to give 
 any idea of the sublime effect produced by those ten thou- 
 sand voices, as they swelled the massive harmonies of that 
 grand tune with a fulness of sound rarely heard. After 
 singing the second verse, Mr. Spurgeon said: ‘I will read 
 the third verse, and you will sing the fourth; and let the 
 uplifting of your voices be as the sound of many waters.’ 
 His audience responded to his wish. The words were: 
 
 ‘We'll crowd Thy gates with thankful songs, 
 High as the heavens our voices raise; 
 
 And earth, with her ten thousand tongues, 
 Shall fill Thy courts with sounding praise. 
 
 ‘Wide as the world is Thy command; 
 Vast as eternity Thy love; 
 
 Firm as a rock Thy truth shall stand, 
 When rolling years shall cease to move.’ 
 
 Most magnificent was the shout of praise that now went 
 up. Not a voice was mute, save where occasionally some- 
 one’s nerves were overpowered by the massive rolling chorus 
 that rose on every side. Never did we before realize what 
 congregational singing might become. It was an uplifting 
 of voice and heart such as one can hope to hear only a few 
 times in a lifetime. Much of this grand effect was no doubt 
 owing to the majesty of the tune itself; much to the fact 
 that all the congregation knew it; and perhaps not a little 
 to the practice of reading each verse before it was sung.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 327 
 
 . No. 318. 
 “HERE O’ER THE EARTH A STRANGER I ROAM.” 
 
 A collier in Staffordshire had one dear little girl, the last 
 of four or five. This child was the light of his eyes; and 
 as he came from the pit at night, she used to meet him at 
 the door of his cot to welcome him home. One day when 
 he came in to his dinner, he missed his little darling, and 
 going into the house with his heavy coal-pit clogs, his wife 
 called him upstairs. The stillness of the place and her quiet 
 voice made his heart’ sick, and a foreboding of evil came 
 upon him. His wife told him they were going to lose their 
 little lamb; she had had a convulsive fit and the doctor said 
 she could not live. As the tears made furrows down his 
 black face, and he leaned over his darling, she said: “Daddy, 
 sing ‘Here is no rest.’ ” 
 
 “No, my child, I cannot sing; I’m choking; I can’t sing.” 
 
 “Oh! do, daddy, sing ‘Here is no rest.’ ” 
 
 The poor fellow tried to sing: 
 
 “Here o’er the earth as a stranger I roam, 
 Here is no rest, here is no rest!” 
 
 But his voice could make no way against his trouble. Then 
 he tried again, for he wanted to please his sweet little girl. 
 
 “Here are afflictions and trials severe, 
 Here is no rest, here is no rest! 
 Here I must part with the friends I hold dear, 
 Yet I am blest, yet I am blest!” 
 
 Again his voice was choked with weeping; but the little one 
 
 whispered, “Come, daddy, sing, ‘Sweet is the promise’ ”’; 
 and the poor father went on again: 
 
328 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “Sweet is the promise I read in His Word; 
 Blessed are those who have died in the Lord, 
 They have been called to receive their reward, 
 There, there is rest! there, there is rest.” 
 
 “That’s it, daddy!” cried the child; “that’s it”; and with 
 her arms around the collier’s neck, she died happy in the 
 Lord. 
 
 No. 319. 
 JESUS, I MY CROSS HAVE TAKEN.” 
 
 Rev. Henry F. Lyte, 1793—1847. 
 
 Rey. George F. Pentecost gives the following from his own 
 experience: “A year or two after I entered the ministry, I 
 passed through an experience that on the dark side of it 
 culminated in leading me to believe not only that I had 
 been mistaken in supposing that God had called me to the 
 work of the ministry, but also that I was even mistaken in 
 supposing that I was a Christian at all. Oh! the blackness 
 and darkness of those hours! I cannot portray the dense 
 gloom that gathered about my soul, and was fairly pressing 
 me down to hell. In this fearful state of mind, having 
 almost yielded up to despair, I was returning to my home 
 from a neighboring town where I had been assisting a min- 
 isterial brother in a protracted meeting. I got aboard the 
 train, flung myself into a seat next a window of the car, 
 and made another desperate effort to recover myself, my 
 faith, my hope, my confidence in God. I prayed in spirit, 
 I even called aloud on God, unmindful of the people around 
 me; I went over the promises, and searched my memory 
 through for some word of the Lord that could bring me 
 help. But God’s Word was a silent and sealed book to me, 
 and my heart seemed to be turning into stone. In the 
 midst of this wretchedness I was looking out of the car 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH © 329 
 
 window up into the starlit heavens, and wondering if there 
 was a God, if there was any Jesus, any Christ, if there was 
 any hereafter. While thus gazing into the dimly lighted 
 darkness without, from out of the midnight darkness within, 
 with only a numb sense of my own wretchedness, as a man 
 might feel who knows he is freezing to death without power 
 to help himself, and, indeed; not caring to any longer, 
 because it seems easier to die, I heard the low voice of sing- 
 ing in my heart; I say I heard the voice of singing within 
 me, and hearkening I caught the words of it, and with my 
 own lips in low tremulous tones began to sing: 
 
 ‘Jesus, I my cross have taken, 
 All to leave and follow Thee; 
 Naked, poor, despised, forsaken, 
 Thou from hence my all shalt be;’ 
 
 I wondered at myself, and at the song; I found my heart 
 softening; I knew that tears were in my eyes; I felt them 
 running down my cheeks; I was away back with Jesus on 
 the Cross; I heard His ery, ‘My God! My God! why hast 
 Thou forsaken me?’ and in that same moment the Holy 
 Ghost gave me fellowship with my Saviour, and I knew that 
 ery from Him was not for Himself alone, but for me. I 
 sang on through the hymn with still melting heart, with 
 returning faith, hope, and confidence, until in a perfect 
 ecstasy of peace I reached the lines: 
 
 ‘O ’tis not in grief to harm me, 
 While Thy love is left to me; 
 
 O ’twere not in joy to charm me, 
 Were that joy unmixed with Thee.’ 
 
 And then like a comforted child, I fairly laid my weary 
 heart against His dear loving heart, knowing in my soul that 
 He loved me, that He died and rose again for me, that He’ 
 lived for me and that as never before we were united to 
 
330 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 each other. Thus that precious hymn was God’s hand 
 reached out to save me when I was sinking; thus He was 
 pleased to manifest Himself to me in a sweeter, surer, and 
 stronger way than I had yet known Him. He had chosen 
 to do this by, and in, a hymn, rather than by prayer, or 
 meditation, or promise. As the cake baked on the coals 
 and the cruse of water at his head were to Elijah, so was 
 that hymn to me.” 
 
 There is a story told of a young lady in England, who 
 was much persecuted by her father because she had em- 
 braced the religion of Christ. Seeking to divert her mind 
 he gave her a song to sing and play, commencing: 
 
 “Go, forget me, why should sorrow.” 
 (See “Our Familiar Songs,” p. 243.) 
 
 To his surprise and discomfiture, she sang the hymn to the 
 tune “‘Ellesdie.” 
 
 “Jesus, I my cross have taken, 
 All to leave and follow Thee.” 
 
 No. 320. 
 “FROM DEAR NEW ENGLAND’S HAPPY SHORE.” 
 
 Perhaps one of the most interesting and touching inci- 
 dents connected with the history of singing occurred at the 
 separation from each other of thirty students at the 
 Andover Theological Seminary in 1832. A question was 
 proposed by a single finely toned voice from the orchestra, 
 and a response was made from the stage on which the gradu- 
 ating class stood—first by the Foreign Missionaries, then 
 by the Domestic Missionaries, and finally by the Home 
 Preachers; then followed the chorus from the whole. The 
 whole service was as follows: 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 331 
 
 Question: “And I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, 
 Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” Isaiah 6:8. 
 Those who were to go as foreign missionaries replied: 
 
 “From dear New England’s happy shore, 
 — Where all our kindred dwell, 
 We go,—on pagans, light to pour: 
 Our native land, farewell!” 
 
 Question: “And I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, 
 Whom shal! I send, and who will go for us?” Those who 
 were to go as home missionaries then replied: 
 
 “We go where seldom on the ear 
 Salvation’s tidings swell: 
 We go to dry the mourner’s tear: 
 Our pleasant home, farewell.” 
 
 Question: “And I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, 
 Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” Those who 
 were to become home preachers then replied: 
 
 “Where all our earthly friendships blend, 
 Of Jesus’ love we’ll tell, 
 
 And in the work our lives will spend: 
 Brethren, a short farewell.” 
 
 All then joined in the following chorus: 
 
 “From all these cherished scenes we go, 
 The home of praise and prayer, 
 To meet earth’s gladness or earth’s woe, 
 And many a toil to bear. 
 
 “Farewell ye friends who shared our joy, 
 Ye in whose hearts we dwell: 
 A noble work shall now employ 
 Our energies, farewell! 
 
332 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “Brethren, we press the parting hand: 
 Our songs of parting tell: 
 Then, till we reach heaven’s holy land, 
 A sweet but brief farewell!” 
 
 The whole presented an extraordinary scene. The audi- 
 ence felt that it was not a mere show, not an exhibition of 
 musical skill. The tones in which the hymn was sung were 
 those of deep emotion; and many hearts were melted as 
 these young servants of Christ poured forth their impas- 
 sioned farewell—some of them to the scenes of their sacred 
 studies, others to the pleasant hills and valleys and churches 
 of New England, and others to all the endearments of their 
 native land. 
 
 No. 321. 
 “PRAISE GOD FROM WHOM ALL BLESSINGS FLOW.” 
 
 BisHop THomMAs Kenn, 1637—1711. 
 
 In the year 1858, a thousand gentlemen were seated at 
 the collegiate dinner-table at Andover, Massachusetts, when 
 the unexpected news was received of the successful laying 
 of the Atlantic cable. The whole assembly arose from their 
 seats spontaneously and in the majestic sounds of “Old 
 Hundred” sang the fine words of Bishop Kenn: 
 
 “Praise God from Whom all blessings flow; 
 Praise Him, all creatures here below; 
 Praise Him above, ye heavenly host; 
 Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost!” 
 
 During the Peninsular campaign several of us (says a cor- 
 respondent of one of the public journals) were sitting in 
 our tent a few hours after sunset, on Sabbath evening, when 
 one of the number, laying his hand on my knee, suddenly 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 333 
 
 exclaimed, “Hark, what is that?” In an instant the talking 
 ceased, and every ear was bent forward to catch the sound 
 which had fixed the attention of our comrade. A silence 
 ensued for a moment and then there was wafted across the 
 air the music of that glorious anthem “Old Hundred,” in 
 which it seemed as if a thousand voices participated. All 
 of us immediately sought the open air, and there stood until 
 the last note died away upon the ear. Never before had we 
 heard anything so magnificently grand as this same “Old 
 Hundred” sung by the soldiers of the Union army on the 
 plains of Yorktown. The air was made vocal with the 
 music, and the woods around reverberated with the mighty 
 strain. Beneath the canopy of heaven the soldiers gazed 
 upward into the starlit sky, and sang, all with one voice: 
 
 “Praise God from Whom all blessings flow; 
 Praise Him, all creatures here below; 
 Praise Him above ye heavenly host ; 
 Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.” 
 
 It was solemn, soul-stirring, to hear these words thus 
 chanted that have so often stirred the holiest emotions 
 of man’s heart. It was a scene not unfitted to inspire the 
 genius of a Christian poet or artist. 
 
 No. 322. 
 “HOW PLEASANT ’TIS TO SEE.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Warts, 1674—1748. 
 
 Three men became hopefully pious about the same time. 
 They were neighbors, heads of families, and singers. For 
 a season they lived in love and exhibited in their lives the 
 graces of the Holy Spirit. During this period they often 
 united in sweetly singing the praises of God. But as one 
 
334 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 of them was once passing the house of another, he heard 
 loud words and found his friends in angry dispute. He went 
 into the house, and began by saying, “Come, neighbors, let 
 us sing one of our favorite hymns: 
 
 ‘How pleasant ’tis to see 
 Kindred and friends agree!’ ”’ 
 
 _They became silent, looked first at him and then at each 
 other, and then one joined the singing. The other very soon 
 followed his example, and the three neighbors sang harmoni- 
 ously together as usual, till all their angry passions were 
 lulled to sleep. They parted in peace, and ever after lived 
 in harmony. In this instance, at least, a hymn was better 
 than an exhortation. 
 
 No. 323. 
 “Q GOD, WHY HAST THOU CAST US OFF?” 
 
 Psaum 74. Scotch. 
 
 This Psalm was sung by the Covenanters before the fight 
 at Pentland (Rullion Green), November 28, 1666. Goaded 
 by oppression they had come from the west country in arms 
 to present a remonstrance to the Government. They ap- 
 proached Edinburgh in the hope of a hearing,.and of sup- 
 port from their friends there; but a strong force had been 
 collected to overawe them. A minute and interesting account 
 is given by Veitch, in his memoir, of the retreat of the 
 weary, discouraged, and half-armed remnant by Colinton, 
 along the east side of the Pentlands. They were inter- 
 cepted by General Dalziel, through a pass in the hills near 
 Glencorse, and sang this psalm before the action. They 
 made a brave resistance, successful at first, but were at last 
 broken. -The fugitives were slaughtered with great bar- 
 barity, the captured shut up in Greyfriars churchyard, with- 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 335 
 
 out food or shelter, numbers executed and banished to the 
 Plantations. The graves of some of the slain may be seen 
 on the hillside where they fell, and a monument which has 
 faith and truth in its lines if rude in rhyme. 
 
 “A cloud of witnesses lie here, 
 
 Who for Christ’s interests did appear; 
 And to restore true liberty, 
 
 O’erturned then by tyranny, 
 
 These heroes fought with great renown, 
 By falling got the martyr’s crown.” 
 
 No. 324. 
 “A MIGHTY FORTRESS IS OUR GOD.” 
 
 Rev. Martin Lutuer, 1483—1546. 
 
 In 1720, a remarkable revival began in Moravia, in a 
 town where David Nitschmann lived. The Jesuits opposed 
 it, and the meetings were prohibited. Those who still assem- 
 bled were seized and imprisoned in stables and cellars and 
 foul outhouses. At Nitschmann’s house a hundred and fifty 
 persons were once gathered when the police broke in and 
 seized all the books within reach. Nothing dismayed, the 
 congregation struck up the stanza of Luther’s hymn: 
 
 “And though this world, with devils filled, 
 Should threaten to undo us; 
 We will not fear, for God hath willed 
 His truth to triumph through us. 
 “The Prince of darkness grim— 
 We tremble not for him; 
 His rage we can endure, 
 For lo! his doom is sure, 
 One little word shall fell him.” 
 
336 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 Twenty heads of families, including David Nitschmann, 
 were apprehended for this and sent to jail, Nitschmann 
 being treated with special severity. He finally escaped; 
 fled to the Moravians at Herrnhut; became a bishop, and 
 afterward joined the Wesleys, in 1735, in their expedition 
 to Savannah, Georgia. ; 
 
 Rev. S. W. DuFFIEp. 
 
 No. 325. 
 “TO US SALVATION NOW HAS COME.” 
 “ES IST DAS HEIL UNS KOMMEN HER.” 
 
 Rev. Paut Speratus, 1484—1551. 
 
 At Heidelberg the Reformation made its way by singing. 
 Fearing the Emperor, the Elector Frederick did not sup- 
 press the saying of the mass as soon as the people desired; 
 and so on one occasion, just as the priest was about to begin 
 _ the service standing at the high altar, a single voice led off 
 in the singing of Paul Speratus’ famous hymn: 
 
 “To us salvation now has come, 
 God’s wondrous grace revealing; 
 
 Works never can avert our doom— 
 They have no power of healing. 
 
 Faith looks to God’s beloved Son, 
 
 Who has for us deliverance won, 
 He is our great Redeemer!” 
 
 The vast congregation immediately joined, and the Elector 
 taking the hint, mass was said no more. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 337 
 No. 326. 
 “QO GOD, LOOK DOWN FROM HEAVEN WE PRAY.” 
 “ACH GOTT, VON HIMMEL SIEH DAREIN.” 
 
 Rev. Martin Lutruer, 1483—1546. 
 
 In the year 1529, a Romish priest was preaching at 
 Liibeck, and just as he ended his homily, two boys com- 
 menced singing Luther’s hymn: 
 
 “CQ God look down from heaven, we pray, 
 Thy tenderness awaken! 
 Thy saints so few, fade fast away— 
 Hast Thou Thy poor forsaken? 
 Thy word no more is taught aright, 
 And faith from earth hath vanished quite— 
 O Lord, our God, revive us!” 
 
 when the whole assembly joined as with one voice, drowning 
 the voice of the priest with the song of Luther. 
 
 In 1527, the Council at Brunswick requested a priest at 
 Magdeburg, who was regarded as a very learned and elo- 
 quent man, to resist the new doctrine of Luther, which was 
 rushing as a flood over the country. He took for his 
 subject the merit of good work in securing salvation. One 
 of the hearers arose, and said he had learned quite a dif- 
 ferent doctrine from Holy Scriptures, and briefly stated his 
 views as to salvation by grace. When he had finished, the 
 priest was commencing to reply, and to reaffirm the doctrine 
 of merits, when another of the audience began singing: 
 
 “O God, look down from heaven, we pray, 
 Thy tenderness awaken!” 
 
 The whole congregation immediately joined, and the priest 
 was compelled to retire. 
 
338 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 327. 
 “ARISE, MY SOUL, ARISE.” 
 
 Rev. CHartes WEsLEy, 1708—1788. 
 
 One of the best incidents connected with this hymn is 
 that of the missionaries who went to Patagonia. When 
 Richard Williams and Captain Allen Gardiner attempted, 
 in December, 1850, to carry the Gospel to Patagonia, they 
 encountered a series of disasters which were simply heart- 
 rending, and which culminated in the death of the whole 
 party. They had nets but found no fish; they lost their 
 anchor and both their small boats at Picton Island; of 
 the larger boats, one was wrecked and became unseaworthy ; 
 the natives were hostile, and were always crying, “Yammer 
 schooner!”—“Give me!”’ The company consisted of Cap- 
 tain Allen Gardiner and Dr. Richard Williams; and of 
 John Maidment and Joseph Irwin, a carpenter, together 
 with three Cornish fishermen, Pearce, Badcock, and Bryant. 
 All were devoted Christians, and in spite of the fact that 
 their ammunition had been forgotten and left on board 
 the ship that brought them, they hoped to establish their 
 mission. But disease set in. Williams and Badcock 
 were attacked by scurvy. Provisions grew scarce. They 
 changed their camp several times without improving 
 their prospects. They had great difficulty in forming 
 friendly relations with the Fuegians. And at last they 
 were reduced to the dire necessity of waiting for help 
 to come from England or the Falkland Islands. As a 
 matter of judgment, it would have been much better if they 
 had attempted to make the voyage to the Islands in 
 their solitary boat, than to wait on hopelessly; but they 
 preferred to remain where they were. Both Captain Gar- 
 diner and Dr. Williams kept diaries, which were afterward 
 found. From these we learned the short sad story of their 
 terrible privations and suffering, and that Maidment and 
 Gardiner were probably the last survivors. The fatal 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 339 
 
 entry is on September 6, and is in Captain Gardiner’s 
 hand: “I neither hunger nor thirst, though five days 
 without food! Marvellous loving kindness to me a sinner!” 
 
 This hymn was the parting song of John Badcock, the 
 first who died. Lying by Richard Williams’ side, in the 
 narrow and leaky cabin of the Speedwell, he asked his 
 companion to sing this hymn with him, and in a few minutes 
 he passed away. Her Majesty’s ship, Dido, commanded by 
 Captain Moreshead, reached Banner Cove, January 19, 
 1852, and found the bodies of Captain Gardiner and Mr. 
 Maidment in the cabin which had served as their shelter. 
 The outcome of this self-sacrifice has been the establish- 
 ment, in 1872, of a permanent mission station at Ushuwia, 
 Tierra del Fuego, with mission operations in Patagonia 
 and among the Araucanian Indians. Professor Christlieb, 
 in his “Foreign Missions,” 1880, tells us that some Pesherehs 
 of Fuegia had declared to the missionary, Mr. Whaits, that 
 they now understood why Captain Gardiner had taken such 
 trouble with them, and they deeply regretted their indiffer- 
 ence to him. 
 
 Rev. S. W. DUFFIELD. 
 
 No. 328. 
 
 “BEFORE JEHOVAH’S AWFUL THRONE.” 
 Rev. Isaac Watts, 1674—1748. 
 
 A notable incident in connection with this hymn was 
 its use at the time when Commodore Perry’s fleet was 
 anchored off Japan in 1853-1854. Divine Service was held 
 on the flagship, and the chaplain, in full sight of thousands 
 upon the shore, gave out this hymn to be sung. The marine 
 band struck up the notes of “Old Hundred,” and the natives 
 of the empire where Christian civilization was to have 
 such power beheld the religious worship of the nation which 
 
 was knocking at their gates. 
 Durriety’s English Hymns. 
 
340 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 829. 
 “BLEST BE THE TIE THAT BINDS.” 
 
 Rev. JoHN Fawcett. 
 
 D. L. Moody relates the following: “In 1860, I had in my 
 Sunday school a pale, delicate young man as one of the 
 teachers. I knew his burning piety, and assigned him to 
 the worst class in the school. They were all girls, and it 
 was an awful class. They kept gadding around in the 
 school-room and were laughing and carrying on all the 
 time. And this young man had better success than any 
 one else. One Sunday he was absent, and I tried myself 
 to teach the class, but couldn’t do anything with them; 
 they seemed farther off than ever from any concern about 
 their souls. Well, the day after his absence, early Monday 
 morning, the young man came into the store where I 
 worked, and, tottering and bloodless, threw himself down 
 on some boxes. 
 
 ““What’s the matter?’ I asked. 
 
 ““T have been bleeding at the lungs, and they have given 
 me up to die,’ he said. 
 
 ““But you are not afraid to die?’ I questioned. 
 
 ““No,’ said he, ‘I am not afraid to die, but I have 
 got to stand before God and give an account of my steward- 
 ship, and not one of my Sunday school scholars has been 
 brought to Jesus. I have failed to bring one, and haven’t 
 any strength to do it now.’ 
 
 “He was so weighed down that I got a carriage and took 
 that dying man in it, and we called at the home of every 
 one of his scholars, and to each one he said, as best his 
 faint voice would let him, ‘I have come to just ask you 
 to come to the Savior,’ and then he prayed as I never heard 
 before. And for ten days he labored in that way, some- 
 times walking to the nearest houses, and at the end of that 
 ten days every one of that large class had yielded to the 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 341 
 
 Savior. Full well-do I remember the night before he went 
 away (for the doctors said he must hurry to the South) 
 how we held a true love feast. It was the very gate of 
 ‘heaven, that meeting. He prayed, and they prayed; he 
 didn’t ask them, he didn’t think they could pray; and then 
 we sang: 
 ‘Blest be the tie that binds 
 Our hearts in Christian love, 
 The fellowship of Christian minds, 
 Is like to that above.’ 
 
 “Tt was a beautiful night in June that he left on the 
 Michigan Southern, and I was down to the train to help 
 him off. And those girls gathered there again, every one, 
 all unknown to each other, and the depot seemed a second 
 gate to heaven, in the joyful, yet tearful communion and 
 farewells between those newly redeemed souls and him 
 whose crown of rejoicing it will be that he led them to 
 Jesus. At last the gong sounded, and, supported on the 
 platform, the dying man shook hands with every one, and 
 whispered, ‘I will meet you yonder.’ ” 
 
 In the life of Rev. Charles Hodge, D.D., it is related 
 by his son, Rev. A. A. Hodge, that “From about 1868 to 
 the year of his death (1878), each eraduating class, at the 
 very last, took a special personal farewell of Dr. Hodge. 
 After receiving their diplomas, and the valedictory charge, 
 and benediction of the representative of the Board of 
 Trustees, the class formed in a circle with Dr. Hodge in 
 the center, in the middle of the front campus. They sang 
 (at least in April, 1869) several verses of the hymn, ‘All 
 hail the power of Jesus’ name,’ and the verse of the mission- 
 ary hymn beginning, ‘Shall we whose souls are lighted.’ 
 Then making a close ring each one crossing his arms, they 
 held hand by hand, and sang, ‘Blest be the tie that binds,’ 
 and then the long meter Doxology. After that Dr. Hodge 
 pronounced the benediction. He then shook hands with 
 
342 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 each student, and each student shook hands with all the 
 others, and they separated.” 
 
 No. 330. 
 “O LORD, THOU HAST REJECTED US.” 
 
 Psalm 60, Scotch. 
 
 Rev. Ebenezer Erskine was Moderator of the Synod of 
 Perth and Stirling, and one of the leaders of those who 
 protested against the action of the Scotch Presbyterian 
 Church Synod, which at last ended in the “Secession” of 
 a part of that body and the organization of the “Secession 
 Church.” When in 1740, he was driven from his church, 
 he took his place with an immense multitude below the 
 battlements of Stirling Castle and sang the first five verses 
 of this psalm: 
 
 “O Lord, Thou hast rejected us, 
 And scattered us abroad; 
 Thou justly hast displeased been; 
 Return to us, O God. 
 
 “The earth to tremble, Thou hast made: 
 Therein did’st breaches make: 
 Do Thou thereof the breaches heal, 
 Because the land doth shake. 
 
 “Unto Thy people Thou hard things 
 Hast shew’d and on them sent; 
 And Thou hast caused us to drink 
 
 Wine of astonishment. 
 
 “And yet a banner Thou hast giv’n 
 To them who Thee do fear; 
 That it by them because of truth, 
 Displayed may appear. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 343 
 
 “That. Thy beloved people may 
 Delivered be from thrall; 
 Save with the pow’r of Thy right hand, 
 And hear me when I call.” 
 
 No. 331. 
 “COME THOU ALMIGHTY KING.” 
 
 Rev. CHARLES WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 During the Revolutionary War, and while the British 
 had possession of Long Island, a body of troops invaded 
 a place of worship one Sunday morning and insisted that 
 the congregation should sing “God save the King.” In 
 reply the people did sing, but it was another set of words 
 ‘to the same tune: 
 
 “Come, Thou-.Almighty King, 
 Help us Thy name to sing, 
 Help us to praise; 
 Father all-glorious, 
 O’er all victorious, 
 Come and reign over us, 
 Ancient of days.” 
 
 No. 3832. 
 “HOW CONDESCENDING AND HOW KIND.” > 
 
 Rev. Isaac Watts, 1674—1748. 
 
 The Rev. J. Leifchild tells how he was once invited to 
 preach in Berkshire, in a straggling village where there 
 
344 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 was very little of the gospel ever heard. The rough element 
 of the place was greatly against the service. Shouts and 
 disturbance attended the opening of the meeting, and a 
 large haystack, the property of his host, was set on fire. 
 But Leifchild persevered and opened the service with a 
 somewhat motley crowd of hearers by reading the Scripture 
 in a solemn and earnest manner. Then he offered prayer, 
 and felt as though he had secured somewhat of the sympathy 
 of his audience. He next read the hymn commencing as 
 above, and especially emphasized certain words in one of 
 the stanzas as follows: 
 
 “Here we receive repeated seals 
 Of Jesus’ dying love: 
 Hard is the heart that never feels 
 One soft affection move.” 
 
 As he read he heard a dull noise near the door like that 
 of a heavy weight falling. At the close of the meeting, 
 he asked about it—when a man was pointed out who 
 came forward and acknowledged that it was caused by 
 a great stone which he had brought in his hand in order 
 to hurl it at the preacher when he announced his text. 
 “But,” he said, “the prayer of the minister, and particularly 
 the hymn that was read, touched my heart, and no sooner, 
 sir, had you uttered the words: 
 
 ‘Hard is the heart that never feels 
 One soft affection move,’ 
 
 than down dropped the stone.” With tears in his eyes he 
 then stayed to converse with the clergyman, and at length 
 became a truly devout person, and was even a religious 
 teacher in later years. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 345 
 No. 333. 
 “HOW SAD OUR STATE BY NATURE IS.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Watts, 1674—1748. 
 
 In Dr. Spencer’s ‘“Pastor’s Sketches” occurs this incident 
 connected with this hymn. He had given out the hymn to 
 be sung, forgetting the possible effect it might have upon the 
 mind of a young woman among his congregation then under 
 deep anxiety of mind. The account proceeds: “The next 
 day she came to tell me that she had made a new discovery. 
 
 “Well,” said I, “what is that you have discovered?” 
 
 “Why, sir,” said she, “the way of salvation all seems 
 to me now perfectly plain. My darkness is all gone. I 
 see now what I never saw before.” 
 
 “Do you see that you have given up sin and the world, 
 and given your whole heart to Christ?” | 
 
 “T do not think that I am a Christian; but I have never 
 been so happy before. All is light to me now. I see the 
 way clear; and I am not burdened and troubled as I 
 was.” 
 
 “And how is this? What has brought you to this state 
 of mind?” 
 
 “T do not know how it is, or what has brought me to it. 
 But when you were reading that hymn last night, I saw 
 the whole way of salvation for sinners perfectly plain, 
 and wondered that I had never seen it before. I saw that 
 I had nothing to do but trust in Christ. 
 
 ‘A guilty, weak and helpless worm, 
 On Thy kind arms I fall.’ 
 
 I sat all the evening just looking at that hymn. I did not 
 hear your prayer. I did not hear a word of your sermon. 
 I do not know your text. I thought of nothing but that 
 hymn; and I have been thinking of it ever since. It is 
 
346 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 so light and makes me so contented. Why, sir,” said she, 
 in the perfect simplicity of her heart, never thinking that 
 she was repeating what had been told her a thousand times, 
 “don’t you think that the reason that we do not get out of 
 darkness sooner is that we don’t believe?” 
 
 No. 834. 
 “’M NOT ASHAMED TO OWN MY LORD.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Warts, 1674—1748. 
 
 In relating the account of a visit paid to a minister much 
 broken in health, Dr. Leifchild says: “I found but the 
 wreck and remnant only of what I had formerly known 
 him to be. . . . He seemed wholly taken up with 
 trifles and was muttering a request for sweetmeats, as 
 though he were in reality again a child. I was confounded 
 and appalled at what I saw and exclaimed: ‘What, my old 
 friend, do you not know me?’ 
 
 “He gave no response, but simply repeated his former 
 request. One of his daughters then said to me: ‘Ask him 
 something about the Scriptures or the Savior, and you will 
 soon see a difference.’ 
 
 “Upon this, I said to him as if complainingly: ‘Well, 
 I see you do not know me; do you know Jesus, Whom 
 I serve in the Gospel?’ 
 
 “He started and looked as if just aroused from sleep; 
 when, lifting up his eyes, he exclaimed: 
 
 ‘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!’ ” 
 
 The Rev. Dr. Marks, after one of the battles on the 
 Peninsula, in which some of the Union men were captured, 
 gave himself up as a prisoner to the rebels that he might 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 347 
 
 not be separated from those over whom he watched as a 
 religious guide, On one occasion, he went on to the Brackett 
 House, on the battlefield, where were four hundred and fifty 
 of our wounded men. The flag of the country was printed on 
 one of the publications which he was distributing; and 
 he mentions that he often saw those mutilated men lift 
 it to their lips and kiss the emblem of our nationality, 
 undeterred by the presence and taunts of the enemy. There 
 was one remarkable man in that group of sufferers, whose 
 -story, as recounted by this gentleman, deserves to be told 
 from one age to another. His name was Nolan. His right 
 leg had been cut off by a cannon shot, and he was lying 
 in the midst of fifty or sixty men in one of the rooms. 
 As I came up to him, I saw that his face was beaming with 
 smiles, and, from his appearance, I could not have supposed 
 for a moment that there was a single pang of pain in 
 that body. I asked him how he had endured his suffering. 
 He said, “I was three days and three nights out on the 
 battlefield, and all that time heard the whisperings of 
 angels, and I only could look up to the stars and think 
 every one of them sang to me. The question of my own 
 personal safety, as a believer in Christ, was settled six 
 years ago; and now I want that all my friends should 
 feel as I do.” And then there would burst forth from his 
 lips that sweet song: 
 
 “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.” 
 
 And this man, even in the midnight hour, would be singing 
 and comforting those poor men around him. Subsequently, 
 he was carried to Richmond, a prisoner. I followed my 
 charge to that city. And as I was one day passing through 
 the great hall of the prison, where some four hundred men 
 were lying, with their wounds in agony, covering every 
 
348 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 inch of the floor, as I stepped over one lacerated limb and 
 another, and looked down into their burning eyes, I heard 
 that song again, sweeter and sweeter, and more and more 
 distinct. At length I found my way to the singer, and it 
 was the same man, still singing: 
 
 “Jesus, my God! I know His name, 
 His name is all my trust.” 
 
 And so he comforted the hundreds of men about him, to 
 whom he could not go, and silenced their murmurs and 
 stilled their groans by this hymn. Afterward it was thought 
 that he must die, and it was told to Nolan. 
 
 I said to him, “It is very probable that today you will 
 be called to appear before God, and stand with the great 
 throng before the divine throne.” 
 
 “Blessed be God!” he said. “I shall be detailed from 
 the battlefield to go up and be with Jesus forever; detailed 
 to dwell in the world of light and glory; detailed to be 
 wounded and to bleed and to die no more. But,” he con- 
 tinued, “doctor, I am not going to die today. I feel that 
 I shall live to go away from this place.” And through 
 that hour of great danger the man did live by the joy of his 
 soul, and afterward was carried to Fortress Monroe. I 
 heard from a soldier afterward that there he was still singing 
 as before, and that subsequently he was removed thence 
 to Washington, and there died and went up into the bosom of 
 his Savior. 
 
 Christian Memorials of the War, Hackett. 
 
 No. 335. 
 
 “JESUS, LOVER OF MY SOUL.” 
 Rey. CHARLES WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 A Mrs. Lewis, of Norwich, England, many years ago 
 went to hear Mr. Hook preach at the Tabernacle, being 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 349 
 
 under great distress of mind. She had determined to attend 
 divine service once more, and if she obtained no peace 
 she intended then to drown herself. The first hymn which 
 the preacher announced was: 
 
 “Jesus, Lover of my soul.” 
 
 which so startled her and suited her condition that she 
 supposed that he “had made this hymn for her sake,” for 
 she had no doubt that some one had informed him of her 
 state of mind. As a result of this experience, she was 
 hopefully converted. 
 
 English Hymns. 
 
 No. 336. 
 “JERUSALEM THE GOLDEN.” 
 
 Bernard of Cluny. 
 Rev. Joun Mason Neate, Translator, 1818—1866. 
 
 There is a touching little story told with some just 
 pride by Dr. Neale, the translator of this hymn, of a 
 child who was ill and in great suffering. The medical 
 attendants could do but little to ease its agonies of pain. 
 But the child would lie without a murmur and almost 
 without motion while the whole of the four hundred lines 
 of the hymn on the better country, of which the hymn com- 
 mencing as above is a part, were being read to it. 
 
 No. 337. 
 “NOW I HAVE FOUND A FRIEND.” 
 
 Henry J. M. Hors, 1809. 
 
 Rev. Denham Smith relates the following: “A little boy, 
 about four years old, came one day where a group of 
 young conyerts were singing this hymn. Immediately the 
 little fellow stood still, with closed lips, a very unusual 
 
350 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 thing for him, and when asked why he did not sing, he said 
 he could not sing, for Jesus was not his: but he said, ‘Will 
 you pray for me, for I want to know Jesus as mine.’ When 
 he went home his mother said to his sisters, ‘Let us sing 
 two or three other hymns, and then “Jesus is mine?” and 
 then perhaps he will sing it too; so they sang several others, 
 and the little fellow caroled away at the top of his voice, 
 until they commenced: 
 
 ‘Now I have found a Friend, 
 Jesus is mine.” 
 
 His lips again closed, and in a voice of craving sorrow, 
 turning to his mother, he said, ‘Ah, mamma, why do you 
 ask me to sing that? For Jesus is not mine.’ 
 
 When his father came home in the evening and heard it, 
 he said: ‘Oh, it must be fancy in the child; a good night’s 
 sleep will wear it away; he is too young to know much 
 of the reality of such things.’ So he went to bed, and next 
 morning when the father opened the door, what do you 
 think he saw? There was the little one standing in his 
 night-clothes, looking like a perfect picture of anxiety and 
 inquiry. 
 
 “He said, ‘Dear papa, is not the day after tomorrow 
 Friday?’ 
 
 “Ves, my child.’ 
 
 “And, papa, will there not be a prayer meeting on 
 Friday?’ 
 
 “Yes, my child.’ 
 
 “Then, will you not ask them to pray for me, that I 
 may be able to sing, “Jesus is mine,” for I have been looking 
 for Jesus, but I cannot find Him; Jesus is not mine.’ 
 
 “His papa promised that he would have him prayed for. 
 Wednesday came, and Thursday, and at last Friday; but 
 he could not say, ‘Jesus is mine’; and amid the engage- 
 ments of the day, the father actually forgot his own child. 
 Toward the end of the meeting, the congregation arose and 
 sang: 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 351 
 
 ‘Now I have found a Friend, 
 Jesus is mine.’ 
 
 It happened that the father was in one part of the church 
 and his little boy in another; and as they sang, the little 
 fellow wended his way through the crowded aisles and 
 groups of young converts till he reached the father, and 
 resting his hands upon his knees, he burst into tears, saying, 
 ‘Dear papa, I have found Jesus! Jesus is mine!’” 
 
 No. 338. 
 “SOVEREIGN RULER OF THE SKIES.” 
 
 Rev. JoHN Ryanp, 1753—1825. 
 
 Robert Flockhart was a field and street preacher well 
 known in the last century. He was a soldier against the 
 French, and when in the battle of the Isle of France, he 
 was suddenly moved to sing. A battlefield, in the midst 
 of flying shot and all the uproar and turmoil is a curious 
 place for a song, but he sang a part of the hymn beginning 
 as above: 
 
 “Plagues and death around me fly, 
 Till He bids I cannot die; 
 Not a single shaft can hit, 
 Till the love of God thinks fit.” 
 
 And he followed this hymn with another quite as appropri- 
 ate to the circumstances: 
 
 “When I tread the verge of Jordan, 
 Bid my anxious fears subside.” 
 
352 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 No. 339. 
 “QO WHERE ARE KINGS AND EMPIRES NOW?” 
 
 BisHop CLEVELAND Coxe, 1818. 
 
 Rey. S. W. Duffield, in his “English Hymns,” quotes one 
 occasion, when this hymn was very effectively used. “It 
 was when the General Conference of the Evangelical Alli- 
 ance was convened in New York City, in 1873. It was at the 
 time when so much had been said about the ‘prayer test,’ 
 and when we scarcely knew whether the faith of the Church 
 might not have been shaken for the moment by the universal 
 storm of skepticism. President Woolsey was giving the 
 opening address. After referring to the prevalent scepti- 
 cism, he looked up with that peculiar twinkle of the eye 
 which we all recollect—at once expressive of denial and 
 satisfaction—and repeated the first stanza of Bishop Coxe’s 
 hymn: 
 
 
 
 ‘Oh, where are kings and empires now, 
 Of old that went and came? 
 
 But Lord! Thy Church is praying yet, 
 A thousand years the same!’ 
 
 For a moment there was silence. In another moment the 
 full significance of the reference had flashed on every mind, 
 and the response was instantaneous and universal. Shouts, 
 waving of handkerchiefs from the ladies, clapping of hands, 
 stamping of feet—I never knew anything like it. Round 
 after round continued, until the storm of applause ended 
 in a burst of grateful tears. No one doubted that the 
 Church still believed in prayer and that the tempest had 
 passed without the loss of a sail!” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 353 
 
 No. 340. 
 “THE GOD OF ABRAM PRAISE.” 
 
 Rev. Tuomas Ouivers, 1725—1799. 
 
 A young Jewess had but lately given her heart to the 
 Savior. Her baptism enraged her father, who was the chief 
 of his synagogue, and he vowed to kill her. She found 
 refuge in the house of the minister who had baptized her, 
 “and there,’ says an eyewitness, who was brought to 
 Christ by the scene, “I saw her, in the hour of bitterness, 
 when the reality of her abandonment by the house of 
 her fathers first came upon her. It did not dampen her 
 joy in Jesus Christ, and I shall never forget the scene when 
 she stood, with clasped hands, her black, lustrous eyes 
 upturned to heaven, and her dark but expressive face lighted 
 up, and lifting up her voice sang snatches of what she had 
 already learned to call her own hymn: 
 
 ‘The God of Abram praise, 
 Who reigns enthroned above, 
 Ancient of everlasting days, 
 And God of love: 
 Jehovah, great I Am, 
 By earth and heaven confessed, 
 I bow and bless the sacred name, 
 Forever blest.” 
 
 No. 341. 
 “ROCK OF AGES, CLEFT FOR ME.” 
 
 Rev. Aucustus MontacuE Topuapy, 1740—1778. 
 
 Mrs. Lucy Seaman Bainbridge, who, with her husband, 
 Dr. Bainbridge, made the tour of the world in order to 
 
304 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 study Christian missions, tells a most beautiful incident 
 in connection with this hymn: “The Chinese women, it 
 seems, are so anxious to ‘make merit’ for themselves that 
 they will perform any labor to escape the painful trans- 
 migrations of the next life. They dread to be born again 
 as dogs or cats, and the highest hope possessed by them 
 is to be reborn as men. In order to secure this, they do any 
 and every meritorious act.”’? One whom Mrs. Bainbridge 
 saw had with incredible labor dug a well twenty-five feet 
 deep and some ten or fifteen feet across. With her poor, 
 weak hands she had excavated every foot of it, and it was 
 only after this achievement that she learned of Christ and 
 of the free Gospel of salvation. When Mrs. Bainbridge 
 met her she was an old woman of eighty, and stretching 
 out her crippled and aged fingers, she and her visitor sang 
 together: 
 
 “Nothing in my hands I bring, 
 Simply to Thy cross I cling.” 
 
 The ship London, lost in the Bay of Biscay, January 11, 
 1866, had on board the Rev. J. D. Draper and his wife, who 
 were bound for Australia. The last man that left the ship 
 was asked what the passengers were doing, and he replied 
 that the last sounds he heard were the voices of as many 
 as could sing, singing: 
 
 “Rock of Ages, cleft for me. 
 Let me hide myself in Thee!” 
 
 Patrick Donnellan was an Irish boy living in County 
 Clare, Ireland. In this county the Irish tongue being 
 mostly spoken, the most dense ignorance and darkness pre- 
 vailed. When Donnellan was fifteen, a school was opened 
 in the neighborhood, at which he learned to read and where 
 he received some Scriptural instruction. When about twenty 
 years of age he became a Christian. At that time there 
 was much persecution of those that read the Bible, by the 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 305 
 
 Romish priests, their names being read aloud by the priest 
 at mass and the ignorant people sometimes resorting to 
 violence in their persecution of them. It was no light 
 matter in such a region for young Donnellan to take a 
 stand as a disciple of Christ, but he took the stand boldly, 
 knowing fully the possibilities before him. When asked 
 by a Christian friend if he did not expect to suffer persecu- 
 tion for the name of Christ, he replied that such was his 
 prospect, and he was aware of it. Soon after, on the six- 
 teenth of February, 1831, he accompanied a gentleman to 
 the house of a poor woman, who had suffered persecution 
 because she desired to educate an only child in a knowledge 
 of the Scriptures. Being well acquainted ‘with the Irish 
 language, he had been employed as an interpreter in this 
 visit. As they returned home after this visit, they were 
 both fired at from behind the hedge of the road and 
 wounded; Donnellan receiving two wounds, one being in the 
 side. From the moment the wound was examined, it 
 was apparent that it would result in his death, and he was 
 so informed. When relief was procured and a cart pro- 
 vided, the sufferer was laid on it and conveyed to the house 
 where many awaited his arrival. This meeting was fitted 
 to excite strong emotions. Donnellan himself, however, 
 was calm, and having been carried into the kitchen and 
 seated, he began to recite the hymn: 
 
 “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.” 
 
 He lived about two days after the wound, and when nearly 
 exhausted and dying, he repeated to his sister and other 
 members of the family the following hymn, as if he would 
 pour into these bleeding hearts the balm of comfort: 
 
356 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “Rejoice for a brother deceased, 
 Our loss is his infinite gain; 
 A soul out of prison released, 
 And freed from its bodily chain; 
 With songs let us follow his flight, 
 And mount with his spirit above; 
 Escape to the mansions of light, 
 And lodge in the Eden of love. 
 
 “Our brother the haven hath gained, 
 Outflying the tempest. and wind, 
 His rest he hath sooner obtained, 
 And left his companions behind; 
 Still tossed on a sea of distress, 
 Hard toiling to make the blest shore, 
 Where all is assurance and peace, 
 And sorrow and sin are no more.” 
 
 When he reached the middle of the last verse he could not 
 refrain from weeping, and this was the only occasion during 
 his sufferings on which he gave way to tears. 
 
 Christian’s Penny Magazine, May 6, 1837. 
 
 On board the ill-fated steamer Sewanakha was one of 
 the Fisk Jubilee Singers. Before leaving the burning 
 steamer and committing himself to the merciless waves, he 
 carefully fastened upon himself and wife life preservers. 
 Some one cruelly dragged away that of his wife, leaving her 
 without hope, except as she could cling to her husband. 
 This she did, placing her hands firmly on his shoulders 
 and resting there till her strength became exhausted, she 
 said, “I can hold on no longer.” 
 
 “Try a little longer,” was the response of the wearied and 
 agonized husband. “Let us sing ‘Rock of Ages.’” And 
 as the sweet strains floated over those troubled waters, reach- 
 ing the ears of the sinking and dying, little did they know, 
 those sweet singers of Israel, whom they comforted. But 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 357 
 
 lo! as they sang, one after another of those exhausted ones 
 were seen raising their hands above the overwhelming waves, 
 joining with a last effort in this sweet dying pleading 
 prayer. 
 
 “Rock of Ages, cleft for me, 
 Let me hide myself in Thee.” 
 
 With the song seemed to come strength; another and yet 
 another was encouraged to renewed effort. Soon in the 
 distance a boat was seen approaching. Singing still, they 
 tried, and soon with superhuman strength laid hold of the 
 lifeboat, upon which they were borne in safety to land. 
 This incident is related by the singer himself, who said he 
 believed Toplady’s “Rock of Ages” saved many another 
 besides himself and wife. 
 
 A Quaker lady,‘who for three years had visited camps 
 and hospitals to help and cheer the sick, wounded and 
 dying during the war of the Rebellion in America, relates 
 the case of a little drummer boy, who had recognized no 
 one since his fall and had given little evidence of con- 
 sciousness; he was very near his end; and she whispered 
 in his ear: 
 
 “Rock of Ages,. cleft for me, 
 Let me hide myself in Thee!” 
 
 when the countenance of the brave youth brightened up, 
 and he followed with the second stanza of the hymn, saying 
 that his mother had taught him that hymn, and he had 
 often sung it in Sunday school, and after a few minutes 
 conversation he expressed a hope in the Savior, and fell 
 asleep to wake no more to earthly scenes. 
 
 A chaplain of the Hartford Retreat for the Insane, Rev. 
 Dr. Thompson, relates the following incident in his expe- 
 rience there: In passing through the halls he met an 
 
358 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 educated man whom he had long known and respected. 
 His incoherent talk and dejected countenance arrested his 
 attention, and he saw that a malady had remorseless sway 
 over the body and mind of the man. The physicians had 
 little hope of his recovery. Finding him one day in the 
 deepest despondency, the chaplain repeated the stanza 
 “Rock of Ages, cleft for me.’’ Afterward when the man 
 came to himself and was better, he reminded the faithful 
 chaplain that the hymn was indissolubly linked with the 
 beginning of his convalescence. 
 Christian Secretary, September 9, 1885. 
 
 No. 842. 
 “O THOU FROM WHOM ALL GOODNESS FLOWS.” 
 
 Rev. THomas Hawets, 17321820. 
 
 Mr. John B. Gough writes thus about his father: “During 
 a retreat of the English army, when closely pursued by 
 Marshal Soult, about the year 1809, my father, then about 
 thirty years of age, was a soldier.in the Fifty-second Light 
 Infantry. He had been slightly wounded in the chest, 
 and though his wound was not considered fatal, it was 
 painful and irritating. The army had suffered fearfully 
 from exposure, famine, and the heavy fatigues of an active 
 campaign. I well remember my father saying to me: ‘John, 
 you will never know what hunger is till you feel the two 
 sides of your stomach grinding together.’ In that cam- 
 paign, men, mad with hunger, fought like wolves over the 
 half-decayed hoof of a bullock; and often when one of 
 these poor animals, overcome with weakness and starvation, 
 was staggering as if about to fall, the ready knife was 
 applied to its throat, and the fainting soldiers, eagerly 
 catching the blood in their hands, and hardly waiting for 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 359 
 
 it to congeal, made it take the place of food. In this 
 retreat the Fifty-second Regiment—to use an American 
 term—was demoralized; and, while they staggered on, my 
 father threw himself out of the ranks, under the shadow of 
 a large rock, to die; he could go no farther. Lying there he 
 took from his inner pocket a hymnbook (which I have 
 today with all the marks of its seventy years upon it), and 
 began to read the hymn in which is the verse: 
 
 ‘The hour is near, consign’d to death, 
 I own the just decree; 
 
 Savior, with my last parting breath, 
 I'll ery, “Remember me.”’’ 
 
 He must die—it seemed inevitable—though far from home, 
 in a strange land. He was a Christian, and endeavored to 
 prepare himself for the change. Suddenly a large bird of 
 prey, with a red neck growing out of a ruffle of feathers, 
 came swooping along, almost brushing my father’s body 
 with its wings; and then. circling up, it alighted on the 
 point of rock and turned its blood-red eye on its intended 
 victim. As my father saw that horrible thing watching and 
 waiting to tear him in pieces even before life was extinct, 
 it so filled him with horror and disgust that he cried: ‘I 
 cannot endure this; it is too terrible. When I am unable 
 to drive that fearful thing away, it will be tearing my 
 flesh. I cannot endure it!’ He arose to his feet and fell, 
 - then crawled and struggled away, till at length he crept 
 into a poor hut, found safety, and soon after joined his 
 regiment. Though he was very, very ill after that frightful 
 episode, he recovered, and died in 1871, at the remarkable 
 age of ninety-four years.” 
 
360 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 848. 
 “SAFE IN THE ARMS OF JESUS.” 
 
 Miss Fanny VAN ALSTYNE, 1823. 
 
 Bishop Hannington, a missionary of the English Church 
 in Central Africa, fell a martyr to his zeal in the cause 
 of missions in October, 1885. During the last few days of 
 his life, he kept a diary, from which the following story 
 of his sufferings and heroism is gleaned: He was on his 
 way to Uganda, and the king, Mwanga, was displeased 
 because white men were coming to his capital on the east- 
 ward side; and had caused his detention by one of his 
 chiefs, Lubwa. This took place on the twenty-first of 
 October. While detained at Lubwa’s, which is near the 
 northeastern arm of Lake Nyanza, a soldier was placed 
 to guard the Bishop’s tent, yet he was allowed to climb 
 a hill from which he could see the Nile. While upon the 
 hill he was set upon by about twenty ruffians. He says, 
 “Brahim (his head man) they bound instantly; me they 
 threw violently to the ground, and proceeded to strip me 
 of all valuables. Thinking they were robbers, I shouted 
 for help, when they forced me up and hurried me away, 
 as I thought, to throw me down a precipice close at hand. 
 I shouted again, in spite of one threatening to kill me with 
 a club. Twice I nearly broke away from them, and then 
 grew faint with struggling and was dragged by the legs 
 over the ground. I said: ‘Lord, I put myself into Thy 
 Hands. I look to Thee alone.’ Then another struggle, and 
 I got to my feet and was thus dashed along. More than 
 once I was violently brought into contact with banana 
 trees, some trying in their haste to force me one way, others 
 the other, and the exertion of struggling directly after dinner 
 gave me an agonizing pain in the stomach. In spite of 
 all, feeling I was being dragged away to be murdered at 
 a distance, I sang: 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 361 
 
 ‘Safe in the arms of Jesus.’ 
 and 
 ‘My God I am Thine,’ 
 
 and then laughed at the very agony of my situation.” 
 
 And so the diary goes on relating his sufferings at the 
 hands of these savages to whose land he had gone to tell 
 them of the love of Christ for them, until at last his 
 reason almost left him and he spoke of himself as very 
 low and crying to God to release him. But through it all 
 he found comfort and help in God’s word and spoke of the 
 Psalms he read and of the help he found in them. And at 
 last he was taken out and murdered by those whom he had 
 gone to help. 
 
 During a great flood of the Missouri River some years 
 ago, the following incident occurred: A woman living 
 near the river bank with her two children, little girls of 
 four and ten years of age, was called away to a neighbor- 
 ing town for the day and left the two children in charge of 
 the home, especially placing the younger one in charge of 
 the older sister. At this time, although there had been 
 heavy rains for many days, the river was still inside its 
 banks, and no flood was expected. After the mother left, 
 however, the rain set in again with great violence, frighten- 
 ing the children greatly with the incessant lightning and 
 thunder. Sometime after night-fall the youngest fell asleep, 
 but the elder, true to the charge committed to her, re- 
 mained awake soothing the child when the noise of the 
 tempest roused it. During the night she was startled by 
 a dull heavy sound at the door. Springing up to open it, 
 what was her astonishment and fright, to be met by the 
 waters of the river, which had overflowed their banks and 
 were beating against the house. As the door opened, the 
 water rushed in over the child’s feet and ankles; she quickly 
 closed the door again and, going to the window, saw that 
 the rain had ceased and that the moon was shining, but 
 
362 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 as far as she could see, it was only water, yellow water 
 everywhere, and rising rapidly. It was almost up to the 
 window panes already, and it was only a question how long 
 the frail wooden door and window could bar the stream 
 before the house would be flooded and they swept away. 
 She almost screamed with terror, but the thought of her 
 little sister, sleeping now, and committed to her special 
 care, nerved her to thoughts and acts above her years. 
 Suddenly she thought of the stairs, and gathering the 
 sleeping child in her arms, she went softly up the steps. 
 She laid her on the bed and kept her awful vigil alone. 
 Oh, for one kiss from mamma’s lips before the terrible 
 waters swallowed her; the tears flowed silently, and she 
 knelt and prayed as she had never prayed before. So the 
 long night wore away, and the candle flickered, flared, 
 and then died in its socket. Suddenly a sound broke on 
 the silence which she knew too well was the breaking up 
 of the furniture below, that awakened “Dot,” the little 
 sister, and she cried plaintively: ‘Will mamma _ never 
 come for us, sister?” 
 
 What a pang those words sent to the sister’s heart as 
 she asked herself the question inwardly; but steadfastly 
 she replied, “If mamma doesn’t, darling, Jesus will.” 
 
 “Then,” said the child dreamily, “I wish He would come 
 quick,” and she dropped asleep again. Nellie held Dot 
 closely in her arms, hoping she would wake no more, but 
 she did, and this time it was with a loud cry: “I want 
 mamma; oh, where’s my mamma?” | 
 
 It was more than Nellie could stand; she sobbed aloud 
 and shook with nervous terror. Then, with a mighty effort, 
 she controlled herself and said: ‘Don’t ery, baby, sister will 
 sing to you.” Tremblingly she began: 
 
 “Safe in the arms of Jesus, 
 Safe on His gentle breast.” 
 
 The words calmed her, and her voice found strength as 
 she sang on to the end of the verse. With the first gleam 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 363 
 
 of the morning, a boat with two oarsmen might have been 
 seen rowing up and down the river searching for the 
 sufferers of that awful night. “That’s a deserted house, 
 no use going there,’ said one; “it rocks now, and in five 
 minutes it will be down.” 
 
 “Hush,” said the other, resting on his oars, as a sweet 
 childish voice, clear and distinct, rang out across the 
 waters: 
 
 “There shall my soul find rest.” 
 
 “Father in heaven,” said the man reverently, as he 
 thought of his own babies asleep in their cradles at home. 
 “There’s a child over there.” A few strong strokes brought 
 the boat with its eager rowers up to the little window sill. 
 He called loudly: “Who’s there?” Nellie rushed to the 
 window. 
 
 “Come, my little maid, no time to talk,” and he reached 
 out his arms to her. But she drew back. “No, Dot first,’’ 
 and, catching up the child, she wrapped her up in a 
 comfort and gave her charge to the strong arms that waited 
 without. The boat with the two saved children had hardly 
 moved away before the old house tottered and fell into 
 the waters, leaving no trace behind, but the children, saved 
 by a song, were soon placed in their mother’s arms. 
 SaraH LeiaH, in Journal and Messenger, January 18, 1884. 
 
 No. 344. 
 “THE DAY IS PAST AND GONE.” 
 
 Rev. JoHN LELAND, 1754—1841. 
 
 In the Century Magazine for September, 1885, in an 
 article entitled “A Woman’s Diary of the Siege of Vicks- 
 burg,” occurs the following: “It is our custom in the 
 evening to sit in the front room a little while in the dark, 
 
364 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 with matches and candle held ready in hand, and watch the 
 shells, whose course at night is shown by the fuse. H——— 
 was at the window and suddenly sprang up, crying, ‘Run!’ 
 
 “ ‘Where?’ 
 
 “ ‘Back!’ 
 
 “T started through the back room, H after me. I 
 was just within the door when the crash came that. threw 
 me to the floor. It was the most appalling sensation I 
 had ever known. Worse thar earthquake, which I have 
 also experienced. Shaken and deafened, I picked myself 
 up; H—— struck a light to find me. I lighted mine, and 
 the smoke guided us to the parlor I had fixed for Uncle 
 J The candles were useless in the dense smoke, and 
 it was many minutes before we could see. Then we found 
 the entire side of the room torn out. The soldiers who 
 had rushed in said, ‘This is an eighty-pound Parrott.’ It 
 had entered through the front, burst on the pallet bed, 
 which was in tatters; the toilet service and everything else 
 in the room smashed. The soldiers assisted H. to board 
 up the break with planks to keep out prowlers, and we 
 went to bed in the cellar as usual. This morning the 
 yard is partially plowed by a couple that fell there in the 
 night. I think this house, so large and prominent from 
 the river, is perhaps taken for headquarters and specially 
 shelled. As we descend at night to the lower regions, I 
 think of the evening hymn that grandmother taught m 
 when a child: 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 ‘Lord, keep us safe this night, 
 Secure from all our fears; 
 
 May angels guard us while we sleep, 
 Till morning light appears.’ 
 
 Surely if there are heavenly guardians,-we need them now.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 365 
 No. 346. 
 “GOD IS OUR REFUGE AND OUR STRENGTH.” 
 
 Psalm 46. Scotch. 
 
 There are times in the history of religious communities 
 when the power of Christian sentiment is seen under cir- 
 cumstances of peculiar interest and sublimity. Such, for 
 example, was the occasion when the representatives of the 
 Presbyterian Church of Scotland met at Edinburgh to sever 
 their connection with the State. A long procession of 
 clergymen, headed by the white-haired Chalmers, issued 
 forth from the old church of St. Giles, and proclaimed to 
 the people by their coming that they had renounced their 
 livings, and all State aid, and that the churches that 
 they represented were henceforth to be free. The streets 
 were lined, and the housetops were covered with people. 
 Suddenly all Edinburgh seemed to burst into song: 
 
 “God is our refuge and our strength 
 In straits a present aid. 
 
 Therefore, although the earth remove, 
 We will not be afraid.” 
 
 From street to street, from house-top to house-top, the 
 
 grand old psalm rose, with a meaning never realized before. 
 Children shouted, for joy, and strong men wept. 
 
 No. 346. 
 “BEHOLD THE SAVIOR OF MANKIND.” 
 
 SAMUEL WESLEY. 
 
 “Good Friday; O how I love the return of Good Friday!” 
 said a silver-haired saintly woman, as she sat with a friend 
 
366 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 at the door of her cottage in the evening light of that 
 Christian memorial day. Her eyes looked as if they were 
 reflecting holy light from the mysterious cross; and her 
 voice was tremulous with sacred feeling as she spoke. “It 
 was on a Good Friday evening that my heart, while yet 
 young, was first broken, as I listened to the story of the 
 cross; and then healed, as the music of this hymn seemed 
 to come direct with life from heaven in those words: 
 
 ‘O Lamb of God! was ever pain, 
 Was ever love like Thine!’ 
 
 O how precious that hymn has been to me ever since! It . 
 is, indeed, my Good Friday hymn. This day’s return is 
 always sweet. And that hymn is my heart’s music through- 
 out the day, and will be till I go to see Him!” 
 
 No. 347. 
 “HOW HAPPY IS THE PILGRIM’S LOT.” 
 Rev. JOHN WESLEY. 
 
 No doubt Mr. Wesley was sincere in all that he said 
 in this hymn at the time it was written, but he changed 
 his mind afterward. There are some stanzas in the hymn 
 as he wrote it that are usually omitted, and two of them 
 read: 
 
 “T have no sharer of my heart 
 To rob my Savior of a part, 
 And desecrate the whole: 
 Only betrothed to Christ am I, 
 And wait His coming from the sky 
 To wed my happy soul. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 367 
 
 “I have no babes to hold me here, 
 But children more securely dear, 
 For mine I humbly claim: 
 Better than daughters or than sons, 
 Temples divine of Heavenly stones 
 Inscribed with Jesus’ name.” 
 
 Four years after he made this rash declaration, he had 
 to take it all back, for he married a widow with four 
 children. It would have been better for him, however, if 
 he had stood by the determination of the iii for the 
 
 match did not prove a happy one, and after leaving him 
 several times and returning again, his wife left him not to 
 return. 
 
 No. 848. 
 “O FOR A HEART TO PRAISE MY GOD.” 
 
 Rev. Cartes Westey, 1708—1788. 
 
 “An aged Congregational minister and his wife, who 
 resided in a retired North Devon village, used occasionally 
 to visit a Methodist home in which the services of the 
 Society were held. While they were sitting in the parlor 
 one day, the old man took up a book from the table, and, 
 looking at the title, threw it down, saying, ‘There is no 
 such thing in the world.’ It was John Wesley’s ‘Plain 
 Account of Christian Perfection.’ The old lady took up 
 the rejected volume, and opening about the middle, her 
 eyes fell upon a passage which arrested her. ‘Why,’ she 
 said, ‘is this perfection? Why, John,’ she cried to her hus- 
 band, ‘is this perfection? Listen to this. I have enjoyed 
 this for many years. Is this perfection, as the Methodists 
 call it? Then I have got it! Is it possible in this world, 
 John? It is to be enjoyed even here. This blessing God 
 gives me from day to day. Listen to this’; and she read 
 from one of Wesley’s pages. 
 
368 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 Her husband was silent, until the Methodist mother of 
 the house opened an old hymnbook, and asked whether 
 they could not both join her in singing a hymn of Charles 
 Wesley’s, which expressed the same spiritual experience 
 as John Wesley described, in a manner more tuneful, but 
 not with less precision. ‘Cannot you sing this from your 
 hearts?’ said she, repeating verse after verse. 
 
 “¢Ves,’ they said. 
 
 “Well, then, we will sing together.’ And the good 
 Methodist woman, and the old veteran theologue, and his 
 venerable, warm-hearted wife, sang: 
 
 ‘O for a heart to praise my God, 
 A heart from sin set free, 
 
 A heart that always feels Thy blood, 
 So freely spilt for me!’ ” 
 
 No. 349. 
 “MY SOUL THROUGH MY REDEEMER’S CARE.” 
 
 Rev. Cuarues Westey, 1708—1788. 
 
 Sometimes a hymn seems to remain in the memory when 
 all things else are forgotten, and to express one’s thoughts 
 when all other forms of words fail to do so. Twenty years 
 ago (1872) in Plymouth, England, a Christian man was 
 dying. His power to speak was well-nigh gone, but now 
 and then he was heard to say, as if trying to recall some 
 half-forgotten words: “Soul—my soul.” His wife, standing 
 by his bedside, repeated various verses of Scripture and 
 parts of hymns in which occurred something about the soul, 
 without obtaining from the sick man any token of recogni- 
 tion, and at last repeated this line, when at once her 
 husband’s hand pressed hers, and as she repeated to him 
 the words of the hymn, he showed by every means within 
 his power, the satisfaction it gave him to hear the words. 
 
 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 369 
 No. 350. 
 “AND CAN WE FORGET IN TASTING OUR MEAT?” 
 
 Rev. Cuartes WEsLEy, 1708—1788. 
 
 The Wesleys were firm believers in giving religion a 
 prominent part in social life, and lost no opportunity of 
 impressing this duty upon their followers. They provided 
 their people with metrical graces to be used before and 
 after their meals, and while partaking of them, and intro- 
 duced what was probably before unknown, the practice of 
 singing these graces. When eighty-six years old, Mr. John 
 Wesley met a large party of friends at dinner at Sligo. 
 While the meal was in progress, Mr. Wesley suddenly 
 stopped, clasping his hands and looking up as if in the 
 attitude of prayer. Instantly all conversation ceased, and 
 every eye was fixed upon the face of Mr. Wesley. And 
 then he began to sing these lines: 
 
 “And can we forget 
 In tasting our meat 
 The angelical food which erelong we shall eat? 
 When enrolled with the blest 
 In glory we rest, 
 And forever sit down at the heavenly feast.” 
 
 When he had sung this stanza, he resumed his meal, but a 
 peculiar solemnity rested upon all who were present, and 
 they never forgot the occasion. 
 
 No. 381. 
 “SALVATION! O THE JOYFUL SOUND!” 
 Rev. Isaac Warts, 1674—1748. 
 
 Miss Harding, the teacher of the Ladies’ Society at Jeru- 
 salem, mentions the following incident of a little Jewish 
 
370 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 girl in that city, one of her scholars: “On all occasions this 
 child is fond of quietly talking with me alone; and one 
 evening, while seated beside me on a stone on the Jaffa 
 Plain, while her sister and another child were playing at a 
 little distance, she repeated to me, in a clear, sweet voice, 
 her favorite hymn: 
 
 ‘Salvation! O the joyful sound! 
 What pleasure to our ears! 
 
 A sovereign balm to every wound, 
 A cordial for our fears. 
 
 Chorus: 
 
 ‘Glory, honor, praise and power, 
 
 Be unto the Lamb forever! 
 
 Jesus Christ is our Redeemer! 
 Hallelujah! praise the Lord!’ 
 
 On coming to the chorus: 
 ‘Jesus Christ is our Redeemer!’ 
 
 she said very earnestly, and with deep feeling, ‘Oh! Ma’am, 
 that’s sweet. Jesus Christ is owr Redeemer, owr Redeemer! 
 No man can redeem his brother; no money! no money! 
 nothing but only the precious Blood of Christ!’ In the 
 mouth of a little Jewish girl, these words had great force and 
 deep interest. The child had only been with me eight 
 months, so I had hardly known how far she could follow 
 the English lessons I had given. I was much affected by 
 the circumstances.” 
 Youth’s Dayspring, June, 1850. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 371 
 No. 352. 
 “PRAISE YE THE LORD! °’TIS GOOD TO RAISE.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Watts, 1674—1748. 
 
 The Wesleys more than almost any other men of their 
 times brought the power of religion into the daily lives of 
 their followers, and taught them to live, and act, and talk, 
 and think, as if God were a present reality to them. On one 
 occasion Mr. John Wesley was taken with a party of friends 
 to the top of a hill behind the town of Chatham, where a 
 very fine view was to be had. All were impressed with the 
 beauty of the landscape spread out beneath their feet, and 
 many were the admiring remarks that fell from their lips. 
 After a few minutes Mr. Wesley took off his hat and began 
 to sing this hymn of praise to God, appropriate to the place 
 and the occasion because of its reference to the works of 
 God in nature. One of the friends present when that hymn 
 was sung said that he never forgot the lesson it taught him, 
 and that often afterward, when looking at a fine bit of 
 scenery, he would recall the incident and say to himself or 
 to those who were with him: “Why should we give the 
 landscape all the praise and its Maker none?” 
 
 No. 353. 
 “HAPPY THE HEART WHERE GRACES REIGN.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Watts, 1674—1748. 
 
 One of the most effective uses ever made of a hymn, by a 
 preacher, was made of this hymn by Rev. Dr. Hannah who 
 preached before a Methodist Conference at Sheffield, Eng- 
 land, in 1835. The house was crowded, and the heat 
 oppressive. The discourse was a masterly one, from the 
 
372 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 text, “And now abideth faith, hope, charity; these three; 
 but the greatest of these is charity.” The sermon was long 
 and held the closest attention of the audience much beyond 
 the usual time for closing, and so when the preacher reached 
 the end of the first two divisions of his subject—‘‘faith and 
 hope’—he said that time would fail him to consider the 
 third and greatest of the Christian graces, and he must leave 
 it to eternity to reveal the full meaning of the word, and 
 then he read this hymn. Powerful as had been the preacher’s 
 description of the graces of faith and hope, it was felt by 
 the audience that no words of his could so clearly and effec- 
 tively have stated the character and power of Christian 
 charity, and one person present in that audience, speaking 
 of the occasion after a lapse of over thirty years, said that 
 the hallowed impression of the reading and singing of that 
 hymn was still fresh upon his mind. 
 
 No. 354. 
 ~ BE PRESEN LAL. OUR, LABLE*; LORD: 
 
 Rev. JoHN CENNICK. 
 
 The propriety of “asking a blessing” or “saying Grace” 
 as it is called, before our meals, is sanctioned by the fact 
 that Jesus Christ did it. The custom is older, however, 
 than the Christian era, and Jesus only gave His sanction to 
 a practice common before in Jewish families. Metrical 
 Graces began with the Reformation, Philip Melancthon, 
 Luther’s companion and helper, having composed some in 
 Latin. And at almost the same time (1545) they appeared 
 in English in Great Britain. They were used both before 
 and after the meal. The Wesleys taught their followers to 
 use them, and Charles Wesley composed and published a 
 small pamphlet of them, containing eleven Graces to be used 
 “before meat,” and fifteen to be used “at or after meat.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 373 
 
 They taught their people to sing them, and this practice 
 became very popular among the Methodists, and is con- 
 tinued to this day by them in many parts of England. Per- 
 haps the most beautiful as well as the most widely used of 
 all these Metrical Graces, is the one written by John 
 Cennick: 
 
 “Be present at our table, Lord! 
 
 Be here and everywhere adored! 
 Thy creatures bless and grant that we 
 May feast in Paradise with Thee.” 
 
 John Wesley had this stanza engraved on the family teapot. 
 
 No. 356. 
 “HOW MANY PASS THE GUILTY NIGHT.” 
 “HEARKEN TO THE SOLEMN VOICE.” 
 
 Rev. CHARLES WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 The coal miners of Kingswood, near Bristol, England, had 
 the habit of spending every Saturday night at the ale houses, 
 in drunken carousals. Mr. Wesley preached there and a 
 great revival took place. Many miners were converted and 
 the whole character of the place was altered. Among other 
 changes the-miners spent every Saturday night in meetings 
 for prayer and the singing of hymns. When Mr. Wesley 
 heard of this he determined to make such meetings general 
 among Methodists everywhere, and appointed watchnight 
 meetings to be held once a month at the full of the moon. 
 
 “We commonly chose,” says Mr. Wesley, “the Friday 
 night nearest the full of the moon so that those of the people 
 who lived at a distance might have light to their homes.” 
 These watchnight meetings, especially when conducted as 
 
374 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 they often were by one of the Wesleys themselves, were 
 meetings of great solemnity and power, and they have been 
 from that day to this a power for good. As soon as these 
 watchnight meetings became an established feature of the 
 Methodist movement, Charles Wesley issued a little twelve- 
 page pamphlet, containing eleven hymns for special use on 
 these occasions, and the first two hymns composed by him 
 for these watchnight meetings were these. The first one, as 
 will be seen, refers to the origin of the watchnight service in 
 the Saturday night drunken revels of the Kingswood col- 
 liers, and the reference is all the plainer in the form in 
 which Wesley first wrote it, beginning, “Oft have we passed 
 the guilty night.” 
 
 No. 356. 
 “FLUNG TO THE HEEDLESS WINDS.” 
 
 Rev. Martin Lutuer, 1483—1546. 
 
 It was but a few years after the Pope issued his Bull 
 against Martin Luther and his errors, that he lighted the 
 fires of martyrdom against Luther’s followers. The first 
 victims were two young monks who had learned the way of 
 salvation by faith as Luther taught it and said they would 
 rather die than recant. They died singing Te Deum 
 Laudamus, and their death opened Luther’s mouth in this 
 song of victory over their heroic death, and of defiance of 
 their murderers. It was his first hymn, and it flew all over 
 the land as if angels carried it, and spread in every direc- 
 tion an enthusiasm for the faith which had inspired the 
 heroes of whom it sang. The translation is by John 
 Alexander Messenger and appeared in a translation of 
 D’Aubigne’s “History of the Reformation,’ published at 
 Philadelphia in 1843. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 375 
 No. 387. 
 “WHEN DOOMED TO DEATH, THE APOSTLE LAY.” 
 
 WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 
 
 When the Methodists were compiling the hymnal now 
 (1892) in authorized use in their churches, they asked Mr. 
 Bryant to write for them a hymn on the subject of temper- 
 ance. He complied with their request and sent them this- 
 hymn, which was one of the last of his compositions, as he 
 died in less than a year after it was written. When he sent 
 the hymn, he wrote a letter in which he said: “Thinking of 
 the subject of which you spoke in your letter, it occurred 
 to me that the deliverance of Peter from prison might fur- 
 nish matter on which to hang a temperance hymn. I have 
 produced what is written above and it is at your service.” 
 
 No. 3858. 
 “ON THIS STONE, NOW LAID WITH PRAYER.” 
 
 JOHN PIERPONT. 
 
 It makes a great difference when and where we use capital 
 letters. Now here is a hymn written by a Unitarian, for 
 use at the laying of the corner stone of a Unitarian chapel 
 in Boston (May 23, 1839,) and the writer intended it to 
 voice his own theology and that of the church for whose 
 use it was composed; and so in writing it he began the 
 words “Corner Stone,” at the end of each stanza with 
 capital letters, while he began the words “child” in the . 
 second stanza, and “spirit” in the third, with small letters. 
 The change by which the hymn is made suitable for Trini- 
 tarian hymnals is hardly a fair one, for it puts into the 
 author’s mouth sentiments in which: he did not believe. 
 
376 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 No. 359. 
 “LORD OF THE SABBATH, HEAR OUR VOWS”—1736. 
 
 Rev. Puitre Dopprince, 1702—1751. 
 
 _ I have heard the complaint that the Bible gives us very 
 indefinite descriptions of heaven, and of the employments 
 of its inhabitants. I think there is in this hymn a sufficient 
 reply to such complaints. On the second of January, 1736, 
 Dr. Doddridge undertook to do this in a sermon to his 
 people, from the text, “There remaineth therefore a rest to 
 tthe people of God:” and this hymn was written to be sung 
 at the close of this sermon to illustrate his theme. A mis- 
 sionary who had spent thirty years in Jamaica, said of this 
 hymn, “One who knows what it is to be exposed to the sun 
 of the torrid zone, shudders to read the dreadful lines in 
 which Dr. Doddridge describes Heaven as a place where 
 there is 
 
 ‘No midnight shade, no clouded sun, 
 But sacred, high eternal noon.’ 
 
 The idea is intolerable. It terrifies one to think of it. The 
 man who wrote that hymn must have lived far North, where 
 a glimpse of the sun was a rare favor, and his highest enjoy- 
 ment to bask in its rays a livelong summer day. I met once 
 in Jamaica,” said he, “with a black boy, under the shade of 
 some cocoanut trees, where we both had taken shelter from 
 the glare of the noonday sun. I said, ‘Well, my boy, did 
 you ever hear of heaven?’ 
 
 “ “Me hear, massa.’ ; 
 
 “<“And what sort of a place do you think it is?’ 
 
 “ “Massa, it must be a very cool place.’ 
 
 This agrees with the incident related of a missionary who 
 spoke to the Greenlanders of the fires of hell, and only 
 aroused in them by so doing a desire to go there. How- 
 ever, this is a good hymn, only when we sing it, it is well to 
 omit the stanza containing the lines referred to. 
 
” 
 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 377 
 No. 360. 
 “PRAISE THE LORD, HIS GLORIES SHOW.” 
 
 Rev. Henry Francis Lyrn, 1793—1847. 
 The fourth stanza of this hymn reads: 
 
 “Strings and wires, hands and hearts, 
 In the concert bear your parts! 
 All that breathe, your Lord adore, 
 Praise Him, praise Him, evermore!” 
 
 This stanza would have shut the doors of our Methodist 
 hymnals to this fine hymn a century ago. The early 
 Methodists held music in high esteem and made it one of 
 their most effective means of evangelization. Indeed Charles 
 Wesley caught up the songs and ballads which were sung 
 on the streets and in the theaters, and wrote for them sacred 
 words. He wrote the words: 
 
 “Listed into the cause of sin, 
 Why should a good be evil? 
 Music, alas! too long hath been 
 Pressed to obey the devil.” 
 
 And yet they would have no instrumental music in their 
 service of praise, and especially abhorred instruments with 
 
 “strings.” John Wesley said, “I have no objection to instru- 
 “ments of music in our chapels, provided they are neither 
 heard nor seen.” And Dr. Adam Clarke, the great Metho- 
 dist commentator, wrote: ‘Music as a science, I admire; 
 but instruments of music in the house of God, I abominate 
 and abhor.” And yet this hymn is now in the hymnals of 
 our Methodist brethren, and they praise God with instru- 
 ments of a good many more than ten strings. 
 
.* 
 
 378 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 361. 
 “<Q HAPPY SAINTS WHO DWELL IN LIGHT.” 
 
 Rev. Joun Berrivce, 1716—1793. 
 
 I am very glad there is a hymn in this book written by 
 John Berridge, because it gives me an opportunity to tell 
 you something of one of the quaintest old fellows (pardon 
 the irreverence) who ever preached a sermon or gave out a 
 hymn. His very looks were enough, it seems to me, to set 
 a congregation off into a roar, and I wish I had his picture 
 here for you to see. He was a clergyman of the Church of 
 England, but no parish bounds or bishops’ threats could 
 keep him from going off on an occasional itinerant trip to 
 preach the Gospel to those who were neglected, whether he 
 found them in Church or field. On one of these occasions 
 he had come, as the story goes, on a Saturday night to a 
 little village in the north of England, and he must needs 
 stay over Sunday there. So he requested the landlord of 
 the inn to go to the parson of the parish and tell him that 
 a clergyman was stopping over Sunday at the inn who would 
 be glad to assist at the service if wanted. The vicar was 
 cautious. ‘We must be careful,” said he, “for you know 
 there are many of these wandering Methodist preachers 
 about. What sort of a man is he?” 
 
 “Oh, he is all right, sir,’ was the response. “You just 
 see his nose, sir, and you will know he is no Methodist.” 
 
 “Well, ask him to call on me in the morning and I will 
 judge for myself.” The call was made and Berridge’s » 
 peaked red nose, and mouth suggestive of jokes and puns, 
 and all sorts of fun, at once convinced the suspicious vicar, 
 and he was invited to preach. But if ever a man made a 
 mistake that vicar did, for Berridge was as earnest in his 
 piety as he was in his fun, and when he preached he went 
 straight for the consciences and heart of his audience, and 
 before he had gotten half through his discourse that morning 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 379 
 
 the hot, sharp sentences came in such rapid succession, that 
 not only the people in the pews but the vicar in the pulpit 
 found themselves arraigned as sinners in the sight of God. 
 
 John Berridge lived at about the same time as Toplady 
 did—Toplady, who wrote “Rock of Ages, cleft for me’— 
 and yet who engaged in such fierce controversy with the 
 Wesleys as would drive him out of any pulpit or church in 
 these days; but Berridge had different ideas about a - 
 preacher’s duty, and he advised a young man, “Look simply 
 to Jesus for preaching food, and what is wanted will be 
 given, and what is given will be blessed. When your heart 
 is right, meek and simple, Jesus will make an orator of 
 you: When you grow lofty and pleased with your prattle, 
 Jesus will make a fool of you. Avoid all controversy in 
 preaching, talking, or writing: preach nothing down but the 
 devil and nothing up but Jesus Christ.” 
 
 No. 362. 
 “ASLEEP IN JESUS! BLESSED SLEEP.” 
 
 Mrs. Marcaret Mackay, 1801. 
 
 The author of this hymn, a Scotch lady, was one day 
 walking in a churchyard in Devonshire, and she came to a 
 tombstone bearing the simple inscription, “Sleeping in 
 Jesus,” and this inscription suggested to her the writing of 
 this hymn, which has the words “Asleep in Jesus” as the 
 beginning of each stanza. 
 
 No. 363. 
 
 “BRING IN THE LAMBS, THE TENDER LAMBS.” 
 
 Twenty years ago there lived in a Michigan city a pro- 
 fessional gambler who was also given to intemperance. He 
 
380 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 was raising a family of boys. His wife was a Christian, and 
 seeing the effect of the father’s habits in the boys, though 
 frail in health she proposed to leave the city and go with 
 her family far back in the wilderness beyond the reach of 
 these associations, that she might save her boys and pos- 
 sibly reclaim her husband. The husband loved his family 
 and consented to make the experiment, so they went over a 
 hundred miles from their home and settled on a homestead 
 in the wilderness. The next summer a Sunday school was 
 organized within three miles of them. The children attended 
 the Sunday school, but the mother was not able to walk the 
 distance through the woods, so the father and mother re- 
 mained at home. But during the summer the school had a 
 picnic, when the children prevailed upon the father to go 
 with them to the picnic. He led the two younger children, 
 and not accustomed to attend such a gathering, he took a 
 seat on a log outside the gathering with a child either side 
 of him. He was greatly pleased with the exercises and did 
 well his part toward furnishing dinner. The Sunday-school 
 missionary was there, and brought his pastor with him, who 
 was a good talker and a good singer. After the speeches 
 and dinner, all joined in singing that stirring old piece, 
 “Bring in the lambs, the tender lambs—O bring them into 
 Jesus’ fold.” (Bradbury Trio, “New Golden Censor,” page 
 338.) 
 
 Tears rolled down the gambler’s cheeks as he looked first 
 at one and then at the other of his lambs, and when the song 
 was finished he came forward and asked the missionary if 
 he had those books to sell. “I want three of them. I don’t 
 care what they cost.” Then he said, “I am a dreadful 
 wicked man and I don’t know who will ‘bring in my lambs.’ ” 
 He urged the minister and missionary to go home with him 
 and stay all night and “We’ll have a prayer meeting,” he 
 said. 
 
 They went, and they did have a “prayer meeting.” Three 
 prayers were offered, the happy wife joining as none but a 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 381 
 
 wife can pray for a husband. Then he prayed for himself 
 and broke all the rest down by his cries and confessions. 
 The Lord heard and answered. Then all joined in the song, 
 “Bring in the lambs,” after which he had an “experience 
 meeting.” But he was not brought into the full light. till 
 the next morning, when he was ready to “publish abroad 
 what great things the Lord had done for him and had com- 
 passion on him.” His little lambs “led him to the lamb 
 of God.” 
 Henry DENsSMoRE. 
 
 No. 364. 
 “COME, O THOU TRAVELER UNKNOWN.” 
 
 Rev. Cuartes Westey, 1708—1788. 
 
 The two brothers, John and Charles Wesley, were more 
 than usually intimate. They roomed together at Oxford, 
 formed and led the “Young Company of Students” there 
 which first obtained the name of “Methodists”; worked side 
 by side in harmony in the great religious movement of their 
 day which established the Methodist Church. Charles, the 
 “Poet of Methodism,” died first. A short time after his 
 death, John Wesley then eighty-five years old, visited the 
 town of Bolton, England, to preach. He began the service 
 in his usual way, with song and prayer, and then gave out 
 this for the second hymn, but when he came to the lines: 
 
 “My company before is gone, 
 And I am left alone with Thee,” 
 
 his emotion became uncontrollable, and he burst out into a 
 flood of tears, and sat down in the pulpit, covering his face 
 with both hands. The effect upon the congregation was 
 such as might be expected—the people ceased to sing, and 
 
382 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 in many parts of the chapel, sat down weeping and sobbing 
 aloud. The congregation was very large, Saturday night 
 though it was; and the place was like a Bochim. After a 
 while Mr. Wesley recovered himself, arose, and gave out the 
 lines again; “and then there was such singing,” said the 
 narrator, “as I never heard before; it seemed as if the sound 
 would lift the roof off the building.” A sermon followed, 
 remarkable for the holy influence attending the delivery, 
 and the deep impression it seemed to make on the multitude 
 of people. 
 
 No. 366. 
 “ON JORDAN’S STORMY BANKS I STAND.” 
 Rev. SAMUEL STENNETT, 1727—1795. 
 
 Hon. Moses F. Odell, a prominent Methodist, was among 
 the first, after the terrible battles of the Virginia Peninsula, 
 to hasten from Washington to minister to the wounded and 
 dying. He relates that the Government employed large 
 steamboats to bring away from the field the severely 
 wounded, and that while he was ministering to the suffering 
 and dying on one of these steamboats, whose berths and 
 cabins were filled with them. a soldier began singing to a 
 familiar tune the words: 
 
 “On Jordan’s stormy banks I stand, 
 And cast a wistful eye, 
 On Canaan’s fair and happy land, 
 Where my possessions lie.” 
 
 Almost instantly the strain was caught up by a score or 
 more of the sufferers, who found in this way an alleviation 
 -of their pain and an expression of their trust. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 383 
 No. 366. 
 “JUST AS I AM WITHOUT ONE PLEA.” 
 
 Miss CHARLOTTE ExuiottT, 1789—1871. 
 
 The following fact is related by the Editor of the Ladies’ 
 Repository, for December, 1867: “On rising one morning, 
 the text ‘The blood of Jesus Christ his Son, cleanseth us 
 from all sin,’ was impressed upon my mind so powerfully 
 that I felt convinced the Lord was speaking to me, and for 
 some special purpose. On going as usual into my district 
 that day, I was met by a poor woman, who informed me 
 that there was a person dying close by, who would be thank- 
 ful to see any one, but so weak as to preclude all excitement 
 or fatigue. I went immediately, and found a young woman 
 almost in the last stage of consumption, scarcely able to 
 speak; indeed she was in a dying state. I was afraid to say 
 much lest I should agitate the feeble life, but just whispered 
 in her ears the words, ‘The blood of Jesus Christ, his Son, 
 cleanseth us from all sin’; also the first verse of the hymn: 
 
 ‘Just as I am, without one plea, 
 But that Thy blood was shed for me; 
 And that Thou bidst me come to Thee, 
 O Lamb of God, I come! I come!” 
 
 The dying one looked at me with great earnestness, as if 
 drinking in the precious message, but spoke not then. I 
 continued my visits after this during the short time she 
 lived—about a month. On one occasion she called to her 
 husband to ‘come and hear about Jesus.’ The last time I 
 went she was waiting for me with great anxiety; and when 
 I entered the room, and approached her dying bed, she 
 sweetly whispered, ‘The blood of Jesus Christ, his Son, 
 cleanseth us from all sin,’ 
 
384 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 ““Just as I am, without one plea, 
 But that Thy blood was shed for me; ° 
 And that Thou bidst me come to Thee, 
 O Lamb of God, I come! I come!’ ” 
 
 Looking at her infant child, whose spirit had just fled to 
 glory, she said: ‘Baby, mother is coming to thee,’ and in a 
 few moments she fell asleep in Jesus.” 
 
 A young man was dying, but he knew he was lost, and 
 was in a terrible state of anxiety. The clergyman was sent 
 for. He came, and read and administered the Sacrament to 
 the young man, and told him he had nothing to fear. As 
 soon as he had left, a friend said to the youth, “I hope you 
 are happy, and can die peacefully now?” 
 
 “No!” replied the young man; “I’m not happy. I have 
 not peace, and I cannot die without that. What shall 
 ilo??; 
 
 Shortly after another friend went to see hin, and began 
 to read him that beautiful hymn: 
 
 “Just as I am, without one plea, 
 But that Thy blood was shed for me, 
 And that Thou bidst me come to Thee, 
 O Lamb of God, I come! I come!” 
 
 No sooner was the first verse read, than the dying youth 
 looked up, and with deep earnestness said, ‘Read that 
 again.” It was read over again, and he drank in every 
 word, listening as for his life. As soon as the verse was 
 finished he said, “There, that will do; I can die with that.” 
 The dear fellow there and then came to Jesus, “just as he 
 was, without one plea,” without one solitary spark of good- 
 ness—he came with all his deep need, and the Lord saved 
 him, 
 “W. E.,” in Episcopal Recorder, October 15, 1885. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 385 
 No. 367. 
 
 “GREAT GOD! WHAT DO I SEE AND HEAR.” 
 
 Rev. WM. Bens. Couiysr, 1781—1854. 
 
 After the World’s Fair of 1851, at London, was over, the 
 Crystal Palace was carefully taken down, and the material 
 removed to Sydenham, where it was rebuilt, and became 
 one of the fixed institutions of London. Rev. Samuel M. 
 Dickson describes a musical service he once listened to there 
 as follows: “Hark! is that thunder? It has the sound of 
 thunder, and surely the clouds threatened it; but the truth 
 is, a man has climbed away up to the key-board of the 
 grand organ, and touched it! O, the witchery of glass walls! 
 They imprison the sounds, but give the illusion of uncon- 
 fined space. The music rolls around the arches of the sky, 
 wave upon wave of sound repeating and echoing in the dis- 
 tance. Now there is a short, sharp piercing note—now a 
 long swell rolling and widening till aisles and corridors are 
 filled; then it gradually lingers into silence, or melts into a 
 soft flute-like strain. Now there is a crash, a leap, a suc- 
 cession of booming discharges, and rattling, galloping rever- 
 berations, ending in a prolonged swell and a sudden stop. 
 Fitting prelude to what is to follow. By hundreds and 
 thousands the singers are gathering into the orchestra 
 around the base of the organ. Soon five thousand voices 
 wait to accompany the monster instrument, and they are 
 children’s; for the school houses of London are empty to- 
 day, and this is the annual jubilee concert. No wonder is it 
 that, as you stand upon your seat and survey the audience, 
 the crowd of heads may be measured by acres; no wonder 
 that they crowd the galleries, and perch upon cornices, and 
 climb into every available nook and crevice. And now, just 
 at three o’clock, a little man with a long baton springs upon 
 a stand in front, telegraphs to the organist and the concert 
 begins. The opening hymn is this beginning: 
 
386 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 ‘Great God! What do I see and hear! 
 The end of things created! 
 
 The Judge of mankind doth appear, 
 On clouds of glory seated: 
 
 The trumpet sounds! the graves restore 
 
 The dead which they contained before! 
 Prepare, my soul, to meet Him.’ 
 
 Imagine the effect, when at the end of the fourth line there 
 was a short pause, after which an invisible trumpet pealed 
 a long and sweeping blast, followed by the words: 
 
 ‘The trumpet sounds! the graves restore.’” etc. 
 
 No. 368. 
 “QO THOU MY SOUL, BLESS GOD THE LORD.” 
 
 Psaum 103, Scotch. 
 
 A clergyman who had been engaged as Seaman’s Chap- 
 lain, at a Southern port, was, in the course of duty, called to 
 the sick bed of a sailor, apparently at the gates of death 
 from the effects of his licentiousness. He addressed him 
 affectionately on the state of his soul. With a curse the 
 sick man bade him begone and not harass his dying bed. 
 The chaplain, however, told him plainly he would speak, 
 and he must hear, for his soul was in jeopardy of eternal 
 death. The man, however, remained silent, and even pre- 
 tended to sleep during his faithful. address and prayer. 
 Again and again the visit was repeated with similar success. 
 One day, however, the sick man made use of an expression, 
 by which the chaplain suspected he was a Scotchman. To 
 make sure of the fact, the chaplain repeated a verse of that 
 version of the one hundred and third Psalm, still in use 
 among the Churches of Scotland: 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 387 
 
 “Such pity as a father hath 
 Unto his children dear; 
 
 Like pity shows the Lord to such 
 As worship Him in fear.” 
 
 The chords of the sick man’s heart vibrated to the well- 
 known language. His eyes glistened with unknown mois- 
 ture. The chaplain prosecuted his advantage. Knowing 
 the universality of religious instruction among the Scotch, 
 he ventured an allusion to his mother. The poor prodigal 
 burst into tears. He admitted himself to be the child of a 
 praying mother, who had often commended him to God. He 
 had left her long before to become a wanderer on the face 
 of the great deep. No longer did he repel the kind attentions 
 of the chaplain, and his monitor had the satisfaction of 
 seeing him recover from his sickness, and arise from his bed, 
 he verily believes, a child of God. 
 
 No. 369. 
 “GOD MOVES IN A MYSTERIOUS WAY.” 
 
 Witu1aAm Cowper, 1731—1800. 
 
 In Whittle’s life of Philip P. Bliss, the following incident 
 is related: On a Sunday afternoon when a Gospel meeting 
 was being held at the skating rink in St. Louis, by Messrs. 
 Whittle and Bliss, there came up a fearful storm of wind and 
 rain. The old timbers quivered ominously. Whittle was 
 speaking, but the noise was so great as to cause him to stop. 
 The storm continuing, plain symptoms of alarm were be- 
 coming visible in the audience. Mr. Bliss, noticing this, by 
 an inspiration from God, struck up a verse of the grand old 
 hymn: 
 
388 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “God moves in a mysterious way 
 His wonders to perform; 
 He plants His footsteps in the sea, 
 And rides upon the storm.” 
 
 The storm was at its fiercest. Just as he sang the words, 
 “And rides upon the storm,” there was an instantaneous 
 cessation of the storm; a little break occurred in the cloud, 
 and a bright ray of brilliant light flashed directly and fully 
 for a moment upon his face. His wife had been uneasy, and 
 asked of the one who sat by her side if there was any 
 danger. She was reassured, and when the incident occurred, 
 she smiled and nodded saying by both look and manner 
 “all is safe for He Who rides upon the storm, has sent 
 the brightness of His sunshine upon us at this moment, as 
 He sent the rainbow.” 
 
 No. 370. 
 “MY FAITH LOOKS UP TO THEE.” 
 
 Ray. Ray PaumMesr, 1808—1887. 
 
 During the Civil War in America, and on the evening 
 preceding one of the most terrible battles of the war, some 
 six or eight Christian young men, who were looking forward 
 to the deadly strife, met together in one of their tents for 
 prayer. After spending some time in committing themselves 
 to God, and in Christian conversation, and freely speaking 
 together of the probability that they would not all of them 
 survive the morrow, it was suggested by one of the number 
 that they should draw up a paper expressive of the feelings 
 with which they went to stand face to face with death, and 
 all sign it; and that this should be left as a testimony to 
 the friends of such of them as might fall. This was unani- 
 mously agreed to; and, after consultation, it was decided 
 that a copy of this hymn should be written out, and that 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 389 
 
 each should subscribe his name to it, so that father, mother, 
 brother, or sister, might know in what spirit they had laid 
 down thein lives. Of course they did not all meet again. 
 The incident was related afterward by one who survived 
 the battle. 
 
 Ray Paumer, in appendix to his “Poetical Works.” 
 
 An active business man, residing in the interior of the 
 state, was accustomed to visit the City of New York from 
 time to time for business purposes. Before coming on a 
 certain occasion, he had observed a swelling slowly forming 
 on his person, which, though not troublesome as yet, occa- 
 sioned him some anxiety; and, after attending to the matters 
 for which he came, he went to submit the case to the judg- 
 ment of an eminent surgeon. He was frankly told that it 
 would prove a malignant tumor, and would probably termi- 
 nate his life by the end of six months. This was, of course, 
 a stunning blow. He was an intellectual believer in Chris- 
 tianity, and a man of upright life, but was without a 
 Christian hope. Before leaving the City, he called on a 
 a sister, we believe—and told her what the 
 surgeon had said. On parting from her, she placed in his 
 hand a printed leaflet, which he put in his pocket. Then 
 he took the cars on the Hudson River Road, and, when 
 seated, sank into profound thought on his position. He 
 recalled his past life, so filled with the divine goodness, 
 his sinful neglect to return this with love and obedience, 
 and his failure to receive the Savior of the world into his 
 heart. Some hours, perhaps, had passed in this way, and 
 his heart had become full of tender feeling, when he remem- 
 bered the leaflet and took it from his pocket. At once his 
 eye rested on the words: 
 
 “My faith looks up to Thee, 
 Thou Lamb of Calvary!” 
 
 
 
 
 
 He read the hymn through slowly, and many times over. 
 His heart adopted the language, a new-born faith found 
 
390 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 full and delightful expression in it, and from that time he 
 had a tranquil rest in God. The prediction of the surgeon 
 was fulfilled; and he died joyfully, having this song sung to 
 him to the last. 
 
 The author of this hymn makes public the following inci- 
 dent concerning it. It is quoted from a letter, from a young 
 lady who had long been a sufferer from a chronic disease: 
 
 “One morning, long ago, I woke with more than the usual 
 exhaustion, and a sense of discouragement amounting to 
 oppression. Do you know that kind of despair so like suffo- 
 cation? Bitter repinings rose in my heart; hard thoughts 
 of God and sinful questionings. Why must it be? What 
 shall I do? I heard the rain beating against the windows. 
 I knew the day must be dreary, and I sighed aloud, ‘What 
 will there be to cheer me today?’ And then I hastily 
 glanced about the room, gladly discovering that I was alone, 
 and turning again to my pillow wearily. Hark! the chords 
 of a piano! The family must be at morning worship. Up 
 through the register, as distinctly as if breathed at my 
 bedside, came the strain: 
 
 ‘My faith looks up to Thee, 
 Thou Lamb of Calvary, 
 Savior Divine!’ 
 
 I enjoyed it and listened eagerly. 
 
 ‘Now hear me while I pray, 
 Take all my guilt away, 
 O let me from this day 
 
 Be wholly Thine.’ 
 
 T felt calmed. I would look up for cheer. I could not say 
 that dismal morning, ‘Thou O Christ, art all I want’; but 
 I could say, ‘My faith looks up to Thee.’ Afterward for 
 several days and nights, I repeated the hymn constantly, 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 391 
 
 especially the stanza, ‘While life’s dark maze I tread.’ Maze 
 was just the word for me. You know what a tangled wild 
 my path of late has been.” 
 
 NO-STT: 
 “FROM GREENLAND’S ICY MOUNTAINS.” 
 
 Rev. RecinaLtp Heser, 1783—1826. 
 
 In 1852, two missionaries were sent out by Bishop James 
 Osgood Andrews, of the Methodist Episcopal Church, to 
 represent the South Carolina Conference on the Pacific 
 Coast, where there was a grand rally of adventurers, a poly- 
 glottal gathering of people of every realm and of every 
 tongue. It was a fine opportunity for American Methodism 
 to plant itself where such a wide and effectual door was 
 opened. One of those missionaries wrote home. to report 
 progress, and said how great was his joy one Sunday after- 
 noon in 1853, in the Santa Clara Valley, to hear a man and 
 his wife from South Carolina sing in front of a tent: 
 
 “Waft, waft, ye winds, His story, 
 And you, ye waters roll, * 
 Till like a sea of glory, 
 It spreads from pole to pole: 
 Till o’er our ransomed nature, 
 The Lamb for sinners slain, 
 Redeemer, King, Creator, 
 In bliss returns to reign.” 
 
 There was melody in that song. It came so unexpectedly; 
 the missionaries had seen the hills and valleys in all their 
 natural luxuriance of flowers and foliage for several months, 
 but that song echoing on the air was like new life to cheer 
 the preachers in their toil. 
 
392 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 372. 
 
 “WHEN THE HARVEST IS PAST AND THE SUMMER 
 IS GONE.” 
 
 Rev. SAMUEL F. SmitH, 1808. 
 
 “In Clerkenwell a preacher and his helpers sang the 
 hymn: 
 
 ‘When the harvest is past and the summer is gone.’ 
 
 At one of the windows sat a poor man in an arm chair, 
 looking very pale, who, before the meeting closed, sent for 
 the preacher. ‘Please, sir, sing that again to me, that part: 
 
 “When the holy have gone to the regions of peace.” 
 
 That’s where I want to go. Do you think that I can get 
 there?’ The preacher said he could. 
 
 ““But you don’t know the life I’ve led. You see, sir, I’ve 
 been in prison thirty times, so I think I must be too bad 
 for Christ.’ So the preacher read to him the story of the 
 crucifixion. * 
 
 “«That’s what I want the Lord to do for me,’ exclaimed 
 the dying man, as the prayer of the dying thief was read. 
 ‘Thank you for coming out to preach and sing,’ he said, as 
 the preacher departed. “The chaplain of the prison used to 
 tell me of a Savior’s love, but I did not care for it then. 
 But I want it now, for I do want to be saved.’ At the next 
 meeting the poor man was not at the window. So the 
 preacher went into the house, and saw that he was fast 
 sinking. Faintly he said: ‘Sir, the mist is rolling away now. 
 I can see Jesus. Do sing it to me.’ So the visitor sang: 
 
 ‘When the mists have rolled away.’ : 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 393 
 
 Then the dying man said: ‘I could hear you all singing so 
 plain tonight, “Crown Him Lord of all.” Will you please 
 pray?’ The preacher prayed. Then the man said: ‘Please 
 raise my head’; and with one hand under his head, and the 
 
 other in his he passed away.” 
 Christian Herald, December 16, 1886. 
 
 No. 378. 
 
 “CHRIST, THOU THE CHAMPION OF THE BAND WHO 
 OWN.” 
 
 Matruaus APELLES VON LOWENSTERN, 1594—1648. 
 
 This was a favorite hymn of Niebuhr who was often 
 heard refreshing his own soul amidst his intense labor and 
 researches by murmuring it as a prayer: 
 
 “And give us peace: peace in the church and school, 
 Peace to the powers who o’er our country rule, 
 Peace to the conscience, peace within the heart, 
 
 Do Thou impart. 
 
 “So shall Thy goodness here be still adored, 
 Thou Guardian of Thy little flock, dear Lord; 
 And heaven and earth through all eternity 
 
 Shall worship Thee.” 
 
 No. 374. 
 
 “COMMIT THOU ALL THY GRIEFS.” 
 
 Rev. Pau GerHarpt, 1607—1676. 
 
 Rev. S. W. Christophers, in “The Epworth Singers” 
 relates that “A venerable minister once said, ‘The first year 
 
394 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 after my marriage was spent in the South of England, and 
 then I was called to take a pastoral charge in South Wales. 
 My income had been small, and my expenses somewhat 
 large, so that when the time of starting came, I had not 
 money enough to pay my way to our journey’s end. We 
 had done our best with the means we had, and were happily 
 one in our repose on God’s fatherly goodness. I believed 
 that He would supply our need day by day as He had 
 always done, and in that full trust we went off on the top 
 of the coach. Those were old coaching days. We had got 
 about half way towards our destination, and when I had 
 given the coachman and guard their fees, I had but twenty 
 pence left in my pocket. We were to go into the inn while 
 the horses were changed, and had to be booked for the rest 
 of the journey. Where the amount of the fare was to come 
 from, I did not know; but still, I rested on the promise of 
 Divine help. As I got off the coach, that verse came freshly 
 to my mind: 
 
 “No profit canst thou gain 
 By self-consuming care; 
 To Him commend thy cause, His ear 
 Attends the softest prayer.” 
 
 And I lifted up my heart to God in the language of the next 
 verse: 
 
 “Thy everlasting truth, 
 Father, Thy ceaseless love, 
 
 Sees all Thy children’s wants, and knows, 
 What best for each will prove.” 
 
 As we walked through the lobby, I saw a paper on the floor, 
 picked it up, and opened it. It was a ten-pound note. “The 
 help has come in time,” said I to myself. But putting the 
 note in my pocket, I called the landlord, told him that I had 
 found a note which I supposed somebody in the house had 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 395 
 
 lost. If he could tell me the amount and the number of the 
 note, I would let the owner have it. There was at once a 
 hue and ery throughout the house, “Who has lost a bank 
 note?” Nobody claimed it; nobody could describe it. The 
 horn blew; the coach was to start; we could not stay; and 
 hurriedly giving the landlord my address in Wales, and 
 assuring him that I would remit the amount lost as soon as 
 the owner of the note was identified, we took our seats, and, 
 by and by, safely arrived at our new residence. No news 
 of the person who had lost the note ever came, nor has any 
 claim ever been made on me from that day to this. How- 
 ever, some people may account for the fact, there it is; one 
 of many instances in my life in which God has shown Him- 
 self near to help me in the time of need.’” 
 
 No. 376. 
 “JESU, THOU ART MY RIGHTEOUSNESS.” 
 
 Rev. CuHartes Westry, 1708—1788. 
 
 “Tt was nearly sunset,” said a traveling preacher, “and 
 a mellow light was upon the valley up which I was footing 
 it toward a village chapel. The light seemed to hallow 
 the balmy quietness around me. I came at length within 
 sight of a group of tin-washers. They were mostly young 
 women in their picturesque sun-bonnets and working dress. 
 They were gracefully using their long-handled instruments 
 in regulating the action of the water on the pounded tin 
 ore, as it was carried over a succession of sloping boards, 
 so as to allow the cleanly washed tin to form a deposit 
 beneath. They were singing in concert as they worked, and 
 on passing the nearest point of the road to them, I caught 
 some of the words of their evening song. The words came _ 
 swelling up the valley: 
 
396 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 ‘Wash me, and make me thus Thine own, 
 Wash me, and mine Thou art:’ 
 
 It filled me with sacred feelings as I passed, and the 
 softening music followed. It was an agreeable preparation 
 for the evening worship. The time of service arrived, and 
 the same singers came with their parents, friends and neigh- 
 bors, all decently dressed for God’s house, and true to the 
 hour of prayer. I chose the same favorite hymn. New 
 inspiration seemed to come upon them, and they made the 
 sanctuary ring with their spirited, glowing harmony, as they 
 sang: 
 
 ‘Jesu, Thou art my Righteousness, 
 For all my sins were Thine; 
 
 Thy death hath bought of God my peace, 
 Thy life hath made Him mine.’ 
 
 And so they sang the whole hymn through. It was a joy 
 to hear from the lips of so many happy young people who 
 had known the washing of regeneration, the words of this 
 hymn, expressing their own experience, and the joy became 
 deeper as their faces brightened or their eyes sparkled 
 through their tears, as they listened to their preacher’s ad- 
 dress on the words of Jesus, ‘If I wash thee not, thou hast 
 no part with me.’ Every feature of the eager, upturned 
 countenances seemed to respond, ‘Lord, not my feet only, 
 but also my hands and my head.’ Nor will that parting 
 music ever be forgotten; for as they went off in groups 
 from the service, I could hear them singing along the hill- 
 side lane: 
 
 “Wash me, and make me thus Thine own; 
 Wash me and mine Thou art; 
 
 Wash me, but not my feet alone, 
 My hands, my head, my heart.’ ” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 397 
 No. 3876. 
 
 “THE NIGHT WAS DARK; BEHOLD, THE SHADE WAS 
 DEEPER.” 
 
 This hymn is to be found in a book entitled “The 
 Changed Cross,” published by A. D. F. Randolph. The 
 title given to the hymn is “The Call,’ and no author’s 
 name is given. In Long’s “Illustrated History of Hymns 
 and Their Authors,” is to'be found the following incident: 
 “An elderly gentleman came into our store one day and 
 asked for a book entitled ‘The Changed Cross.’ He said 
 it contained a hymn which led him to the Savior. Upon 
 a little inquiry, he gave the following account: ‘Twelve ~ 
 years ago, I was in a very agitated state of mind about my 
 soul’s welfare. I was working in a store on Federal Street 
 one day, when I felt unusually distressed. I went up to 
 the third story. The window was slightly lowered—about 
 a pane’s length. While there, and in this state of mind, 
 there came suddenly a little slip of paper floating in at the 
 window. I picked it up and found thereon these stanzas 
 (drawing a worn slip from his pocket) : 
 
 “In meek obedience to the heavenly Teacher, 
 Thy weary soul can find its only peace; 
 Seeking no aid from any human creature, 
 Looking to God alone for his release. 
 
 “And He will come, in His own time and power 
 To set His earnest-hearted children free: 
 Watch only through this dark and painful hour, ~ 
 And the bright morning yet will break for thee.” 
 
 I cried, “God be praised!” and I have been praising God 
 ever since.’ On being asked how that piece of paper came 
 there, and why, he said, ‘An angel sent it.’” The whole 
 hymn consists of seventeen stanzas, and the two quoted 
 above are the last two. 
 
398 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 No. 877. 
 “OUT ON AN OCEAN ALL BOUNDLESS WE RIDE.” 
 
 Rev. WILLIAM FatrFretp Warson, 1833 (Methodist). 
 
 In “Letters from Eden,” published by the American 
 Tract Society, the following incident is related: A little 
 boy named Simon Manoogian, living in Harpoot, became 
 a Christian when nearly nine years old, and soon after he 
 was bitten by one of the half-wild dogs which infest 
 that city. A few months after the bite he said one day 
 to his teacher, “I am sick; my head aches,” and the teacher 
 sent him home to his mother. The next day he asked to 
 have his pastor sent for, and on his arrival said to him, 
 “TI called you to say how grateful I am to you for teaching 
 me of Jesus.” The pastor read and prayed with him, and 
 talked to him of the Savior and left him. Hydrophobia had 
 now set in with all its attendant suffering and horror, The 
 writer says, “I first saw him a few hours before his death, 
 when I went expecting to see him ‘not in his right mind,’ 
 as the people said he was. But this was because they had 
 never seen such a death. Before we reached the house, 
 he had requested them to call his teacher and schoolmates 
 and, as I entered, was earnestly exhorting the latter to 
 prepare to follow him. Said he to them, ‘When I reach 
 heaven, I will pray for you, that you may come there 
 too, and not go, like the rich man, where you cannot get 
 even a drop of water.’ He asked each one to pardon every- 
 thing which he had done to grieve him, and then said, 
 ‘Can we sing a hymn?’ When asked what hymn, he 
 replied: 
 
 ‘Out on an ocean all boundless we ride, 
 We’re homeward bound, homeward bound;’ 
 
 Till then the paroxysms of the terrible disease had regularly 
 interrupted him, but, when we began to sing, they ceased. 
 
 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 399 
 
 The soul’s power seemed -to overcome and control that of 
 the disease, and he sang in a clear, strong voice with us. — 
 When we reached the last stanza: 
 
 ‘Into the harbor of heaven we glide— 
 We're home at last; 
 
 Softly we drift on its bright silver tide— 
 We're home at last. 
 
 Glory to God! all our dangers are c’er, 
 
 We stand secure on the glorified shore; 
 
 “Glory to God!” we will shout evermore; 
 We're home at last.’ 
 
 None of us could sing that with him. And do you wonder 
 that I was obliged to stop and weep as I gazed on the 
 scene so new in this dark land? And do you wonder that 
 the people, who had crowded in to witness the strange scene, 
 thought him ‘out of his head?’ Not one impatient word 
 escaped his lips. ‘In a short time,’ said he, ‘you will put 
 my body into the grave. Do not do it weeping, but sing the 
 hymn: 
 “Joyfully, joyfully, onward I move, 
 Bound to the land of bright spirits above.” 
 
 And I in heaven will take my harp and join you in your 
 song.’ ” 
 
 No. 378. 
 “I HEAR THE SAVIOR SAY.” 
 
 Mrs. Atvina M. Hatt, 1818. 
 
 Mrs. S. K. Brandagee in The Sailor’s Magazine for June, 
 1880, says: “A few weeks ago, in our little country Sunday 
 Echool, we were singing the hymn quoted, and as the chorus 
 rose foud and clear, ‘Jesus paid it all, yes, all the debt I 
 
400 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 owe,’ my eyes unconsciously turned to a young man, singing 
 so earnestly, tears filling his eyes. After school, joining 
 me, he said, ‘I can never sing that hymn without tears; 
 it was the means of my conversion two years ago.” A 
 lawyer by profession, with a clear legal head, yet that 
 simple hymn had, under the Spirit, conquered intellect, 
 worldly tastes, and youthful follies, and led to an entire 
 consecration to Him Whose precious Blood paid it all, long, 
 long ago. 
 
 “A lady, listening to the conversation, said, ‘Some years 
 ago I was visiting a gay watering place, and on Sabbath 
 evening, after some singing, not especially well suited to 
 the Sabbath, I took my seat at the piano, with a prayer 
 that the dear Lord would enable me, by my singing, to 
 help some weary soul. I sang “Jesus paid it all.’ Two 
 or three years afterward, visiting the same place again, 
 a colored woman. came to me saying, “Yes, you are de 
 lady; I knows you are.” 
 
 “What lady?’ I asked. 
 
 “De very one who sang, “Jesus paid it all?’ Last 
 night one of the waiters comes to me and says, “ ’Tis de very 
 one, I’s sure I ’members her. Don’t you know how sweetly 
 she sang ‘Jesus paid it all, all de debt I owes?’ Yes, I 
 neber forgets it “Jesus paid it all,” and I neber forgets de 
 dear lady who sang it so sweetly.’ ” 
 
 “Thus these sweet hymns, which reach the heart of 
 learned and unlearned alike, seem to be only the beginning 
 of that chorus, which will louder and louder grow, until 
 the ‘Lamb That was slain gathers His elect together from 
 the four quarters of the globe to join in the grander chorus, 
 “Now unto Him That loved us, and washed us from our 
 sins in His own blood, and hath made us kings and priests 
 unto God and His Father, unto Him be glory and dominion 
 for ever and ever.”’” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 401 
 No. 379. 
 ‘STODAY THE SAVIOR. CALLS.” 
 
 Rey. 8S. F. Smiru, 1808. 
 
 Mr. Moody relates: “The last time I preached upon the 
 matter of decision in religion was in old Farwell Hall. 
 I had been for five nights preaching upon the life of Christ. 
 I took Him from the cradle and followed Him up to the 
 judgment hall, and on that occasion I consider I made 
 as great a blunder as ever I made in my life. If I could 
 recall my act I would give this right hand. It was upon 
 that memorable night in October, and the Court House 
 bell was sounding an alarm of fire, but I paid no attention 
 to it. We were accustomed to hear the fire bell often, ana 
 it didn’t disturb us much when it sounded. I finished the 
 sermon upon ‘What shall I do with Jesus?’ And I said 
 to the audience, ‘Now, I want you to take this question 
 ‘with you and think over it, and next Sunday I want you 
 to come back and tell me what you are going to do with it.’ 
 What a mistake! It seems now as if Satan was in my 
 mind when I said this. Since then I have never dared to 
 eive an audience a weck to think of their salvaton. If 
 they were lost, they might rise up in judgment against 
 me. ‘Now is the accepted time.’ We went downstairs to 
 the other meeting, and I remember when Mr. Sankey was 
 
 singing, and how his voice rang when he came to that 
 pleading verse: 
 
 ‘Today the Savior calls; 
 For refuge fly. 
 
 The storm of justice falls 
 And death is nigh.’ 
 
 After meeting we went home. I remember going down 
 La Salle Street with a young man, and saw the glare of 
 
402 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 flames. I said to the young man, ‘This means ruin to 
 Chicago.’ About one o’clock, Farwell Hall went, soon 
 the church in which I had preached went down, and 
 everything was scattered. I never saw that audience 
 again. My friends, we don’t know what may happen 
 tomorrow, but there is one thing I do know, and that is, 
 if you take the gift you are saved. If you have eternal 
 life you need not fear fire, death or sickness. Let disease 
 or death come, you can shout triumphantly over the grave 
 if you have Christ.” 
 
 No. 380. 
 “PASS ME NOT, O GENTLE SAVIOR.” 
 
 Miss Fanny Van ALSTYNE, 1823. 
 
 Mr. G. W. Smart, a sailor missionary, writes in the 
 Sailor’s Magazine for August, 1885, as follows: “Two 
 American men-of-war have been here (Funchal, Madeira 
 Islands) lately—the Kearsage and the Pensacola, The 
 former came from the Congo River, and the latter from 
 the States. The men of the Kearsage had forty-eight 
 hours here. .They came on shore in two parties, eighty-five 
 in the first, and seventy-eight in the second. The “Sailors’ 
 Rest” was quite full for four nights. In addition to the 
 beds, the cane sofas were occupied, and one man actually 
 slept on the table in the reading room. Many of the men 
 dined, supped and breakfasted at the ‘Rest.’ All were 
 pleased that they had such a place to come to. An inter- 
 esting incident occurred on one of the days. A man from 
 the ship came in and asked leave to play the harmonium. 
 He played several well-known tunes very nicely and then 
 asked me for a Sankey tune book. I gave him one, and 
 he commenced to play ‘Pass me not, O gentle Savior.’ 
 Another man came in and sang it. A man who was in 
 the dormitory came in with the tears streaming down his 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 403 
 
 face, and coming up to me put a coin into my waistcoat 
 pocket, saying as he did so: ‘Look here! that hymn has 
 knocked me over. I can’t stand it. Take that for the 
 Home.’ On looking at the coin, I was surprised to find that 
 it was a sovereign. He requested those who were singing 
 to sing the hymn again, which they did, and he became very 
 much affected. He afterward told me his history. He 
 and his brother had some money left them; he squandered 
 his and went to the bad, while his brother continued in 
 good circumstances. He has sat, on several occasions, in 
 bygone days, at his brother’s table when the present Bishop 
 of London, Dr. Temple, has been a guest. Now he is an 
 able seaman in the American Navy. And this had been 
 brought about by drink. He would not join his companions 
 in drinking any more just then, but, of course, I have now 
 lost sight of him.” 
 
 No. 381. 
 “I AM SO GLAD THAT OUR FATHER IN HEAVEN.” 
 
 Pure Buss, 1838—1876. 
 
 “At a recent meeting in New York City, General Clinton 
 B. Fisk spoke of his early associations with Jerry McAuley 
 in the work, and of its extended influence. In Liverpool 
 one night he heard a rough-looking sailor speak in a 
 seaman’s mission meeting. Though the man was rough, 
 his face shone. ‘I found Jesus over there in America,’ he 
 said, and all who heard him listened in wonder. This man 
 was known as ‘Swearing Johnny.’ ‘When we were paid off, 
 I took my money to the saloons, and pretty soon I was 
 drunk again. Then I went out into the streets, and the 
 snow was beating against my face. As I passed along, I 
 heard singing, and stopped to listen,’ he said. ‘I heard 
 ‘them singing “Jesus loves even me.’—“T'll go in and see 
 about it,” I said to myself.’ He went in and there he saw 
 
404 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 ‘that wonderful man, Jerry McAuley,’ and he led him to 
 Christ. 
 
 “*Yes,’ said his wife, ‘and its been nothing but Jerry 
 McAuley and “Jesus loves me” ever since Johnny’s ship 
 
 came home.’ ” 
 Satlor’s Magazine, April, 1885. 
 
 No. 882. 
 “ONE SWEETLY SOLEMN THOUGHT.” 
 
 Miss PHorsBE Carey. 
 
 Were the incident I want to relate to you about this 
 hymn found floating among the newspapers without author, 
 I should not dare tell it, but it has for its authority Rev. 
 H. D. Ganse, the well-known Dutch Reformed pastor, who 
 furnished it to the Sailor’s Magazine. He relates that in 
 the summer of 1881 he spent a few weeks at Geneva Lake, 
 Wisconsin, and there became acquainted with a family in 
 which there was a baby about a year old. Of this baby 
 he says: “He was of beautiful, fair complexion and hair, 
 with large blue eyes and ample forehead—a grave, manly, 
 reasonable-looking baby, with as sweet an expression as I 
 ever saw. I took to him at once and he allowed it, and I 
 was seldom with him without having him a little while 
 in my arms. After returning to St. Louis, since he was not 
 in my congregation, I saw but little of him; but I never 
 went through his neighborhood without scanning the baby 
 carriages in hope of again meeting his sweet face. Once I 
 was rewarded, about a year ago, and found him the picture 
 of health and beauty. Having learned very lately that 
 Captain Wade’s family had been very sick and that a 
 child had died, I called upon the relatives in my own congre- 
 gation to be informed of the facts, and was told, to my 
 great sorrow, that the lost child was my little friend. 
 But the narrative then given of the circumstances preceding 
 
 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 405 
 
 and attending his death, while it greatly affected me, more 
 than relieved my grief; for even the child’s death seemed 
 to be ‘swallowed up in victory.’ The reader will remember 
 that at the time of his death he was but three years and 
 nine months old. Some weeks before, and while his health 
 was still perfect, his attention had been attracted to 
 Phoebe Cary’s well-known hymn, in the form in which it 
 has been set to music and is commonly sung: 
 
 ‘One sweetly solemn thought 
 Comes to me o’er and o’er, 
 
 I am nearer home today, 
 Than I’ve ever been before. 
 
 ‘Nearer my Father’s house, 
 Where the many mansions be, 
 
 Nearer the great white throne, 
 Nearer the crystal sea.’ etc. 
 
 These were singular words to fascinate such a child; but 
 they did. Every night, after his prayer was said, and his 
 mother had tucked him up in his bed and kissed him 
 ‘ood night,’ he would call out to his father with his clear 
 ringing voice, ‘Nearer to home, papa’; when his papa would 
 be required to come from another floor and sing him the 
 whole song. The singing, however, was subject to such inter- 
 ruptions as these: ‘What’s “great white throne,” papa? 
 What’s “erystal sea,” papa?’ 
 
 “Whether or not he came thus to understand the words 
 and to have interest in their meaning will appear by what 
 follows. Certainly he had mind and character enough for 
 understanding them. One night, after his fatal sickness had 
 been for several days upon him, his mother, exhausted by 
 watching, had thrown herself down across the foot of his 
 bed, committing him for the first time to the care of a 
 competent nurse who had been a few days with him. When 
 the nurse attempted, at the proper hour, to give him his 
 
406 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 -medicine, he called out like any baby, ‘Mama, give it to 
 baby!’ His mother, rising at once to meet his wish, the 
 nurse explained by saying, ‘Baby, mama go tired.’ Immedi- 
 ately he answered, ‘Baby take it from the lady,’ and he 
 did so regularly for the rest of the night; during the whole 
 of which he made no call for his mother again, though 
 he lay for a good part of the time wide-awake looking at 
 her. With the same kind of thoughtfulness, when once 
 informed why he should not, in his sickness, kiss his parents 
 upon their lips, he steadily said thereafter, ‘Baby kiss you 
 on the neck.’ 
 
 “Such incidents will help us to judge how much intelli- 
 gence there was in the sayings and acts that remain to be 
 described. Let it be observed that he was as far as possible 
 from fretfulness or complaining. When asked, ‘How does 
 baby feel?’ his common answer was, ‘Better,’ or ‘Pretty 
 better.’ Still his knowledge that he had done with this 
 life, and was to have another, was perfectly distinct. Early 
 in his sickness, as his mother came to touch his throat, he 
 turned sadly toward her and said, ‘Don’t touch baby’s 
 throat any more, mamma; baby’s going to die.’ 
 
 “Later on, when the truth of his prophecy grew more 
 apparent, his mother asked him, ‘Don’t baby want to 
 stay with papa and mamma?’ He nodded his head. ‘Then 
 pray to God to let you stay.’ 
 
 “He answered very faintly, ‘You pray to God.’ 
 
 ““O darling!’ she said, ‘I have prayed so many, many 
 times.’ 
 
 “His answer was very striking: ‘Baby tired of praying 
 to God.’ 
 
 “On the morning of the day on which he died, his voice 
 had grown very weak. He was seen to be trying to speak. 
 His mother, bending close to him, heard him say, ‘Baby 
 going to home.’ Scarcely believing what she heard, she 
 “asked him, ‘Where, my darling? where are you going?’ and 
 he answered, ‘Baby going to God.’ ” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 407 
 
 A worker in Christ’s vineyard, who has done much for our 
 sick and wounded soldiers at Washington, writes to a 
 friend as follows: “The hundred hymn books you sent 
 me will be very useful, and, I think, will do much good. 
 There is one hymn in the book that I can never forget if 
 I live a thousand years. It is the sixty-third, beginning: 
 
 ‘One sweetly solemn thought,’ 
 
 I had held by the bedside of a dying soldier several prayer 
 meetings; it was at the Patent Office Hospital, and the 
 soldiers would gather round the bedside of this interesting 
 Christian, and we would pray with him and them, read to 
 them, talk a little, and sing several pieces out of the hymn 
 book. This sixty-third hymn was his favorite, and he 
 always wanted it sung. We used to sing it to the sweet 
 tune of Dennis. One evening, just as the sun was setting, 
 we went in, and he wanted us to have the prayer meeting. 
 In the course of the service, I leaned over and asked him 
 what we should sing. He said, ‘My hymn.’ We knew 
 very well what it was, and sung it as far as the conclusion 
 of the third verse, and there we had to stop. He actually 
 went to ‘wear his starry crown,’ just as we were singing 
 at his request, those very words.” 
 Hacxett’s “Christian Memorials of the War.” 
 
 No. 383. 
 “IF YOU CANNOT ON THE OCEAN.” 
 
 Mrs. ELLEN HuntTINGTON GATES. 
 
 The ever-memorable fourth and closing anniversary of 
 the Christian Commission was held in the Hall of the 
 House of Representatives, Washington, D. C., on Sabbath 
 evening, February 11, 1866. A great crowd filled the 
 
408 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 hall, overflowing the lobbies outside, and turning thousands 
 away in a disappointed stream. The hall was draped in 
 memory of the beloved dead, who by his presence graced 
 the anniversary of the Commission, and by his tearful sym- 
 pathy has made that occasion ever fragrant in the history 
 and record of the institution. The Hon. Schuyler Colfax, 
 Speaker of the House, presided. Precisely at seven o’clock 
 the exercises began, by the singing of the noble hymn of 
 praise: 
 
 “Jesus shall reign where’er the sun 
 Does his successive Journeys run, 
 His kingdom stretch from shore to shore, 
 Till moons shall wax and wane no more.” 
 
 The audience, rising and joining in the praise, was led by 
 Philip Phillips, of Cincinnati. Prayer was then offered by 
 the Rev. Dr. Boynton, Chaplain of the House, and the 
 Scriptures were read, in the Forty-sixth Psalm, by the 
 Rev. Dr. Taylor, Secretary of the American Bible Society. 
 Speaker Colfax said, “I regret to inform you that the Hon. 
 James Harlan (Secretary of the Interior) is detained by 
 indisposition at home, and will not be able to be here 
 as announced. Before singing the beautiful and impressive 
 hymn, ‘Your Mission,’ next in order in the programme, let 
 me read a brief note from the paper I hold in my hand. 
 On the twenty-ninth of January, 1865, at the last anniver- 
 sary meeting of this Commission, when hostile armies were 
 contending together in deadly strife, this poem was sung 
 as a part of the exercises of the evening. Abraham Lincoln, 
 with his tall form, his care-furrowed face, and his nobly 
 throbbing heart, was here, and after listening in tears, he 
 sent up, written upon the back of this programme (holding 
 up the precious sheet) in that plain familiar handwriting, 
 by that hand that now lies cold in the grave, this request: 
 ‘Near the close, let us have “Your Mission” repeated by 
 Mr. Phillips. Don’t say I called for it.’” It was this 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 409 
 
 incident that gave to this hymn its special interest and made 
 it so widely known and sung all over the land. In this 
 connection it is an interesting fact that President Lincoln 
 gave to two hymns such notice as to establish their popu- 
 larity, the other one being the one beginning: 
 
 “Oh why should the spirit of mortal be proud?” 
 
 No. 384. 
 
 “SAY, BROTHERS, WILL YOU MEET US?” 
 
 Rev. George A. Hall relates that during the last year of 
 the war, while engaged in the work of the Christian 
 Commission in the Union Army near Petersburgh, nightly 
 crowded meetings were held in a little chapel by the 
 soldiers of the Sixth Army Corps, at which were “witnessed 
 such scenes as have never been known outside of army 
 lines.” The night before a fight on the left, the question 
 was put to a most solemn assembly, “How many of you 
 that are seeking Christ are ready to surrender to Him 
 now?” In answer some twelve or fifteen came forward and 
 knelt by the front seat, among them was an interesting 
 youth. An old man, seeing him, darted from his seat and, 
 pressing through the crowded aisle, threw his arms about 
 the young soldier, sobbing, “My son, my son. He was 
 lost and is found.” Just then an Adjutant from Division 
 headquarters, apologizing for his intrusion, called out, “All 
 men belonging to Division, fall in.” They were to 
 march in the darkness of the night, to secure a position 
 for the attack at daybreak. The men at the front seat 
 arose, fell on each other’s necks and wept. Some of them 
 were to go. The father was not in the Division ordered 
 out. His boy was. The parting was tender and cheerful. 
 He kissed him and said, “Go now, my boy, since the Lord 
 is going with you.” There were hurried pledges to be faith- 
 
 
 
410 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 ful, and then they all took hold of hands around the altar 
 and sang: 
 
 “Say, brothers, will you meet us, 
 Say, brothers, will you meet us, 
 Say, brothers, will you meet us, 
 
 On Canaan’s happy shore?” 
 
 and hurried to their quarters to make ready to fall in. 
 Some did not return from that fight. Two were brought 
 into City Point Hospital badly wounded. They told us 
 of the meeting, of their consecration, of their fearlessness 
 in the fight, and their readiness to meet death, if it was 
 God’s will. 
 
 “Tncidents of the Christian Commission.” 
 
 No. 385. 
 “SHRINKING FROM THE COLD HAND OF DEATH.” 
 
 Rey. CuHartes WesLey, 1708—1788. 
 
 During the last days of Rev. John Wesley, he was accus- 
 tomed to preach as usual in different places in London and 
 its vicinity, generally meeting the society after the preaching 
 in each place, and exhorting them to love as brethren, to 
 fear God, and honor the King, which he wished them to 
 consider as his last advice. He then usually, if not invari- 
 ably, concluded with giving out that verse: 
 
 “O that without a lingering groan, 
 I may the welcome word receive; 
 My body with my charge lay down, 
 And cease at once to work and live!” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 411 
 No. 386. 
 “ALAS! AND DID MY SAVIOR BLEED.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Watts, 1674—1748. 
 
 “Before me lies a letter written from a distant Western 
 city in which the young man says, ‘Do you remember a 
 hymn of Watts which you made us boys learn once, be- 
 ginning: 
 
 “Alas! and did my Savior bleed?” 
 
 I thought it rubbish at the time, and had nearly forgotten 
 it, but this winter some of its lines have followed me like 
 a detective. We have been having revival meetings, and 
 I couldn’t shake off the question: 
 
 “Was it for crimes that I have done, 
 He groaned upon the tree?’ 
 
 Here follows the story of the revival, and of his own surren- 
 der to Christ in the words of the last stanza of the hymn, 
 which, doubtless have been the language of many another 
 heart in similar circumstances: 
 
 ‘Here, Lord, I give myself away,— 
 Tis all that I can do.’” 
 
 Francis J. Dyer, in Congregationalist, March 24, 1887. 
 No. 387. 
 “ALMOST PERSUADED NOW TO BELIEVE.” 
 
 Puiuie Buss, 1838—1876. 
 
 “In a mission of this great city (New York) a few 
 evenings ago, there sat among the motley and changing 
 
412 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 audience a young man whose face had a kindly look. All 
 unnoticed he sat, till in a pause he rose, saying, ‘Please 
 sing seventy-five,’ and took his seat. The first stanza of 
 ‘Almost persuaded’ was sung when the leader said, ‘I want 
 to ask that young man if he is a Christian.’ Calmly rising, 
 a young man of perhaps twenty years, fairly clothed, not 
 a vicious but an undecided face, he replied, ‘No, I am not 
 a Christian, but I learned that piece in the Sunday school. 
 I was brought up in a quiet little country village in the 
 southern part of the United States. There I went to 
 church and Sunday school, where I learned this hymn. 
 I always went to church till I came to New York, then I 
 began to run around, but I never hear that piece sung but 
 I am almost persuaded to become a Christian.’ I wish that 
 I might record that he did then and there give his heart 
 to Christ, but like too many others we fear he put it off 
 to a more convenient season. The incident shows, however, 
 the lasting influence of a hymn and how impossible it is to 
 shake off the impressions they produce.” 
 W. J. W. in Christian Secretary, September 2, 1885. 
 
 No. 888. 
 “IT WOULD NOT LIVE ALWAY. I ASK NOT TO STAY.” 
 
 Rev. Wm. Aucustus MUHLENBERG, 1796—1877. 
 
 A correspondent of the Religious Herald, of Hartford, 
 writing of a revival in that city in connection with the 
 noonday meetings of the Y. M. C. A., in 1885, says: “A 
 few days ago, the proprietor of one of the drinking. and 
 gambling hells of this city and also of a house of prostitu- 
 tion in New York, was passing the above-mentioned prayer 
 meeting. The windows were open, and the hymn, ‘I would 
 not live alway,’ reached his ear. ‘Stop,’ said he to his 
 companion, ‘listen to those words; they were sung at my 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 413 
 
 brother’s funeral. Come,’ said he, ‘let us go in and hear 
 the singing.’ They went in, and before the meeting closed 
 he gave his heart to God. One week ago, he united with 
 the church, and is now, so far as he is able, destroying the 
 work of darkness he once builded.” 
 
 No. 889. 
 “DEPTH OF MERCY! CAN THERE BE.” 
 
 Rev. CHartes Wesiey, 1708—1788. 
 
 In the Fulton Street, New York, Prayer Meeting, a 
 gentleman related his own experience, saying that he was 
 some years ago sent from New York to Nashville, Tennessee, 
 so that he might be away from his wicked companions. 
 But he took with him his sinful appetites, and was there 
 as here still bound by the slavery of the cup. He realized 
 his degradation, but could not break his chains. He passed 
 a rude place one day from which issued the sound of song. 
 This was the song: 
 
 “Depth of mercy! can there be 
 Mercy still reserved for me?” 
 
 As he leaned against the door, it gave way, and entering, 
 
 he found a little congregation of colored people. Among 
 
 them was a colored auntie who had long been praying for 
 
 the poor man’s salvation. “Ah,” said she, “I know you 
 
 would come.” 
 “Oh, auntie,” he asked, “is there any hope for me?” 
 “Oh, yes, for you,” and the colored saints sang on; 
 
 “God is love! I know, I feel; 
 Jesus weeps, and loves me still.” 
 
 Weekly Witness, April 13, 1887. 
 
414 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 390. 
 “J WILL SING FOR JESUS.” 
 
 Puiure PHILLIPS. 
 
 One evening a great throng had gathered in the Effing- 
 ham Theatre, London, in connection with William Booth’s 
 mission, to hear Mr. Phillips sing. He sang the song 
 beginning “T will sing for Jesus.’’ The song was wafted to 
 the ears of a despairing man, while on his way to the 
 London docks to commit suicide. It arrested his attention. 
 As he listened, the verse was sung: 
 
 “Can there overtake me 
 Any dark disaster, 
 While I sing for Jesus, 
 My blessed, blessed Master?” 
 
 His purpose was thwarted. It brought home to his heart 
 the memory of a mother’s prayers and praises in his early 
 days, and brought him broken-hearted to the feet of his 
 Savior. 
 
 History of Hymns by E. M. Lone. 
 
 No. 391. 
 “TAKE THE NAME OF JESUS WITH YOU.” 
 
 Lyp1A Baxter, 1809—1874. 
 
 I had been sitting alone in the little chapel for some 
 time, busy at the organ in preparation for a meeting, and 
 was about to leave the room, when an old man, who had 
 been in the reading room adjoining, came slowly toward me, 
 and, lifting his face toward mine, said: “I like music. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 415 
 
 Won’t you go back and play a little more for me?” He 
 was eighty-four years old, as he told me afterward. His 
 body was bent under the burden of the years, and as I 
 seated myself again at the organ, he came and stood beside 
 me, fully ripe, as it seemed for heaven. He was alive to 
 only one great thought—Jesus the Savior and Master. He 
 had been turning the leaves of the “Gospel Hymns,” while 
 my fingers ran over the keyboard, and presently he laid 
 the book before me, saying: “Play that slowly, and I'll 
 try and sing it for you.” Softly and very slowly, I followed 
 him as with a broken voice, often scarcely audible, he tried 
 to sing: 
 
 “Take the Name of Jesus with you 
 Child of sorrow and of woe; 
 It will joy and comfort give you, 
 Take it then where’er you go.” 
 
 It was little more than a whisper song; but as he took 
 up the words of the chorus, a glad smile spread over his 
 face, and his voice seemed to gather strength from his heart 
 as he looked rather than sang: 
 
 “Precious Name! O, how sweet! 
 Hope of earth and joy of heaven.” 
 
 It was true worship, the simple, glad expression of a 
 loving, loyal heart. Verily, I sat alone with a saint that 
 day, for as the other verses were sung, their wondrous 
 meaning was interpreted by the face of the singer, and the 
 veil seemed almost to fall away, revealing to me the things 
 unseen. I had never seen the old man before; it is not 
 probable that I shall ever see him again in the flesh; but 
 his life touched mine with blessing that day, for he had 
 unconsciously brought the Master very near. There was 
 no tnusic in the old man’s voice; indeed, it could truthfully 
 
416 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 be said that he almost had no voice; but he drew a soul 
 a little nearer to its Savior with what he had. 
 W. N. Burr, in Illustrated Christian Weekly. 
 
 No. 392. 
 “LORD I HEAR OF SHOWERS OF BLESSING.” 
 
 Mrs. EvizABeETH CopNER. 
 
 In the year 1868 or 1869, the following note was read 
 at one of the large union prayer meetings in the First 
 Presbyterian Church, Rochester, at one of the E. P. Ham- 
 mond meetings: 
 
 “Mr. H.: Thank you for singing that hymn “Even Me” 
 for it was the singing of that hymn that has saved me. 
 I was a lost woman, a wicked mother. I have stolen, 
 and lied, and been so bad to my poor little innocent 
 children. I have no friend. I have attended your in- 
 quiry meetings, but no one came to me on account of 
 the crowd, so I went away always wretched, lost. 
 But Saturday afternoon, at the First Presbyterian 
 Church, when they all sung those beautiful words, 
 ‘Let some droppings drop on me, in blessing others, O 
 bless me, even me,’ it seemed to reach my very soul. I 
 thought Jesus can accept me, ‘even me,’ a bad, wicked, 
 passionate mother; and it brought me to His feet, and 
 I feel my burden of sins removed. Jesus has accepted 
 me; even me. Can you wonder that I love those words, 
 or love te hear them sung? Ah! may I too sing them 
 when He shali take me before His throne at the last 
 and accept EVEN ME. God bless you. 
 
 Yours truly. 
 A CONVERT.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 417 
 
 No. 393. 
 “Q GOD OF LIGHT AND LOVE.” 
 Rey. R. C. Watterson, 1812. 
 
 This hymn was written for the Annual Meeting of the 
 ‘Unitarian clergy and laity, Boston, May, 1845. The Hon. 
 John Quincy Adams presided, and made the introductory 
 address. The interest was very great, and it was throughout 
 a most memorable occasion, by no one present ever to be 
 forgotten. The following was sung as the fifth verse, in 
 allusion to the venerable and illustrious presiding officer: 
 
 “Bless thou the Patriot Sire, 
 Who, warm with Freedom’s fire, 
 Spreads light around; 
 He like a rock has stood 
 ’Mid strife and fire and flood, 
 True to his country’s good, 
 True to his God.” 
 
 The Rev. Dr. Pierce, with his snow-white locks, at President, 
 Adams’ right-hand, led in the singing; and, when this verse 
 was commenced, he lifted up his arm and pointed to Mr. 
 Adams, at the same time raising his voice to its utmost 
 power, the vast multitude heartily uniting. The enthusi- 
 asm was literally beyond description.” 
 
 “Singers and Songs of the Liberal Faith.” 
 
 No. 394. 
 
 “? AM SO GLAD THAT OUR FATHER IN HEAVEN.” 
 Pure Buss, 1838—1876. 
 
 A New York City missionary one day came in his rounds 
 to a small room in a tenement house, the home of a 
 
418 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 beautful girl and her mother. The thought of the poor 
 young thing and her hard lot had burdened him as he 
 climbed up the dark stairs, the heavy sewing machine at 
 which she sat day after day wearing out her life. He 
 wondered that even religion could keep pure and white 
 one lovely blossom amid such trial and such temptation, 
 and wondered more that she did not despair. No; as he 
 neared the landing he heard a sweet voice singing. Opening 
 the door, and meeting the violet eyes through a thick 
 cloud of steam with which washtubs filled the place to 
 suffocation, he could not help exclaiming: “My poor child, 
 how do you stand it?” 
 
 She sobered a moment; then catching up again the refrain 
 just leaving her lips, sang on, smiling at him: 
 
 “Oh, I am so glad that Jesus loves me, 
 Jesus loves me, Jesus loves me; 
 I am so glad that Jesus loves me, 
 Jesus loves even me!” 
 
 No. 295. 
 “WHAT A FRIEND WE HAVE IN JESUS.” 
 
 Rev. Horatius Bonar, 1808. 
 
 A woman who, with her husband, had long been addicted 
 to strong drink was at last reformed and converted through 
 the influence of the meetings held at the Medical Mission, 
 81 Roosevelt Street, New York. After some time, the 
 woman received a severe injury to her leg, necessitating her 
 removal to the hospital. 
 
 “Tt was, indeed, a touching scene to witness, as the mother 
 had to part with her two little children; but she-commended 
 them to her Heavenly Father’s care, and, with a word of 
 kindly warning to her husband to cheer up and look to the 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 419 
 
 Lord and mind not to take the drink, she left them. For 
 some days the fever raged high, and part of the time the 
 poor woman was quite delirious. One morning a stretcher 
 was brought to her bedside to remove her to the operating 
 room. She knew what it meant, and a shudder passed 
 through her frame at the thought of what she would have 
 to undergo, but she said: ‘I’m ready to go, bless the Lord, 
 for He will be with me.’ Just then, though, a thought crossed 
 her mind, causing a temporary feeling of depression. What 
 was it? Why, she had heard that persons under the influ- 
 ence of ether uttered strange things at times, and the thought 
 crossed her mind that perhaps she might say some bad 
 words such as she had been wont to use in days gone by. 
 But so changed had she become now that the very thought 
 of her giving utterance to these things was horrible. Just 
 then she remembered the verse sung at the mission: 
 
 ‘Have we trials and temptations, 
 Is there trouble anywhere? 
 We should never be discouraged, 
 
 Take it to the Lord in prayer.’ 
 
 And so she lifted her heart to the Lord as the nurse lifted 
 her body upon the operating table; ‘O Lord, keep the 
 door of my lips’; and He did so. The operation was a very 
 tedious one, needing the removal of a large piece of bone, 
 and it was three hours before she came to herself. On 
 doing so, her first question was not as to her leg being 
 on or off, but, turning to the nurse, she asked, eagerly: 
 ‘Did I say anything wrong?’ On being assured that she 
 did not, but had only whispered, ‘Safe in the arms of 
 Jesus,’ she exclaimed, ‘Thank God!’” ' 
 Medical Missionary Record, May, 1887. 
 
 In one of the South Sea Islands recently visited by a 
 missionary, he found that a couple of boys who had attended 
 the mission school at another island had unconsciously 
 effected the conversion of some of the natives by singing 
 
420 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 the Sabbath school hymns, “Hold the Fort,” and “What a 
 Friend we have in Jesus.” At the first service held by the 
 missionary, two men who had been bitter enemies came 
 forward and openly made known their reconciliation. 
 Foreign Missionary, March, 1884. 
 
 No. 396. 
 “NO MORE MY GOD, I BOAST NO MORE.” 
 Rey. Isaac Warts, 1674—1748. 
 
 This hymn has for its title in Watts’ collection, “The 
 value of Christ, and His Righteousness.” Mr. Cooper, a 
 missionary to the East Indies, had been on one occasion 
 preaching on justification, at a military station on the 
 Malabar coast, and on giving out the hymn at the end of 
 the service, which was the one hundred and ninth, of the 
 first Book of Watts, he paused and remarked, that if any- 
 one who did not come to Christ for the bestowment of this 
 righteousness joined in the singing of this hymn, he was 
 insulting God. One of the soldiers who was hearing him 
 said he was thunderstruck. “What a wretch I must be, 
 that I am prohibited from joining in the praise of God.” He 
 went to the barracks under this impression, and found that 
 without an interest in Christ he was a wretch indeed: and 
 now, to all human appearances, he has fled for refuge to 
 that atonement he had formerly neglected. 
 
 Arvine’s Cyclopedia. 
 
 No. 397. 
 
 “COME HUMBLE SINNER IN WHOSE BREAST.” 
 Rev. Epmunp Jongs, 1722—1765. 
 
 In his “Revival Lectures,” President Finney says, “There 
 is a hymn that has done great mischief. It begins: 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 421 
 
 ‘Come humble sinner in whose breast, 
 A thousand thoughts revolve.’ 
 
 This hymn was once given by a minister to an awakened 
 sinner, as one applicable to his case. He began to read, 
 ‘Come humble sinner.’ He stopped. ‘ “Humble sinner,” 
 that is not applicable to me. I am not humble.’ Ah, how 
 well it was for him that the Holy Ghost had taught him 
 better than the hymn. If the hymn had said, ‘Come, anxious 
 sinner,’ or ‘guilty sinner,’ or ‘trembling sinner,’ it would 
 have been well enough, but to call him a humble sinner 
 would not do. There are many hymns of the same char- 
 acter. It is very common to find sinners quoting the false 
 sentiments of some hymn, to excuse themselves in rebellion 
 against God.” 
 
 “One glorious day in June, accompanied by an officer 
 of the Eighth Missouri, I set out for the rifle pits. When I 
 reached them, I found the heat stifling; and as I bent to 
 avoid the whizzing Minié balls and the falling branches 
 of the trees, cut off by an occasional shell, I felt that war 
 was a terrible reality. The intense excitement of the 
 scene, the manly, cheerful bearing of the veterans, the 
 booming of the cannon from the battlements and the heavy 
 mortars that were ever and anon throwing their huge 
 iron balls into Vicksburg, and the picturesque panorama 
 of the army encamped below, obliterated all sense of per- 
 sonal danger or fatigue. After a friendly talk with the 
 men in the extreme front, and a peep again and again 
 through the loopholes, watched and fired upon continually 
 by the wary foe, I descended to the second ledge, where the 
 sound of music reached us. We followed it quietly, and in 
 a few moments stood behind a rude litter of boughs, on 
 which lay a gray-headed. soldier, face downward, with a 
 comrade on either side. They did not perceive us but sang 
 on the closing lines of the verse: 
 
422 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 ‘Come, humble sinner, in whose breast, 
 A thousand thoughts revolve, 
 
 Come, with your guilt and fear oppressed, 
 And make this last resolve.’ 
 
 I joined in the second verse: 
 
 ‘I'll go to Jesus, though my sin 
 Hath like a mountain rose; 
 
 I know His courts, Ill enter in, 
 Whatever may oppose.’ 
 
 “In an instant each man turned and would have stopped, 
 but I sang on with moistened eyes, and they continued. 
 At the close of the hymn, one burst out, ‘Why, ma’am, 
 where did you come from? Did you drop from heaven into 
 these rifle-pits? You are the first lady we have seen here,’ 
 and then the voice was choked with tears. 
 
 “TI said, ‘I have come from your friends at home to see 
 you, and bring their messages of love, and the comforts that 
 they want you to have.’ 
 
 ““Do you think so much of us as that? Why, boys, 
 we can fight another year on that, can’t we?’ 
 
 “*Yes! Yes!’ they cried, and almost every hand was 
 raised to wipe away the tears.” 
 
 “Woman’s Work in the Civil War.” 
 
 No. 398. 
 “NOTHING EITHER GREAT OR SMALL.” 
 
 Rev. Proctor. 
 
 In his book, “Bringing in Sheaves,” Mr. Earle relates the 
 following: “A citizen, about thirty years ago, had such a 
 elear view of himself as a sinner in the sight of God, and 
 felt so deeply that he must have help or perish, that he came 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 423 
 
 to my room, after midnight, to know what he should do to 
 be saved. Oh, the agony of that soul! He walked the floor 
 erying, ‘I shall perish! What shall I do? What shall I 
 do?’ He kneeled down by a chair, and literally laid his face 
 on the carpet. But he soon rose, saying, ‘I must be lost!’ 
 His groans and cries were heartrending. I saw plainly that 
 he needed to get a clear view of Jesus and His work, and 
 asked him not to groan, but to be calm, and listen to me for 
 a moment. After getting his attention, I told him that his 
 tears and overwhelming anguish would not help him, but he 
 must let go of all reliance upon anything but Jesus, and 
 simply believe. I then repeated a portion of an old Scotch 
 hymn (God be thanked for that good Scotch brother who 
 wrote it.) 
 
 ‘Nothing either great or small, 
 Nothing sinner no; 
 
 Jesus died and paid it all, 
 Jesus paid it all, 
 Long, long ago. 
 All the debt I owe, 
 
 And nothing either great or small, 
 Remains for me to do.’ 
 
 “Looking up through his tears, he asked, ‘Is that it, Mr. 
 Earle? Is that the way?’ 
 
 “T replied, ‘That is exactly the way.’ But the light was 
 not yet clear enough for him to fully embrace Jesus by a 
 simple faith. He commenced groaning and pleading again, 
 saying, ‘Oh, what shall I do?’ 
 
 “T said to him, ‘Don’t groan; let me have your attention 
 a little longer.’ I then repeated the last stanza of that 
 beautiful hymn: 
 
 ‘Cast your deadly doing down, 
 Down at Jesus’ feet; 
 
 Stand in Him, in Him, alone, 
 All glorious and complete.’ 
 
424 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 As the Spirit shed light upon his dark mind, he smiled 
 through his tears, and said, ‘I believe that it is; yes, that is 
 it. Jesus died and paid it all. I thought I must do some- 
 thing, and could not see what I could do. How glad I am 
 that I came here tonight. I can trust Jesus now; yes, I can 
 trust Him.’ I then asked him to kneel down and tell Jesus 
 he could trust Him. After doing this, he left me, saying, 
 ‘Oh, I am so happy now!’ ” 
 
 No. 399. 
 “QO JESUS, MY HOPE, FOR ME OFFERED UP.” 
 
 Rev. CHARLES WesLeEy, 1708—1788. 
 
 Those who are familiar with the “History of Methodism,” 
 by Dr. George Smith, will not have forgotten the story he 
 tells of a girl in Cornwall, who had been for some time a 
 very great opponent of the revivals. She had been accus- 
 tomed to ridicule the cries and groans of those who were in 
 distress about their souls; but there was one defect in her 
 mimicry. She had never really attended any of those prayer 
 meetings. She was persuaded to go on one of these occa- 
 sions, and the Spirit of God sent an arrow of conviction to 
 her heart, and she who went to mock “remained to pray.” 
 That night she was kneeling with the penitents; that night 
 she was privileged to find peace with God, and rejoiced in 
 conscious pardon, and the next morning when she met her 
 companions they found a strange change had passed over 
 her. They looked to her for mimicry, but they found noth- 
 ing but serious earnestness. So, by and by, they began to 
 persecute her as she had persecuted others. She happened 
 
 oO wear earrings and it was at that time thought to be an 
 offense against good taste and Christian propriety that any- 
 one who was converted should wear earrings. It was pointed 
 out to Mary that she ought not to wear them if she was 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 425 
 
 truly converted to God. She retained them for awhile, but 
 at last her heart gave way, and as she was beating the ore 
 to pieces with a hammer, she took the earrings, put them 
 among the ore, and hammered and smashed them until they 
 were a mass of shining metal, and as she struck them she 
 sang the words of the hymn she had heard the night before: 
 
 “Neither passion nor pride Thy cross can abide, 
 But melt in the fountain that streams from Thy side: 
 Let Thy life-giving Blood remove all my load, 
 And purge my foul conscience, and bring me to God.” 
 
 No. 400. 
 “QO LORD OF HOSTS! ALMIGHTY KING!” 
 
 Ouiver WENDELL HotMegs, 1809. 
 
 This was called the “Army Hymn.” In compliance with 
 a request of Congress, President Lincoln appointed the last 
 Thursday in September, 1861, as a day of fasting and 
 prayer. Nowhere was this fast day better observed than in 
 the Union Army. A correspondent of the Traveller thus 
 describes its observance in General Banks’ Division, then 
 stationed on the Upper Potomac: 
 
 “Yesterday, the fast day appointed by the President, was 
 observed in this Division in a marked method. All drill was 
 omitted, of course. Public services were held in a rare 
 manner. In accordance with a general order, all the regi- 
 ments in the immediate locality assembled in a beautiful 
 field at the entrance to Darnestown village, with full bands, 
 and the artillery and cavalry. The Major General, Briga- 
 diers, and other high officers, attended in full uniforms. A 
 march, varying from a short distance to a mile and a half, 
 brought all together, when the infantry formed in mass, 
 flanked by artillery and cavalry. Six chaplains officiated. 
 
426 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 Assistant Adjutant-General Drake read the General’s order. 
 Chaplain Gaylord, of the Twelfth Massachusetts, read the 
 President’s Proclamation in a most impressive manner. 
 Chaplain Reed, of the Thirteenth Pennsylvania, read selec- 
 tions of Scripture, and the hymn: 
 
 ‘My country, ’tis of thee.’ 
 
 Chaplain Phillips, of the Ninth New York, offered prayer. 
 Chaplain Quint, of the Second Massachusetts, read the army 
 hymn, and also made the address of the day; and Chaplain 
 Lasher, of the Fifth Connecticut, offered the concluding 
 prayer, and after the ‘Doxology,’ pronounced the Benedic- 
 tion. The grand mass of soldiery, as brigade after brigade 
 took their places in perfect order; the great number of State 
 and National banners floating in the breeze; the respect of 
 the men, with the devoutness of many, and especially the 
 majestic music of the united bands pouring out ‘America’ 
 and ‘Old Hundred,’ in which blended a multitude of voices, 
 made it a scene long to be remembered. The author of the 
 _ ‘Army Hymn’ has never yet heard his own poem sung in 
 all its majesty. He never will till he hears it from thousands 
 upon thousands of men in active service, waiting impatiently 
 for the order to advance to victory, with the sunlight play- 
 ing upon sabers of dragoons, on the pieces of artillery caps, 
 and a forest of bayonets: 
 
 ‘O Lord of Hosts! Almighty King! 
 Behold the sacrifice we bring! 
 
 To every arm Thy strength impart, 
 Thy Spirit shed through every heart! 
 
 ‘Wake in our breasts the living fires, 
 The holy faith that warmed our sires; 
 Thy Hand hath made our Nation free; 
 To die for her is serving Thee. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 427 
 
 ‘Be Thou a pillared flame-to show 
 The midnight snare, the silent foe; 
 And when the battle thunders loud, 
 Still guide us in its moving cloud. 
 
 ‘God of all nations! Sovereign Lord! - 
 In Thy dread name we draw the sword, 
 We lift the starry flag on high 
 
 That fills with light our stormy sky. 
 
 ‘No more its flaming emblems wave, 
 To bar from hope the trembling slave; 
 No more its radiant glories shine 
 
 To blast with woe one child of Thine. 
 
 ‘From treason’s rent, from murder’s stain, 
 Guard Thou its folds till Peace shall reign, 
 Till fort and field, till shore and sea, 
 Join our loud anthem, Praise to Thee!’ ” 
 
 No. 401. 
 “JESUS AND SHALL IT EVER BE.” 
 
 JosEPH Gricc, 1728—1768. 
 
 In Rev. Rufus W. Clark’s life of John E. Emerson, it is 
 related that while he was a boy an inquiry meeting was held 
 in the church where he attended, at the close of which all 
 who desired to converse with the minister on the subject of 
 their personal salvation were requested to remain. John 
 accepted the invitation and tarried. While sitting in his 
 seat, he observed some boys in the gallery pointing at him 
 - and laughing. The blood rushed to his cheeks, and feeling 
 keenly their ridicule, he took his hat in his hand to leave 
 the house, but just as he was rising to go these lines flashed 
 into his mind: 
 
428 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “Ashamed of Jesus, that dear Friend, 
 On Whom my hopes of heaven depend!” 
 
 In an instant he was ready to reply: 
 
 ‘No! when I blush be this my shame, 
 That I no more revere His name.” 
 
 Immediately he resumed his seat; laid aside his hat, and 
 resolved that, God helping him, he would strive, in spite of 
 every obstacle, to obtain salvation. 
 
 No. 402. 
 “CHEER UP, MY SOUL, THERE IS A MERCY SEAT.” 
 
 Rev. JounN Newton, 1725—1807. 
 
 In “New England Revivals,” by Dr. Bennett Tyler, he 
 gives an account of a youth converted in a revival at Can- 
 ton, Connecticut, who after struggling for salvation for some 
 time says of himself: “I remained in this sorrowful situation 
 for several days, seeking relief, but refusing the precious 
 balm of Gilead. A certain Monday in this month was a most 
 trying day tome. It seemed as if the whole universe gazed, 
 with an eye of contempt, on its sinful, wretched inhabitants. 
 But, Oh! the following Wednesday! May that precious day 
 never be erased from my memory; the day, as I hope, in 
 which God met my poor, perishing soul. Having taken up 
 the ‘Hartford Collection of Hymns’ I began to read the 
 two hundred and seventy-fourth: 
 
 ‘Cheer up, my soul, there is a mercy seat, 
 
 Sprinkled with blood, where Jesus answers prayer; 
 There humbly cast thyself, beneath His feet, 
 
 For never needy sinner perished there.’ 
 
 ‘ 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 429 
 
 And truly, I said to myself, who can wish for a higher seat, 
 than at the feet of Sovereign mercy? And my heart was 
 now ready to thank God that I was in His hands.” 
 
 No. 403. 
 “HARK! THE VOICE OF LOVE AND MERCY.” 
 
 JONATHAN Evans, 1748—1809. 
 
 At the beginning of the nineteenth century the religion of 
 the Shetland Islands was a degenerated form of the Pres- 
 byterian Church of Scotland, that contained very little 
 indeed of the life and power of Godliness. A mission of the 
 Independent Church had been established and was begin- 
 ning to infuse a more spiritual religion into the lives of the 
 people. 
 
 Sinclair Thomson, a young man of twenty-five, was a 
 member of the established church of the island, not only in 
 good and regular standing, but by reason of considerable 
 musical skill, holding the office of precentor of the parish, 
 the duty of that office being to conduct the singing on all 
 occasions of public worship. And yet young Thomson was 
 a smuggler, and the keeper of a gin house, a great stickler 
 for the orthodoxy of his church, but a stranger to anything 
 like vital religion. One Sunday morning in 1809, he, with two 
 other young men, were on their way to the parish church. 
 There was to be no service there, but it was the law that, 
 whenever a wedding was to take place, it should be pro- 
 claimed from the kirk pulpit three Sabbaths in succession. 
 This was the duty of the precentor, and though no service 
 should be held, still the proclamation must be made, and the 
 two other men were taken along as witnesses. On the way 
 the men became warm and stopped at a wayside cottage for 
 rest and water. A woman was within, engaged in reading a 
 little book: Thomson, finding out that the woman was not 
 
430 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 a member of the kirk, but of the mission church of the Inde- 
 pendents, told her that. she was doing wrong and that on 
 his way back from the kirk he would stop and have a talk 
 with her about it. This he did, but his words were such as 
 might be expected from such a one as he; more decided than 
 winning. The woman sat in silence. Stung a little that she 
 gave him no reply, and half conscious that she was “answer- 
 ing a fool according to his folly,’ he became bitter and 
 irritable in his language. Perceiving finally that he had 
 plunged into a controversy where the contention was all on 
 his own side, and somewhat at a loss how to close the inter- 
 view, he finally asked, “Will you lend me that little book 
 which you are reading?” 
 
 She held it out to him at once, with the words, “You are 
 welcome to it as your own.”’ He was surprised and pleased. 
 The book proved to be on “The Propriety of Observing the 
 Communion Every Sabbath,” and the reading of it led him 
 to looking up the passages of Scripture to which it referred, 
 and this again to still further investigation, until at last he 
 came to a point where he concluded that his own religion 
 was only a cold formal thing devoid of life or reality. His 
 first resort for comfort was in a reformation of his life, and 
 of increased zeal in outward religious duties. He estab- 
 lished family worship, admonished his neighbors of their 
 sins, abandoned his smuggling, studied the Bible daily, and 
 in all these ways went about to establish his own righteous- 
 ness. All this gave him comfort, but why it failed he did 
 not understand. He longed for some good minister, in whom 
 he could confide, to guide him in the right way, but no such 
 one was at his hand. The “missionary preachers” were 
 twenty-four miles away, and to them he could not go. At 
 last light broke in from a quarter quite unexpected. 
 
 He had by some means gained possession of one of the 
 hymn books used by the Independents, and had learned 
 some of their tunes. One day, while engaged in his house 
 at some handiwork, he was singing some of those hymns 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 431 
 
 to himself, almost unconsciously. It was the hymn com- 
 mencing: 
 “Hark! the voice of love and mercy 
 Sounds aloud from Calvary; 
 See! it rends the rocks asunder, 
 Shakes the earth and veils the sky. 
 ‘It is finished:’ 
 Hear the dying Savior cry.” 
 
 Nothing in the hymn particularly drew his attention until 
 he came to the last verse: 
 
 “Now redemption is completed, 
 Sin atoned, the curse removed; 
 Satan, death, and hell defeated, 
 As the rising fully proved. 
 All is finished: 
 There our hopes do rest. unmoved.” 
 
 The last line especially impressed him: 
 “There our hopes do rest unmoved.” 
 
 He paused in his work, exclaiming, “Where, where?” He 
 went back over the verses of the hymn to ascertain where 
 the sinner’s “hopes do rest unmoved.” The Gospel pro- 
 vision shone in upon his mind, the full, blessed beam of the 
 Sun of Righteousness. Sinclair Thomson soon began preach- 
 ing and became a great power for good all over Shetland, 
 preaching for nearly fifty years. 
 
 Sincuair THomson, or the “Shetland Apostle.” 
 
 No. 404. 
 “HEAR, O SINNER! MERCY HAILS YOU.” 
 Rev. ANpDREw: Reep, 1787—1862. 
 
 In his “Revival Lectures,” President Finney says: 
 “T once heard a celebrated organist produce a remarkable 
 
432 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 effect in a protracted meeting. The organ was a powerful 
 one, and the double bass pipes were like thunder. The hymn 
 was given out that has these lines: 
 
 ‘See the storm of vengeance gathering 
 O’er the path you dare to tread! 
 Hark the awful thunder rolling 
 Loud and louder o’er your head! 
 Turn, O sinner! 
 Lest the Henini strike you dead.’ 
 
 “When he came to these words, we first heard the distant 
 roar of thunder, then it grew nearer and louder, till at the 
 word ‘louder,’ there was a crash that seemed almost to over- 
 power the whole congregation. Such things in their proper 
 place do good. But common singing dissipates feeling. It 
 should always be such as not to take away feeling, but to 
 deepen it.” 
 
 No. 405. 
 “FROM DEEP DISTRESS TO THEE I PRAY.” 
 
 Mitts, Translator. 
 
 This is a translation of a hymn by Martin Luther, who 
 based it on the one hundred and thirtieth Psalm, which he 
 greatly loved. This hymn took a great hold upon the 
 German people when it was first written, and was very soon 
 being sung all over the country. On the sixth of May, of 
 the year in which it was written, a poor old weaver sang it 
 through the streets of Magdeburg and offered it for sale 
 at a price that suited the poorest. He was cast into prison 
 by the burgomaster, but two hundred citizens marched to 
 the Town Hall, and would not leave till he was freed. This 
 prayer psalm had also its comforting power on the one who 
 wrote it. When Luther, during the Augsburg Diet, was at 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 433 
 
 the castle of Coburg, and had to suffer much from inward 
 and outward trials, he fell into a swoon. When he awoke 
 from it, he said: “Come, and in defiance of the devil, let us 
 sing the Psalm, ‘From deep distress to Thee I pray’; let us 
 sing it in full chorus, and extol and praise God.” This 
 hymn was also sung at the funeral of the great friend and 
 protector of Luther, Frederick the Wise, in 1525. And when 
 the body of Luther, himself, was on its way from Hisleben, 
 where he died, to Wittenberg, where he lies buried, it rested 
 for a night, February 20, 1546, in the church in Halle of 
 which Justus Jonas, the bosom friend of Luther, was pastor. 
 This hymn was given out by Jonas, and sung by the thou- 
 sands who thronged and wept around Luther’s coffin. 
 
 No. 406. 
 “T SAW ONE HANGING ON A TREE.” 
 
 Rev. JonN Newton, 1725—1807. 
 
 A little Sunday school boy was badly wounded at a spin- 
 ning mill in Dundee, Scotland. After being taken home, he 
 lingered for a few days and then died. His mother came to 
 the mill to see the boy’s teacher, and tell him about his 
 death. The teacher asked her how he died. 
 
 “He was singing all the time,” said she. 
 
 “Tell me what he was singing?” said the teacher. 
 
 “He was singing: 
 
 ‘O, the Lamb, the loving Lamb, 
 The Lamb upon Calvary; 
 The Lamb that was slain, and liveth again, 
 To intercede for me.’ ” 
 Newton’s “Life of Christ.” 
 
434 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 407. 
 “THE LORD’S MY SHEPHERD, I’LL NOT WANT.” 
 
 Rey. WinuIAM WHITTINGHAM. 
 
 Mr. Robert Pollock, author of “The Course of Time,” 
 also wrote “The Persecuted Family,” a narrative of the 
 sufferings of the Covenanters in the reign of Charles Second. 
 It is the biography of the family of Rev. James Bruce, one 
 of the clergymen who refused compliance with the orders of 
 the king, and were therefore ejected from their pulpits and 
 churches. After Mr. Bruce had been in this way turned out 
 of both his church and his home, he retired to a little farm 
 house four miles away from the village where he had 
 preached, and continued preaching to such of his flock as 
 he could gather together, in the fields and houses of the 
 peasants. But soon the persecution became still more 
 severe, and the ejected clergy were forbidden to preach 
 even in the fields, and the people were forbidden under the 
 severest penalties from giving them shelter or food. Mr. 
 Bruce was now compelled to betake himself, with his family, 
 to a wandering life, now sheltered in some barn; now in 
 some shepherd’s hut; and now exposed without cover to all 
 sorts of weather. A cave on the banks of the Ayr became 
 a place of their frequent resort. It had been formed in the 
 precipitous banks by the hands of men, as a hiding-place 
 in the former troublous times of Scotland, and was roomy 
 enough to admit five or six persons. The entrance to this 
 retreat was by rude and difficult steps, cut out of the stone; 
 and over its mouth, concealing it from view, hung the strag- 
 gling branches of the birch and hazel, that had struck their 
 roots into the seams of the rock. Two or three rude seats, 
 some straw and blankets, made up the furniture of the cave. 
 And to this place, in the darkness of the night, did the peas- 
 ants of the surrounding country come with food for their 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 435 
 
 pastor and his family, and to receive in return instruction, 
 advice, and comfort. 
 
 For nearly four years this cave was their home, and 
 during this time many of his flock had been thrown into 
 prison, and sent into banishment, had endured the cruelties 
 of torture, or died on the scaffold, and although they had 
 had many hair-breadth escapes, yet none of them had fallen 
 into the hands of their enemies. 
 
 On a Sabbath evening in the month of September, Mr. 
 Bruce, with his wife and children, left the cave, to meet 
 some of his flock, in a wild glen in the neighborhood, where 
 he was to deliver a sermon. When they arrived at the 
 appointed place, there was about a score assembled—some 
 of them stood, some seated themselves on the cold turf, 
 while Mr. Bruce took his station by a large stone, on which 
 he rested the Bible, and read, or rather repeated, for the 
 night was dark, the following verses from the twenty-third 
 Psalm: 
 
 “The Lord’s my shepherd, I’ll not want; 
 He makes me down to lie 
 In pastures green: He leadeth me 
 The quiet waters by. 
 
 “My soul he doth restore again; 
 * And me to walk doth make 
 Within the paths of righteousness, 
 Ev’n for his own name’s sake. 
 
 “Yea, though I walk in death’s dark vale, 
 Yet will I fear none ill; 
 For thou art with me; and thy rod 
 And staff me comfort still.” 
 
 And then the people sang the words their minister had 
 read, joined him in prayer, and listened to a sermon from 
 his lips, and were just receiving from his hands the benedic- 
 
436 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 tion, when the services were interrupted by a company of 
 soldiers, who had stolen upon them unperceived. They 
 fled into a morass too soft to permit the pursuit of the 
 soldiers who were on horseback, and so escaped except Mrs. 
 Bruce, who was shot and almost instantly killed. 
 
 No. 408. 
 “WE ARE JOYOUSLY VOYAGING OVER THE MAIN.” 
 
 Rev. Witu1Am Hunter, 1811—1877. 
 
 Among the band of young converts, at Mr. Moody’s Sun- 
 day school at Chicago, which all the time increased around 
 him, was a little girl whose father owned a small vessel, 
 in which he freighted lumber. Having given her own 
 heart to the Savior, she tried to persuade her father to do 
 the same. But he was a man having no taste for religion, 
 though he was very fond of the child, whom he took with 
 him on a certain voyage, during which she tried in vain to 
 establish a prayer meeting in the little cabin, and to convert 
 some of the crew. 
 
 On arriving at the lumber camp, this little missionary 
 commenced a Sunday school, as nearly as possible like the 
 North Market Mission. Not content with this, and hearing 
 of another encampment of woodcutters similar to their own, 
 she opened a second school among them also. During the 
 severe northern winter she presided personally over these 
 institutions, riding on horseback through the woods every 
 Sunday, after the manner of the early Methodist pioneers. 
 It may be supposed that these two schools in the woods were 
 of a very simple character, since the little girl herself was 
 the entire force of officers and teachers; and all the library 
 and literature in use among them was her own little copy 
 of the New Testament. The result of her labor cannot now 
 be given; but it is easy to imagine the tender interest with 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 437 
 
 which these rough woodsmen sat at the feet of their child 
 missionary, charmed by her Christian courage, and cheered 
 by her simple faith. 
 
 The lumber season being over, the little vessel started for 
 Chicago. During the voyage a terrible storm arose, dis- 
 abling the craft, and driving her rapidly toward a lee shore. 
 The crew being completely exhausted, and expecting in a 
 few minutes to be drowned, begged the little girl to pray for 
 them, which she did, with the greatest composure. When 
 she had told the good Lord all about them, and asked Him 
 to take them out of their danger, if He thought best, and, 
 above all things, to forgive their sins and make them ready 
 for heaven, she began, in a clear sweet voice, to sing that 
 little Sunday school hymn: 
 
 “We are joyously voyaging over the main, 
 Bound for the evergreen shore, 
 Whose inhabitants never of sickness complain, 
 And never see death any more; 
 Then let the hurricane roar, 
 It will the sooner be o’er; 
 We will weather the blast, and will land at last, 
 Safe on the evergreen shore.” 
 
 With the song new strength and hope seemed to come to 
 the arms and hearts of the crew; and renewing their efforts 
 to weather the point which threatened their destruction, and 
 aided perhaps by some slight change in the wind, or abate- 
 ment of the storm, the little craft weathered the rocks of 
 the headland close enough to toss a biscuit ashore, and then 
 swung out safely on the open course for home. 
 “TD, L. Moody, and His Work,” by Dantz.s. 
 
 In the Life of “Uncle John Vassar” by his nephew, Rev. 
 T. E. Vassar, occurs the following incident: “TI shall not 
 soon forget the delight with which I first heard him singing 
 a song, whose lively notes and cheerful, rejoicing confidence 
 
438 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 accorded admirably with his own spirit. It was toward the 
 close of a crowded meeting in a long chapel. He rose after 
 a prayer, and turned round in the aisle so as to face the 
 congregation. His right hand held the left by two fingers, 
 and kept it out of the way behind his back. Standing in 
 his humble but easy manner, he began in a low voice: 
 
 ‘We are joyously voyaging over the main, 
 Bound for the evergreen shore, 
 
 Whose inhabitants never of sickness complain, 
 And never see death any more.’ 
 
 Warming as he went on, he kept looking over the audience 
 to observe their feeling; and before he had finished he was 
 clapping his hands quietly in time to the tune, and leading 
 us all in the chorus, like an enthusiastic singing. teacher. 
 The hymn, though familiar now, was then new to most of 
 us, but we could not help joining with Uncle John, to the 
 best of our ability, in the chorus. Few, perhaps none, went 
 away from the meeting that night without resolving to 
 secure transportation in that good ship, for which, according 
 to his wont, Uncle John was looking up passengers.” 
 
 No. 409. 
 “ALAS! AND DID MY SAVIOR BLEED.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Warts, 1674—1748. 
 
 In the same book, in connection with the last anecdote, 
 the following incident is given: ‘‘There is one tune he used 
 to sing which we call ‘Vassar’ still. The words he used to 
 put to it were, 
 
 ‘Alas, and did my Savior bleed’; 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 439 
 
 “There was a Catholic woman who would not listen to 
 him or take a tract from his hand, but she finally did suffer 
 him to sing. And to this tune, whose proper name I do not 
 know, he sang the verse: Us 
 
 ‘But drops of grief can ne’er repay 
 The debt of love I owe 
 
 _ Here, Lord, I give myself away— 
 Tis all that I can do.’ 
 
 and at its close she was utterly subdued and ultimately 
 became a true Christian. Her experience she used to sum 
 up in the words, ‘Ah, those drops of grief, those drops of 
 grief—I couldn’t get over them.’ ” 
 
 No. 410. 
 
 “THE VOICE OF FREE GRACE CRIES, ‘ESCAPE TO THE 
 MOUNTAIN.’ ” 
 
 Rey. RicHarD BurpsaLu, 1735—1824. 
 
 In the autobiography of Dr. Lyman Beecher, it is related 
 that: “One Sabbath evening, when there was a meeting of 
 such persons as desired personal conversation on the subject: 
 of religion, many persons being present, and while quite a 
 number of those who used to come to his aid on such occa- 
 sions were engaged in conversation with such persons as. 
 had come up for religious instruction and guidance, he came 
 to me and said, ‘I want you to sing now. We'll sing: 
 
 “The voice of free grace cries, ‘escape to the mountain’.” 
 He then called for the attention of all to the hymn which 
 
 was sung by all who were disposed to take part. At its. 
 close, he made a few remarks, and the conversations were 
 
440 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 resumed. The next day, or soon after, I met him, when he 
 said to me, ‘Well, one person gave up his heart during the 
 singing of the hymn, as he told me afterward, and probably 
 there were others of whom I had not heard.’ ” 
 
 No. 411. 
 
 “WELCOME, HAPPY MORNING! AGE TO AGE SHALL 
 SANS. 
 
 This hymn was written toward the close of the sixth 
 century, by Venantius Honorius Clementianus Fortunatus, 
 
 Bishop of Poictiers. 
 “Evangelical Hymnal,” No. 596. - 
 
 Jerome of Prague, the celebrated lay reformer, after once 
 recanting and acknowledging the errors of his companions, 
 Wickliffe and Huss, and assenting to the condemnation of 
 the latter, was troubled over what he had done and de- 
 manded a new trial. At this trial he manifested great 
 courage and replied to the charges of heresy with eloquence 
 and power. He was, however, condemned to martyrdom, 
 and burned at the stake. After he had been tied to the 
 stake, he observed the executioner about to set fire to the 
 fagots behind his back, and cried out to him, “Bring thy 
 torch hither; perform thy office before my face. Had I 
 feared death, I might have avoided it.” As the wood began 
 to blaze he sang this hymn, which the violence of the flames 
 about him did not interrupt. 
 
 No. 412. 
 “COME SAINTS AND SINNERS HEAR ME TELL.” 
 
 In an address delivered at the Baptist Church, Hyde 
 Park, Massachusetts, by Hon. Elijah A. Morse, in 1887, 
 
 fel 
 
 he relates the following incident: “Some time ago an old 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 441 
 
 man came to me in Canton and said, ‘I am going to such a 
 place, won’t you let me stay all night; I haven’t any money, 
 and I can’t get there tonight; won’t you give me a place 
 to sleep?’ 
 
 “T have known the old man for several years, and I said, 
 ‘Come in, old man, and you'll be welcome.’ 
 
 “Well, he spent the night with me, and in the morning he 
 said, ‘Mr. Morse, you have been very kind to me; I haven’t 
 any money, and I know you don’t want any money, but I'll 
 tell you what I’ll do to pay you. I'll sing you a song my 
 mother used to sing eighty years ago.’ 
 
 “T called my little sons around me, and said, ‘Old man, let 
 us have the song.’ It was about union with God. It went 
 something like this: 
 
 ‘Come saints and sinners hear me tell 
 The wonders of Immanuel, 
 
 Who saved me from a burning hell, 
 
 And brought my soul with Him to dwell; 
 And gave me heavenly union. 
 
 ‘When Jesus saw me from on high— 
 Beheld my soul in ruin lie, 
 
 He looked on me with pitying eye 
 
 And said to me as He passed by, 
 “With God you have no union.” 
 
 ‘Then I began to weep and pray; 
 
 I looked this way and that to fly; 
 But still I found no refuge nigh; 
 Then sought salvation for to buy; 
 
 But still I found no union. 
 
 ‘But when I hated all my sin, 
 
 My dear Redeemer took me in, 
 And with his blood He washed me clean, 
 And O what seasons I have seen, 
 
 E’er since I felt this union. 
 
442 
 
 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 ‘I praised the Lord both night and day, 
 I went from house to house to pray, 
 
 And if I met one on the way 
 
 Always I found something to say, 
 About this heavenly union. 
 
 ‘Come heaven and earth unite your lays, 
 And give to Jesus endless praise; 
 
 And O! my soul look up and gaze! 
 
 He bleeds, He dies, your debt He pays, 
 And gives you heavenly union. 
 
 ‘O, could I like an angel sound 
 Salvation through the world around; 
 
 Old Satan’s kingdom to confound, 
 
 And triumph on Immanuel’s ground, 
 And cause a general union! 
 
 ‘And when we reach those blessed plains 
 Where love divine triumphant reigns, 
 We'll bid adieu to all our pains, 
 And join the sweet angelic strains, 
 To one eternal union. 
 
 ‘There we shall see as we are seen, 
 Without a veil of flesh between; 
 And not a cloud to intervene, 
 For all is pleasant and serene, 
 In climes of heavenly union. 
 
 ‘Almighty God, teach every tongue, 
 To shout and sing the Union Song; 
 
 All praises to Thy Name belong; 
 
 Let Zion sing, “Thy kingdom come,” 
 And fill this world with union.’ ” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 443 
 No. 413. 
 “COME YE SINNERS POOR AND NEEDY.” 
 
 JosePpH Hart. 
 
 “When the richest American of his day was in his last 
 fatal sickness, a Christian friend proposed to sing for him, 
 and the hymn he named was, ‘Come ye sinners poor and 
 needy.’ 
 
 “ «Ves, yes,’ replied the dying millionaire, ‘sing that for 
 me; I feel poor and needy.’ Yet at that moment the stock 
 markets of the globe were watching and waiting for the 
 demise of the man who could shake them with a nod of his 
 head! ‘Poor and needy!’ How the sand sweeps from under 
 a man’s soul in such an hour as that!” 
 
 THEODORE CUYLER. 
 
 No. 414. 
 “GIVE TO THE WINDS THY FEARS.” 
 
 Rev. Paut Geruarpt, 1607—1676. 
 Translated by Rev. JouN Westey, 1703—1791. 
 
 When the “Women’s Crusade” against the liquor saloons ~ 
 was commenced in Ohio, this hymn was used before they 
 started out on their first effort. The account is thus given 
 in the Centennial Temperance Volume: 
 
 “Mrs. Cowden, our Methodist minister’s wife, was then 
 requested to sing a familiar air: 
 
 ‘Give to the winds thy fears, 
 Hope and be undismayed: 
 
 God hears thy sighs and counts thy tears; 
 God shall lift up thy head,’ 
 
444 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 And while thus engaged the women, seventy-five in number, 
 fell in line, two and two, and proceeded first to the drug 
 stores, and then to the hotels and saloons. Thus the first 
 brave consecrated company went out for duty for God und 
 humanity in the Women’s Crusade. ‘Till the middle of the 
 following June, they visited the saloons almost daily.” 
 
 No. 415. 
 
 “ES WOLL UNS GOTT GENADIG SEYN.” 
 Rev. Martin Luruer, 1483—1546. 
 
 “MAY GOD UNTO US GRACIOUS BE.” 
 
 Translated by ArrHuR Tozer Russen, 1806— 
 
 Spangenburg relates a story about this hymn. The 
 Chief Councillor and Captain Commandant of the Duke 
 of Regenstein, Hans de Lunderstedt, was a zealous advo- 
 cate of the new doctrine, to which his master, the old Duke, 
 was bitterly opposed. The old man had never read or 
 understood a word of Luther’s teaching, and would have 
 nothing to do with anything new. The priests had told him 
 that it was execrable heresy that was now abroad; and filled 
 his ears with all manner of evil reports. A preacher one 
 _ Sunday allowed the people to sing for the first tme “Es woll 
 uns Gott genadig seyn,”’ and also “Ein feste Burg ist unser 
 Gott.” This was told to the Duke, and represented as a 
 most disgraceful infraction of all Church order, and a most 
 imprudent and outrageous attack on her doctrines. 
 
 The Duke was furious. He went instantly for Hans de 
 Lunderstedt, and ordered him to drag the rebellious preacher 
 by the hair of his head to Halberstadt, to be examined as to 
 ’ these heretical hymns, and to suffer the punishment due to 
 his wicked presumption. The wise commandant humbly 
 besought the Duke to be cautious; for, after all, the hymns 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 445 
 
 might not have been so bad as the priests had represented. 
 He said that he was well acquainted with the offending 
 preacher, and knew him to be a good citizen and a loyal 
 subject, who would never allow anything improper to be 
 sung in his church. 
 
 The Duke, still angry, replied: “The hymns may be what 
 they please; it is enough for me that they are Luther’s and 
 therefore must be heretical. I will allow nothing of that 
 sort in my duchy.” 
 
 The captain inquired whether his grace really knew what 
 the hymns were? The Duke answered, “Yes, one begins, 
 ‘Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott,’ and the other, ‘Es woll uns 
 Gott genadig seyn.’ I will not allow any such stuff to be 
 sung in my churches. Go and bring the insolent heretic 
 before me instantly.” 
 
 The captain quietly rejoined; “Most gracious master! you 
 know my fidelity to your interests. I beseech you to con- 
 sider well what you are saying, and wishing to do. Does 
 not your grace want God to be still your stronghold? Are 
 you not willing that men in your duchy should praise and 
 glorify Him? Do you not also wish that God may be gra- 
 cious to us now, as the hymn expresses it; and that men 
 should call upon Him? Who else but God would be gracious 
 tous? Is it the favor of the devil that we should seek?” 
 
 The old Duke was struck by this representation of the 
 matter, and the wise and good councillor went on to say 
 that the hymns were not made by Luther, but that they 
 were psalms of David, and words of Holy Scripture which 
 Luther had only translated into German, so as to be under- 
 stood by the people, and turned into verse, that they might 
 be sung. The spirit of these hymns is only the spirit of 
 prayer to God, bringing peace and consolation to poor 
 troubled men. The Duke being now thoroughly interested, 
 Hans read to him the whole of the hymns. The Duke was 
 more than satisfied; his anger was turned away, and a desire 
 was excited in haw to read Luther’s other writings. That 
 he did so, and that he profited by the advice of his faithful 
 
446 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 and pious councillor, we have good reason to believe, for 
 shortly after he opened the door for the introduction of the 
 new teaching into his duchy, and was a warm friend and 
 
 patron of the preachers of the Gospel. 
 Lutuer’s Table-Talk. 
 
 No. 416. 
 “NUN BITTEN WIR DEN HEILIGEN GEIST.” 
 
 “NOW PRAY WE ALL GOD, THE COMFORTER.” 
 
 Translated by ArrHur Tozer RusseEx, 1806. 
 
 One of the converted students of Wittenberg was the son 
 of the Burgermeister of Zullichau. The young graduate and 
 divine preached the first Gospel sermon ever heard in the 
 church of his native town. He began by singing the hymn, 
 “Nun bitten wir den Heiligen Geist.” If the people had 
 ever heard “Veni Creator Spiritus,’ the Latin invocation 
 had fallen on ears unintelligent and unmoved, compared 
 with the effect produced by the plain words heard in their 
 own tongue from the earnest preacher. The Burgermeister 
 was so enraged that he rose up and hastened from the 
 church, exclaiming, ‘““Now we invoke the devil!” But this 
 interruption only riveted the attention of the audience upon 
 
 the son of the graceless father. 
 Lutuer’s Table-Talk. 
 
 A learned doctor in Frankfort was at one time earnestly 
 refuting the new heresy of Luther. The people listened 
 patiently for a time, but at length as with one voice, raised 
 the tune to the hymn, “Nun bitten wir den Heiligen Geist.” 
 The preacher recommenced after they had sung, but the 
 people again interrupted him with the hymn, “Nun freut 
 euch, hebe Christen, gemein”; (Dear Christian saints lift 
 up your hearts in joy). The preacher was obliged to leave 
 the ground in possession of his psalm-singing opponents. 
 
 Lutuer’s Table-Talk. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 447 
 No. 417. 
 “SWEET HOUR OF PRAYER, SWEET HOUR OF PRAYER.” 
 W. W. WALrForp. 
 
 “NEARER MY GOD TO THEE.” 
 Mrs. Saran Fiower Apams, 1805—1848. 
 
 Mrs. Merriam Grant, one of the ladies injured in the ter- 
 rible railroad accident at Chatsworth, Llinois, in 1887, tells 
 the following pathetic incident of the disaster. She was in 
 the rear car with her husband. In the car was a company of 
 six people. In order that they might sit together, Mr. and 
 Mrs. Grant changed seats with a young man and his bride. 
 Their courtesy saved their lives, for the young people were 
 both killed. Mrs. Grant thought this party were theatrical 
 people, or concert singers, they were so jolly and sang so 
 well. They could sing, and they laughed and told stories 
 and anticipated the pleasure of the trip until late at night. 
 Then Mrs. Grant composed herself to sleep in her chair, 
 covering her face with her handkerchief. Nearly everybody 
 in the car was quiet but the jolly party of six. About this 
 time the young bride was requested to sing “Sweet Hour 
 of Prayer.” Something in the desire to sleep and rest re- 
 called the sweet old song. The young woman sang; all 
 listened; while the train sped on. 
 
 “Sweet hour of prayer, sweet hour of prayer, 
 That calls me from a world of care, 
 And bids me at my Father’s throne 
 Make all my wants and wishes known.” 
 
 There was a pause, and the clear voice went on again: 
 
 “And since He bids me seek His face, 
 Believe His word, and trust His grace, 
 T’ll cast on Him my every care 
 And wait for thee, sweet hour of prayer.” 
 
448 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 Oh, how little did the singer and her audience think that, 
 to most of them, the morning would never come for another 
 “Sweet hour of prayer!” And then what was it? Did they 
 sing it as the last and most fitting song before closing their 
 eyes to sleep; or did the angel of death bring the thought 
 to their minds? Whatever it was, all raised their voices in 
 that grandest of prayers, ‘Nearer, my God, to Thee,” and 
 all, singing it, went to their death. 
 
 “Though like a wanderer, the sun gone down, 
 Darkness be over me, my rest a stone” 
 
 went the melody above the roar of the doomed train. Their 
 sun had gone down, but they did not know it. Darkness 
 would soon be over them, but they knew it not. And as the 
 little gleam of fire appeared, far down the track, their 
 voices swelled in, 
 
 “Yet in my dreams I’d be, 
 Nearer, my God, to Thee.” 
 
 The speed of the train increased down the grade. Again 
 the song swelled: 
 
 “There let the way appear, 
 Steps unto heaven.” 
 
 The way was already in sight: 
 
 “All that Thou sendest me, 
 In mercy given.” 
 
 And then, with but a moment of life left for each—even 
 when poor Edward McClintock’s hand was giving its last 
 desperate wrench to the throttle of his engine—the singers 
 
 sang: 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 449 
 
 “Angels to beckon me, 
 Nearer my God to Thee.” 
 
 Enough. It was finished. The engines struck the frail 
 bridge and it sank. The car containing the singers crashed 
 like a thunderbolt through the two cars in front of it, killing 
 and grinding as a foot kills a worm. In the same instant 
 another car crashed through it and the singers were dead. 
 Peoria Transcript. 
 
 No. 418. 
 “HOW BRIGHT THESE GLORIOUS SPIRITS SHINE.” 
 
 W. Cameron, 1751—1811. 
 
 An evangelist, who did much for the temporal and spirit- 
 ual welfare of the soldiers of the Crimean War, and by his 
 cheerful manner won many of them to Christ, was return- 
 ing one night from before Sebastopol to his comfortless 
 lodgings at Balaklava, and wading almost ankle-deep in 
 mud; he lifted up his eyes and viewed the bright, calm 
 stars that shone overhead, and his soul soaring beyond 
 them, he cheered his toilsome way by singing to a well- 
 known tune the inspiring hymn beginning: 
 
 “How bright these glorious spirits shine! 
 Whence all their bright array? 
 
 How came they to the blissful seats 
 Of everlasting day? 
 
 “Lo, these are they from sufferings great, 
 Who came to realms of light, 
 And in the blood of Christ have washed 
 Those robes that: shine so bright.” 
 
 Next day, as he was on his way to the trenches, he fell 
 in with a poor soldier in miserable circumstances ; his cloth- 
 
450 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 ing was meager, tattered, and muddy, and his toes were 
 sticking out at the side of his wornout shoes. The evange- 
 list, Mr. Matheson, asked, in his frank way, how he was 
 getting on, and seeing his wretched condition, gave him half 
 a sovereign to buy a pair of shoes. The soldier replied, that, 
 although he was far from being well or comfortable in mind, 
 he was much better than he was yesterday. This excited 
 Mr. Matheson’s curiosity, and he pressed him to tell why he 
 was so excessively wretched yesterday, which he did with 
 some hesitancy and reluctance. 
 
 “As I thought,” said the soldier, “of all we had passed 
 through since we came out here, that we had been before 
 this ugly place so long, and that we appeared as far from 
 taking it as the first day we sat down before it, I was per- 
 fectly miserable, and could hardly have been worse; death 
 seemed preferable to life, and I resolved I would kill myself 
 and be done with it. I took up my musket and went down 
 there about eleven o’clock last night, and was making all 
 ready to dispatch myself, when a person I could not dis- 
 tinguish in the darkness passed down near me, wading 
 through the mud, but apparently in a happy mood of mind; 
 for he was singing: 
 
 ‘How bright these glorious spirits shine’ 
 
 in a tune with which I was familiar, and I said to myself, 
 ‘Well, now, this is very cowardly, for that man’s circum- 
 stances are, no doubt, as bad as mine, and yet he seems to 
 be happy’; but on listening to the words he was singing, I 
 thought he must be in possession of a source of happiness 
 and have a something to support him to which I was a 
 stranger. I wished I only knew how to be as happy as he 
 was, and with that I put my musket under my arm and 
 returned, and I feel better today, and more resolved to bear 
 the worst.” 
 
 How great was his surprise to be told that the singer who 
 had charmed away his evil spirit was now before him. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 451 
 
 “Was it you? Then I won’t keep your half sovereign. I 
 won't keep it now, for your singing last night has given me 
 much more than I can express.” Mr. Matheson told him 
 of his own source of happiness, and pointed him to the 
 Cross and the Savior, and the unhappy soldier of the Crimea 
 became a joyous soldier of Christ. 
 
 K. P. Hammonp. 
 
 No. 419. 
 “THERE IS A GATE THAT STANDS AJAR.” 
 
 Lyp1a Baxter, 1809—1874. 
 
 At a meeting of the Wesleyan Missionary Society in 
 _ Exeter Hall, London, in 1887, Dr. Wenyon, Medical Mis- 
 sionary from South China, said: “A man came to me for an 
 operation. As I found that the action of the heart was very 
 weak, I asked if he could do without chloroform. He was a 
 timid man. He was afraid, he said; but after considering 
 a moment, he said: ‘I will stand it if you will let me sing.’ 
 I said, ‘Sing away as much as you like, my friend.’ I began 
 to operate, and he began to sing, in the Chinese version: 
 
 ‘There is a gate that stands ajar, 
 And through its portals gleaming, 
 A radiance from the cross afar, 
 A Savior’s love revealing. 
 Oh, depth of mercy, can it be 
 That gate was left ajar for me, 
 Was left ajar for me?’ 
 
 I performed the operation, and still he was singing, and he 
 never flinched.” 
 
 Medical Missionary Record, February, 1888. 
 
 A pretty commentary on the word “ajar” as used in this 
 
452 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 hymn comes from a little boy, and is related in the “Golden 
 Rule.” 
 
 “Ray,” I said, “set the door ajar for mamma.” 
 
 “Yes, ma’am.” And the eager little feet rushed across 
 the floor and opened the door wide. 
 
 “Why, my dear child,” I said, “don’t you know what 
 ‘ajar’ means? It means that you should open the door just 
 a little bit.” 
 
 “The boy stopped in the middle of the floor, and gave me 
 an astonished look out of his blue eyes, as he said, ‘Why, 
 mamma! don’t you know the verse, “There is a gate that 
 stands ajar?” And do you think that Jesus would open the 
 heaven door just a little bit? I tell you “ajar” means very, 
 very wide open.’ ”’ 
 
 No. 420. 
 “BRIGHT SPARKLES IN THE CHURCH-YARD.” 
 
 This is one of the old-time slave songs of the South, sung 
 by the Fisk Jubilee Singers. | 
 
 “There were two young girls, and both were inmates of 
 a gilded palace of sin in the city. One was hardened in her 
 sin—the other had only waded ankle deep into the black 
 moat which circles the walls of perdition. The other night 
 they went to hear the Jubilee Singers, and sat unnoticed in 
 the gallery. The sweet, tender music, so touching and true 
 to nature, entered like a limpid stream into the soul of the 
 younger girl, and filled her whole heart. She leaned forward 
 and caught every word, with her eyes shining and her lips 
 trembling. People turned round and wondered at the fair 
 face, and watched her soul shining through her great eyes, 
 but they never suspected who she was or whence she had 
 come. There she sat still and immobile, with her small, 
 gloved hands tightly clenched, and every nerve in her little 
 body strung to an almost painful tension. All was still in 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 453 
 
 the pavilion. The very gas lights held themselves motion- 
 less, as if afraid to make a sound. The great audience was 
 hushed. And then a note sweet and tender, but full and 
 rich as moonlight, swelled and rose like a sea, and then, like 
 a shower of pearls falling through the sounding waters, a 
 woman’s voice sang: 
 
 ‘Bright sparkles in the church-yard, 
 Give light unto the tomb; 
 
 Bright summer-spring’s over— 
 Sweet flowers in their bloom.’ 
 
 The girl in the gallery gave a great, shuddering sob. The 
 singer looked up and went on: 
 
 ‘My mother once— 
 
 My mother twice— 
 
 In the heaven she’ll rejoice, 
 In the heaven once— 
 
 In the heaven twice— 
 
 In the heaven she’ll rejoice.’ 
 
 “Again the girl in the gallery gave a long, shuddering sob, 
 and hid her white stricken face in her trembling hands. But 
 still the music fluttered about her like the rustling of an 
 angel’s wings: 
 
 “Oh mother, don’t you love your darling child? 
 Oh, rock me in the cradle all the day.’ 
 
 She sat still and heard till the last cadence of the music 
 had wandered out into the moonlight, where the angels, who 
 wished to learn it by heart, caught it up, and bore it in 
 triumph into Heaven. ‘I must go from here,’ said the girl 
 hoarsely, ‘Let me go, don’t follow me—I will be better 
 soon.’ Her comrade reasoned with her, but she kept saying 
 hoarsely, ‘Let me go—I will be better soon.’ She hurried out 
 
454 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 and fled like a frightened deer. She was mad! Her eyes 
 were hot and dry, her brain was bursting, and all the while 
 a wondrous choir was singing in her ears: 
 
 ‘Bright sparkles in the church-yard, 
 Give light unto the tomb; 
 
 Bright summer-spring’s over— 
 Sweet flowers in their bloom.’ 
 
 “She fled like a hunted thing till the lights of the city 
 were far behind and she was alone on a country road. She 
 stopped to rest a moment, but the chorus went onward 
 through the sky and she could not stop, for the words were 
 beckoning to her: 
 
 ‘My mother once— 
 My mother twice— 
 In the heaven she’ll rejoice.’ 
 
 “Tireless she followed on, on, on, the long, long night. 
 The moon went down and she grew blind and staggered and 
 groped her way, but still she said hoarsely, ‘I must go on. 
 I'll be better soon.’ In the morning a farmer threw open 
 his door and saw lying on his steps the soiled figure of a 
 girl. He picked her up and laid her on his own bed, and his 
 wife laid the wild, pleading face against her warm bosom. 
 A stream of music reached the ears of the dying girl: 
 
 ‘Oh, mother, don’t you love your darling child? 
 Oh rock me in the cradle all the day.’ 
 
 She sank back with a weak, pleased smile. ‘Rock me,. 
 mother, that’s it—oh! how nice—how nice it is. Oh, rock 
 me, mother, rock me, mother. I am too tired to say my 
 prayers tonight, mother. Let me sleep, mother, and kiss me, 
 but let me sleep—sleep!’ And she closed her eyes and slept, 
 and the choir in Paradise, lest they might wake her, sang 
 softly: 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 455 
 
 ‘My mother once— 
 
 My mother twice— 
 
 In the heaven she’ll rejoice, 
 In the heaven once— 
 
 In the heaven twice— 
 
 In the heaven she’ll rejoice. 
 Toronto Evening News, October 10, 1881. 
 
 DB 
 
 No. 421. 
 “O, SING OF JESUS, LAMB OF GOD.” 
 
 T. C. Kang, 1830. 
 
 “In the year 1874, the Fisk Jubilee Singers visited this 
 country. (England.) At this time a gentleman in London 
 heard them singing the hymn, ‘O sing of Jesus, Lamb of 
 God.’ He listened with manifest pleasure to the beautiful 
 hymn, and so pleased was he that he offered the singers 
 a sum of money if they would sing that particular hymn 
 wherever they went. They promised, and one night, when 
 singing it at a meeting at Dublin, a lady came forward to 
 the president at the close, and told him that she had been 
 wandering in darkness for thirty years, but that night 
 she got her eyes opened while they were singing the chorus, 
 ‘I’m redeemed, I’m redeemed through the blood of the 
 Lamb that was slain.’ The thrilling words had gone right to 
 her heart, and revealed Jesus to her for the first time.” 
 
 Christian Herald, January 27, 1887. 
 
 No. 422. 
 “PATRIOTIC SINGING.” 
 
 I remember of passing, one hot day in the summer of 
 1862, the mansion of a wealthy Virginian whose sympathies 
 
456 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 were strongly with the other side. Colonel Webster was 
 riding some little distance in advance of the column, and 
 as he arrived opposite the house, the blinds were suddenly 
 closed with a loud slam, indicating that the lordly descen- 
 dant of the Cavaliers was not over and above pleased with 
 the approach of the Yankees. This act greatly amused 
 the Colonel, and he laughed until he grew red in the face. 
 Then, evidently having hit upon a pleasant expedient by 
 which the recreant Southerner could be reminded of his 
 abandoned loyalty, he allowed the regiment to pass on 
 until the colors came opposite the house. The order to 
 halt was then given, and the men were brought to the 
 front. 
 
 While they were wondering “what was up,” the band 
 came down from the head of the column and formed in ° 
 front of the house. “Now, Mr. Martland,” said the Colonel, 
 addressing the bandmaster, “I want you to see if you can’t 
 warm this old fellow up a little. He’s probably a proud 
 descendant of England—most of these high-toned Virginians 
 are—so suppose you give him ‘America,’ to start with; 
 that’s partly English, you know.” And the concert began 
 with the soothing strains of ‘My Country, ’tis of thee,’ 
 the regiment lustily singing the last verse, but only a 
 slight tremor was noticeable in the blinds—none of them 
 was opened. “Now try ‘Yankee Doodle,’ ” said the Colonel. 
 “Perhaps that will remind him of the way his forefathers 
 and ours fought together in the War of the Revolution.” 
 So “Yankee Doodle” was played, but still there was no 
 evidence of life within the mansion. 
 
 “I think he must be a hard customer,” said the Colonel. 
 “Tt may be that the ‘Star Spangled Banner’ will fetch him. 
 Try that.” And the beautiful strains of that grand old 
 song were sent out with a sweetness that should have 
 moved the old man’s heart if it had been as hard even 
 as stone, but still the blinds were unyielding. Then the 
 “Red, White, and Blue,” “Hail Columbia,” and other patri- 
 otic airs were in turn tried, but still the old Virginian 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 457 
 
 remained obstinate. Even “Carry me back to old Virginia’’ 
 had not the slightest effect. Just as we were beginning to 
 think that we would be obliged to give it up as a bad 
 job, Martland struck up “Home, Sweet Home,” and the 
 piece was rendered with a degree of beauty and feeling 
 that would be hard to excel. As the last notes died away, 
 the blinds flew open, and the door, too, and the old 
 Virginian stepped out upon the piazza with a broad smile 
 upon his face. He had surrendered, apparently only 
 because he felt obliged to, but now that the ice was broken, 
 he became genial and even hospitable. The officers of 
 the regiment were invited in, and such refreshments as 
 the house afforded were offered them, while the wish of the 
 men, quite loudly expressed, that the old flag be put out, 
 was complied with; and with the “Stars and Stripes” 
 floating from an upper window, and the old man standing 
 at the gate laughing, we moved on. 
 Newspaper clipping. 1888. 
 
 No. 423. 
 “YES, MY NATIVE LAND, I LOVE THEE.” 
 
 Rev. 8. F. SmiruH, 1808. 
 
 Some fifty years ago there took place in a rural town 
 in New York a simple service that touched the hearts of 
 all who witnessed it. It had reference to the departure 
 of a missionary for Oregon. The missionary was a young 
 lady, greatly beloved in the town. She was a member of 
 the choir or body of. singers. A hymn, then familiar, was 
 given out by the minister, beginning: 
 
 “Yes, my native land, I love thee.” 
 
 As it was being sung, many of the singers were deeply 
 affected, and one by one ceased to sustain the simple 
 
458 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 melody. The young missionary found herself at last sing- 
 ing nearly or quite alone: 
 
 “Scenes of sacred peace and pleasure, 
 Holy days and Sabbath bell 
 Richest, brightest, sweetest treasure, 
 Can I say a last farewell? 
 Can I leave you, 
 Far in heathen lands to dwell? 
 
 “Yes, I hasten from you gladly— 
 From the scenes I loved so well: 
 Far away, ye billows bear me 
 Lovely, native land, farewell: 
 Pleased I leave thee, 
 Far in heathen lands to dwell. 
 
 “In the deserts let me labor; 
 
 On the mountains let me tell 
 How He died—the blessed Savior— 
 To redeem a world from hell; 
 
 Let me hasten, 
 Far in heathen lands to dwell.” 
 
 Years afterward, this incident was distinctly remembered 
 when it was announced that this woman’s influence as the 
 wife of a pioneer missionary had contributed much to 
 bringing to the United States a territory larger in extent 
 than Great Britain and Ireland, and nearly four times as 
 large as New England. This vast region is now known as 
 the State of Oregon, and the Territories of Washington and 
 Idaho. In the spring of 1836, two newly married mission- 
 aries and their wives began a bridal tour from New York 
 to Walla Walla, a distance of thirty-five hundred miles. 
 The expedition is now famous in history as ‘Whitman and 
 Spaulding’s,” the names of the two clergymen who, with their 
 wives, then started on horseback for the Rocky Mountains 
 and the regions beyond. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 459 
 
 In this sublime journey into the regions of nature’s most 
 stupendous monuments, the health of Mrs. Spaulding failed. 
 “To not put me on the horse again,” she said one morning. 
 “Leave me here, and save yourselves for the great work. 
 Tell mother I am glad I came.” But her strength revived, 
 and she went on. Twenty-five hundred miles from home, 
 the party looked down from the Pacific slope, and beheld a 
 new empire. It was a July day, under a blazing sun. 
 The crowns of mountains filled the air around them. 
 Before them lay the vast and mysterious rivers of the 
 Platte, Yellowstone, and Columbia, with their luxuriant 
 valleys. 
 
 The missionaries rested. ‘“Let us have a season of 
 devotion,” said their leader. They lifted the American 
 flag in the clear air. They then laid a Bible beneath it 
 on the ground and opened it. Then they knelt under the 
 flag and around the open Bible, and took formal possession 
 of the western side of the continent for the Christian Church. 
 Our history has few pictures that are more poetic. It was 
 like Balboa at Panama or La Salle on the Mississippi. 
 
 Youth’s Companion, March 19, 1885. 
 
 No. 424. 
 “1’M A PILGRIM BOUND FOR GLORY.” 
 
 In “The Salvation War” for 1884, it is related: “In con- 
 nection with the prosecution of eleven of our officers and 
 soldiers in the university city of New Haven for singing in 
 the streets, one of the most interesting episodes in the Army’s 
 history took place. Against the attack made upon us at 
 the instance of Christian authority, we were defended by 
 a Jewish solicitor, who called upon the court to allow him 
 to prove that the singing of our soldiers was neither irrev- 
 erent, blasphemous, nor disorderly, but quite unobjection- 
 able. So the eleven soldiers sang in court: 
 
460 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 ‘l’m a pilgrim bound for glory, 
 I’m a pilgrim going home; 
 
 Come and hear me tell my story— 
 All that love the Savior come.’ 
 
 “Tt seems that they sang in the dock with their usual 
 happiness, clapping their hands for joy. The female cap- 
 tain explained that the object of the army in singing in 
 the street was to beseech sinners to make their peace with 
 God and to become good citizens. Judge Deming, to his 
 honor, decided that we had not broken the law nor intended 
 to do so.” 
 
 No. 426. 
 “Q TELL ME NO MORE OF THIS WORLD’S VAIN STORE.” 
 
 Joun GAMBOLD, 1711—1771. 
 
 In the life of Rev. Rowland Hill, by the Rev. Edwin 
 Sidney, it is said that during the last eighteen months, or 
 thereabouts, of Mr. Hill’s life, he engaged in almost every 
 cause, with the impression that it would probably be the 
 last effort he should make for it. His friend, Mr. George 
 Clayton, in a letter to me, thus strikingly depicted his 
 manner and feelings on one of these occasions: 
 
 “The last time he occupied my pulpit at Walworth, 
 when he preached excellently for an hour on behalf 
 of a charitable institution (it was in the winter, twelve 
 months before his death), he retired to the vestry after 
 service, under feelings of great and manifest exhaustion. 
 There he remained, till every individual save the pew- 
 openers, his servant, and myself, had left the place. At 
 length, he seemed, with some reluctance, to have sum- 
 moned energy enough to take his departure, intimating 
 that it was in all probability the last time he should 
 preach in Walworth. Charles (Mr. Hill’s servant) went 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 461 
 
 before to open the carriage door—the pew-openers 
 remained in the vestry. I offered my arm, which he 
 declined, and then followed him as he passed down the 
 aisle of the chapel. The lights were nearly extinguished, 
 the silence was profound, nothing indeed was heard, 
 but the slow majestic tread of his own footsteps, when 
 in an undertone he thus soliloquized: 
 
 ‘And when I’m to die, “Receive me,” I’ll ery, 
 For Jesus hath loved me, I cannot tell why: 
 But this I do find, we two are so joined, 
 
 He’ll not live in glory and leave me behind.’ 
 
 To my heart this was a scene of unequalled solemnity, 
 nor can [ ever recur to it without a revival of that 
 hallowed, sacred, shuddering sympathy, which it origi- 
 nally awakened.” 
 
 No. 426. 
 “T HEARD THE VOICE OF JESUS SAY.” 
 
 Rev. Horatius Bonar, 1808. 
 
 A poor English girl in Miss Leigh’s home in Paris, ill 
 in body and hopeless in spirit, was greatly affected by 
 hearing some children singing: 
 
 “T heard the voice of Jesus say.” 
 
 When they came to the words “Weary and worn and sad,” 
 she moaned, “That’s me! That’s me! What did He do? 
 Fill it up, fill it up!” 
 
 She never rested until she had heard the whole of the 
 hymn which tells how Jesus gives rest to such. By and 
 by she asked, “Is that true?” On being answered, “Yes,” 
 she asked, ‘“Have you come to Jesus? Has He given you 
 
462 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 rest?” “He has.” Raising herself she asked, “Do you 
 mind my coming very close to you? May be it would be 
 easier to go to Jesus with one who has been before than 
 to go to Him alone.” So saying she nestled her head on 
 the shoulder of her who watched, and clutching her as 
 one in the agony of death, she murmured, “Now, try and 
 take me with you to Jesus.” 
 The Sunday at Home. 
 
 No. 427. 
 “THOU GOD OF TRUTH AND LOVE.” 
 
 Rev. CHARLES WESLEY, 1708—1788. | 
 
 Here is a love story in a hymn. The author remained 
 single until forty years old. Then he began to doubt 
 whether this was the proper thing to do. “How know I 
 whether it is best to marry or no?” said he, and soon after 
 he met a fine young lady in Wales, and she so impressed 
 him that he concluded to ask his brother John about it; 
 but John was a cautious adviser on such a delicate matter 
 as this, although bold enough on ordinary occasions, and 
 he “neither opposed, nor much encouraged,” the courtship. 
 Then the lover went to another clerical friend. He also 
 was cautious and advised him “to pray and wait for a 
 Providential opening.” This he did. He prayed, and he 
 waited, and the more he prayed and the more he waited, 
 the more he concluded that he wanted that girl. And 
 as he thought, and prayed, and waited, he writes that he 
 “expressed the various searchings of his heart, in many 
 hymns on the important occasion.” He has not told us in 
 so many words which of his: hymns these are, but in the 
 same year when he was married, he issued a volume of 
 hymns containing quite a number of pieces entitled “Hymns 
 for Christian Friends,” and there is good reason to believe 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 463 
 
 that they are the hymns referred to and that they were 
 first addressed to one Christian friend in particular. These 
 hymns have required some alteration, as can easily be 
 imagined, to fit them for our public service of song. 
 
 Possibly some of you have thought of wedding days, and 
 it may do you no harm to hear Charles Wesley’s descrip- 
 tion of his. Here it is, taken from his diary: 
 
 Saturday, April 8, 1749. 
 
 ‘Sweet day! so cool, so calm, so bright, 
 The bridal of the earth and sky.’ 
 
 Not a cloud was to be seen from morning till night. I 
 rose at four; spent three hours and a half in prayer or 
 singing, with my brother, with Sally, with Beck. At 
 eight I led my Sally to church. Her father, sisters, 
 Lady Rice (?), Grace Bowers, Betty Williams and, I 
 think, Billy Tucker and Mr. James were all the persons 
 present. At the church door, I thought of the prophecy 
 of a jealous friend, that if ‘we were even at the church 
 door to be married, she was sure, by revelation, that 
 we could get no farther.’ We both smiled at the remem- 
 brance. We got farther. Mr. Gwynne gave her to me 
 (under God). My brother joined our hands. It was 
 a most solemn season of love. Never had I more of 
 the Divine presence in the sacrament. My brother gave 
 out the following hymn: 
 
 ‘Come, thou Everlasting Lord.’ 
 
 He then prayed over us in strong faith. We walked 
 back to the house and joined again in prayer. Prayer 
 and thanksgiving was our whole employment. We were 
 cheerful without mirth; serious without sadness.” 
 
464 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 428. 
 “WORSHIP AND THANKS AND BLESSING.” 
 
 Rey, CuHarues Westy, 1708—1788. 
 
 The title of this hymn given to it by its author suggests 
 the circumstances under which it was written; it was 
 “written after a deliverance in a Tumult.” It is scarcely 
 conceivable to us that in England, a professedly Christian 
 country, no longer ago than the time of the Wesleys, min- 
 isters of the Gospel traveling from place to place, were in 
 danger of being set upon by mobs, and their very lives put in 
 jeopardy, for no other cause but the fact that they preached 
 the Gospel outside the pale of the Established Church. 
 But it is strictly true, nevertheless, and history records 
 Many instances. Here is one recorded by Mr. Wesley 
 himself. It occurred in 1747 in a place called Devizes. 
 
 “After riding two or three hundred yards,” says Mr. 
 Wesley, “I looked back and saw Mr. Merton on the ground, 
 in the midst of the mob, and two bull dogs upon him. One 
 was first let loose, which leaped at the horse’s nose; but 
 the horse with his foot beat him down. The other fastened 
 on his nose, and hung there, till Mr. Merton, with the butt 
 end of his whip, felled him to the ground. Then the first 
 dog, recovering, flew at the horse’s breast and fastened there. 
 The beast reared up and Mr. Merton slid gently off. The 
 dog kept his hold till the flesh tore off. Then some of the 
 men took off the dogs, and others cried, ‘Let them alone.’ 
 I stopped the horse and delivered him to my friend, who 
 remounted with great composure, and we rode on leisurely 
 as before till out of sight.” 
 
 It was fresh from such a scene as this, that Mr. Wesley 
 wrote this hymn and gave it this descriptive title. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 465 
 No. 429. 
 “GOD OF MY LIFE, WHAT JUST RETURN.” 
 
 Rev. CHARLES WeEsLEy, 1708—1788. 
 
 A few months after the conversion of Mr. Wesley, he 
 was taken so seriously ill that he did not expect to recover. 
 When restored to health, he wrote this hymn as a song of 
 gratitude for his recovery. Some of the omitted stanzas 
 refer to this personal experience. Like these: 
 
 “Jesus to my deliverance flew, 
 When sunk in mortal pangs I lay; 
 Pale death his ancient Conqueror knew, 
 And trembled and ungrasped his prey. 
 
 “The fever turned its backward course, 
 Arrested by Almighty power; 
 
 Sudden expired its fiery force, 
 And anguish gnawed my side no more.” 
 
 No. 430. 
 “GLORY TO GOD WHOSE SOVEREIGN GRACE.” 
 
 Rev. CHARLES WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 George Whitefield, the celebrated evangelist, was once in 
 Bristol, England, and spoke of visiting America to en- 
 deavor to convert the savages of the great Western continent. 
 The friends to whom he spoke exclaimed, ‘What need of 
 going to America to convert savage Indians? Have we not 
 savages enough at home? If you want to convert Indians, 
 there are colliers enough at Kingswood.” Kingswood was 
 a wood near Bristol which had once belonged to the king, 
 
466 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 but coal had been discovered there, and in the time of 
 Whitefield and of Wesley it was inhabited by a horde of 
 lawless men, ignorant, depraved, and brutal. Whitefield 
 and Wesley both preached and worked at Kingswood, and 
 with such success as to change and renovate the entire 
 neighborhood. This hymn is Mr. Wesley’s song of triumph 
 over the success of the Gospel in working such a wonderful 
 change. The reference to “senseless stones” and “repro- 
 bates” and “outcasts” is indicative of the characer of the 
 people of whom the hymn was written, and an omitted 
 stanza is plainer still: 
 
 “Suffice that for the season past, 
 
 Hell’s horrid language filled our tongues; 
 We all Thy words behind us cast, 
 
 And loudly sang the drunkard’s songs.” 
 
 No. 431. 
 “QO LOVE DIVINE, HOW SWEET THOU ART!” 
 
 Rev. CHARLES WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 At. one time Rev. William Dawson, the eccentric but 
 very eloquent preacher, had given a very impressive sermon, 
 and at its close had given out this hymn to be sung. The 
 choir was singing the hymn beginning: 
 
 “God only knows the love of God.” 
 
 when Mr. Dawson shouted, “Stop, friends! If angels, the 
 first-born sons of light, cannot understand the height, the 
 breadth, the depth, the length of the love of God, how ean 
 we expect to fathom it while here below?” and then he 
 repeated with a feeling and emphasis that thrilled the 
 whole audience and gave to the hymn and the sentiment 
 it conveyed a meaning they never possessed before. “God 
 only knows the love of God.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 467 
 No. 432. 
 “EARTHQUAKE HYMNS”—1750. 
 
 Rev. CHARLES WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 On February 8, 1750, there was an earthquake in London 
 which greatly terrified the people, many of whom ran in 
 hot haste to the churches and chapels as if they thought 
 that these would afford them shelter. Just a month later 
 there came a second and much severer shock. Charles 
 Wesley was preaching at “The Foundry,” as his chapel 
 was called, and had just repeated his text, when the walls 
 of the building were shaken and the people cried out with 
 fear. Mr. Wesley, always intrepid in the midst of danger, 
 immediately changed his text and shouted, “Therefore will 
 we not fear, though the earth be removed and the hills be 
 carried into the midst of the sea. The God of Jacob is 
 our Refuge.” And then he preached from this new text a 
 sermon suited to the terrified condition of his audience. 
 Many of the people thought the Judgment Day was at 
 hand. Both the Government and the Church took steps to 
 allay the alarm. Forms of prayer were composed to be 
 read in the churches “by His Majesty’s special command,” 
 and the highest dignitary of the church sent out a letter 
 to the clergy and people on the same subject. Mr. Wesley 
 thought this a good opportunity to direct the attention of 
 the people to God, and the things of eternity, and so he 
 issued a pamphlet containing nineteen hymns which were, 
 as he said, “Occasioned by the Earthquake.” These hymns 
 did much to allay the alarm of the people, and to turn their 
 thoughts to religious matters. Six years later (in 1756) 
 occurred the great earthquake at Lisbon, Spain, by which 
 it has been estimated that’ sixty thousand people lost their 
 lives in a few moments. This event again startled the 
 people not only of England but of all Europe, and these | 
 “Barthquake Hymns” were republished with three additional 
 
468 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 hymns, and again exerted great influence in quieting the 
 people and in turning them to God. 
 
 No. 433. 
 “RIGHTEOUS GOD WHOSE VENGEFUL VIALS”—1756. 
 Rev. Cuartes Wester, 1708—1788. 
 
 The circumstances of the British Nation at the beginning 
 of the year 1756 were such as to excite alarm in almost 
 every way. A terrible disease had in some parts of the 
 country swept away nearly all the cattle. An earthquake 
 in Spain had swallowed up a large part of the city of 
 Lisbon and destroyed sixty thousand people almost in a 
 moment, and a dread of terrible coming events had pervaded 
 all of Europe. The quarrel had commenced which ended 
 in the old French War in this country. There were threats 
 of an invasion of the land from France, and a great conflict 
 between Catholics and Protestants seemed imminent. In 
 view of all these gathering clouds, the King of England 
 appointed a day of national fasting and prayer. The two 
 Wesleys were patriots as well as preachers, and keenly alive 
 to all that affected the welfare of the nation. John Wesley 
 published addresses intended to warn the people of the 
 impending dangers, and his brother Charles rendered a 
 different but no less effective service by publishing a pam- 
 phlet containing seventeen hymns, appropriate to the cir- 
 cumstances of the times. This is one of these hymns. 
 
 No. 434. 
 
 “TO HEAVEN I LIFT MY WAITING EYES.” 
 Rev Isaac Warts, 1674—1748. 
 
 The first vaccination for smallpox was in 1796. Previous 
 to that time its ravages had been terrible, and its appear- 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 469 
 
 ance as greatly to be dreaded as that of the plague. A 
 young lady friend of Rev. John Newton, to whom we are 
 indebted for so many good hymns, was away from home 
 and desired to return, but hesitated because of the presence 
 of the smallpox in the neighborhood, and so through a 
 mutual friend she applied to Mr. Newton for advice. He 
 replied, “Give my love to your friend. I dare not advise! 
 but if she can quietly return at the usual time, and neither 
 run intentionally into the way of the smallpox, nor run 
 out of the way, but leave it simply with the Lord, I shall 
 not blame her. My prescription is to read Dr. Watts’s 
 Psalm 121 every morning before breakfast, and pray over 
 it till the cure is effected—Probatum est.” And then he 
 quotes a stanza from this Psalm, written in another meter 
 from the one we have here, as follows: 
 
 “Hast Thou not given Thy word, 
 To save my soul from death? 
 And I can trust my Lord 
 To keep my mortal breath. 
 I'll go and come 
 Nor fear to die, 
 Till from on high, 
 Thou call me home.” 
 
 “WHEN ISRAEL OF THE LORD BELOVED.” 
 
 Sir Wauter Scort, 1771—1882. 
 
 One would scarcely look for a hymn writer among novel- 
 ists nor for a hymn in a novel. But here is a hymn by one 
 of the most successful novelists, Sir Walter Scott, and it 
 is taken from one of his most successful romances, “Ivanhoe” 
 (1820). You remember how Rebecca, the beautiful Jewish 
 
470 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 maiden, is charged with witchcraft and sorcery, and tried 
 before a tribunal of Knights Templars, and how when, 
 after hearing the evidence against her, sentence of death 
 is about to be pronounced, she appeals to the last tribunal. 
 “There is yet one chance of life left to me,” she says, 
 “even by your own fierce laws. I challenge the privilege 
 of trial by combat and will appear by my champion”; 
 and taking off her glove she flings it down before the Grand 
 Master, who has conducted the farce of a trial. And then 
 in the prison awaiting the day of combat, but knowing of no 
 one on whom she can call to appear and defend her with 
 sword and lance, but with full faith in the God of Israel, 
 she sings her evening hymn of prayer and faith, in these 
 words. 
 
 No. 436. 
 “THE GATHERING CLOUDS WITH ASPECT DARK.” 
 
 Rev. Joun Newton, 1725—1807. 
 
 Here is a hymn which should be of interest. to Americans, 
 for although written in England, it was directly connected 
 with the battle of Lexington, which began the Revolutionary 
 War. That battle occurred on April 19, 1775, and the news 
 reached England the latter part of May. On the last day 
 of that month Mr. Newton recorded in his diary: “The 
 paper this evening brought an account of the commence- 
 ment of hostilities in New England, and many killed on 
 both sides. These things, I fear, are the beginning of 
 sorrows. O that I could be suitably affected by what I 
 see and hear.” 
 
 Mr. Newton at once called upon his people to hold 
 extraordinary meetings for prayer on account of the times, 
 and he records that although the first meeting was held 
 at five o’clock in the morning, more people were present 
 than usually came in the evening. On Sunday, June 11, 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 471 
 
 he preached a sermon on the times, giving a sketch of the 
 state of the English nation, to arouse his people to more 
 earnest prayer by “apprising them,” as he says, “ of the im- 
 portance of the present crisis.” And this hymn was written 
 to be sung on that occasion. It was also published the next 
 month (July) in the Gospel Magazine. This incident throws 
 a little side light on the history of the Revolutionary strug- 
 gle in this country by showing how it affected the Christian 
 people of England. 
 
 No. 437. 
 “AS THY DAYS, THY STRENGTH SHALL BE.” 
 
 Miss Frances RipteEy HAvVERGAL. 
 
 The author of this hymn has herself told how it came 
 to be written: ‘The New Year’s Bells were ringing in St. 
 Nicholas’ Church, close to our home. I was sleeping 
 with my sister; she roused me to hear them, and quoted 
 the text: ‘As thy days thy strength shall be,’ as a New 
 Year’s motto. I did not answer, but presently returned 
 it to her in rhyme (the two first stanzas). She was pleased, 
 so I finished it next day and gave it to her. 
 
 No. 438. 
 “ALL YE THAT PASS BY, TO JESUS DRAW NIGH.” 
 
 Rev. Cuartes Westey, 1708—1788. 
 
 Rev. George Whitefield, the celebrated evangelist, was 
 once announced to preach in the market place at Notting- 
 ham, England. People came from far and near to listen, 
 for his reputation was great. Among them came a man 
 from a neighboring town, and just as he rode up to the 
 
472 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 outskirts of the great crowd, Mr. Whitefield gave out this. 
 hymn, and the first words that caught the newcomer’s 
 ears from the great preacher’s lips were these: 
 
 “All ye that pass by, to Jesus draw nigh 
 To you is it nothing that Jesus should die?” 
 
 The words seemed addressed directly to him, and the inquiry 
 of the last line never was out of his mind, until he had 
 answered it, that to him it was everything that Jesus had 
 died. 
 
 No. 439. 
 “FIFTY-FIRST PSALM.” 
 
 One of the earliest recollections of the New England 
 children of a generation ago was the verses and pictures of 
 the “New England Primer,” “which for a century and a 
 half was in those parts the first book in religion and morals 
 as well as in learning and in literature.” It contained that 
 wonderful poetic alphabet which began: 
 
 “In Adam’s fall 
 We sinned all.” 
 
 and ended with, 
 “Zaccheus he 
 Did climb the tree 
 His Lord to see.” 
 
 and it contained that beautiful cradle song beginning: 
 
 “Hush my dear lie still and slumber, 
 Holy angels guard thy bed.” 
 

 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 473 
 
 It was embellished with cuts, and one of these was entitled 
 “The burning of Mr. John Rogers”; and with the picture 
 was the story of his martyrdom. He was a faithful minister 
 of the Gospel, too faithful for his times. He incurred the 
 displeasure of Queen Mary, “Bloody Mary” she was called, 
 who confined him first in his own home and then in 
 Newgate prison and then condemned him to be burned. 
 The Primer tells the story how at Smithfield on February 
 14, 1554, his wife and children tried to bid him farewell as 
 he was on his way from the prison to the stake, but the 
 cruel officers would not permit them to speak to him, and 
 so the Primer says, “His wife with nine small children and 
 one at her breast, followed him to the stake: with which 
 sorrowful sight he was not in the least daunted, but with 
 wonderful patience died courageously for the Gospel of Jesus 
 Christ.” John Rogers was the first martyr in Queen Mary’s 
 reign, and on his way from Newgate to Smithfield, he sang 
 this fifty-first Psalm. 
 
 No. 440. 
 “HOLY GHOST, WITH LIGHT DIVINE.” 
 
 Rey. ANDREW Reep, 1788—1862. 
 
 We hear it said sometimes nowadays that a minister can 
 tell a congregation all he knows in about ten years, and 
 that about that time he had better go to a new place where 
 he can preach his old sermons to a new audience. That is 
 an unjust thing to say, usually, but now and then it is true; 
 and pastorates are shorter in these days than they were a 
 generation ago. The author of this hymn, as soon as he had 
 completed his education, became pastor of the church of 
 which he was already a member and of which his father 
 before him had been a member too, and he stayed right 
 there, an acceptable and able preacher for over half a cen- 
 
474 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 tury, until he died. In addition to his duties as a pastor 
 and preacher, he became a great leader in philanthropic 
 effort, and himself founded no less than six asylums for the 
 sick and helpless at London, where he lived. He was also 
 an author, and in this direction had at one time a curious 
 experience. In early life he had been familiar with a very 
 peculiar and sad history, which so affected him that when 
 he supposed the chief actor in it to be dead, he published 
 the story under the name of “No Fiction, A Narrative 
 Founded on Fact.” The book attracted great attention and 
 many editions of it were published, but the man whom he 
 had supposed to be dead turned out to be alive and lively 
 too; for although a fictitious name had beeen given him in 
 the story, he recognized himself, and published an indignant 
 denial of much of the narrative. Dr. Reed had a boy, who 
 proposed to write his father’s life, if he would furnish him 
 the material. Dr. Reed wrote it himself, in condensed form, 
 by replying as follows: “To my saucy boy, who said he 
 would write my life and asked for materials, 
 
 AS ..E 
 
 “I was born yesterday: 
 I shall die tomorrow: 
 I must not spend today, 
 In telling what I have done; 
 But in doing what I may for Him 
 Who has done all for me. 
 I sprang from the people; 
 I have lived for the people; 
 The most, for the most unhappy. 
 And the people when they know it, 
 Will not allow me to die out of 
 loving remembrance.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 475 
 No. 441. 
 “AMAZING GRACE! HOW SWEET THE SOUND.” 
 
 Rev. Joun Newton, 1725—1807. 
 
 I would like to give you two pen pictures. The date is 
 1735. An English sea captain takes his eleven-year-old boy 
 with him to sea. Seven years of a sailor’s life, and then a 
 vacation on shore, where he meets a girl of fourteen years, 
 whose charms delay him till his ship sails leaving him 
 behind. Three years more of life on the sea, and he is 
 home again, a deserter, in irons, degraded and flogged. He - 
 is an infidel now, a profligate, profane, licentious wretch. 
 Off to the sea again, and as the ship passes a small palm- 
 covered island off the African coast he leaves her, and 
 enters the service of an English slave-dealer. Here he 
 gives himself up to every form of wickedness with perfect 
 abandon. He has scarcely clothes to cover him, and he is 
 content to keep himself from starving with bits of food 
 given him by the slaves. “Had you seen me then,” he 
 writes, “go pensive and solitary in the dead of night, to 
 wash my own shirt, upon the rocks, and afterward put it 
 on wet, that it might dry upon my back while I slept: had 
 you seen me so poor a figure that, when a boat’s crew came 
 to the island, shame often constrained me to hide myself in 
 the woods, from the sight of strangers; especially had you 
 known that my conduct, principles, and heart were still 
 darker than my outward condition:” and so he writes on, 
 of himself. . 
 
 One day a ship goes sailing by, and he signals her, hoping 
 to trade such things as he can offer for supplies. At first 
 the captain declines to stop, but at last rounds to, and our 
 vagabond goes aboard, Now leave this picture as it is, and 
 let me tell you that in far away England, the father has 
 heard of his boy’s whereabouts and condition and has com- 
 missioned the captain of a ship to try to find and bring him 
 
476 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 back. And the girl for whose sake he let his ship go away 
 and leave him, sends messages of friendship. The captain 
 has searched faithfully but without success for the wan- 
 derer, and has started onward on his voyage, and this is the 
 very ship, and the man he has sought in vain stands on her 
 deck. The captain tells him that his father has sent for him 
 to come home, but he declines to go; and then he lies to him 
 and tells him he has fallen heir to a fortune, and he wavers, 
 and then he tells him that Mary Catlett wants him to come 
 back, and he consents to go. And this finishes the first of 
 the pictures I am trying to draw. And now for the second 
 picture I must take you to a little English village called 
 Olney, where a curate of the Church of England is endearing 
 himself to the people of his flock by his faithful preaching, 
 as he gathers them together on the Sabbath, and by the 
 hearty sympathy with which he enters into all the affairs of 
 their lives. He writes for them to read the story of his life, 
 and tells them of his wanderings from home, and country, 
 and God, and how he was at last brought back to God, 
 and country, and home. And he writes hymns for them to 
 sing in their church, and their prayer meetings, and their 
 homes. And in his sermons, and his books, and his hymns, 
 he never tires of telling how God has lifted him up out of 
 the horrible pit and the miry clay. And these two pictures 
 are of the same person. The first, as he was transformed 
 by the spirit of evil until nearly all likeness of humanity 
 was lost, and the second, as he was transformed again by 
 the Spirit of God into some likeness to Christ. 
 
 No. 442. 
 “JESUS SHOW US THY SALVATION.” 
 Rey. Cuartes Wesiry, 1708—1788. 
 
 Christians of the Episcopal Church should prize this 
 hymn, for although written by the great Methodist poet 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 477 
 
 Wesley, it is based on a passage from the “Litany” in the 
 “Book of Common Prayer”. “By the mystery of the holy 
 incarnation! by the holy nativity and circumcision! by thy 
 baptism, fasting and temptation! by thine agony and bloody 
 sweat! by thy cross and passion! by thy precious death and 
 burial! by the glorious_resurrection and ascension! and by 
 the coming of the Holy Ghost! Good Lord, deliver us!” 
 Now compare this from the Litany with the hymn; many 
 lines are exact copies, and the whole hymn is a paraphrase 
 of it. 
 
 No. 443. 
 “STAY, THOU INSULTED SPIRIT, STAY.” 
 
 Rev. CHARLES WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 This hymn may be called the half-way post in the 
 author’s career. He died in his eighty-first year, and this 
 was published when he was forty-two. The last line of 
 the second stanza, which now reads, “For many long, rebel- 
 lious years,’ Wesley wrote, “For forty long, rebellious 
 years.” There is one other hymn of his of the same sort, 
 the one beginning: 
 
 “God is in this and every place,” 
 in one stanza of which he writes: 
 
 “And have I measured half my days, 
 And half my journey run,” ete. 
 
 This also was written when he was about forty years old, 
 and seems to indicate that he expected to live to be 
 eighty. 
 
478 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 No. 444. 
 “JESUS, THOU ALL-REDEEMING LORD.” 
 
 Rey. Cuaryes WEsLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 The title of this hymn tells the circumstances of its origin, 
 “Before Preaching to the Colliers in Leicestershire.” If Mr. 
 Wesley was as plain in his preaching as in his hymns, he 
 certainly made himself understood by his hearers. This 
 hymn, written to be sung to an assemblage of degraded, 
 reckless men, has some stanzas which later compilers deem 
 it wise to omit; one of these omitted stanzas will serve to 
 show you the style of several more: 
 
 “Ve liars and blasphemers too, 
 Who speak the phrase of hell, 
 Ye murderers all, He died for you 
 He loved your souls so well.” 
 
 Another hymn beginning, “Lovers of pleasure more than 
 God,” is taken from this piece. 
 
 No. 446. 
 “THE PRAYING SPIRIT BREATHE.” 
 
 Rev. Cuartes WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 There are but few hymns that have been written espe- 
 cially for business men. The one by Dr. Horatius Bonar 
 beginning, “Calm me, O God, and keep me calm,” is, J think, 
 well suited to their needs, but it was not written with this in 
 view; indeed I do not remember any hymns so written, but 
 this and one other by the same author. This has for its title, 
 “For Believers, in an Hurry of Business.” We are accus- 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 479 
 
 tomed to look upon this as the age of hurry, but it would 
 seem from this title that there was a “hurry of business” a 
 century and a half ago, and that it attracted the notice of 
 at least one of the preachers of that day, and led him to 
 provide for it this prayerful hymn. The other hymn referred 
 to above is the one beginning, “Lo! I come with joy to do,” 
 and has for its title, “For a Believer in Worldly Business.” 
 
 No. 446. 
 “AH! LOVELY APPEARANCE OF DEATH.” 
 Rev. CHARLES WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 Mr. Wesley’s views of death were peculiar. He can 
 scarcely be said to have invested it with any thought of 
 mourning. He composed quite a number of funeral hymns 
 for the use of his followers, but the one beginning, 
 
 “Rejoice for a brother deceased,” 
 
 sets the pattern for nearly all of them. He once wrote of 
 the body of a friend who died, “No sight upon earth in my 
 eyes, is half so lovely,” and of a young miss whose remains 
 he had just seen he wrote, “A more beautiful corpse I never 
 saw.” These glimpses of his views about death, will amply 
 account for a hymn beginning with such words as the above. 
 
 No. 447. 
 “AWAY MY UNBELIEVING FEAR.” 
 
 Rev. Cuartes Wesiey, 1708—1788. 
 
 The Methodist Love-feasts have always been character- 
 ized by the relation of personal experiences by those who 
 
480 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 share in them. At one such meeting an aged man who had 
 been rich, but by a succession of adversities had been 
 brought down to extreme poverty, arose and said, “I have 
 known what it is to be well off in the world, and I loved 
 Jesus then! and I have known what it is to be in want, but 
 I love Him still. I have been like the apostle ‘Instructed 
 both to be full and to be hungry; both to abound and to 
 suffer need’; but I am content. ‘Although the fig tree shall 
 not blossom, neither shall fruit be in the vines; the labor 
 of the olive shall fail, and the fields shall yield no meat! 
 the flocks shall be cut off from the fold, and there shall be 
 no herd in the stalls! yet I will rejoice in the Lord, T will 
 joy in the God of my salvation.’ And then the old man 
 struck up a song. It was the second stanza of this hymn: 
 
 ‘Although the vine its fruit deny, 
 Although the olive yield no oil, 
 The withering fig tree droop and die; 
 The fields elude the tiller’s toil, 
 The empty stall no herd afford, 
 
 And perish all the bleating race, 
 Yet will I triumph in the Lord, 
 
 The God of my salvation praise.’ ”’ 
 
 No. 448. 
 “HYMNS OF INTERCESSION.” 
 
 Rev. CHARLES WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 In the year 1758, England, as well as nearly all the 
 nations of Europe, was engaged in war. The Wesleys 
 found time enough always to keep themselves and their 
 people in full sympathy with the nation and with the world 
 about them, and. during these troublous times the principal 
 Methodist Societies throughout England held special meet- 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH Agi 
 
 ings at noon of every Friday to pray for the nation, the 
 church, and the world. In these circumstances Charles 
 Wesley wrote and published a tract of forty hymns, en- 
 titled, “Hymns of Intercession for all Mankind:” containing 
 hymns of prayer, for the King, the Church, the Fleet, the 
 Army, for Prisoners, Our Enemies, and other subjects appro- 
 priate for use at these meetings. 
 
 No. 449. 
 “HYMNS ON THE EXPECTED INVASION.” 
 
 Rev. Cuartes Wesuiey, 1708—1788. 
 
 In the year 1758, England, as well as most of the nations 
 of Europe, was at war. During the next year, 1759, the 
 French made several unsuccessful attempts to invade Eng- 
 land, and as he had done amid the turmoil of the previous 
 year, so now Mr. Wesley wrote hymns for the people suited 
 to the times they were living in. A tract was published 
 entitled, “Hymns on the Expected Invasion,” containing 
 eight pieces. 
 
 No. 450. 
 “HYMNS FOR THE USE OF FAMILIES,” etc. 
 
 Rev. CuHarues WesLey, 1708—1788. 
 
 The Wesley brothers, John and Charles, published over 
 forty books, large and small, of Sacred Poetry. Among all 
 of these, the book whose title is given above is probably 
 entitled to preeminence. Of the pieces in this book, it 1s 
 said that probably not a single hymn in it was written with 
 reference to an imaginary case which might occur, but that 
 all were written under the excitement of actual experience 
 in his own family, or the family of some friend, so that a 
 personal history is connected with them all. 
 
482 ~ STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 451. 
 “HYMNS FOR CONDEMNED MALEFACTORS.” 
 
 Rev. Cuartes Westey, 1708—1788. 
 
 Although Charles Wesley preached almost daily, wrote 
 seven thousand hymns, and performed much other work of a 
 public character, he still found time to do a great deal of 
 work with individuals. He became greatly interested in 
 criminals, and visited many in the prisons, and especially 
 such as were condemned to death. The very last work he 
 published was a tract entitled, “Prayers for Condemned 
 Malefactors.” These prayers were hymns, suited to the 
 circumstances of these poor men: hymns of penitence and 
 confession, hymns of prayer for pardon, and hymns of trust 
 in God. In a note which Mr. Wesley himself wrote at the 
 end of one of these hymns, he says, “These prayers were 
 answered Thursday, April 28, 1785, on nineteen malefactors 
 who all died penitent.” 
 
 No. 462. 
 “GREAT GOD OF WONDERS! ALL THY WAYS.” 
 
 Rev. Samvuet Davies, 1723—1761. 
 
 England used to send her convicts to a penal settlement 
 in the South Sea, and if by any means a convict escaped 
 and was recaptured he was sent to “Macquarie’s Harbour, 
 Van Diemen’s Land.” Here, with no companions but other 
 convicts like themselves, they grew to be almost fiends. 
 Sometimes they escaped and formed themselves into gangs 
 of robbers and murderers. A gentleman who used often to 
 visit them in their cells, relates that he has seen them 
 brought in, with the flesh of murdered victims in their 
 pockets, which they had intended to use as food. One such 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 483 
 
 man said of himself, that he thought no more of killing men 
 and women than of killing dogs, and added that the only 
 occasion when he was at all disturbed in his mind by what 
 he had done, was when he had dashed out the brains of a 
 baby before the eyes of its mother. Yet even these men 
 were reached by the mercy of God, and some of them con- 
 verted. This hymn seemed specially adapted to their wants 
 and they repeated it and sang it, sometimes at the gallows 
 where they were hung. To what remote places a hymn may 
 wander or what hearts it may reach, finds illustration in 
 this hymn, written by a President of Princeton College, and 
 sung under the gallows in Van Diemen’s Land. 
 
 No. 458. 
 “HOW SWEET THE NAME OF JESUS SOUNDS.” 
 
 Rev. JouN Newton, 1725—1807. 
 
 John and Charles Wesley left to their followers a collec- 
 tion of hymns which continued in use as the authorized 
 hymnal of the Methodist Church for a great many years 
 after its compilers had left the earth. When at last it was 
 revised, the new hymn book was a great subject of discussion 
 among the Methodist people. Among the new hymns in- 
 serted in the book was this one. And one Methodist said to 
 another, as they chatted about the new book, “I wonder if 
 Newton, when he wrote that hymn, divined that he was 
 ministering comfort to so many poor Methodists. I used 
 often to go,” he said, “to the house of a music master, who 
 was also singer, preacher, and saint, all in one, when I 
 was jaded with travel and study. Oh, what a heaven used 
 to steal in upon my soul, while he sat at the piano and with 
 tender voice sang: 
 
 ‘How sweet the name of Jesus sounds 
 In a believer’s ear! 
 
484 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 It soothes his sorrows, heals his wounds 
 And drives away his fear.’ 
 
 And the hymn became all the more hallowed to me when 
 this same singer told me how his mother used to sing it too.” 
 
 No. 454. 
 “GIVE ME THE WINGS OF FAITH TO RISE.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Watts, 1708—1788. 
 
 Philip Doddridge was in the habit of composing hymns 
 to enforce the teachings of his sermons. Such hymns were 
 read at the close of the service and sung by the congrega- 
 tion. But Doddridge and Watts were good friends, and 
 Doddridge often used the hymns his friend had written. He 
 once wrote a letter to Watts in which he told him what an 
 effect upon his audience the use of this hymn had produced. 
 
 “On Wednesday last,’ he wrote, “I was preaching in a 
 barn to a pretty large assembly of plain country people, in 
 a village a few miles off. After a sermon from Hebrews 
 6:12, we sung one of your hymns, 
 
 ‘Give me the wings of faith to rise,’ 
 
 and in that part of the worship, I had the satisfaction to 
 observe tears in the eyes of several of the auditory: and 
 after the service was over, some of them told me that they 
 were not able to sing, so deeply were their minds affected 
 by it: and the clerk in particular told me he could hardly 
 utter the words of it. These were most of them poor people 
 who work for their living.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 485 
 No. 456. 
 “PLUNGED IN A GULF OF DARK DESPAIR.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Watts, 1708—1788. 
 
 A minister in England was once preaching to a large con- 
 gregation before dawn on Christmas morning. His theme 
 was appropriate to the day, “The love of God in the gift of 
 His Son.” At the close of his sermon he asked, “Where is 
 there love among men like the love of life? and yet is there 
 a father who would give the life of his son to save his own? 
 History tells of a soldier who received into his own heart the 
 blade intended to kill his King, but is there a father here 
 who would give his son’s life to save another though that 
 one were his best friend? But if there were such an one, 
 is there one who would give the life of his son to save a 
 foe? But God has so loved us, enemies and rebels against 
 Him, that He gave His only begotton Son, that we might 
 not perish but have everlasting life.” And then he repeated 
 a stanza of this hymn: 
 
 “QO! for such love let rocks and hills 
 Their lasting silence break, 
 
 And all harmonious human tongues 
 The Savior’s praises speak!” 
 
 And as he ended, a voice in the audience shouted, “Halle- 
 lujah!” and then another and another repeated the cry, and 
 then catching the inspiration of the lines the minister had 
 used, the whole congregation arose and sang the next stanza 
 of the hymn: 
 
 “Angels! assist our mighty joys, 
 Strike all your harps of gold! 
 But when you raise your highest notes, 
 His love can ne’er be told.” 
 
486 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 No. 456. 
 
 Rev. Isaac Warts, 1708—1788. 
 
 In the latter part of the seventeenth century the deacon 
 of an Independent church at Southampton, England, was 
 imprisoned) because of his nonconformity to the Church of 
 ~ England. see i to come and sit on the stone steps 
 
 of the prison door, with a baby in her arms. A few years © 
 
 as follows: 
 
 “JT write not for your farthing, but to try, 
 ‘How I, your farthing writers can outvie.” 
 
 This couplet won the prize and the teacher was rejoiced to 
 find that her own seven-year-old boy was the writer. He 
 kept on rhyming until the habit made him a sort of nuisance 
 in the family, and his father, now released from prison, 
 threatened that if he did not stop verse-making he would 
 whip him. It wasn’t many days, either, until he had an 
 opportunity to carry his threat into execution, and while he 
 was applying the rod, the culprit tearfully exclaimed: 
 
 /“Dear father do some pity take, 
 And I will no more verses make.”/ 
 
 This settled the matter, for the father wisely concluded that 
 so incorrigible a rhymster couldn’t be cured by whipping, 
 and he was allowed to rhyme on without further molesta- 
 tion, and while still a young man he had substituted many 
 of his Psalms and Hymns for the uncouth forms till then in 
 use. It was Isaac Watts. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 487 
 
 No. 457. 
 “JESUS, LORD, THY SERVANTS SEE.” 
 Rev. BENJAMIN SCHMOLKE. 
 
 Translated by Frances ExizasetuH Cox. 
 
 On September 12, 1716, a fire broke out at the town of 
 Schweidnitz, in Silesia, which destroyed half the town. The 
 author of this hymn, who was a pastor in the town, suffered 
 much from this fire, as also did many of his people. He 
 wrote this hymn to commemorate the event, and for many 
 years it was sung at an annual religious service held in the 
 town on the anniversary of the fire. 
 
 No. 458. 
 “LORD, IT BELONGS NOT TO MY CARE.” 
 
 Rev. RicHarp BAXtTeEr. 
 
 In the days of Oliver Cromwell, there lived a man, who, 
 though a constant sufferer from disease, did a prodigious 
 amount of work. He wrote books to the number of a hun- 
 dred and sixty-eight. He was driven from place to place. 
 He was in prison once for preaching, was kept out of his 
 own pulpit by a guard of soldiers, was fined for preaching 
 again, and at last at seventy years of age, he stood before a 
 judge, accused of writing a paraphrase of the New Testa- 
 ment. 
 
 “Richard! Richard!” cried the judge, as he pointed his 
 finger at him. “Thou art an old fellow, an old knave! thou 
 hast written books enough to fill a cart, every one of them 
 as full of sedition as an egg is full of meat. Hadst thou been 
 
488 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 whipped out of thy writing trade forty years ago, it had 
 been happy.” And so he sent the old man to jail again. 
 When, at last, at seventy-six years of age, worn out with 
 hardship and disease, he lay sick and dying, he was asked, 
 “Flow are you now?” 
 
 “Almost well,” was the reply, and this is the spirit of 
 his hymn: iy 
 
 “Lord, it belongs not to my care, 
 Whether I live or die.” 
 
 No. 459. 
 “NOW HUSH YOUR CRIES AND SHED NO TEAR.” 
 
 NicHoutas HERMAN. 
 
 Three centuries and a half ago, there lived in a little 
 mountain village between Saxony and Bohemia, a man who 
 did the duties of head master in the schools, and of pre- 
 centor and organist in the church. His interest in the chil- 
 dren of the village led him to write hymns for them which 
 he intended should drive out the songs they often heard of 
 vicious sort, and his love of music led him to write tunes 
 for the words, so that the children sang both his words and 
 his music. This hymn, written by him, was a great favorite 
 with Prince Albert of England, husband of Queen Victoria, 
 often called “the Good Prince,” and it was sung at his 
 funeral. Its author had some curious notions, and one of 
 them was about the way musicians like himself would spend 
 their time in heaven. “Every organist or Lutanist,” said he, 
 “in that life too, will take some holy text, and strike upon 
 his organ or his lute; and every one will be able to sing at 
 sight, and by himself four or five different parts. There will 
 be no more confusion and mistakes, which now often put 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 489 
 
 many a good musician out of heart, especially when he has 
 to begin again several times over.” 
 
 No. 460. 
 “ALL PRAISE TO THEE MY GOD THIS NIGHT.” 
 
 BisHop Ken, 1637—1711. 
 
 “HARK! THE HERALD ANGELS SING.” 
 
 Rev. CHARLES WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 “LO! HE COMES WITH CLOUDS DESCENDING.” 
 
 Rev. C. WESLEY AND Rev. M. Mapan. 
 
 “ROCK OF AGES, CLEFT FOR ME.” 
 Rev. A. M. Topuapy, 1740—1778. 
 
 Some years ago, an English clergyman, interested in 
 hymns, took the trouble to examine fifty-two of the hymnals 
 then in use by the various branches of the Anglican Church 
 in Great Britain and America, and to make up a list of the 
 hymns which seemed to be most highly prized as indicated 
 by the number of books containing them. Not a single 
 hymn was to be found in the fifty-two books, and but four 
 were found in fifty-one of them. These were the four 
 hymns whose first lines are given above. Of course the 
 estimate of the value placed upon the hymns would be 
 greater if the books had been taken from different denomi- 
 nations, but it is worth something as it is. 
 
490 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 No. 461. 
 “MUCH IN SORROW, OFT IN WOE.” 
 “OFT IN DANGER, OFT IN WOE.” 
 “OFT IN SORROW, OFT IN WOE.” 
 
 Henry Kirke Waits, 1785—1806. 
 
 These are merely different beginnings of the same hymn. 
 In 1805, a young man’s name was on the records of St. 
 John’s College in England, as a “Sizar.” That was a student 
 who worked his way. He had certain work to do in connec- 
 tion with the school, and for this work his expenses were 
 smaller than those of other students. At the next examina- 
 tions this youth of twenty years stood highest in his class. 
 And a year later he did the same, but he did it at the cost 
 of his life, for the long hours of work and study brought on 
 consumption and he died that same year. After his death, 
 this hymn was found, scribbled on the back of a mathe- 
 matical paper, and evidently written while he was pursuing 
 his study of mathematics by the light of the midnight lamp. 
 It stopped abruptly at the end of the second line of the 
 third stanza: 
 
 “Shrink not, Christians! will ye yield? 
 Will ye quit the painful field?” 
 
 Here sleep or sickness had overtaken him, and his last 
 hymn was left unfinished. But twenty years later an 
 English lady (Miss Frances Fuller Maitland) took up the 
 lines as he had left them and finished the hymn. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 491 
 No. 462. 
 
 “THOU SOFT FLOWING KEDRON, BY THY SILVER 
 STREAM.” 
 
 Mapam De F.ieury. 
 
 It is well to base poetic fervor on historic fact, otherwise 
 ludicrous blunders are liable to occur. As a matter of fact, 
 the Kedron is a very muddy little stream which only flows 
 about three months in the year, during the season of heavy 
 rains, and during the remainder of the year is entirely dry. 
 
 No. 463. 
 “IN GRIEF AND FEAR TO THEE, O LORD.” 
 
 Rev. WiLu1AM BULLOCK. 
 
 A lady came to England, some years ago, with her invalid 
 husband, who was an officer in military service in India. 
 She was a native of Tasmania and had been converted 
 through the work of a missionary who had lived in her 
 country when she was a child. In telling the story of her 
 life, she told how she had gone with her husband to India, 
 and had there shared with him a great many perils. “But 
 the worst of all,” said she, “was in the time of pestilence. 
 The cholera was in the camp and that was awful. My 
 earlier religious impressions were revived, and amidst my 
 fears for my husband and myself, I used: to pray in the 
 words of a hymn entitled, ‘The Church in Plague or 
 Pestilence.’ 
 
 ‘In grief and fear to Thee, O Lord, 
 We now for succor fly; 
 
 Thine awful judgments are abroad, 
 O, shield us lest we die.’ ” 
 
492 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 “Oh, how I prayed,” she said: 
 
 “‘Oh, look with pity on the scene 
 Of sadness and of dread, 
 And let Thine angel stand between 
 The living and the dead!’ 
 
 And the Lord answered me, and we were saved, my husband 
 and I.” 
 
 The hymn she used as her prayer was written by an 
 English missionary, who had himself been a witness to just 
 such scenes as she was passing through, and who wrote the 
 hymn, as his own prayer, and for the help of others. 
 
 No. 464. 
 oTHE Ost: GHORD 
 “Seated One Day at the Organ.” 
 
 Miss ADELAIDE ANN Proctor, 1835—1864. 
 
 About sixty years ago, a little girl in London, whose 
 father was a poet, began to show a love for poetry herself. 
 She made for herself a little album, as she called it, of note 
 paper, just as many of us did when we were children, and 
 before she could write plainly herself, her mother copied 
 for her into this little book, the poems she liked best. Later, 
 she sent a little poem of her own composing to Charles 
 Dickens, who was the editor of Household Words, under an 
 assumed name, and he was so much pleased with it that he 
 asked for more, and so she kept on until she died. Charles 
 Dickens, in writing about the earnestness of her life, said: 
 “Now it was the visitation of the sick that had possession 
 of her; now it was the sheltering of the homeless; now it 
 was the teaching of the densely ignorant; now it was the 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 493 
 
 raising up of those who had wandered and got trodden under 
 foot; now it was the wider employment of her own sex in 
 the general business of life; and now it was all these things 
 at once.” And with such work, it is not strange that she 
 wore herself out and died at twenty-nine. The music was 
 written by Sir Arthur Sullivan, well known as the author of 
 “Pinafore” and other light music, but who has written some 
 good sacred music as well. The tune to which we sing the 
 favorite hymn, 
 
 * ‘Onward Christian soldiers, 
 Marching as to war, 
 With the cross of Jesus 
 Going on before” 
 
 is a good specimen. He was one of the first composers to 
 depart from the old-time method of setting all the stanzas 
 of a hymn to the same music. 
 
 No. 466. 
 “NICALA.” 
 
 Have you ever wondered how our tunes came by their 
 names? Upon these names there often hangs a history, 
 and there is one hanging upon this. It takes us back into 
 the latter part of the second century and into the neighbor- 
 hood of Palestine, where a priest by the name of Arius 
 began to preach the doctrine that Christ was not the equal 
 of the Father. This was the beginning of that doctrine 
 which in different form is now known as Unitarianism. ‘A 
 great dispute arose, and early in the third century the 
 Emperor Constantine called together the Bishops of the 
 whole Christian Church, to discuss and decide what should 
 be done with Arius and his doctrine. The Emperor him- 
 self presided at the meetings, and the result of the discussion 
 was the issuance of a creed, which declared in formal words 
 
494 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 the doctrine of the Trinity. This creed has come down to 
 this day as “The Nicene Creed” and the Council which pro- 
 claimed it was assembled in Nicwa, a city of Asia Minor, 
 about fifty miles away from Constantinople. When Heber’s 
 hymn beginning, “Holy! Holy! Holy; Lord God Almighty,” 
 became popular, a tune was written expressly for it by Dr. 
 J. B. Dykes, one of the most successful composers of church 
 music in England. The hymn was written for Trinity Sun- 
 day, and is a hymn of praise to the Triune God, so what 
 more appropriate name could be found for the tune to which 
 it was to be sung than that of the city, in which centuries 
 before, the doctrine was proclaimed which both hymn and 
 tune were intended to honor. 
 
 No. 466. 
 “AWAKE, MY SOUL TO MEET THE DAY.” 
 Rev. Pumir Dopprincr, 1702—1751. 
 
 Dr. Doddridge arose at five o’clock in the morning at all 
 seasons of the year. He wrote this hymn for his own use, 
 and by it he made the very act of arising an exercise of 
 devotion. His title for it was, “A Morning Hymn, to be 
 Sung at Awakening and Arising.” It is said that when in 
 using it he reached words, “as rising now,” etc., he sprang 
 out of bed. The thought almost has an element of ludicrous- 
 ness in it, and yet a day so well begun, would likely feel the 
 influence of its beginning through all its hours. 
 
 No. 467. 
 
 “DEPTH OF MERCY! CAN THERE BE.” 
 Rev. Cuartes Wesiey, 1708—1788. 
 
 An actress was passing along the street of a little English 
 town, when she heard singing in a cottage by the roadside. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 495 
 
 Curiosity led her to look in at the open door, and there she 
 saw a few poor people gathered together and heard the 
 lines, 
 “Depth of mercy can there be, 
 Mercy still reserved for me?” 
 
 The tune was sweet but she heeded not the music. It was 
 the words that had caught her attention. She remained 
 long enough to hear a prayer, uncouth in language but sin- 
 cere and fervid, and then she left; but those words followed 
 her, and she resolved to find them again, so she obtained 
 the hymn book containing them and read and reread them, 
 and they led to her conversion. For a time she excused her- 
 self from attending on the stage, until at last the manager 
 of the theater called upon her and asked her to take the 
 principal part in a new play. Then she told him of the 
 change in her life. At first he ridiculed and then he pled 
 the loss it would be to him for her to refuse, and at last she 
 consented to appear once more. The character she was to 
 assume required of her that she should sing a song when 
 she came upon the stage. The night came and the curtain 
 rose, and the orchestra began playing an accompaniment to 
 her song, but she stood silent. The music soon ceased, and 
 then with clasped hands and eyes suffused with tears, she 
 sang, not the song of the play, but: 
 
 “Depth of mercy can there be, 
 Mercy still reserved for me? 
 Can my God His wrath forbear, 
 Me the chief of sinners spare? 
 
 No. 468. 
 “JESUS AND SHALL IT EVER BE.” 
 
 JOSEPH GRIGG. 
 
 Quite a number of the hymns in common use among us 
 have been written by persons not yet out of their teens. 
 
496 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 This one was written by a boy of ten years, and although 
 some few words in it have been altered by compilers who 
 have used it in their books, the hymn remains essentially 
 as the boy wrote it, and it is doubtful whether even the 
 altered words are improvements over the original form. 
 
 No. 469. 
 “THE GREAT ARCHANGEL’S TRUMP SHALL SOUND.” 
 
 Rey. CuHartes WESLEY, 1708—1788. 
 
 On one of his visits to the town of Leeds, Mr. Wesley 
 preached in the upper room of an old building which was 
 densely packed and many stood without unable to gain 
 admission. Suddenly the timbers gave way and the floor 
 fell, taking over a hundred people with it into the room 
 below. None were killed but several were severely hurt. 
 Mr. Wesley himself was stunned for a moment, but almost 
 immediately recovered and quieted the panic-stricken people 
 by singing, “Praise God from Whom all blessings flow.” 
 This is part of a hymn written to commemorate this remark- 
 able escape from death. 
 
 No. 470. 
 
 “THOU HIDDEN LOVE OF GOD WHOSE HEIGHT.” 
 
 GERHARD TERSTEEGEN, (German). 
 
 Translated by Rev. JonN Westey, 1703—1791. 
 
 If tradition is to be relied upon, this hymn, so far as 
 relates to its translation by John Wesley, is due to an unfor- 
 tunate love affair in which he became involved while in 
 America, an incident in his life that cost him much of 
 reputation. Mr. Wesley, himself, declares the hymn to have 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 497 
 
 been written in Savannah, and says of one of its stanzas, 
 that it gives his religious sentiments at that time. This 
 stanza is: 
 
 “Ts there a thing beneath the sun 
 That strives with Thee my heart to share? 
 Ah! tear it thence and reign alone, 
 The Lord of every motion there!” 
 
 Dr. Southey, one of Mr. Wesley’s biographers, connects the 
 love affair with the writing of this hymn, and a certain 
 “Miss Sophia” as the one who was referred to. 
 
 No. 471. 
 “PEACE, DOUBTING HEART! MY GOD’S I AM.” 
 Rev. CuHartes Wesiey, 1708—1788. 
 
 The author. himself once made good use of his own hymn, 
 perhaps saving his life and the lives of a boat’s crew. He 
 had engaged a boat to take him from St. Ives to the Scilly 
 Isles. A storm arose and the crew began to be afraid, when 
 Mr. Wesley began to sing: 
 
 “When passing through the watery deep, 
 I ask in faith His promised aid; 
 The waves an awful distance keep 
 And shrink from my devoted head. 
 Fearless, their violence I dare, 
 They cannot harm, for God is there.” 
 
 The song gave new courage to the men and they brought 
 the boat in safety to the shore. 
 
498 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 472. 
 “QO THAT THE LORD WOULD GRACIOUS BE.” 
 
 Rev. Martin Lutuer, 1483—1546. 
 
 Luther’s hymns and Luther’s music flew through Ger- 
 many as if supernaturally winged. Not only did professed 
 Protestants sing them, but they were the songs of the street 
 and the workshop and the field. Everywhere, people were 
 singing his hymns and unconsciously spreading his doc- 
 trines. They even crept into Romish churches. It is told 
 of this hymn that it, with several others, was introduced 
 into the chapel service of the Duke Henry of Wolfenbiittel, 
 and that a priest made complaint. When the Duke asked 
 what hymns they were of which he complained, the priest 
 replied, ‘““May it please your Highness they are such as this: 
 
 “O! that the Lord would gracious be’! 
 
 “Hold! Hold!” replied the Duke, “must the Devil then 
 be gracious? Whose grace are we to seek if not that of 
 God only?” And so the Lutheran hymns kept their place 
 even in the Romish chapel. 
 
 No. 473. 
 “THE LAST HOPE.” (Music by Gottschalk.) 
 
 Gottschalk, the pianist and composer, was at one time in 
 the Island of Cuba, and while there was the guest of an 
 invalid lady. Her disease was incurable and greatly aggra- 
 vated by anxiety about a son who was absent. The greatest, 
 relief she found was from Gottschalk’s music. One evening 
 she was suffering more than usual, and exclaimed to the 
 musician, “Oh, for Heaven’s sake, play me something.” So 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 499 
 
 he sat down to the piano and began to improvise the melody 
 of this piece. As he brought out in music one thought after 
 another, the idea took possession of him that he was playing 
 for her for the last time. The next day he went to another 
 part of the Island, and at the end of a week returned. As 
 he reached the top of a hill that overlooked the town in which 
 she lived, he heard the bell of the little church tolling for a 
 burial and soon he met a funeral train winding up the hill. 
 It was the body of his friend to whom he had played, that 
 they were bearing away to burial. Then he recalled the 
 melody he had played, arranged the different parts, and in 
 memory of the occasion when it was improvised, he named 
 it “The Last Hope.’ Whenever afterward he played at 
 private assemblies or for friends, he always finished his per- 
 formance with this piece. A very beautiful hymn tune has 
 been taken out of this composition, which sometimes goes 
 by the original name and is sometimes called “Mercy.” 
 
 No. 474. 
 “HAIL COLUMBIA, HAPPY LAND.” 
 
 JosepH HopxkINSON. 
 
 The music which we now call “Hail Columbia” was 
 written by a German by the name of Feyles whose’ home 
 was in Philadelphia. He composed it in 1789 and it was 
 first played in that year at Trenton, New Jersey, when 
 Washington was on his way to New York to be inaugurated 
 as first President of the United States. It is thus associated 
 with the very birth of the nation, and has that claim at 
 least to be considered our national air. Its composer gave 
 to it the name of “President’s March” because of the event 
 in honor of which it was composed. The words we now 
 sing to it were written nine years later, in 1798, by Joseph 
 Hopkinson, a young Philadelphia lawyer. A young singer 
 
500 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 by the name of Fox, connected with the theater in that city, 
 was to have a benefit on a certain Monday night, but on 
 Saturday afternoon not a ticket had been sold, and his bene- 
 fit seemed likely to result in a loss. Political feeling was 
 running very high, there seemed every prospect of a war 
 with France, and Congress was then in session in the city 
 deliberating on that question. The thought struck the singer 
 that if he could get a new patriotic song written to the tune 
 of “President’s March,” then a very popular tune, it would 
 save him from the failure that otherwise seemed inevitable. 
 Hopkinson, the lawyer, was an old schoolmate of his, and 
 to him he went late Saturday afternoon and told him the 
 situation he was in, and what he wanted. Hopkinson prom- 
 ised to try what he could do, and the next afternoon gave 
 him the words now so familiar. Monday morning the news- 
 papers and flaming posters announced the new patriotic song 
 to be sung that night to the tune of ‘“President’s March.” 
 The theater was filled to overflowing. The song was sung. 
 There was not a word in it to offend either political party, 
 not a word of France or England, but a reference to Wash- 
 ington, the great leader beloved by all, and an appeal to 
 the patriotism of the people. And the appeal was not in 
 vain; nine times the audience recalled the singer to the 
 stage to repeat the song, and then all arising, amid tremen- 
 dous enthusiasm, they joined in the final chorus. It was 
 repeated night after night, and was sung all over the city, 
 on the streets, and in assemblies of citizens. It quelled the 
 strife of parties, and almost in a day bound the whole nation 
 together and saved it from the impending danger. 
 
 No. 4765. 
 “TRUE LOVE CAN NEF’ER FORGET.” 
 SAMUEL Lover. 
 
 In ancient times there were professional bards who 
 gained their livelihood by their art. They sang the praises 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 501 
 
 and the loves of kings and the bravery of heroes. Their 
 songs were never written, but handed down from generation 
 to generation by word of mouth. The last of the Irish bards, 
 as well as one of the greatest was Turlogh O’Carolan, who 
 died no longer ago than 1738. The songs he composed and 
 sang became very celebrated. He became blind while young 
 and passed the remainder of his life in darkness. The story 
 runs that when a youth he fell in love with Bridget Cruise, 
 but the course of true love as usual did not run smooth and 
 they never married. Twenty years later, as the blind bard 
 -was playing the harp by the waterside, a boat drew to the 
 shore, and the blind man, stretching his hand to assist 
 a lady to alight, recognized by the touch of her hand his 
 ladylove of long years agone. This story, half mythical 
 perhaps, is told in verse in the song beginning, “True love 
 can ne’er forget.” 
 
 No. 476. 
 “YANKEE DOODLE.” 
 
 The name now given to this tune had its origin here in 
 America. It is a corruption of the word English, or Anglais, 
 as it is in French, as imperfectly pronounced by the Indians, 
 and its meaning would be “English simpleton.” Where the 
 tune originated no one knows. It hears a close resemblance. 
 to an old song sung in the vineyards of France. The Span- 
 iards recognize it as much like an ancient ballad of theirs. 
 Louis Kossuth, when he heard it in this country, said it was 
 an old Hungarian dance, and the Dutch claim it as one of 
 their own low-country songs. Its first appearance in this 
 country was in June, 1755. The British army was on the 
 shores of the Hudson river, and recruits for the provincial 
 army came pouring in from all the country round. They 
 came in all sorts of dress, as a writer has described it, “some 
 with long coats, some with short coats, and some with no 
 coats at all.” The arms and accoutrements they brought 
 
502 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 were as various as their coats, and the music to which they 
 marched was more ridiculous than either, for it was the 
 uncouth music of two centuries before. Their whole ap- 
 pearance excited the mirth of their opponents, as well it 
 might, and a certain Dr. Shackburg, Surgeon in the English 
 Army, told them he would give them a tune to march by; 
 so he wrote out “Yankee Doodle,” and presented it to the 
 simple country soldiers as one of the celebrated martial airs 
 of Europe. They liked it. It was easy to play and soon in 
 all the camps of the American Army the soldiers were drill- 
 ing to the music of “Yankee Doodle.” And as in this way it- 
 may be said to have been the music with which the Ameri- 
 can Revolution began, so it was literally the music with 
 which it ended, for when Lord Cornwallis surrendered his 
 army to General Washington at Yorktown, his troops 
 marched into the American lines to the music of this same 
 “Yankee Doodle.” 
 
 The War of 1812, as it is called, between this country and 
 Great Britain, was terminated by a treaty made at the city 
 of Ghent in Belgium. When the Ministers of the two coun- 
 tries had concluded their labors, the burghers of the old 
 Dutch city where they met, resolved to give an entertain- 
 ment in their honor, and desired to use in it the national airs 
 of. the two nations now happily at peace again. So their 
 musical director called on the American Ministers for the na- 
 tional air of the United States. None of them knew exactly 
 what tune to name, and as to that neither you nor I could 
 do any better now that three-quarters of a century more 
 of national life has passed away. But they finally decided 
 to give “Yankee Doodle.” Then the director asked if any 
 of them had the music, but no one had it, and then he sug- 
 gested to Henry Clay that perhaps he might sing or whistle 
 it. “Never whistled or sung a tune in my life,” said Clay, 
 “but perhaps Mr. Bayard can.” But Mr. Bayard couldn't, 
 and so the question went through the five distinguished 
 Americans and not one of them could sing or whistle. What 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 503 
 
 to do they hardly knew, until Mr. Clay exclaimed, “I have 
 it,” and called his negro servant, whom he had brought with 
 him from Kentucky, and he whistled while the Dutch musi- 
 cian took down the notes, and at the grand entertainment 
 the finest band of Ghent played “Yankee Doodle” with 
 variations as the national air of the United States. 
 
 No. 477. 
 “THE DAY OF RESURRECTION.” 
 JouHN DAMASCENE, (in Greek). 
 
 Translated by Rev. Joun Mason Nutz, 1818—1866. 
 
 Dean Stanley has described the singing of this hymn in 
 the Greek Church at Athens on Easter Morning. ‘As mid- 
 night approached, the Archbishop with his priests, accom- 
 panied by the King and Queen, left the church and 
 stationed themselves on the platform, which was raised 
 considerably from the ground, so that they were distinctly 
 seen by the people. Everyone now remained in breathless 
 expectation, holding their unlighted tapers in readiness when 
 the glad moment should arrive, while the priests still con- 
 tinued murmuring their melancholy chant in a low half 
 whisper. Suddenly a single report of a cannon announced 
 that twelve o’clock had struck, and that Easter day had 
 begun; then the old Archbishop, elevating the cross, ex- 
 claimed in a loud, exulting tone, ‘Christos anesti!’ and 
 instantly every single individual of all that host took up 
 the cry, and the vast multitude broke through and dispelled 
 forever the intense and mournful silence which they had 
 maintained so long, with one spontaneous shout of indescrib- 
 able joy and triumph, ‘Christ is risen, Christ is risen.’ At 
 the same moment the oppressive darkness was succeeded by 
 a blaze of light from thousands of tapers which, communi- 
 
504 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 cating one with another, seemed to send streams of fire in 
 all directions, rendering the minutest objects distinctly vis- 
 ible, and casting the most vivid glow on the expressive 
 faces, full of exultation, of the rejoicing crowd; bands of 
 music struck up the gayest strains; the roll of the drum 
 through the town, and further on the pealing of the cannon 
 announced, far and near, these ‘glad tidings of great joy’; 
 while from hill and plain, from the sea shore and the far 
 olive grove, rocket after rocket ascending to the clear blue 
 sky, answered back with their mute eloquence that Christ is 
 risen indeed, and told of other tongues that were repeating 
 those blessed words, and other hearts that leap for joy; 
 everywhere men clasped each other’s hands and congratu- 
 lated one another, and embraced with countenances beaming 
 with delight, as though to each one separately some wonder- 
 ful happiness had been proclaimed; and so in truth it was; 
 and all the while, rising above the mingling of many sounds, 
 each one of which was a sound of gladness, the aged priests 
 were distinctly heard chanting forth a glorious old ‘hymn 
 of victory’ in tones so loud and clear that they seemed to 
 have regained their youth and strength to tell the world 
 that Christ is risen from the dead, having trampled death 
 beneath His feet, and henceforth they that are in the tombs 
 have everlasting life.” 
 
 No. 478. 
 “WHY THOSE FEARS? BEHOLD, ’TIS JESUS.” 
 
 Rev. THomas Keuuy, 1769—1854. 
 
 Mr. Christopher gives the following story of a sea voy- 
 ager: “I was once on my way to the Antipodes. The vessel 
 was a transport; but a number of troops were also on board. 
 All went on safely, however, till one night, the horrors of 
 which I can never forget. I was fast asleep in my berth, 
 when about the middle of the night I was startled by a 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 505 
 
 shock, then alarmed by a strange hubbub of creaking tim- 
 bers, shuffling feet, and hoarse voices, striving with the 
 whistling, roaring wind. Then came a thundering crash; 
 down went the vessel on her beam ends; and down came the 
 rushing sea, all but filling the cabins, and putting out the 
 lights. There was an awful hush for a moment, but soon 
 broken by an officer, who, leaping from an adjoining berth, 
 cried, ‘This is like hell when the fire is put out!’ But just 
 then some gentle spirit seemed to touch my tremulous heart; 
 and a sweet calm came over my soul. Then I felt as if 
 voices from the better land were singing to me that beautiful 
 hymn: 
 
 ‘Why those fears? Behold, ‘tis Jesus 
 
 Holds the helm and guides the ship,’ etc. 
 
 We lived to outride the storm, but as long as I live, I shall 
 feel that the experience of that night ever hallowed to me 
 the memory of Thomas Kelly. His long life was not spent 
 in vain, if that hymn alone had been all its fruit.” 
 
 No. 479. 
 “SPEAK GENTLY, IT IS BETTER FAR.” 
 
 Davip BATES. 
 
 The author of this song was a Philadelphia broker and 
 was nicknamed by his fellow brokers “Old Mortality.” One 
 day he sat writing at his desk at home, while his wife 
 was sewing near him, and two little children were having 
 a pretty lively romp. Their noise disturbed the mother, 
 who asked them to be quieter. But they were soon making 
 as much noise as ever, and then came another reproof, the 
 effect of which only lasted a few minutes, when the nervous 
 mcther sprang to her feet: and exclaimed, “TI’ll teach you 
 to be quiet.” The boys avoided a box on the ears by a 
 quick escape from the room. 
 
506 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “Speak gently, wife, speak gently,” said Mr. Bates, and 
 turning to his desk he took a fresh sheet of paper and wrote 
 these words. At the supper table he handed it to his wife. 
 She saw the title and, thinking it a second reproof, said 
 she didn’t want to see it and handed it back unread. 
 
 The next day at his office a literary friend came in, and 
 Mr. Bates showed it to him. “This is a good thing, Bates,” 
 said his friend, ‘you should have it published.” And acting 
 upon the suggestion, he sent it with a note to L. A. Godey, 
 editor of Godey’s Magazine, published in Philadelphia. 
 Within a few days he received a check from Mr. Godey for 
 one hundred dollars, with a note complimenting the poem. 
 Mr. Bates looked at the check in amazement, and exclaimed, 
 “Well, this is the biggest one hundred dollars I ever saw!” 
 He kept it locked up in his desk for a long time, and would 
 occasionally take it out and look at it. 
 
 The poem has been translated into many languages and 
 is greatly admired by foreigners, especially by the cultured 
 Brazilian Emperor. When Rev. J. C. Fletcher, the cele- 
 brated American missionary, was in Brazil, he visited Dom 
 Pedro. During the call of the. Reverend gentleman, the 
 Emperor said, “I have something to show you, and shall be 
 very glad if you can tell me the name of the author.” He 
 at once led the way into his private library, where one of 
 the most prominent objects in the room. was a large tablet - 
 reaching from the floor to the ceiling, on which appeared 
 the familiar poem “Speak Gently,” in both the English and 
 the Portuguese languages. 
 
 “Do you know who wrote this?” asked Dom Pedro. 
 
 “Yes,” replied Mr. Fletcher, “the writer was formerly 
 a fellow townsman of mine, Mr. David Bates.” 
 
 “T consider it,” said the Emperor, “the most beautiful 
 poem of any language that I have ever read. I require 
 all the members of my household to memorize it, and as far 
 as possible, to follow its teachings.” Upon Mr. Fletcher’s 
 return home, the Emperor sent by him a complimentary 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 507 
 
 letter to the author, expressing his appreciation of the lines 
 and his gratification at learning their authorship. 
 
 No. 480. 
 “THE MOONLIGHT SONATA.” 
 
 Lupwic von BEETHOVEN, 1770—1827. 
 
 The Wide-Awake Magazine tells a pretty story of the 
 way that Beethoven composed this beautiful piece of music. 
 He was going by a small house one evening and heard 
 someone playing his “Symphony in F” on the piano. He 
 stopped to listen, and heard a voice say, “What would L 
 not give to hear that piece played by some one who could 
 do it justice.” 
 
 The composer opened the door and entered. ‘Pardon 
 me,” said Beethoven, somewhat embarrassed; “pardon me, 
 but I heard music, and was tempted to enter. I am a 
 musician!” The girl blushed; and the young man assumed 
 a grave, almost severe manner. “I heard also some of your 
 words,” continued Beethoven. “You wish to hear, that is, 
 you would like—in short, would you like me to play to 
 you?” 
 
 There was something so strange, so comical in the whole 
 affair, and something so agreeable and eccentric in Bee- 
 thoven’s manner, that we all involuntarily smiled. “Thank 
 you,” said the young shoemaker, “but our piano is bad, 
 and then we have no music.” 
 
 “No music!” repeated Beethoven. “How then did made- 
 moiselle—?” He stopped and colored, for the young girl 
 had just turned toward him, and by her sad, veiled eyes 
 he saw that she was blind. “I entreat you to pardon me,” 
 stammered he, “but I did not remark at first. You play, 
 then, from memory.” 
 
 “Entirely !” 
 
 “And where have you heard this music before?” 
 
508 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “Never, excepting the music in the street.” She seemed 
 frightened, so Beethoven did not add another word, but 
 seated himself at the instrument and began to play. 
 
 “He had not touched many notes when I guessed,” says 
 the narrator, who accompanied him, “what would follow, 
 and how sublime he would be that evening. I was not 
 deceived. Never, during the many years I knew him, did 
 I hear him play as on this occasion for the blind girl and 
 her brother on that old dilapidated piano. At last the 
 shoemaker rose, and approached him, and said in a low 
 Voice: ‘Wonderful man, who are you then?’ Beethoven 
 raised his head, as if he had not comprehended. The 
 young man repeated the question. The composer smiled 
 as only he could smile. ‘Listen,’ said he; and he played 
 the first movement in the “F Symphony.” A cry of joy 
 escaped from the lips of the brother and sister. They 
 recognized the player and cried: ‘You are, then, Beethoven!’ 
 He rose to go, but they detained him. ‘Play for us once 
 more, Just once more,’ they said. He allowed himself to 
 be led back to the instrument. The brilliant rays of the 
 moon entered the curtainless windows and lighted up his 
 broad, earnest, and expressive forehead. ‘I am going to 
 improvise a sonata to the moonlight,’ he said, playfully. 
 He contemplated for some moments the sky sparkling with 
 stars; then his fingers rested on the piano, and he began 
 to play in a low, sad, but wonderfully sweet strain. The 
 harmony issued from the instrument as sweet and even as 
 the bright rays of the beautiful moonlight spread over the 
 shadows on the ground.” 
 
 No. 481. 
 “IL TROVATORE.” 
 
 “The Anvil Chorus.” 
 
 When Verdi was putting the finishing touches upon “T] 
 Trovatore,” he was visited in his study by a privileged 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 509 
 
 friend, who was one of the ablest musicians and critics. 
 The latter was permitted to glance over the score and try 
 the “Anvil Chorus” on the pianoforte. “What do you 
 think of that?” asked the master. 
 
 “Trash!” said the connoisseur. 
 
 Verdi rubbed his hands and chuckled. ‘Now look at 
 this—and this—and this,” he said. 
 
 “Rubbish!” 
 
 The composer arose and embraced his friend with a burst 
 of joy. 
 
 “What do you mean by such strange conduct?” asked 
 the critical one. 
 
 “My dear friend,” responded the master, “I have been 
 composing a ‘popular’ opera; in it I resolved to please 
 everybody except the great judges and classicists like you. 
 Had I pleased you I would have pleased no one else; what 
 you say assures me of success. In three months ‘Il 
 Trovatore’ will be sung, and roared, and whistled, and 
 barrel-organed all over Italy.” And so it was! 
 
 No. 482. 
 “CHILD OF THE REGIMENT.” 
 
 “Ask me not why my heart with fond emotion.” 
 CHARLES JEFFERYS, Author. 
 
 During the occupation of the Tyrol by the French, and 
 after a skirmish between the hostile ranks, an infant child 
 was found alone in their camp by the Eleventh Regiment of 
 the Grand Army of Napoleon; by that regiment she was 
 fostered and beloved, and all were proud of the charming 
 vivandiére. Maria, the name given to the child, upon the 
 attainment of her eighteenth year, was discovered to be the 
 daughter of the Marchioness de Berkenfield, and by her 
 removed to a sphere more consonant with the dignity of her 
 
510 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 birth. Still the affectionate girl found it impossible to 
 shake off the attachment of her childhood, and being re- 
 proached by her mother with want of pride, defended 
 herself in the words of this song, which was so exquisitely 
 sung by the renowned cantatrice, Jenny Lind, in the “Child 
 of the Regiment,” as to entitle it to be called with propriety 
 the gem of that favorite opera. 
 
 No. 482a. 
 “BLEST BE THE TIE THAT BINDS.” 
 
 Rev. JoHN Fawcett. 
 
 A great international convention of Young Men’s Chris- 
 tian Associations was held in Stockholm, Sweden, in August, 
 1888. Delegates were present from every civilized land 
 on the globe, speaking many languages, but all devoted to 
 the cause of Christ. The convention ended by a grand 
 Mass Meeting on Sunday evening, August 19. At the 
 close of this meeting, just before they were to separate for 
 their homes in the four quarters of the earth, never to 
 meet again alive, the delegates joined hands and closed the 
 meeting by the singing of this hymn, 
 
 No. 483. 
 “HOLY GHOST, DISPEL OUR SADNESS.” 
 
 This hymn has been a sort of football among hymn 
 writers and hymn menders for two hundred and fifty years. 
 Paul Gerhardt wrote it in German in 1648. Awhile later 
 it was translated into English by John Christian Jacobi. 
 In 1776, Augustus Montague Toplady, who wrote “Rock 
 of Ages,” made it over, condensing it from ten stanzas into 
 six. In 1849, the editors of the ‘Methodist Episcopal 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 511 
 
 Hymnal” wanted to use it, but not badly enough to take it 
 as it was. So they transposed parts of it and altered 
 others. And in 1876, when the same book was revised, the 
 editors changed it still further. What the future has in 
 store for it remains to be seen, but it started with ten 
 eight-line stanzas and now has but four four-line stanzas. 
 
 No. 484. 
 “O COME AND MOURN WITH ME AWHILE”’—1849. 
 
 Rey. Frepertck WILLIAM Faser, 1814—1863. 
 
 Notice that refrain, repeated at the end of each stanza, 
 “Jesus, my Love, is crucified.” This hymn was written 
 in 1849. And yet it embalms in sacred verse words that 
 were spoken by one who was ordained to his ministry by 
 “the disciple whom Jesus loved,” and that. were spoken 
 within a few years after that disciple’s death, if not while 
 he was yet alive. St. Ignatius, of Antioch, after faithfully 
 ministering to the people of his flock at Antioch, while 
 fierce fires of persecution raged about them, was at last 
 condemned by Trajan to be thrown to the wild beasts 
 in the Amphitheatre. And while on his way thither 
 December 20, in the year 107 or 115, frequently exclaimed, 
 as if he were being honored to follow in the footsteps of 
 Christ, “My Love was crucified.” 
 
 No. 485. 
 
 “SPIRIT, LEAVE. THY HOUSE OF, CLAY.” 
 
 JAMES Montcomery, 1771—1854. 
 
 When Montgomery was a young man and editing a paper 
 in Sheffield, England, his editorials attracted the notice and 
 
512 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 roused the opposition of the Government party, which twice 
 caused his arrest for alleged sedition. The second arrest 
 resulted in his imprisonment, and while in prison he had 
 for a fellow convict a Quaker by the name of Joseph 
 Browne, who was also imprisoned on account of his opinions. 
 Mr. Browne died not long after, and Mr. Montgomery 
 wrote this hymn in his memory, giving to it this dedication: 
 “Verses to the memory of the late Joseph Browne of 
 Lothersdale, one of the people called Quakers, who had 
 suffered a long confinement in the Castle of York, and loss 
 of all his worldly goods, for conscience sake.” 
 
 No. 486. 
 
 “THE LORD IS OUR REFUGE, THE LORD IS OUR 
 GUIDE”—(Psalm Forty-six). 
 
 Rev. Henry F. Lyts, 1793—1847. 
 
 The author of this hymn was the minister of a seaside 
 town in South Devon, England. There were many fisher- 
 men’s families among his flock, and sometimes when by 
 chance the men were ashore, the congregation would be 
 largely made up of fishermen and their families. One 
 summer Sunday morning in 1838 when he entered his 
 church, he found it filled with such an audience. He began 
 by telling them of his pleasure at seeing them there, and 
 then said that he should speak almost entirely to them. He 
 took for his text the words of the Master to the fishermen 
 of Galilee, “Cast the net on the right side of the ship and 
 ye shall find,” and then there followed a loving and faithful 
 appeal to those who see “God’s wonders in the deep,” and 
 then he closed with this version he had himself composed 
 of the Forty-sixth Psalm. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 513 
 No. 487. 
 “MET AGAIN IN JESUS’ NAME.” 
 
 Rev. JoHN Pysgr, 1790—1859. 
 
 The history of this hymn is the history of a tent. The 
 tent was built in 1814 for religious services at Bristol, 
 England. A wild young man, whose waywardness had 
 caused grief to his widowed mother, had been converted 
 and had often spoken as a lay preacher in this tent. At 
 last he gave up his business, and then he and the tent 
 moved about over England, from Bristol to London, and 
 from London to Manchester, until the man, by years of 
 unremitting toil, was compelled to abandon his tent and 
 settle down to less laborious work; but even then he took 
 no rest, and was found one day sitting in his study chair 
 —dead with the harness on. He wrote a few good hymns 
 and this one among the rest. 
 
 No. 488. 
 “KATHLEEN MAVOURNEEN.” 
 
 “Kathleen Mavourneen, the Gray Dawn Is Breaking.” 
 
 Thomas W. Higginson relates that he was once at a 
 little musical party in New York where several accom- 
 plished amateur singers were present, and with them the 
 eminent professional, Adelaide Phillips. The amateurs were 
 first called. Each chose some difficult operatic passage 
 and sang her best. When it came to the great singer’s 
 turn, instead of exhibiting her ability to eclipse the other 
 singers, she simply seated herself at the piano, and sang 
 “Kathleen Mavourneen” with such thrilling sweetness, that 
 a young Irish girl who was setting the supper table in the 
 
514 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 next room, forgot her work, threw herself into a chair, 
 put her apron over her face, and cried as if her heart 
 would break. 
 
 No. 489. 
 “QO GOD OF BETHEL BY WHOSE HAND.” 
 
 Rev. Pump Dopprince, 1702—1751. 
 
 I am often astonished to note into what far-off places 
 and by what circuitous paths our hymns have traveled in 
 their mission of comfort to human hearts. Here is a 
 hymn written in England and first read and sung at the 
 close of a sermon one winter Sunday in 1736 (January 16), 
 finding its way by and by into the Scotch Paraphrases, 
 and so into the church and family worship of the Presby- 
 terians of Scotland and fixing itself in their memories and 
 their hearts; and then a hundred years after it was written, 
 turning up again in the heart of Africa, to comfort and 
 encourage a Scotchman who had wandered thither. David 
 Livingston was a Scotch boy and had become familiar with 
 the hymn book his parents used, in the days of his boyhood. 
 And when in manhood he had become the famous explorer 
 of the African Centinent, he carried with him in his travels 
 a little pocket copy of the old home hymn book; and when, 
 in the depths of African forests, dangers seemed thick about 
 him, and food seemed likely to fail, he records that often 
 he would take out the old hymn book, and seated under 
 some sheltering tree, would read aloud the words of this 
 hymn, and arise encouraged and comforted. 
 
 No. 490. 
 “VAIN, DELUSIVE WORLD ADIEU.” 
 Rey. CHARLES WeEsLEyY, 1708—1788. 
 
 Rev. Adam Clarke was the great Methodist commentator. 
 His comments on the Bible fill six great volumes, and they 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 515 
 
 were for many years among the most popular, at. least 
 among Methodists. When Adam Clarke was a young man 
 of twenty-three, he was one of Wesley’s itinerant preachers 
 and was sent by him to preach on one occasion in a little 
 country village in England. At the close of one of their 
 services in a crowded room, they were singing this hymn, 
 when Mr. Clarke stopped them and made an earnest appeal 
 to the young people present to follow out the teaching of 
 the hymn and give themselves to God. Thirteen took his 
 advice and there between the stanzas of this hymn began 
 the Christian life. To me a hymn which a century and 
 a half ago was used and sung under such conditions 
 becomes almost a sacred thing. 
 
 No. 491. 
 “JESUS, THESE EYES HAVE NEVER SEEN.” 
 
 Rev. Ray Paumer, 1808—1887. 
 
 It is a constant wonder what apparently trivial things 
 are always leading us toward things of high importance. 
 Now here is a hymn that has become known and loved the 
 world around, and it had its origin in an occurrence of 
 trifling moment. Its author was sitting in his study at 
 Albany, New York, preparing a sermon which had Christ 
 for its special theme. Needing a volume from his book- 
 case, which had doors to it, he arose and opened the book- 
 case door, when the book he wanted appeared right before 
 his eyes. It occurred to him that in some such way, as 
 the opening of a door, the face of Christ, near us all the 
 time, but unseen, would be revealed to us, and the thought 
 filled his heart so that he turned to his desk and wrote this 
 hymn. Although the author is best known by the hymn, 
 “My faith looks up to Thee,” he himself preferred this to 
 any other he had written. And when he was dying and had 
 
516 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 become so feeble that his words were scarcely audible, 
 he was heard to whisper one of its stanzas: ; 
 
 “When death these mortal eyes shall seal, 
 And still this throbbing heart, 
 
 The rending veil shall Thee reveal, 
 All glorious as Thou art.” 
 
 No. 492. 
 “MY FAITH LOOKS UP TO THEE.” 
 
 Rev. Ray PaumMer, 1808—1887. 
 
 This hymn affords an illustration of the peculiar craze 
 called “Anglomania.” It was published in a hymn book in> 
 1832, and although the book became quite well known, 
 this hymn attracted little attention beyond being reprinted 
 in a few newspapers. An English minister (Dr. Andrew 
 Reed), himself a hymn writer, while on a visit to America, 
 found it floating about in a newspaper, cut it out and 
 carried it to England with him and inserted it without any 
 author’s name in a hymn book he compiled. It had several 
 vears of English life before it was much known here, and 
 then some American compiler, going as so many Americans 
 do to England for his goods, found this ane imported it 
 again to the country of its birth. 
 
 No. 493. 
 “YET THERE IS ROOM! THE LAMB’S BRIGHT HALL.” 
 
 Rev. Horatrus Bonar, 1808—1889. 
 
 When Moody and Sankey visited Scotland, no one entered 
 more heartily into their work than Rev. Horatius Bonar. 
 At that time, although the hymns he had written were used 
 in the worship of song in churches all over the world, they 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 517 
 
 had never been heard in his own church, which still retained 
 the old version of the Psalms honored by the use of several 
 generations of worshippers. Mr. Bonar wrote several hymns 
 especially for the use of Mr. Sankey in these evangelistic 
 services and this one among the rest. 
 
 While Moody and Sankey were in Scotland, a gay young 
 woman was one day invited by a friend to go with her to 
 their meeting. At first she declined, saying she did not 
 care to hear them, but at last consented and went. Neither 
 Mr. Sankey’s singing, nor Mr. Moody’s preaching made any 
 ‘Impression upon her, and she wondered why people were 
 making such a stir about such a commonplace sort of 
 service. At last came the time to close, and Mr. Sankey 
 ended the meeting by singing alone, this hymn, which had 
 been written for him by Mr. Bonar. He had reached the 
 last stanza: 
 
 “Ere night that gate may close, and seal thy doom, 
 Then the last, low, long cry, ‘No room, no room! 
 No room, no room! Oh, woeful ery, no room!’ ” 
 
 These closing words startled her like a sudden peal of 
 thunder. She went away, but the words followed her and 
 kept repeating themselves over and over in her ears, “No 
 room! No room! No room!” And they brought her at 
 last to a committal of herself to Christ. 
 
 No. 494. 
 “FEAR NOT, O LITTLE FLOCK, THE FOE.” 
 
 Gustavus ApoLpHus, King of Sweden, in prose. 
 Dr. JAcos Fasricius, in poetry, 1593—1654. 
 Miss CATHERINE WINKWORTH, 1829—1873. 
 
 This hymn was born in one of the most terrible times 
 that ever troubled Europe—the Thirty Years’ War—which 
 
518 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 began soon after the death of Luther, and was the effort 
 of the Roman Church to crush out the Reformation he had 
 started. Count Tilly, a German soldier, had been placed 
 at the head of the armies of the Catholic League, and for 
 twenty years he devastated the Protestant cities and prov- 
 inces, overcoming every army that appeared against him, 
 and never being defeated in a single battle. 
 
 On the tenth of May, 1631, he captured the City of 
 Madgeburg and permitted his soldiers to burn the town 
 and massacre in cold blood twenty-five thousand of its 
 inhabitants. But this was his last victory. A new soldier 
 had come upon the scene. Gustavus Adolphus, King of 
 Sweden, had become the champion of the Protestant Union,. 
 had landed the year before with an army, small but deter- 
 mined, on the northern coast, and was sweeping southward 
 with a record of victories, almost as uniform as that of 
 the Catholic Commander. They met on the seventh of 
 September, 1631, near Leipsic, and Gustavus was victorious 
 over the general, and the army, which had never before 
 been vanquished, and then while his army rested, he wrote 
 down roughly in prose, a hymn for them to sing, and his 
 chaplain changed it into verse, and here it is translated 
 for us by an English lady, Miss Winkworth. 
 
 His army often sang it after that as they kneeled upon 
 the battle field before the fight began, and they sang it 
 on the morning of the day its author fell, while leading 
 them against the army of the Catholics. 
 
 Tilly had been again defeated, and slain, on the battle 
 field, by Gustavus; and Wallenstein, another celebrated 
 eeneral, now commanded his army. It was at Lutzen, 
 November 6, 1632, Gustavus had spent the night in prepar- 
 ing for the contest, and after a foggy morning, at about 
 ten o’clock the mist had risen, disclosing the opposing 
 armies. The army of Gustavus, as was their custom, knelt 
 down for a moment of prayer, then sang the old battle 
 hymn of Luther—‘A Mighty Fortress is our God, A 
 
sa dieitie 
 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 519 
 
 ) 
 
 Bulwark never failing,” and then the hymn of their own 
 
 commander, 
 “Fear not, O little flock, the foe.” 
 
 And then they charged upon the enemy. 
 
 The battle was hot and seemed at one time likely to go 
 against the Protestants. Just then Gustavus was wounded 
 and fell to the ground, and his horse galloped riderless 
 back. His soldiers saw and recognized the horse of the 
 Kking, and this roused them to such a fury that they swept 
 over against the Catholic Army with a force that nothing 
 could resist, and gained the day, but Gustavus, the King, 
 was dead. 
 
 As we sing this hymn, let us remember amid what terrible 
 scenes it had its birth, and what a part it has had in the 
 great contest that gave to Germany religious liberty. 
 
 No. 495. 
 “JUST AS I AM WITHOUT ONE PLEA.” 
 Miss CHARLOTTE Exuiottr, 1789—1871. 
 
 An English sea captain, notorious for his wickedness, 
 once attempted to commit suicide but was brought back 
 to life. 
 
 Thinking of himself as alive, and yet if he could have had 
 his own way, as dead, he was impressed with the thought 
 that an overruling Providence had stepped in to thwart his 
 purpose, and that some better life awaited him. With this 
 impression he went into a little seaside church and listened 
 to a sermon, at the end of which the preacher invited any 
 one who wished to be saved to come the next evening and 
 talk with him. He went, and soon had told all the story of 
 his life to the minister, who made him no reply, but took a 
 hymn book, turned down a leaf at a particular hymn, 
 
520 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 handed it to the man, and told him to take it home and read 
 that hymn carefully as if in the presence of God, and to 
 “mean it when he read it.” 
 
 The captain turned away somewhat indignant at the 
 way he had been treated. ‘Have I come all this way,” 
 he thought, “merely to be sent away with a hymn book?” 
 On his way out of the church he thought he would see right 
 then what the hymn was which he had been told to read, 
 “and to mean it when he read.” So he sat down in a pew 
 and read the words of this hymn, “Just as I am without one 
 plea.” 
 
 The words startled him when he thought of the minister’s 
 direction, but he read on, every line and word seeming to 
 have been written for him. He caught the minister’s thought, 
 and made the words his own then and there, and went away 
 a saved man. : 
 
 No. 496. 
 “JESUS! THE NAME HIGH OVER ALL.” 
 
 Rev. Cuartes Wesiegy, 1708—1788. 
 
 How the hymns we heard our mothers sing when we 
 were children come back to us in after years, and sometimes 
 mould and fashion our lives. 
 
 There is a story of a mother with whom this hymn was 
 a favorite so that she used to sing it while engaged in 
 her daily duties. One stanza attracted the attention of her 
 little daughter, and fixed itself in her memory: 
 
 “Oh that the world might taste and see 
 The riches of His grace; 
 His arms of grace that compass me, 
 Would all mankind embrace.” 
 
 From this verse, sung by the mother during her childhood, 
 there came to her the thought of devoting her life to the 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 521 
 
 work of foreign missions, and she is now (1890) at work 
 among the women of India, telling them “the riches of 
 His grace.” 
 
 No. 497. 
 “WHAT MEANS THIS EAGER ANXIOUS THRONG.” 
 
 Miss Erra CAMPBELL. 
 
 During the year 1864, there was a great revival of religion 
 in Newark, New Jersey. At one of the meetings, Mr. R. G. 
 Pardee made an address based on the answer given to 
 blind Bartimeus when he asked the meaning of the multi- 
 tude whose tramping feet he heard as they passed the place 
 where he sat begging. “And they told him that Jesus of 
 Nazareth passeth by.” (Luke, 18:37.) 
 
 Miss Campbell was present, and it seemed to her a 
 fitting subject for a poem descriptive of the throngs that 
 were then pressing along the streets of Newark drawn by 
 the manifest presence of Christ. It soon found its way into 
 a collection of revival hymns first set to the tune of “Sweet 
 hour of prayer” and later to a tune of its own, composed 
 by Mr. Theodore Perkins. 
 
 The Rev. E. P. Hammond relates that a gambler once 
 came into a revival meeting at Lockport, New York, where 
 this song was being sung. He was converted, and a few 
 days later, in telling his experience, he said that this hymn 
 had been the means of awakening him, and added that when 
 he went out of the church that day, as he was passing over 
 the canal, he took from his pocket his pack of cards, the 
 implements of his profession, which he called “The Devil’s 
 Testament with its fifty-two leaves,” and threw them into 
 the water below. 
 
522 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 No. 498. 
 “THERE IS A FOUNTAIN FILLED WITH BLOOD.” 
 
 Wituram Cowper, 1721—1800. 
 
 This hymn is as cordially hated by some as it is cordially 
 loved by others. It has been called “The Slaughter House 
 Hymn,” and those especially who look to Christ as an 
 example to be followed, rather than as the One whose blood 
 cleanseth from all sin, protest against its use . Even James 
 Montgomery, earnest Christian that he was, disliked it, 
 but his criticism was mostly against the first couplet. 
 
 He thought it incorrect to speak of “a fountain filled with 
 blood,” and he tried to mend the fault by a stanza of his 
 own. 
 
 “From Calvary’s cross a fountain flows, 
 Of water and of blood: 
 More healing than Bethesda’s pool, 
 Or famed Siloam’s flood.” 
 
 But this stanza, more correct in phraseology possibly, fell 
 flat, and Cowper’s is still sung, and will be, perhaps, as long 
 as the old Bible verse is remembered which says that, 
 “Tn that day there shall be a fountain opened in the house 
 of David, and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, for sin and 
 for uncleanness.” 
 
 No. 499. 
 “ALONE, YET NOT ALONE AM I.” 
 
 During the old French War in this country, a party of 
 Indians, then allies of the French, made a descent upon the 
 town of Carlisle, Pennsylvania, killing the father and son 
 of a poor German family, and carrying two little girls away 
 captive; the mother was absent from home. 
 
 a 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 523 
 
 Many years after, one of these little girls, with many other 
 captives, was released and taken back to the place from 
 which she had been taken. Relatives and friends of those 
 who had been captured so many years before came to see 
 if they could recognize their lost ones, and among them 
 came this mother seeking her two lost children. The girl 
 had grown beyond recognition, and she failed to find her. 
 
 At last the officer having them in charge inquired if 
 she could not remember something with which her children 
 were familiar at home, and which might help them to 
 recognize her if they were present. She replied that there 
 was a hymn that she used to sing to them often, and she 
 began to sing it over again: 
 
 “Alone, yet not alone am I, 
 Though in this solitude so drear! 
 I feel my Savior always nigh.” 
 
 She had only gotten so far when a young woman came 
 rushing from the crowd of released captives, and threw 
 herself into her arms, and together, the mother and daughter 
 sang the remaining lines: 
 
 “He comes the weary hours to cheer, 
 I am with Him and He with me, 
 Even here, alone I cannot be.” 
 
 No. 600. 
 “THE SON OF GOD! THE LORD OF LIFE.” 
 
 Grorce Moaripncr, 1787—1854. 
 
 In England sixty or seventy years ago, there lived a - 
 man who had been in the Japan-ware business, but had 
 failed and turned his attention to the writing of books 
 
524 STORIES OF THE GREAT: 
 
 for children. At this he proved more successful, and his 
 books became the standard stories for the children of that 
 day. They were full of adventure and fun, and at the 
 same time always contained a good moral that made them 
 safe for any child to read. 
 
 He wrote under the name of “Old Humphrey,” and 
 that name became as familiar to the children of old 
 England as that of “Peter Parley” to the children of New 
 England. 
 
 His name was George Mogridge, and he wrote poetry as 
 well as prose. This hymn is one of his. 
 
 No. 501. 
 “THAT DAY OF WRATH, THAT DREADFUL DAY.” 
 
 Sir Water Scort, 1771—1832. 
 
 A little more than a century ago (in 1786) a Scotch 
 boy of fifteen years, of delicate constitution, might have 
 been seen limping about, for he was lame, listening to 
 the-tellers of old stories, and reading as his fancy or his 
 whim directed, in history, or poetry, or story. 
 
 Ten years later he ventured to publish a book himself, 
 and then, year after year, he sent out book after book, 
 always of poetry. “Marion,” “The Lady of the Lake,” 
 “The Lay of the Last Minstrel,” and so on, and then 
 suddenly he changed his course and wrote no more poetry 
 but sent out one after another romances in prose, until 
 twenty-seven of the Waverly Novels had appeared, and 
 the author was rich and lived in a beautiful home. Then 
 his publishers failed, and left him with an expensive home 
 and a great burden of debt. But he determined to ask no 
 favors, but to pay every debt by the fruit of his pen. This 
 his books eventually did, but it was at the expense of the 
 author’s life. Worn out by the task he had set himself 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 525 
 
 to do, he gave up his work and his books, and called a 
 son-in-law to read to him from that book which, he said, 
 was the only one a dying man cared to hear, and so he died, 
 
 This hymn is a translation of an old Latin hymn of the 
 thirteenth century by Thomas of Celano; introduced by 
 Sir Walter Scott into the “Lay of the Last Minstrel.” 
 
 It is in the sixth canto of the poem, the one beginning 
 with the words familiar to most of the school boys: 
 
 “Breathes there a man with soul so dead, 
 Who never to himself hath said, 
 ‘This is my own, my native land!’ ” 
 
 The marriage feast of Lady Margaret has been described, 
 the minstrels have one after another sung their songs, and 
 the sudden gloom, the single flash of lightning, and the 
 single thunder peal have terrified the guests, and they had 
 gone on pilgrimage to Melrose Abbey. And then the poem 
 goes on: 
 
 “And slow up the dim aisle afar, 
 With sable cowl and scapular, 
 And snow white stoles in order due, 
 The holy Fathers two and two 
 In long procession came: 
 Taper and host and book they bear, 
 And holy banner flourished fair 
 With the Redeemer’s name. 
 Above the prostrate pilgrim band, 
 The Mitred Abbot stretched his hand, 
 And blessed them as they kneeled. 
 With holy cross he signed them all, 
 And prayed they might be sage in hall 
 And fortunate in field. 
 Then Mass was sung and prayers were said 
 And solemn requiem for the dead: 
 And bells toll’d out their mighty peal 
 For the departed spirit’s weal; 
 
526 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 And ever in the office close 
 The hymn of Intercession rose: 
 And far the echoing aisles prolong, 
 The awful burthen of the song, 
 ‘That day of wrath, that awful day.’” 
 
 No. 502. 
 “ARISE, MY SOUL, ARISE.” 
 
 Rev. Cuartes Westey, 1708—1788. 
 
 Rev. Mr. Cranswick, for many years a missionary to 
 the West Indies, refers to this hymn as one of the most 
 useful he has ever met. He says he has a record of over 
 two hundred persons who were apparently converted during 
 the singing of it. He made great use of it in revival 
 services and would frequently ask inquirers to join in the 
 singing of it as far as they could do so heartily, making 
 its sentiments their own. Sometimes they would hesitate 
 at one of the stanzas, and then he would have the whole 
 audience begin the hymn again. Usually they faltered at 
 the last stanza. 
 
 “My God is reconciled: 
 His pardoning voice I hear: 
 He owns me for his child: 
 I can no longer fear: 
 With confidence I now draw nigh: 
 And ‘Father, Abba, Father,’ cry.” 
 
 And then they would all begin again and sing along through 
 the experiences of which the different stanzas sing, until 
 at last, with bright faces and joyous hearts, the whole 
 hymn could be sung. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH Ban 
 No. 603. 
 
 “Q DAY OF REST AND GLADNESS, O DAY OF JOY 
 AND LIGHT.” 
 
 CHRISTOPHER WorDSWoRTH, Bishop. 
 
 One Sunday morning there was a visitor at the house 
 of the author of this hymn who was to officiate in the pulpit 
 that day. He was with Wordsworth in the library when 
 the latter put his arm in his and said, “Come upstairs with 
 me, the ladies are going to sing a hymn to encourage you in 
 your labor for the day.” So they went and sang from slips 
 of paper on which had been written, this hymn. Several 
 days later the visitor found out that Wordsworth himself 
 had written it. 
 
 No. 504. 
 
 ‘TORD DISMISS US WITH THY BLESSING, BID US 
 NOW DEPART IN PEACE.” 
 
 Rev. Rospert Hawker, 1753—1828. 
 
 There is a funny story connected with this hymn, which, 
 however, does not spoil the hymn by being told. The 
 author published a little collection of hymns such as were 
 sung by the children of the Sunday school connected with 
 his church, and this one was included in the collection, but 
 with no author’s name attached. It was the custom to 
 sing it at the close of the evening service, so that it became 
 quite well known to his people. 
 
 One day a young grandson of Dr. Hawker, who after- 
 ward became a very eccentric clergyman, but who was 
 then young, came to the Doctor’s study with a paper in 
 his hand and said, “Grandfather, I don’t altogether like 
 that hymn, ‘Lord dismiss us with thy blessing.’ I think 
 
528 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 it might be improved in meter and language, and would be | 
 better if somewhat longer.” 
 
 “Oh indeed,” said Dr. Hawker, getting a little red in the 
 face, “and what emendations commend themselves to your 
 precocious wisdom?” 
 
 “This is my improved version,” said the youngster, and 
 then he read four stanzas of his own writing. When he 
 had finished reading his own, he read the short hymn as it 
 was in the book and added, “Now ‘this is crude and flat, 
 don’t you think so, Grandfather?” 
 
 “Crude and flat, sir! Why, you young puppy, it is 
 mine! I wrote that hymn.” 
 
 “Oh! I beg your pardon, Grandfather, I did not know 
 that. It is a very nice hymn, indeed, but—but,” as he went 
 through the door, “mine is better.” 
 
 However, we still sing the Grandfather’s hymn. 
 
 No. 506. 
 “Q SACRED HEAD, ONCE WOUNDED.” 
 
 . This is one of seven “passion hymns” written in Latin 
 
 by St. Bernard of Clairvaux, a monk of the Roman Church. 
 They are addressed respectively to the feet, the knees, the 
 hands, the side, the breast, the heart, and the face of the 
 Savior on the cross. This is the last of the seven, addressed 
 to the face. It was and still is one of the best of the 
 Latin hymns. The German translation was equally popular, 
 and the English words have found a place in nearly all 
 our hymnals. 
 
 Just see what a combination this hymn presents. Three 
 learned men of three different races, living in three different 
 centuries, belonging to three different churches, and speaking 
 three different languages, have united their work to prepare 
 it for our use. 
 

 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 529 
 
 No. 506. 
 “LIFE IS WEARY, SAVIOR, TAKE ME.” 
 
 “LEAVE GOD TO ORDER ALL THY WAYS.” 
 
 GrorcE NeuMaRE, 1621. 
 
 A poor young man gained his living, in Hamburg by 
 his skill upon the violin, but by and by he fell sick so 
 that he could no longer play, and so could no longer earn 
 
 ‘his food. 
 
 One night he stole off to a Jew and pawned his violin 
 for a little money to buy bread. As he was putting the 
 instrument into the hands of the money lender, he looked at 
 it as if it were his child and asked if he might play just one 
 more tune upon it. 
 
 “Of all sad hearts that have left your door,” said he, 
 “mine is the saddest.” The tears came to his eyes, and his 
 voice choked, and then he took the instrument and began 
 to play a tune exquisitely soft, and then began to sing a 
 hymn which he himself had written: 
 
 “Tife is weary, Savior, take me.” 
 
 He played and sang, and then laid down the violin and 
 rushed out of the door, but as he went he stumbled against 
 some one in the darkness. Some one who had been listen- 
 ing to his song. 
 
 “Could you tell me where I could get a copy of that 
 song?” The inquirer was the servant of a wealthy man, who 
 learned the story of the violin and its owner, and took him 
 into his employ. He soon reclaimed his old violin, and 
 with it went to see his old landlady, who had always been 
 his friend in trouble. As soon as it was known that he 
 had come, her room filled up with neighbors and friends, 
 eager to hear him play and sing, and to them he sang 
 another hymn which he also wrote himself: 
 
530 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “Teave God to order all thy ways. 
 And hope in Him, whate’er betide.” 
 
 This was George Neumark. When asked if he wrote the 
 hymn he replied, “Well, yes; I am the instrument, but 
 God swept the strings. All I knew was that these words, 
 ‘Who trusts in God’s unchanging love,’ lay like a soft 
 burden on my heart. I went over them again and again, 
 and so they shaped themselves into a song.” 
 
 No. 507. 
 
 “ONWARD, CHRISTIAN SOLDIERS, MARCHING AS TO 
 WAR.” 
 
 Rev. SABINE BARING-GOULD. 
 
 A Mission School in England, at its festivals, was in 
 the habit of marching from the schoolroom to the Parish 
 church with a banner at the head of the procession with 
 the cross inscribed upon it, and the author wrote this 
 hymn to be sung on the way. This explains the language 
 of the stanza: 
 
 “Onward, Christian soldiers, 
 Marching as to war, 
 With the cross of Jesus, 
 Going on before.” 
 
 It has been the occasion of a story just a little bit 
 laughable, but not too much so to spoil the usefulness 
 of the hymn, which, with the excellent tune written for it 
 by Sir Arthur Sullivan has become very popular. 
 
 The Bishop of Ripon was on one occasion about to join 
 in a church processional, when he noticed a banner before 
 him with a cross on it and requested that it be removed, 
 
 Re ee 
 

 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 531 
 
 as he disliked the idea of this use of the cross. The rector 
 said, “My Lord, we are about to sing as a processional, 
 ‘Onward, Christian soldiers; shall we alter the last lines 
 to read, ‘With the cross of Jesus left behind the door?’ ” 
 “Substitute another hymn,” said the Bishop, and they did so. 
 
 No. 508. 
 
 “LORD DISMISS US WITH THY BLESSING, 
 FILL OUR HEARTS WITH JOY AND PEACE, 
 
 LET US EACH THY LOVE POSSESSING, 
 TRIUMPH IN REDEEMING GRACE.” 
 
 Hon. anp Rev. Eater Suiruey, 1725—1786. 
 
 The author of this hymn was a devoted preacher of the 
 gospel, and when he had passed his three-score years, and 
 was so great a sufferer as not to be able to appear in the 
 pulpit or even to lie down in bed, he was often to be found 
 sitting in a chair in his own house preaching to an audience 
 that filled the rooms and stairways of a spacious dwelling, as 
 far as his voice could be heard. 
 
 For those who gathered thus to listen to his words, he 
 composed a hymn to be sung as they parted from him, and 
 from each other, which has been used as a closing hymn 
 for a century and more. 
 
 The authorship of the hymn as given above is not certain. 
 By some it is claimed for John Fawcett, who wrote “Blest 
 be the tie that binds,” but Fawcett did not claim it for 
 himself. 
 
 No. 509. 
 
 Joun SEBASTIAN BACH. 
 
 In 1685 (March 21) there was born a little German boy, 
 who soon began to show a love for music. He was an 
 
532 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 orphan and lived with a brother who was a church organist, 
 but the little boy went ahead so rapidly with his musical 
 studies, that he outstripped his older brother, who was 
 jealous of his progress, forbade his doing anything but his 
 daily allotted task, and kept him from getting the books he 
 coveted. 
 
 In an old cupboard in the house they lived in, the boy 
 knew there was, away on the upper shelf, a rare old book 
 of manuscript music, and he never passed the old cupboard, 
 without a thought how he might get this book. 
 
 The upper part of the cupboard door was of lattice 
 work, and he thought he might possibly squeeze his little 
 hand through this, and contrive to pull the soft parchment 
 through, so he watched his opportunity when no one 
 was about, and got the book safely into his possession. 
 Now if he could only copy it before it should be missed, 
 but how,—for his brother refused him candles or lights, but 
 he could not refuse him moonlight. So waiting for moon- 
 light nights, and working at the window of his little room, he 
 at last copied the whole book; but no sooner had he begun 
 to use the music it contained than his brother found him 
 out and burned the book befere his very eyes. 
 
 Somehow it seems to me that when I see written above 
 a tune we sing the name of this boy, John Sebastian Bach, 
 I take a little greater interest in the music for knowing 
 of these struggles of his boyhood. 
 
 No. 610. 
 “GREENVILLE” (Tune). 
 
 JEAN JAcQuES RoussEAvu, 1712—1778. 
 
 Something of the sacredness of this tune may be lost to 
 us if we learn its origin and its composer. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 533 
 
 An adventurer roaming about France and Switzerland, 
 a profligate with a mistress in each new city he made his 
 home, an infidel or sceptic in religion, a brilliant writer 
 and a good musician, such and worse was Rousseau. 
 
 In 1752 he published an opera in French entitled “Le 
 Devin de Village.” 
 
 In one of the scenes there is a melody, without words, 
 headed “Pantomime” and arranged for stringed instruments. 
 About forty years later this appeared in England with the 
 words of a love song attached. A quarter of a century 
 later it was again published under the name of ‘“Rousseau’s — 
 Dream,” and under this title with the words of the love 
 song, it is still to be found in song collections, in just the 
 form in which we sing it to sacred words, under the name 
 of “Greenville.” 
 
 No. 611. 
 “Q THOU WHO CAMEST FROM ABOVE.” 
 Rev. CHARLES WESLEY. 
 
 When the Methodist preachers met in conference with 
 Mr. Wesley, he kept them busy telling their experiences, 
 and so at one such conference a number of them agreed 
 among themselves that they would turn the tables on 
 him by asking him his, so when the hour arrived one of 
 them addressed him: “Mr. Wesley, vou often ask us about 
 our experiences and now we should like to be favored with 
 yours.” 
 
 “Very well,” was the reply, “you shall have it.” And 
 then he repeated this hymn. “That is my experience,” 
 said he, “can any Christian give a better?” 
 
534 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 No. 612. 
 “TELL ME THE OLD, OLD STORY.” 
 Sh LOVE IO, LELGel Hh ORY... 
 
 Miss Kats HANnKEy. 
 
 These two hymns are the two parts of a “Life of Jesus in 
 Verse,” written by an English lady in 1866. The first part 
 is entitled, “The Story Wanted,” and the second, “The 
 Story Told.” 
 
 A few months after they were published in England, there 
 was a Y..M.C. A. convention at Montreal. Among those 
 present was Major General Russell, who was then in com- 
 mand of the English forces detailed to protect the Canadian 
 frontier from the much talked of Fenian raid. He arose in 
 the meeting and read the first part, beginning with the 
 words, “Tell me the old, old story,” from a manuscript copy 
 he held in his hand; as he read it the tears rolled down his 
 cheeks, and the sight of an old soldier, reading a simple 
 song like that, and weeping as he read, attracted much 
 attention in the meeting. 
 
 Mr. M. H. Doane of Cincinnati heard him read it, ob- 
 tained of him a copy, and on the stagecoach, riding from 
 
 the Glenn Falls House to the Crawford, in the White Moun- - 
 
 tains, he wrote the music for it, and sang it in the hotel 
 parlor that evening. 
 
 It is somewhat curious that these two hymns led to the 
 writing of a third a few months later by Mrs. Emily Hunt- 
 ingdon Miller in the same meter, and intended as a sequel 
 to the others, and beginning, 
 
 “T love to hear the story.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 535 
 
 No. 618. 
 “NORTHFIELD” (Tune). 
 
 JEREMIAH INGALLS, 1764—1838. 
 
 Mr. Ingalls was one of the early tune writers of America, 
 following soon after William Billings. 
 
 The tradition is, that traveling in Massachusetts, on one 
 occasion he became very hungry, and stopping at a way- 
 side inn, he ordered dinner, which was long delayed. 
 
 The delay gave him time to think of his spiritual hunger, 
 and to compose this tune. 
 
 It is often used for the hymn beginning: 
 
 “Lo! what a glorious sight appears.” 
 
 No. 614. 
 
 “WELLESLEY” (Tune). 
 
 Miss Lizzir 8S. Tources. 
 
 This tune was written by a school girl, daughter of the 
 eminent composer and singer, Dr. Eben Tourgee. She was a 
 member of the High School at Newton, Massachusetts. 
 
 A hymn for the graduating class had been written, and 
 she had been asked to write the music for it. She took it 
 to her father, telling him that she did not know how to 
 compose a tune appropriate to the words. 
 
 “Sit down to the piano,” replied her father, “put the words 
 before you and try.” ; 
 
 She did as directed, and this tune came floating into her 
 mind. Her father, in publishing it later, gave it the name 
 of the college near by, “Wellesley.” 
 
lie yo" “STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 No. 616. 
 “PEACE MY HEART, BE CALM, BE-SLibi.- 
 
 Rev. Cuartes Wester, 1708—1788. 
 
 The wife of Charles Wesley was at one time attacked by 
 smallpox, and before she had entirely recovered, their first 
 born child died: of the same disease. 
 
 The father wrote this hymn for his own, but more espe- 
 cially for his wife’s comfort, entitling it, “A Mother’s Act 
 of Resignation on the Death of a Child.” 
 
 A city pastor once found his way into a cellar, in one of 
 the poverty-stricken parts of Manchester, England. 
 
 The father was dying of consumption, and the mother 
 was bending over the body of her dead child. 
 
 The minister tried first to console the mother in her 
 sorrow, and then turned to the father, and told him of the 
 bright hope there was for those who died in childhood. 
 
 The man replied that he knew of no such hope, and 
 pointing to a shelf, on which were a few infidel books, he 
 said, those books contained his opinions. 
 
 “Yes,” said the minister, “but these books give you no 
 comfort now. I’m not going to dispute with you, but J 
 have a wife, and we, too, have lost a child. My wife was 
 reconciled to her loss, by thinking what her child had gained, 
 and there is a hymn written by a man in just such cireum- 
 stances as you are in now, that helped us, and it may help 
 you.” And then he read this hymn. 
 
 When he finished, the mother’s face was calm, and there 
 was a tear in the father’s eye. Then he prayed, and when 
 he had ended, it was the mother’s voice that first spoke. 
 “T will follow my child to Jesus,” said she; “And so will I,” 
 the father responded. ! 
 

 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 537 
 
 No. 616. 
 “WHEN THOU MY RIGHTEOUS JUDGE SHALT COME.” 
 
 SELINA SHIRLEY, Countess oF HuNnTINGDON. 
 
 A titled lady spoke offensively of Lady Huntingdon, in 
 the presence of King George the Third, and he replied, 
 “Pray, madam, are you acquainted with Lady Huntingdon?” 
 
 “T am not,” was the reply. 
 
 “Have you ever been in her company?” again the King 
 asked. 
 
 “Never,” said the somewhat astonished lady. 
 
 “Never form your opinion of any one,” said the King, 
 “from the ill-natured remarks and censures of others. Judge 
 for yourself, and you have my leave to tell everybody how 
 highly I think of Lady Huntingdon.” 
 
 Lady Huntingdon, and her husband too, were earnest 
 Christian people. She employed preachers, and built chapels 
 for them to preach in, and gathered about her so many 
 zealous evangelists, that they formed almost a denomination 
 by themselves, and were known as, “The Lady Huntingdon 
 Connexion.” They annoyed some of the less-zealous clergy 
 of the established church, and a Bishop once complained 
 to that same King George the Third, that these zealous 
 preachers of Lady Huntingdon disturbed his diocese. 
 
 “Make Bishops of them, make Bishops of them,” the King 
 replied. 
 
 “That might be done,” the Bishop rejoined, “but 
 please your Majesty, we cannot make a Bishop of Lady 
 Huntingdon.” 
 
 “Tis true,” chimed in the Queen, “but it would be a 
 lucky dirclimatandé if you could, for she puts you all to 
 shame.” 
 
 This was the sort of woman who though no great poet, 
 yet wrote one or two hymns which pel survived their 
 author, and come down tor us. 
 
538 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 617. 
 “SISTER, THOU WAST MILD AND LOVELY.” 
 
 Rev. SamvurL F. SMITH. 
 
 This hymn, written by the author of, “My Country, ’tis 
 of Thee,” was once made very apt use of by Dr. Lowell 
 Mason, in connection with the composition of one of his 
 own tunes. 
 
 He was, in 1833, teaching music in the public schools of 
 Boston. In July of that year, a girl of sixteen died, who 
 had been a member of the Mt. Vernon School, much beloved 
 by her companions, and who had taken much interest in 
 Dr. Mason’s singing lessons. 
 
 When the hour for the next lesson after her death arrived, 
 Dr. Mason entered the room, and at once commenced writ- 
 ing upon the blackboard a series of exercises for the pupils 
 to sing. He said but little, and nothing about the girl who 
 had died, but these blackboard exercises were all of a plain- 
 tive sort, in harmony with the feeling of solemnity which 
 pervaded the school. 
 
 When the music hour was nearly done, he rapidly com- 
 bined the short passages they had been practising into a 
 tune, and had them sing it several times, until they had 
 become a little familiar with it, and then he quickly wrote 
 on the board beneath the music, the words of this hymn: 
 
 “Sister, thou wast mild and lovely.” 
 
 And the whole school sang it to the tune just written for 
 it, when Dr. Mason closed the lesson, and left the room. 
 
 The impression left on the minds of the pupils, by this 
 delicate tribute to their companion who had died, was deep 
 and lasting. 
 
 In memory of the occasion, he gave to the tune the name 
 of the school, “Mt. Vernon.” 
 
“HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 539 
 
 No. 518. 
 “ALL HAIL THE POWER OF JESUS’ NAME.” 
 Rev. Epwarp PrRRONET. 
 
 One evening John Wesley was preaching in his chapel 
 in London, when he chanced to see, sitting among the 
 audience, a brother minister, with whom he had had some 
 acquaintance, but whom he had never heard preach. 
 
 This seemed to him like a long-sought opportunity, and 
 so, without so much as saying, “By your leave, Sir,” he 
 announced that the man would preach in that pulpit on the 
 following morning at five o’clock. 
 
 The preacher so unceremoniously announced did not wish 
 to disturb the meeting by a refusal, especially as that would 
 seem to oppose Mr. Wesley, and yet he didn’t altogether like 
 that method of arranging matters. 
 
 Next morning at five o’clock he was in the pulpit. After 
 the opening service was over, he said that he had been 
 announced to preach, without consultation, and should do 
 so only at the expense of his own feelings, out of respect for 
 Mr. Wesley. But that although weak, and unprepared, he 
 should give them the best sermon they had ever heard, and 
 then he read the Sermon on the Mount, and without a word 
 of comment, closed the service with song and prayer. 
 
 This was Edward Perronet, who wrote one splendid 
 hymn: 
 
 “All hail the power of Jesus’ name.” 
 
 It is needless to suggest, that if the good brothers had 
 lived in these times, neither one of them would have done 
 so discourteous a thing. 
 
540 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 619. 
 “WHOSOEVER HEARETH, SHOUT, SHOUT THE SOUND.” 
 
 Puiuie B.ulIss. 
 
 In the winter of 1869, a young evangelist from England, 
 named Henry Moorhouse, came to this country to preach. 
 
 He was quite small in stature, and boyish in appearance, 
 and scarcely more than a boy in years. 
 
 Some one tells the story of going to hear him one evening, 
 when he took for his text the words recorded in John, 3:16, 
 “God so loved the world,” etc., and thinking that he never 
 heard so much brought out of that wonderful text before. 
 So he went next night, to see what he would have to say on 
 some other verse, and was surprised to hear the same text 
 announced, and another sermon, different entirely from the 
 first, and throwing still more light upon the words. 
 
 And so for six successive evenings, this boy preacher, as 
 he was called, preached from the same text, unfolding each 
 evening more and more of its meaning and power. 
 
 This hymn, with the tune to which it is sung, was written 
 by Mr. Bliss, after listening to these six sermons, to embody 
 the new views he had received, of the freeness and fulness o£ 
 the gospel invitation, as given in this text. 
 
 No. &20. 
 “I LOVE TO STEAL AWHILE AWAY’—1818. 
 
 Mrs. PHorse HinspaLteE Brown, 1783—1861. 
 
 Phoebe Hinsdale was an orphan girl at Canaan, New 
 York. 
 
 A few months of school in each year, forgetting between 
 times nearly all she had been taught before, found her at 
 eighteen years of age, still unable to read. 
 
‘ 
 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 541 
 
 She married a house painter by the name of Brown, who 
 took her to Ellington, Connecticut; but marriage did not 
 improve her fortune. She was poor, and pressed by the hard, 
 unending cares of the house, and of children, and sometimes 
 in the early evening, just to have a bit of quiet, she would 
 leave her kitchen, and her children, and walk back and 
 forth, under a row of elms, that grew along the roadside, 
 between her home and the nearest neighbor. 
 
 One day she was visiting at the house of her pastor, Rev. 
 Dr. Hyde, and his neighbor, with others, was present. Just 
 as Mrs. Brown was rising to go home, this lady turned to 
 her, and somewhat curtly said, “Mrs. Brown, why do you 
 come up at evening so near our house, and then go back 
 without coming in? If you want anything, why don’t you 
 come in and ask for it? I could not think who it was, and 
 sent my girl down the garden to see; and she said it was you, 
 that you came to the fence, but seeing her turned quickly 
 away, muttering something to yourself.” 
 
 Mrs. Brown made no reply, but that evening, after the 
 children were all in bed, except the baby, she sat down in 
 the kitchen with the baby in her arms, and burst into a 
 flood of tears, and then she wrote what she called, “An 
 Apology for her Twilight Rambles,” addressing them to this 
 lady. ; 
 
 “T love to steal awhile away, 
 From little ones and care.” 
 
 This was strictly true. “I had,” she says, “four little chil- 
 dren, a small unfurnished house; a sick sister in the only 
 furnished room, and there was not a place above or below, 
 where I could retire for devotion without a liability to be 
 interrupted.” 
 
 But after the unkind words spoken to her that day, she 
 never took that walk again. 
 
542 | STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 621. 
 “LISTED INTO THE CAUSE OF SIN.” 
 
 Rev. CHarues WESLEY. 
 
 Charles Wesley stood in the open air, one day, in a sea- 
 port town of England, and began to sing. This was the way 
 in which he often gathered an audience, and it was his pur- 
 pose now, when his singing had drawn a crowd together, to 
 preach a sermon to them. 
 
 But there came along a party of jolly sailors, “half seas 
 over” with grog, and hearing the singing, they stopped and 
 began to sing themselves. But their song was one of their 
 own, and not that which Mr. Wesley sang. 
 
 He could not compete against their greater numbers, and 
 so he made one of those quick turns, at which he was such 
 an adept, and having caught the music of the song they 
 sang, he challenged them to come back again later in the 
 day, and he would be there and sing them a new song to 
 their own tune. 
 
 They came at the appointed time, and so did he, and this 
 was the song he sang. The tars were generous fellows, and 
 owning themselves beaten, they enjoyed the song, and 
 _ stayed to hear the sermon that came after it. 
 
 The tune was, ‘Nancy Dawson.” 
 
 No. 522. 
 Miss ANNE STEELE. 
 
 _In the town of Broughton, England, there was a Baptist 
 preacher who had been born there, and yet was an exception 
 to the proverb, about the honor a prophet has in his own 
 country, for he was so popular a preacher that he drew 
 away the flock of the curate of the Established Church, who 
 
 le Been -_ 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 543 
 
 complained to his Bishop of the depletion of his parish, and 
 asked how he might best oppose him. 
 
 “Go home,” said the Bishop, ‘and preach better sermons 
 than Henry Steele, and your people will return.” 
 
 It may seem a little far-fetched as an introduction to this 
 hymn, to relate an incident about her father’s uncle, as I 
 have done, but when the Rev. Henry Steele laid down the 
 pastorate of that church, his nephew took it up, and carried 
 it on for sixty years, and the incident will give you the 
 surroundings amid which Anne Steele was nurtured. 
 
 This father wrote in his diary one day—it was November 
 29, 1757—“This day Nannie sent a part of her composition 
 to London to be printed. I entreat a gracious God, who 
 enabled and stirred her up to such a work, to direct it, 
 and bless it, for the good and comfort of many.” 
 
 And later, three times at least, the father records in his 
 diary, his prayer that the book his daughter has written may 
 be made useful in the world. 
 
 Is it any wonder that hymns, so tended by a father’s care, 
 and followed as they started out, by a father’s prayers, have 
 come down to us through a century and a quarter, and are 
 still singing their way along among the churches? 
 
 
 
 No. 523. 
 
 BERNARD OF CuiAIRVAUX, 1091—1153. 
 
 One of the most wonderful, as well as one of the best of 
 men, was Bernard the Monk of Clairvaux. 
 
 The story of his life reads like a romance. An evening 
 might be spent in talking about it, and the talk would be 
 stimulating to every noble virtue and pure thought. 
 
 When twenty-five years old, he was chosen leader of a 
 band of twelve monks, who started out to found a new 
 monastery. 
 
 The spot was a valley, in the midst of pathless forests, 
 and haunted by robber bands. It was called the “Valley of 
 
544 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 Wormwood,” but he, with the band which gathered about 
 him, transformed it into a place of beauty, and changed its 
 name to “Clairvaux,” the bright valley. 
 
 He was an eloquent preacher, and he preached the cru- 
 sade, until his appeal stirred not only France, but Europe, 
 to wrest from the hands of the Turk the Holy Land and 
 Sepulcher. But he preached a crusade against sin in the 
 heart, and in the life, as well as a crusade against the Turks, 
 
 He was one of the most active men of his age, shared in 
 all its contests, and worked with unceasing diligence to 
 reform the religion of the church, and the lives of the people. 
 
 His personal life and influence was as lovely as it was 
 commanding. His eyes were described as “dove like,” his 
 face as “angelic,” his smile as “benevolent,” his letters as 
 “the bread of consolation,” and men who had come under 
 his influence, flocked to him at Clairvaux, to be near him 
 -for counsel, and sympathy, and help, and as they stood 
 weeping about his bed, when at sixty-two he was dying, his 
 last whispered words were: “I am in a strait betwixt two, 
 having a desire to depart and be with Christ, which is far 
 better; nevertheless the love of my children urgeth me to 
 remain here below.” 
 
 No. 524. 
 “A DEEP AND HOLY AWE,” 
 
 JOACHIM NEANDER. 
 
 One day a wild and careless German boy, with a couple 
 of boon companions, went into a church in Bremen to 
 ridicule the service. But the sermon they heard touched 
 the leader’s conscience, and set him thinking, and then led 
 him to reform his wild life. 
 
 He was fond of hunting, and one day he followed his 
 game so far, that night came on, and he lost his way among 
 the mountains, where climbing even by daylight was 
 perilous. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 545 
 
 After wandering about a while, he suddenly found himself 
 on the edge of a cliff, where another forward step would 
 throw him down a precipice. He was almost overcome with 
 terror, and prayed to God for rescue, and promised if it 
 were given to devote his life to His service. 
 
 All at once, as if by miracle, he felt his strength and 
 courage return, and he imagined a hand was leading him. 
 He followed it, and it brought him safely to his home. 
 
 He kept his vow. By and by he became head master of 
 a school at Diisseldorf, and he taught religion to his scholars 
 as well as mathematics, and outside of school he preached, 
 and held other religious services. 
 
 These gave offense, and he was commanded not to preach, 
 was deposed from his school, and banished from the town. 
 It was in the summer when this occurred, and he wandered 
 away into a glen on the River Rhine, and here he lived for 
 several months in a cave in the rocks, still known as “Nean- 
 der’s Cave,” and here he wrote hymns, which remembering 
 his promise to God, he called “Songs of the Covenant,” and 
 this was one of these songs written in ““Neander’s Cave.” 
 
 No. 625. 
 “Q LORD THY HEAVENLY GRACE IMPART.” 
 
 Rev. JoHNn FREDERICK OBERLIN, 1740—1826. 
 
 In the year 1767, a young man of twenty-seven years 
 became the pastor of a little mountain village, in the north- 
 eastern part of France between Alsace and Lorraine. 
 
 He found his people few in numbers, poor, ignorant, and 
 for the most part irreligious. 
 
 He entered at once into the life of the people, taught them 
 better modes of cultivation than they had known before, 
 helped them to build roads and to improve their homes, sent 
 their boys away to learn trades, and founded a school for 
 those who remained at home, and while caring for their 
 
546 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 souls, so interested himself in their temporal welfare too, 
 that the population increased fivefold, and the place was 
 everywhere spoken of for the piety, and prosperity of its 
 people. 
 
 One Sunday in 1820, he preached a sermon to his people 
 from the text, “He shall see of the travail of His soul, and 
 shall be satisfied,” and at the close of the sermon he read 
 this hymn, and then said, ““My dear friends, may these be 
 the feelings of our hearts,.and as such let us sing them,” 
 and then the whole congregation joined in singing the words 
 their pastor had written. 
 
 No. 526. 
 “J WANT TO BE AN ANGEL.” 
 
 Mrs. Sypney P. GILL. 
 
 For many years this was a very popular Sunday school 
 song, and perhaps at that time it was useful, but there are 
 better hymns for that use now, containing sentiments more 
 natural and helpful. 
 
 Its author had been teaching the infant class, in a Phila- 
 delphia Sunday school, and angels had been the subject of 
 the lesson. 
 
 At the close a little child spoke up, “I want to be an 
 angel.” The child died a few days after, and the hymn was 
 written to be sung in her memory, in the school to which 
 she belonged. 
 
 No. 527. 
 “TUST AS I AM WITHOUT ONE PLEA.” 
 
 Miss CHARLOTTE ELLIoTT. 
 
 John B. Gough tells a curious story, the point of which 
 is associated with the singing of this hymn. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 547 
 
 Sitting in a city church, one morning, he was annoyed by 
 the actions of a man whom the usher showed into the same 
 pew. 4 
 The man’s face was repulsive, “mottled,” as Mr. Gough 
 described it, “like castile soap.” His lips twitched, and 
 every now and then his mouth would make a singular 
 sound. | 
 
 Mr. Gough moved away from him as far as he could, to 
 the other end of the pew. By and by the audience arose to 
 sing this hymn: 
 
 “Just as I am, without one plea, 
 But that Thy blood was shed for me.” 
 
 The man knew the hymn, and sang without any book. 
 And Mr. Gough said to himself, ‘He can’t be such a very 
 disagreeable man after all,” and he moved along a little 
 nearer to him. But such work as he made of the singing, 
 “Tt was awful, positively awful. I never heard anything 
 like it,” said Mr. Gough, “and every now and then in the 
 midst of the singing his mouth would twitch out that strange 
 sound, and then he would sing faster to catch up with the 
 music.” 
 
 At the end of one stanza, while the organist was playing 
 the interlude, he leaned over toward Mr. Gough and whis- 
 pered, “would you be kind enough to give me the first line 
 of the next verse?” Mr. Gough repeated it to him: 
 
 “Just as I am, poor, wretched, blind.” 
 
 “That's it!” said he, “that’s it, and I am blind, God 
 help me!” And the tears ran down his face, “And I ‘am 
 wretched, and I am a paralytic.” And then he tried to sing, 
 
 “Just as I am, poor, wretched, blind, 
 Sight, riches, healing of the mind, 
 Yea all I need, in Thee to find, 
 
 O Lamb of God I come! I come!” 
 
548 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “And at that moment,” says Mr. Gough, “with the new 
 revelation he had made of himself to me, it seemed to me I 
 had never heard in my life a Beethoven Symphony with as 
 much music in it as the blundering singing of that poor, 
 blind paralytic.” 
 
 No. 528. 
 “CHRISTIANS, AWAKE, SALUTE THE HAPPY MORN.” 
 
 JOHN Byron. 
 
 A century and a half ago, in England, it was a rare streak 
 of good fortune for a man to keep out of jail his whole life 
 through, provided he had any opinions. Party feeling ran 
 very high, and a new party coming into power not only 
 appointed its adherents to the offices, but put its opponents 
 behind prison bars, where it was supposed their opinions 
 would do less harm than in the open air. 
 
 And then there was always a possibility that the king of 
 today might be the refugee or the pretender of tomorrow. 
 
 John Byron, who lived from 1700 to 1763, and taught 
 shorthand for a living much of the time, was as quaint as 
 he was pious, and fully alive to the danger of having too 
 pronounced political opinions. | 
 
 He favored the House of Stuart, but on one occasion he 
 was present when toasts were in order, and he was called 
 on for a toast to the King. With quick wit he improvised 
 a stanza which extricated him from his dilemma, and gave 
 him some celebrity as well: 
 
 “God bless the King, 
 I mean the Faith’s defender: 
 God bless, no harm in blessing, the Pretender: 
 But who Pretender is, or who is King, 
 God bless us all, that’s quite another thing.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 549 
 
 No. 529. 
 “HE IS GONE, A CLOUD OF LIGHT.” 
 
 Rev. ARTHUR PENRHYN STANLEY. 
 
 It is a never-ending wonder, when one traces things back 
 to their causes, to see how prominent a factor in the world’s 
 history have been occurrences, in themselves trivial. 
 
 Some children had been reading the story of the Ascension 
 of Christ, “While they beheld, He was taken up, and a 
 cloud received Him, out of their sight, and while they looked 
 steadfastly toward heaven as He went up,” etc., and they 
 asked their father how the disciples felt after that, and 
 complained that there was no hymn that spoke of it. 
 
 The father told Dean Stanley of this, and asked if he 
 could not write a hymn to supply the vacancy the children 
 had noticed. 
 
 It was done, and soon after published in a magazine, with 
 no thought that it would have other fate than that befalling 
 other bits of poetry so published. 
 
 But the children had told a want of many another dis- 
 ciple, and the piece soon found its way into the hymnals, 
 and has made for itself a permanent place in the song service 
 of Christians, especially those who love to recognize with 
 suitable worship each year as the anniversary days come 
 round, the chief events in the life of Christ. 
 
 Sir Arthur Sullivan composed for it the tune of “St. 
 Patrick,” to which it is usually sung. 
 
 No. 530. 
 “J AM SO GLAD THAT OUR FATHER IN HEAVEN.” 
 
 Puitie Buiss. 
 
 Soon after Mr. Bliss began his work as @ singing evange- 
 list, there came into use a revival song, the chorus of which 
 
5950 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 began, “O how I love Jesus,” and Mr. Bliss heard and sang 
 this song a great many times, until he said to himself, “I 
 have sung long enough of my poor love for Christ, and now 
 I will sing of His love for me.” So he wrote the hymn: 
 
 “I am so glad that our Father in Heaven, 
 Tells of His love in the book he has given, 
 Wonderful things in the Bible I see, 
 
 This is the dearest that Jesus loves me.” 
 
 This is a much more appropriate subject for a hymn than 
 the other, and more in accord with the teaching of the Bible, 
 which says, “Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that 
 He loved us.” 
 
 No. 531. 
 
 GRANVILLE Maxim. 
 
 In the early part of the present century, there lived in 
 the town of Buckfield, Maine, a man of marked ability, but 
 of eccentric habits. 
 
 He was a great lover of music, and many of the melodies, 
 used in revival services of that day, were of his composition. 
 
 Tradition tells the story, that in early life he was disap- 
 pointed in a love affair, and one morning took a rope, and 
 wandered away into the forest, intending to commit suicide. 
 
 He sat down to rest and think, at a deserted logging camp, 
 and as he sat he heard a bird singing her lament, over some 
 robber of her nest. By and by he thought he would leave 
 some memento which might chance to come to the eye of 
 the lady he loved, and that would tell her of his grief. 
 
 So he cut a piece of birch bark, and wrote on it a stanza: 
 
 “As on some lonely building top, 
 The sparrow tells her moan, 
 Far from the tents of joy and hope, 
 I'll sit and grieve alone.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 551 
 
 And then he began to write a melody to suit the words, 
 and becoming more and more interested in the song, he 
 added other parts until he had completed a beautiful piece 
 of music, and then he pictured to himself how the song 
 would sound, if a skilful choir should perform it, and with 
 it all his thought of suicide vanished away. 
 
 He found a purpose for which to live, and he returned to 
 the town, and to useful pursuits. 
 
 The hymn, “Come Holy Spirit, Heavenly Dove,” was for- 
 merly sung to the tune of “Turner,” composed by Mr. 
 Maxim, and other tunes by him, once popular, but now 
 fallen into disuse were, ‘““Buckfield” and “Portland.” 
 
 No. 582. 
 Francis JosepH Haypn, 1732—1809. 
 
 One day two elderly gentlemen were dining together in 
 Hamburg. They were both masters of music, one living at 
 Hamburg and the other at Vienna. 
 
 They were talking of music, and musicians, when sud- 
 denly the one who was at home declared to the other that 
 he had right then in his house a boy, who was, he thought, 
 a musical prodigy. 
 
 He had found him at his father’s house in the country, 
 singing and keeping time with a couple of sticks, while his 
 father played the harp and his mother sang. He had 
 brought him to his home, and was teaching him, music. 
 
 So the boy was brought in from the kitchen, where he 
 was eating his dinner with the cook, and although baskful 
 at first, as soon as he was told to sing, forgot it all, and 
 throwing his head back, burst out into melody like a bird. 
 
 The visitor was delighted, and exclaimed, “He shall come 
 to Vienna with me, and sing in my choir.” And so he car- 
 ried the boy away from Hamburg to Vienna, and there his 
 fine sweet voice delighted all the town. 
 
552 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 One day the roguish boy cut off the tail of one of the 
 singer’s wigs, and his master turned him out, right then and 
 there, of choir and home. 
 
 It was a winter’s night, and the poor boy was friendless 
 and homeless. At last as he wandered along the street he 
 thought of a poor barber who had once spoken kindly to 
 him, and to this house he went. 
 
 The barber took him in and gave him a home, and by 
 and by, when the poor homeless boy had become the famous 
 composer, Francis Joseph Haydn, he married the barber’s 
 daughter. 
 
 Haydn gathered about him a circle of musical young 
 fellows like himself, and their chief recreation was going 
 about Vienna on moonlight nights serenading famous 
 musicians. 
 
 One night they played one of Haydn’s compositions under 
 the window of Herr Curtz, the leader of the opera in the 
 city. Suddenly a window opened and Herr Curtz himself 
 shouted to know who was playing the violin. “Joseph 
 Haydn,” came back the answer. 
 
 “Whose music is it?” 
 
 “My own,” and almost before the young player knew 
 what was going on, Curtz was down to the ground, had him 
 by the collar, and was marching him upstairs into the mas- 
 ter’s music room. Then he told him that he wanted him 
 to compose some music for him, and gave him his subject. 
 
 Haydn went to the piano, and soon caught the thought 
 Herr Curtz wished to express, and got a hundred florins for 
 his work. Soon after he got an appointment in the house- 
 hold of Prince Esterhazy, when his curious duty was to have 
 a piece of music ready to lay at the Prince’s plate at break- 
 fast every morning. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 303 
 
 No. 533. 
 “THE HARMONIOUS BLACKSMITH.” 
 
 GrorGE Frepperick HANDEL. 
 
 Handel was one day going to the palace of the Duke of 
 Chandos, near London, when he was overtaken by a shower 
 of rain, and took shelter in a blacksmith shop. 
 
 The blacksmith kept on with his work, and sang a song 
 as he worked. 
 
 Handel was attracted by the song, but more by the curi- 
 ous fact that the blacksmith’s hammer kept time with the 
 song, and drew from the anvil two harmonious sounds 
 according with the melody of the song, and making a sort 
 of continuous bass. He remembered the air with its queer 
 accompaniment, and when he returned home composed this 
 piece of music. 
 
 No. 584. 
 “JORDAN” (Tune). 
 WiiurAM Biiurnes, 1746—1800. . 
 
 This tune was composed by the first American musical 
 composer of whom there is any record. 
 
 He was a Boston tanner without education but with much 
 natural genius. He is described as somewhat deformed, 
 blind of one eye, one leg shorter than the other, one arm 
 somewhat withered, and continually taking snuff. He pub- 
 lished half a dozen books of music, in each of which he 
 sifted out the inferior work of the book which had preceded 
 it, or improved them by his increased experience. 
 
 His music was much ridiculed by some, as may be in- 
 ferred from the fact that some one hung a couple of cats 
 over his tanner’s sign as an intimation that their harmonies 
 were much like his. 
 
 However, his tunes were very popular, and were indeed 
 
554 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 almost the only music known in New England during the 
 last quarter of the last century. 
 
 The American Army also used them in camp, and march, 
 through the years of the Revolution, and they did much to 
 encourage and cheer the soldier’s hearts. 
 
 One of the tunes was named “Chester,” and he wrote the 
 words as well as the music. It was a patriotic hymn 
 appropriate to those stirring times, beginning: 
 
 “Let tyrants shake their iron rod, 
 And slavery clank her galling chains: 
 We'll fear them not—we trust in God; 
 New England’s God forever reigns.” 
 
 But although he was a patriot in full sympathy with the 
 political independence of the colonies, still in Christian wor- 
 ship he saw no reason why the independent colonies should 
 not be in unison with the mother country, and so he wrote 
 a stanza, which if we give to it the pronunciation of the 
 olden time, makes very good rhyme: 
 
 “Oh, praise the Lord with one consent, 
 And in this grand design, 
 
 Let Britain and the colonies 
 Unanimously join.” 
 
 Mr. Billings died in 1800, and lies buried in the old “Gran- 
 ary Burial Ground” in Boston, with no stone to mark his 
 grave. 
 
 Some of his tunes are, “Chester,” “Majesty,” “Rock of 
 Ages,” “Christ the Lord is Risen Indeed,” “Jordan,” etc. 
 
 No. 535. 
 
 Rev. Samvuet Meptey, 1738. 
 
 Nearly a hundred and fifty years ago, in 1758, an English 
 boy, not yet twenty years of age, entered the English navy, 
 and was soon after wounded in a battle. 
 
 EE 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 505 
 
 His wound proved very serious, and the surgeon told him 
 he was afraid that amputation was the only thing that 
 would save his life. “But,” said he, “I can tell tomorrow 
 morning.’ 
 
 The boy had been religiously trained by a pious father, 
 but while in the navy he had led a profligate life. But now 
 the surgeon’s words brought rushing back to him the prayers 
 he had heard his father offer, and fe began to pray himself, 
 spending much of the night in that way. 
 
 When the surgeon examined the wounds next morning, he 
 lifted his hands in surprise, and exclaimed, “This is little 
 short of a miracle.” So favorable a change had taken place 
 that no amputation was needed, and the wounds speedily 
 healed. 
 
 The boy resolved to reform his life, but like many another 
 who makes that resolution in his own strength, he failed. 
 Returning to his home he lived with his grandfather, and 
 one Sunday evening he asked the servant if his grandfather 
 was going out to church. “No,” was the reply, “he is 
 coming to read a sermon to you.” . 
 
 And the young man was compelled to listen to one of 
 Dr. Watts’ sermons. He was indifferent at first, but soon 
 the words of the sermon began to touch his heart, and as 
 soon as it was ended, and his grandfather had left the room, 
 he fell on his knees in prayer, and was soon after converted, 
 and later he became a preacher of the gospel. 
 
 I think it adds interest to a hymn, sometimes, to know 
 something of the experiences through which its author 
 
 passed. 
 No. 536. 
 
 “CREATION,” Oratorio—1799. 
 
 Francis JosepH Haypn, 1732—1809. 
 
 The idea of setting to music, to be sung, the Bible story 
 of the creation of the world, must have come from a man 
 of daring as well as of genius. 
 
556 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 -Haydn’s “Oratorio” was first produced in Vienna in 1799. 
 The words for it, except those taken from the Book of 
 Genesis, were arranged from Milton’s “Paradise Lost.” 
 
 The Oratorio was at once a great success, and is still 
 among the grandest of the Oratorios. 
 
 No. 537. 
 “°TTS RELIGION THAT CAN GIVE.” 
 
 Mary Masters. 
 
 There are hymns written by men and women of the high- 
 est literary culture, and hymns of high poetic merit, which 
 have made no history for themselves; while there are others 
 of no literary value, and written by illiterate authors, which 
 have yet become powers for good, 
 
 A century and a half ago, in 1733, a poor English woman 
 published a little volume of poems, and in the preface it is 
 stated that she was “never taught her English grammar. 
 Her education rose no higher than the spelling book or the 
 writing master; her genius to poetry was always browbeat 
 and discountenanced by her parents,” and more of like 
 import. 
 
 Twenty years later, in 1755, she published still another 
 book, and in it appeared what she called a “Short Ejacula- 
 tion” containing but six lines, as follows: 
 
 “Tis religion that can give 
 ' Sweetest pleasures while we live; 
 ’Tis religion must supply 
 Solid comfort when we die, 
 After death its joys will be 
 Lasting as Eternity.” 
 
 1 do not know what the history of these six lines has been, 
 as they have sung their way along the years for this century 
 and a half, but somewhere along the road, some one, prob- 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 557 
 
 ably a singing evangelist, interlined it with a refrain, and 
 lengthened it with a chorus so that it read: 
 
 “Tis religion that can give, 
 In the light, in the light, 
 Sweetest pleasure while we live, 
 In the light of God. 
 
 -“Tet us walk in the light, 
 In the light, in the light, 
 Let us walk in the light, 
 In the light of God.” 
 
 In this form, as it was sung during a revival time, a young 
 man heard it in a congregation, as he says, of “common 
 people, by voices many of them cracked and discordant,” 
 and yet he says: “I think it was the singing of that simple 
 old hymn and chorus that awakened in me the desire to be 
 a Christian by setting before me its promise of ‘sweetest 
 pleasure’ and ‘solid comfort’ in strong contrast with the 
 unsatisfactory portions I was getting from worldly pleas- 
 ures, and the fear of death that was constantly before me.” 
 And then he adds, “Eternity only will reveal the power that 
 hymn had over me, both in bringing me to God, and in 
 strengthening and encouraging me in the first days of trial 
 and temptation, that came to me as a young Christian.” 
 
 You will agree that there is still another thing, that Eter- 
 nity alone will reveal, of the results growing out of the 
 singing of this hymn, when I tell you that the young man 
 who thus describes the effect it had upon him, was Rev. 
 George F. Pentecost. 
 
 No. 588. 
 “COME LET US JOIN OUR FRIENDS ABOVE.” 
 Rev. CHARLES WESLEY. 
 
 The author of this hymn died three years before his 
 brother John. They had been roommates in college days, 
 
508 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 and from that time on through sixty years of preaching, and 
 writing, and working, had been companions and co-workers 
 in founding the great denomination of Methodists. 
 
 One Sunday morning, after the death of Charles, the sur- 
 viving brother John, himself an aged man, arose in the pul- 
 pit of the City Road Chapel, London, to announce the 
 opening hymn, but instead of doing s0, he stood silent with 
 eyes closed for nearly ten full minutes. Then with a feeling 
 that told of the emotion of his heart, he began to read this 
 hymn: 
 
 “Come let us join our friends above, 
 That have obtained the prize, 
 And on the eagle wings of love, 
 To joys celestial rise.” 
 
 It seemed to those who were present as if they were about 
 to witness the meeting again of the brother who had “ob- 
 tained the prize” with the one who was still striving for it. 
 
 And when they sang the hymn it seemed almost as if the 
 host that had “crossed the flood” were joining voices with 
 those on the hither side. 
 
 No. 539. 
 “IN THE CHRISTIAN’S HOME IN GLORY.” 
 
 Rev. SaMvuEL Youna Harmar, 1809. 
 
 The influence, upon after life, of hymns learned in child- 
 hood, can hardly be measured. They come into the mind 
 when least expected, and sometimes when least desired, but 
 always on some good errand. 
 
 An English actor was one evening in the midst of a play 
 on the stage, when this hymn which he had learned in his 
 childhood came rushing into his mind, and so unmanned him 
 that he was obliged to go to the manager and tell him that 
 he could not go on. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 559 
 
 In an effort to stifle the thoughts which the hymn brought 
 to his mind, he went to the bar of the theater, and drank. 
 
 He shortly after. attended one of the Moody and Sankey 
 meetings, and was converted, and then related this incident. 
 
 No. 540. 
 “COME, O THOU TRAVELER UNKNOWN.” 
 
 Rev. CHARLES WESLEY. 
 
 This is a very celebrated hymn, which has received the 
 admiring notice of poets and critics ever since it was written. 
 The hymn is entitled, “Wrestling Jacob,’ and this was a 
 famous subject with Mr. Wesley not only in poetry but in 
 prose. 
 
 His journal records not less than eight different occasions 
 when he preached upon that theme, and he records also that 
 in most cases the preaching was effective upon the audience. 
 
 No. 541. 
 “WATCHMAN, TELL US OF THE NIGHT.” 
 
 Sir Joun BowRrine. 
 
 An old writer says. that, “Whenever the Holy Ghost 
 inspireth a new hymn, it is His wont to inspire someone 
 with a good tune to fit it.” 
 
 This seems to me to be eminently true of this hymn, and 
 the tune to which we sing it. 
 
 -The hymn was written and published in England, in 1825, 
 and the tune was written for it, and the two were published 
 together in this country in 1831. 
 
 The hymn is a dialogue, and Lowell Mason’s tune for it 
 was entitled a “Dialogue and Chorus.” The dialogue being 
 
560 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 rendered by a soprano voice singing the first two lines, a 
 tenor the second two, and so on alternately, and the full 
 chorus repeating the last two lines of the stanza to different 
 music. The music is practically the same, however, as we 
 use it now. 
 
 No. 542. 
 
 “THREE FISHERS WENT SAILING OUT INTO THE 
 WEST.” 
 
 Rev. CHARLES KINGSLEY. 
 
 The author of this song, well known as a preacher, poet, 
 and novelist, who died but a few years ago, spent his boy- 
 hood in a little fishing town on the English coast, where his 
 father was rector of the parish. He often saw the fleet of 
 herring fishers put out to sea, and witnessed the little reli- 
 gious service it was the custom to hold on the wharf before 
 they started, in which the fishermen and their wives, and 
 sweethearts, and children, joined. 
 
 Later in life, after a weary day, he recalled this scene of 
 his youth, and wrote this song. 
 
 No. 643. 
 “°*MID PLEASURES AND PALACES.” 
 “HOME, SWEET HOME.” 
 
 JOHN Howarp PAYNE. 
 
 A hundred years ago, in 1792, a little boy was born in 
 New York City, who was destined to supply the world with 
 one of its sweetest, most valued songs. 
 
 From the place of his birth to East Hampton, the most 
 easterly town of Long Island, then to Boston, back to New 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 561 
 
 York, to Schenectady to college, then as an actor to New 
 York, Baltimore, and Boston, thence to London and Paris, 
 and Berlin, and back again to America, and then to Tunis 
 in Africa, where he died, the author of “Home, Sweet Home’”’ 
 was himself a homeless wanderer his whole life long. His 
 song was written when he was nearly starving, with an attic 
 for his home in Paris, and when the words he had written 
 were known all over the world, he himself said that he had 
 often heard them sung in London, Paris, and Berlin, “when 
 he had not a shilling to buy his next meal with, nor a place 
 to lay his head.” 
 
 He had written quite a number of plays which were suc- 
 cessful in every way save in bringing money to their author, 
 and in 1823 Charles Kemble, who was manager of Covent 
 Garden in London, bought a quantity of these dramatic 
 productions. 
 
 Among them was a play entitled, ‘“Clavi, the Maid of 
 Milan.” This play Kemble asked the author to alter into 
 an opera, and in doing so he introduced into it the words 
 of “Home, Sweet Home.” 
 
 A sister of Mrs. Charles Kean was the chief singer at 
 Covent Garden then, and she first sang the song as a part 
 of this opera. So that the words were first heard in a cele- 
 brated theater, under the management of a celebrated man, 
 and sung by a celebrated singer. 
 
 The music was written for the words, though not for that 
 occasion. Sir Henry Rowley Bishop, an English composer, 
 then a young man, had been engaged to edit a collection of 
 the national melodies of all countries. 
 
 While engaged in this work, he discovered that he had no 
 melody from Sicily, and so he invented this, and it was pub- 
 lished in the collection as a Sicilian air, when as a fact it 
 was the invention of a London musician. 
 
 The song, with the words of Payne, became at once im- 
 mensely popular. A hundred thousand copies were sold 
 within a year, the publisher was greatly enriched, even the 
 lady who first rendered it was, by the singing of it, brought 
 
562 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 to the notice of a wealthy gentleman who became her hus- 
 band, and Payne, who wrote it, received not so much as the 
 price of a night’s lodging. 
 
 No. 544. 
 “GUIDE ME O THOU GREAT JEHOVAH.” 
 
 Rey. WiLu1aM WIuuiAMs, 1717—1791. 
 
 Almost two hundred years ago, there lived in a village of 
 Wales, a good deacon of an Independent church. He lived 
 in the times that were troublous for the churches, and for 
 Christians who wished to worship in any other than the 
 way established by the state; and the church of which he 
 was a deacon had to meet for a time in a cave during the 
 hours of twilight, to avoid being swooped down upon, and 
 scattered or imprisoned by the King’s soldiers. 
 
 This good deacon had a boy who was intended for a physi- 
 cian, and went away to college to prepare for this profession. 
 
 On his way home from ‘college, he was passing through a 
 little Welsh village one Sunday morning, when he heard the 
 ringing of a parish church bell, and turned in to rest and 
 listen. 
 
 The service was formal and cold, and made no impression 
 on the young fellow’s mind, but as he passed out of the 
 church, he noticed that the people instead of scattering to 
 their homes, remained in the churchyard as if expecting 
 someone, and in a few minutes a man took his stand upon 
 one of the flat tombstones and began to talk. 
 
 There was nothing cold or formal now, but hot, fiery 
 torrents of speech, and like the preaching of John the Bap- 
 tist, it was a call to “repent for the Kingdom of Heaven is 
 at hand.” 
 
 The young man went into the churchyard intending to be 
 a doctor, but he came out with his face set another way, 
 and soon after he became a preacher. All over Wales, for 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 563 
 
 the next half century, that man went traveling on foot and 
 with horse three thousand miles a year, preaching the Gos- 
 pel of Christ. He was a poet as well as a preacher, 
 and oftentimes improvised poetry in his extemporaneous 
 sermons. 
 
 He was absent-minded sometimes, and thereby hangs a 
 tale. He was away from home and family one Sunday 
 holding a service by the seashore. 
 
 A friend was conducting the opening service, and while he 
 was praying a cuckoo began to sing close by the open 
 window. 
 
 When the prayer was ended, our poet preacher arose to 
 give out the hymn, but instead of a hymn it was a poetic 
 appeal to the cuckoo to fly away to the preacher’s home, and 
 tell Molly, his wife, that he was alive, and then to go to an- 
 other town and tell Jack, his son, to keep his place, and 
 added a wish, that should they fail to meet again on earth, 
 they might not fail to meet in heaven. 
 
 Just then his friend touched him, and reminded him that 
 while what he was giving to the people might be a very good 
 sentiment, it was hardly a hymn. And the poet, suddenly 
 coming to himself, thought of the great sea whose waves 
 were breaking just outside the door, and without a moment’s 
 hesitation gave out another stanza: 
 
 “Salvation like a boundless sea 
 Keeps swelling on the shore: 
 Here shall the weak and helpless find 
 Enough for ever more.” 
 
 Perhaps this little glimpse of the life of Wiliam Williams 
 will give new interest to the hymns he wrote. Only two of 
 them have found their way into the English hymnals. 
 
 “Guide me O Thou great Jehovah,” 
 and 
 
 “O’er those gloomy hills of darkness.” 
 
564 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 644. 
 “MY FAITH LOOKS UP TO THEE.” 
 
 Rev. Ray PALMER. 
 
 Mr. Palmer was a young man just out of college, and not 
 yet entered upon his theological studies. He was in poor 
 health, and teaching a ladies’ school in New York City. 
 
 It was then that this hymn was written, and the stanzas, 
 the author says, simply gave form to what he felt. 
 
 “T recollect,” he says, “that I wrote them with very tender 
 emotion, and ended the last line with tears.” 
 
 Once written, the lines went into his pocketbook, until 
 one day Dr. Lowell Mason met him on a street in Boston, 
 and asked him if he had not some hymn that he would con- 
 tribute to a new book that he was compiling. The pocket- 
 book was produced, and the little hymn was handed out. 
 
 On reaching home, Dr. Mason was so much interested in 
 the words, that he composed for it the tune, “Olivet,” to 
 which it is even now almost always sung. 
 
 A few days later he met the author again and said, “Mr. 
 Palmer, you may live many years, and do many good 
 things, but I think you will be best known to posterity as 
 the author of, 
 
 “My faith looks up to thee.” 
 
 No. 546. 
 “IN THE WAVES AND MIGHTY WATERS.” 
 
 Davin WiuuiAMs, 1718—1784. 
 
 David Williams was a Welsh schoolmaster who had a 
 turbulent wife. He preached as well as taught, and the 
 story is, that one night on reaching home his wife assailed 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 565 
 
 him with a bitter scolding. Outside a storm was raging, but 
 he preferred that to the storm that was raging in his home. 
 So out he went again into the darkness, and stood on the 
 bank of a river near, and its rushing torrent, and the wail- 
 ing of the winds brought to his mind the time when his feet 
 should stand on the brink of another river, and what hand 
 would help him then, so he wrote: 
 
 “In the waves and mighty waters, 
 No one will support my head, 
 But my Savior, my Beloved 
 Who was stricken in my stead: 
 In the cold and mortal river, 
 He will hold my head above, 
 I shall through the waves go singing, 
 For one look of Him I love.” 
 
 * This short hymn has become known wherever the Welsh 
 language is spoken. An incident connected with it has given 
 to it the title of ““The Miner’s Hymn.” 
 
 In the month of April, 1877, a colliery in Wales was 
 flooded, and fourteen miners found themselves imprisoned 
 waiting helplessly for death. The whole nation seemed to 
 turn its thought toward that coal pit, and as the rescue 
 party toiled on by day and night, every hour seemed to 
 make the suspense more painful. 
 
 So seven days passed, with no signs of the imprisoned 
 miners, and hope was nearly lost, but on the eighth day 
 nine of the miners were found, and found alive though 
 nearly dead for want of food and air. And as they told 
 their story, it came out that despair would have driven them 
 mad, had they not cheered themselves by singing over and > 
 over the words of this hymn. 
 
566 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 647, 
 
 Miss ANN GrirrFiTus, 1776. 
 
 In the year of our Independence as a Nation, a farmer’s 
 daughter was born in Wales. When she had grown to be a 
 young woman, she was as gay as the gayest, and fond of 
 dance and song. 
 
 On the way to one such merrymaking gathering, an old 
 servant of her father induced her to go aside into a chapel 
 meeting. 
 
 A word spoken by the preacher proved to be a message 
 for her, and she went to her home instead of to the dance, 
 and soon became as widely known for her earnest piety as 
 she had been for her gaiety. 
 
 Soon, as she went about her work as a farmer’s girl, or 
 as she walked through the woods, and fields, and country, 
 roads, she began to think in poetry, and her piety expressed 
 - itself in hymns. But she never wrote them down, and but 
 for a servant girl in her father’s house the world would not 
 have known them. 
 
 To this servant girl she used to recite her hymns as they 
 were composed, and then the two girls would sing them to 
 some Welsh tune, over and over again. 
 
 When the composer had died, the servant girl, who by 
 _ this time had married, repeated them over to her husband, 
 
 who wrote them down, and so they were preserved. 
 
 No. 548. 
 “LAND AHEAD! ITS FRUITS ARE WAVING.” 
 
 Rev. E. ADAMS. 
 
 This hymn is a memento of a very curious bit of history: 
 ~ In the latter part of the eighteenth century (1789) a 
 British ship left one of the Sandwich Islands with a cargo 
 
 ‘ 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH $567 
 
 of bread fruit plants, which were to be transplanted into 
 the soil of one of the West India Islands. 
 
 A few days later a part of the crew mutinied, put the 
 captain and those who were loyal to him adrift in a boat, 
 and for twenty years nothing was heard of ship or men. 
 
 Then a Nantucket whaler stopped at what had always 
 been supposed to be an uninhabited island in the Pacific, 
 called Pitcairns Island, and was greatly surprised to find it 
 the home of the long lost and almost forgotten mutineers 
 of the old ship Bounty. 
 
 One of the mutineers, who had assumed the name of John 
 Adams, had. drawn up a little code of laws, by which the 
 little band was governed. He had been their teacher and 
 stranger than all, their religious leader too, for he had 
 organized religious worship after the form of the Church of 
 England, and then and even down to the present day they 
 are a Christian people. 
 
 When, after presiding over his little kingdom wisely and 
 beneficently for many years, until it had come to be called 
 “The Paradise of the Pacific,” John Adams, the mutineer, 
 lay dying, he exclaimed, as if his eyes saw beyond the veil, 
 “Land in sight!” 
 
 “Are you happy?” asked one standing by. 
 
 “Rounding the cape into the harbor,’ was the jubilant 
 reply, and then at last, as he grew weaker, “Let go the 
 anchor,” he exclaimed, and he was dead. 
 
 These words were woven into a song not many years ago, 
 and, with the music to which they are attached, have be- 
 come quite popular. 
 
 No. 549. 
 “1.0! THE DAY OF REST DECLINETH.” 
 Rev. CHANDLER Ropssins, 1810—1882. 
 
 The daughter of the author of this hymn was returning 
 from Europe on a Cunard steamer. 
 
568 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 An aged Scotch Presbyterian minister and his wife were 
 among the passengers. The party were singing hymns on 
 the deck one Sabbath evening, when the minister went to 
 his stateroom and brought back a book of hymns and tunes, 
 to show to the party what, he said, was the sweetest hymn 
 he knew, set to the sweetest tune. 
 
 What was the surprise of the author’s daughter, who, by 
 the way, was married, and only known to the Scotchman by 
 her husband’s name, to hear him repeat the first line of the 
 hymn her own father had written, and to hear him sing it 
 to the tune, “Bedford Street,” which had been composed for 
 the hymn by Mr. L. B. Barnes, President of the Handel and 
 Haydn Society of Boston, and named for the street upon 
 which stood her father’s church. 
 
 No. 550. 
 “FINDING NO PLACE OF REST.” 
 Mr. JoHN Brookb GREENWOOD, 1828. 
 
 This hymn has had the experience of getting into com- 
 pany where it was not wanted, and of not being able to 
 withdraw. 
 
 Its author was a merchant of Manchester, England, and a 
 member of a Congregational church of that city. 
 
 The verses fell into the hands of a relative of the author, 
 who was a Roman Catholic, and through her into the hands 
 of her priest, and he passed it along into the columns of a 
 Roman Catholic newspaper. 
 
 Somewhere on the way they lost the signature. 
 
 Awhile after, Rev. Orby Shipley, a Roman Catholic 
 
 priest, and one of the strictest of that church, conceived 
 the idea that members of that church ought not to use, in 
 their devotions, hymns written by any not members of their 
 own particular branch of the household of faith. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 569 
 
 So he published a collection called, “Annus Sanctus,” 
 
 purporting to contain not a single piece not written by a 
 faithful adherent of the Romish Church. 
 
 Finding this hymn to be good poetry, and correct in senti- 
 ment, and withal in the columns of a Roman Catholic paper, 
 he included it in his book. 
 
 And so in this immaculate selection by monks, and 
 priests, and cardinals, there stands this hymn by a plats 
 Congregational cotton merchant. 
 
 No. 661. 
 “THE KING OF GLORY WE PROCLAIM.” 
 JAMES MONTGOMERY. 
 
 At the annual meeting of the Church Missionary Society 
 of England, which has under its charge the foreign mission 
 work of the Church of England, held in the spring of 1848, 
 it was arranged to hold that autumn, a Jubilee service, 
 which all its mission stations throughout the world should 
 join in. 
 
 James Montgomery was invited to prepare a hymn for 
 the occasion, which should be translated into all the lan- 
 guages spoken by the people among whom they had missions, 
 and which should be sung in all those places on that day as 
 a jubilee hymn. 
 
 He wrote this hymn, and when the autumn came, at the 
 central meeting in London, he was able, although in his 
 seventy-seventh year, to join in the first singing of ' the 
 hymn, which that day literally followed the sun in its course, 
 until it had belted the earth with song. 
 
570 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 No. 882. 
 “GREAT GOD, THE NATIONS OF THE EARTH.” 
 
 Rev. Wiuu1am Warp, 1769—1821. 
 
 Just before William Carey, the celebrated Baptist mis- 
 sionary, left England for his field of work in India, he met 
 on a street of Hull, a boy who had been converted, and who 
 was working in a printing office in that town. 
 
 “We shall want some one by and by,” said Carey to the 
 boy, “to print the Bible for us in the languages of India. 
 Hold yourself in readiness when you are needed.” 
 
 The boy never forgot the words, and a few years later 
 he went to India to do for Dr. Carey and his associates the 
 very work which he had been told he would be needed for, 
 and while on the voyage he wrote this hymn. 
 
 No. 553. 
 “TELL IT OUT AMONG THE NATIONS.” 
 
 Miss Frances Riptey Havercay, 1836—1879. 
 
 This hymn was written one Sunday when the author was 
 prevented by sickness from attending church. She was fol- 
 lowing the order of service of the Episcopal Church, and had 
 read the words, “Tell it out among the heathen, that the 
 Lord is King,” when the thought came to her that the words 
 would make a good beginning for a hymn. With the 
 thought the words for the hymn came to her faster than she 
 could write them, and with them the music, and in a few 
 minutes the hymn was written and the tune for it com- 
 posed. The tune was named “Epenetus.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 571 
 No. 584. 
 “JUST AS I AM, WITHOUT ONE PLEA.” 
 
 Miss CHARLOTTE Evuiotr, 1789—1871. 
 
 An English magazine, in 1887, invited its readers to send 
 in lists of what they regarded as the best hundred hymns. 
 About thirty-five hundred lists were received, and this hymn 
 was found to be one of the chief favorites of the people, 
 but three hymns having a higher number of votes. These 
 were, “Rock of Ages,” “Abide with Me,” and “Jesus Lover 
 of my Soul.” 
 
 No. 556. 
 “HOW SWEET THE NAME OF JESUS SOUNDS.” 
 
 Rev. Joun Newton, 1725—1807. 
 
 An English magazine, in 1887, invited its readers to send 
 in lists of what they regarded as the best hundred hymns. 
 About thirty-five hundred such lists were sent in, and this 
 hymn was found to be one of the chief favorites, but four 
 hymns having a higher number of votes. These were, 
 “Rock of Ages,” “Abide with Me,” “Jesus Lover of my 
 Soul,” and “Just as I Am.” 
 
 No. 586. 
 
 “GOLDEN HARPS ARE SOUNDING.” 
 
 Miss Frances Rwiey Havercat, 1886—1879. 
 
 The author of this hymn was visiting some friends, and 
 while with them went to a boys’ school. Being very tired, 
 
572 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 she leaned against the playground wall, while a friend who 
 accompanied her went into the school. Returning in a few 
 minutes, he found her scribbling on an old envelope the 
 words of this hymn, the thought of which had just suggested 
 
 itself to her. 
 
 No. 587. 
 “JERUSALEM, THE GOLDEN.” 
 BERNARD OF CLUNY. 
 
 Some years ago there was published in England, the 
 biography of a little boy under the title, “A Little Child 
 Shall Lead Them.” In this book it is related that when 
 this child was suffering agonies which the physicians de- 
 clared were almost unparalleled, he would lie without a 
 motion or a murmur while the whole of this long poem of 
 four hundred lines was read to him. 
 
 No. 558. 
 “MY GOD, MY FATHER, WHILE I STRAY.” 
 Miss CuarLoTre Exuiott, 1789—1871. 
 
 An English magazine, in 1887, invited its readers to send 
 in lists of what they considered the best hundred hymns. 
 About thirty-five hundred such lists were sent in, and this 
 hymn was found to be among the chief favorites, but five 
 hymns standing higher on the list. These were, “Rock of 
 Ages,” “Abide with Me,” “Jesus Lover of My Soul,” “Just 
 as I Am,” and, “How Sweet the Name of Jesus Sounds.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 573 
 
 No. 559. 
 “JESUS LOVER OF MY SOUL.” 
 
 Rev. Cuartes Westey, 1708—1788. 
 
 An English magazine, in 1887, asked its readers to send 
 in lists of what they considered the best hundred hymns. 
 About thirty-five hundred such lists were received, and this 
 hymn was found to stand third in favor among the readers 
 of that periodical, the two better liked being “Rock of 
 Ages,” and “Abide with Me.” 
 
 No. 560. 
 “I LAY MY SINS ON JESUS.” 
 
 Rev. Horatius Bonar, 1808—1889. 
 
 Unlike many writers of hymns, Dr. Bonar kept no record > 
 of where, or when, or why his hymns were written. It is 
 known that a few of them were written for the use of Mr. 
 Sankey when he and Mr. Moody were holding evangelistic 
 meetings in Scotland. It is also known that he was in the 
 habit of writing them while traveling on railroad trains. 
 This one was written when the author was a young man, 
 not yet the pastor of a church, but serving as assistant to 
 a minister in Leith, Scotland. It was written for the 
 children of the Sunday school connected with this church. 
 
 No. 561. 
 “I GAVE MY LIFE FOR THEE.” 
 
 Miss Frances Riptey Havercau, 1836—1879. 
 
 This idea of a hymn, to be sung by a mixed congregation 
 of people, in which the words supposed to be spoken by 
 
574 _ STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 the Savior are sung back to Him by the audience, is a 
 very near approach to profanity. This hymn had great 
 currency in the earlier days of the Moody and Sankey 
 “Gospel Hymn Books,” but is now quite properly almost 
 entirely discarded. The author was but a young lady of 
 twenty-two and was in Germany. She came in one day 
 quite tired and sat down where a picture with the words 
 of this first line for a motto hung directly before her. The 
 lines of the hymn came into her mind almost at once, and 
 she wrote them down with a pencil on a scrap of paper. 
 Reading them over, they did not satisfy her, and she 
 threw them into the fire, but they fell out unburned, and 
 she picked them up and saved them. Later she showed 
 them to her father, Rev. W. H. Havergal, who thought 
 them worthy of use and wrote for them the tune “Baca.” 
 Later the impropriety of singing such words was noticed, 
 and the hymn changed in all its stanzas so as to make it 
 a song addressed to Christ, beginning: 
 
 “Thy life was given for me.” 
 
 No. 662. 
 “ART THOU WEARY, ART THOU LANGUID.” 
 
 Sr. STEPHEN, 725—794. 
 
 It is a long way from the lonely monastery in the valley 
 of the Kedron to the sands of Cape Cod, and a long time 
 from the middle of the eighth century when this hymn was 
 written, to the middle of the nineteenth. And as widely 
 different as these places and times, is one use recently 
 made of this hymn, written by the distinguished old hermit 
 monk of Mar Saba. It occurs in the novel, “Cape Cod 
 Folks,” written some years ago by Miss Sally Pratt Mc- 
 Lean. Two of the prominent characters in that novel 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 575 
 
 are George Olver and Ben Cradlebow. Near the end of 
 the story Ben is drowned in a fierce storm while trying 
 with Olver to save a boat’s crew from the same fate. 
 
 - Just before the storm the two have been at work mending 
 an old craft, and after the storm is over, and Ben Cradle- 
 bow is dead, with the neighbors gathered in one of the 
 cottages on the shore, the Captain tells the story, “By and 
 by him and George Olver struck up a song. I’ve heern 
 ’em sing it before, them two. As nigh as I calk’late, it’s 
 about findin’ rest in Jesus, and one a askin’ questions, all 
 fa’r and squar’, to know the way and whether it’s a goin’ 
 to lead thar straight or not, and the other answerin’. And 
 he—he was a tinkerin’, way up on the foremast, George 
 Olver and the rest on us was astern—and I'll hear to my | 
 dyin’ day how his voice came a floatin’ down to us thar— 
 chantin’-like it was, cl’ar and fearless and low. So he 
 asks, for findin’ Jesus, if thar’s any marks to foller by; 
 and George Olver, he answers about them bleedin’ nail 
 prints, and the great one in His side. So then that voice 
 comes down agin, askin’ if thar’s any crown, like other 
 kings, to tell Him by; and George Olver, he answers 
 straight about that crown o’ thorns. Then says that other 
 voice, floatin’ so strong and cl’ar, and if he gin up all and 
 follered, what should he have? What now? So George 
 Olver, he sings deep o’ the trials and the sorrowin’. But 
 that other voice never shook, a askin’ and what if he helt 
 to Him to the end, what then should it be, what then? 
 George Olver answers: ‘Forevermore, the sorrowin’ ended— 
 Death gone over.’ Then he sings out, like his mind was 
 all made up, ‘And if he undertook it, would he likely be 
 turned away?’ ‘And it’s likelier,’ George Olver answers 
 him, ‘That heaven and earth shall pass.? So Pll hear it 
 to my dyin’ day—his voice a floatin’ down to me from up 
 above thar, somewhar, askin’ them questions that nobody 
 could ever answer like, so soon, he answered ’em for himself.” 
 
576 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 568. 
 “FROM GREENLAND’S ICY MOUNTAINS.” 
 
 To the tune of 
 
 “mv7aAS WHEN THE SEAS WERE ROARING.” 
 
 The first singing of Heber’s missionary hymn affords a 
 striking illustration of the scarcity of good hymn tunes 
 at that time and of the readiness with which music entirely 
 secular was used with sacred words. A poet by the name of 
 John Gay—the same, by the way, who wrote the song of 
 “Black-eyed Susan”’—about the year 1720 brought out in 
 London a new play, new, not only in words, but in style, 
 for the action in it was intended to be tragic while the 
 language was absurd. The title was “What D’ye Call It?” 
 and when it was played, some of the audience, seeing the 
 acting but catching but few of the words, were ready to 
 shed tears at the pathetic scene, while others who sat nearer 
 and not only saw the play but heard the words, were splitting 
 their sides with laughter at the absurdity of the combination. 
 The author of the play introduced into it a song, the music 
 of which was furnished by a no less renowned composer 
 than George Frederick Handel. The song began, “ "T'was 
 when the seas were roaring.”’ The play soon became obso- 
 lete, but the song retained its popularity, and is sung even 
 now. When Heber handed the copy of this hymn to 
 Dean Shipley to be used at the church service on the follow- 
 ing morning he asked, “To what tune will it go?” and then 
 suddenly added, “Oh! it will go to ‘’Twas when the seas 
 were roaring.’’”’ And to that music first heard as part of 
 an uproarious comedy on the stage was our great missionary 
 hymn first sung. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 577 
 No. 664. 
 “NOW BEGIN THE HEAVENLY THEME.” 
 
 Rey. Martin Mapan, 1726—1790. 
 
 A young lawyer in London, who cared neither for 
 religion nor its ministers, was spending the evening with 
 companions as gay as himself, when they commissioned 
 him to go out and hear John Wesley, who was preaching 
 that evening in the neighborhood, and to come back to 
 them and report for their sport how he looked, acted and 
 spoke. Just as he entered the room where the service was 
 held, Mr. Wesley was announcing his text, “Prepare to 
 meet thy God.’ The gay lawyer was deeply impressed 
 at once and more so as the sermon proceeded. 
 
 When it was finished, he returned to his companions, 
 who shouted, “Well, have you taken off the old Methodist?” 
 
 ‘No, gentlemen,” was the reply, “but he has taken me 
 off.” 
 
 He forsook them at once, became a Christian, and turned 
 from the practice of the law to the preaching of the gospel. 
 He was passionately fond of music and made a collection 
 of hymns, which had a remarkable influence on the hymn 
 service of his day. This hymn is often attributed to him, 
 although it is not certainly known that he wrote it, or any 
 other; but many hymns that he used in his collection were 
 amended and improved by him, and have been in use ever 
 since in his amended form rather than in the shape their 
 authors wrote them. 
 
 No. 565. 
 “ART THOU WEARY, ART THOU LANGUID.” 
 Sr, SrePHEN IN GREEN, 725—794. 
 
 Rev. Joun Mason Neate, Translator. 
 
 The valley of the Kedron from Jerusalem to the Dead 
 Sea is a ravine between cliffs that rise on either side so 
 
 * 
 
578 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 abruptly as to be almost inaccessible. These hillsides are 
 full of caves hewn into the face of the rock and used as 
 burial places centuries before the time of Christ. 
 
 A few centuries after His coming there arose a passion 
 among religionists for a hermit life, and these caves, which 
 had before been only the resting places of the dead, 
 became the homes of the living. Gradually these hermits 
 associated themselves together, and passages were often 
 cut from cave to cave, and walls of masonry along the face 
 of the cliff were added, to give support* to buildings con- 
 nected with these caves. Not far from the Dead Sea, in 
 the Kedron Valley, there is still standing a monastery 
 which had such a beginning. Several times during the 
 fourteen hundred years since it was founded, it has been 
 plundered and its monks murdered by Bedouin Arabs and 
 Turks, and for safety’s sake, it has been surrounded by 
 massive walls, partly the natural rock of the cliff and 
 partly masonry. Inside these walls there is a curious maze 
 of cells and chambers perched one above another mostly 
 cut out of the solid rock, and reached by steps and narrow 
 paths. Travelers still visit it, and are hospitably fed and 
 lodged by the monks who make it their home. 
 
 Almost twelve hundred years ago, a boy of ten years was 
 placed in this monastery under the care of his uncle, who 
 was one of its hermit monks, and for sixty years, until 
 he died, one of these cells cut in the rock in which some 
 patriarch of Old Testament times had been entombed, was 
 his sleeping room by night, and his place of meditation 
 ond prayer by day. And here he wrote this hymn, which 
 is so popular with us today. His name was Stephen, and 
 this gives name to the tune “Stephanos,” written for the 
 hymn by Mr. Monk. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 579 
 
 No. 566. 
 “GRACIOUS SPIRIT, DWELL WITH ME.” 
 Rev. Tuomas Toke Lyncu, 1818—1871. 
 
 When a young man, Mr. Lynch was a school teacher in 
 England, and at the same time he was in the habit of 
 gathering poor people together and preaching to them. His 
 personal appearance was peculiar, so peculiar that when at 
 college he arose for the first time to speak, his fellow 
 students greeted him with laughter. He published a volume 
 of poetry entitled “The Rivulet,” and in this all his hymns 
 appeared. The book was no sooner published than the 
 London Morning Advertiser, which was not only the organ 
 of certain London clergymen, but of the London brewers 
 as well, pounced upon both book and author. The hymns, 
 it was said, “might have been written by a Deist, and many 
 of them might be sung by Freethinkers.” They were said 
 to be “Christless” and “contradicting the Word of God” 
 and also such as “might have been written by a man who 
 had never seen a Bible.” The attack became so fierce and 
 unrelenting, both against book and author, that at last 
 a company including some of the foremost ministers of 
 England published a protest against so wanton and unjust 
 an accusation. Lynch himself published a reply in poetry, 
 the title page of which contained a few lines, which will 
 illustrate the bitterness with which he had been fought. 
 
 “Quote him to death! Quote him to death! 
 Hit him and hear not a word that he saith. 
 Shout and ery out, for this is the man 
 Out of whose Spirit the ‘Rivulet’ ran. 
 What is his book but a cauldron that brims 
 Over and over with poisonous hymns?” 
 
 This is one of the hymns which was so hunted and hooted 
 at when first it was written. 
 
580 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 “No. 567. 
 
 “MINE EYES HAVE SEEN THE GLORY OF THE COMING 
 OF THE LORD.” 
 
 Mrs. JuLia Warp Howe (See No. 109). 
 
 In the Autumn of 1861, Mrs. Howe visited Washington, 
 and while there drove out one day to witness a review of 
 troops that was to take place a little way out of the 
 city. While on the way out, a sudden movement of 
 Southern troops near the city cut off a small party of 
 Union soldiers and broke up the expected review. Riding 
 back along the road, the way was filled with soldiers, so 
 that she could drive but slowly, and her party began to 
 sing some of the well-known war songs, and among them 
 “John Brown’s body lies a mouldering in the grave.” This 
 song pleased the soldiers very much and they joined in 
 the singing of it. Rev. James Freeman Clarke, who was 
 one of the party, said to Mrs. Howe, “You ought to write 
 some new words to that tune.” The next morning, when 
 Mrs. Howe awoke, she was astonished to find words arrang- 
 ing themselves in her mind to fit the “John Brown” tune. 
 And soon the whole hymn was thought out, and she arose, 
 and in the uncertain light scrawled it down upon paper, 
 and then went back to bed for another nap. It was 
 published soon after but was first brought into prominence 
 by Chaplain McCabe in a lecture in Washington, just after 
 he had been released from Libby Prison, telling how he 
 had obtained a copy of it and sung it after a Union victory. 
 
 No. 568. 
 
 GIOVANNI PipruuiciI DA PALESTRINA, 1524—1594. 
 
 In 1564, the Council of Trent, considered the question 
 of church music. The old plain chant had gradually been 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 581 
 
 built upon by the musicians, until it was thought the music 
 of the churches had become extravagant, and elaborate, 
 and detrimental to the spirit of worship. A large party 
 in the Church favored sweeping all these more recent 
 innovations away by edict of the Church and returning 
 to the simple uninspiring chanting of former times. There 
 was an organist just then in Trent who was very anxious 
 as to the result. He admitted the excesses into which the 
 musical composers had fallen, but thought a style of 
 music might be found befitting the sacred uses of the 
 Church and yet appealing to the musical taste of the best 
 musicians. He pleaded with the members of the council 
 so eloquently that at last they consented that a committee 
 of their number might listen to three masses he would 
 present. The first of these was to be sung in the Sistine 
 Chapel at Rome, June 19, 1565. It was a day of great 
 importance to the interests of music, for on the decision 
 of the committee rested the future of ecclesiastical music, 
 and much of the future of musical composers as well. The 
 night before the eventful day, the organist spent alone, in 
 prayer and final preparation for the morrow. 
 
 The Chapel was filled with the most famous people in 
 Rome, and the Pope himself was in the audience. No 
 decision from the committee was needed other than a 
 formal one, for the Pope himself declared that “A trium- 
 phant host of angels in the New Jerusalem might have 
 sung to the apostle of the Apocalypse some such inspiring 
 strains.” And so it was decided that music of the style of 
 this by Palestrina might be composed and used by the 
 Church in its worship. Palestrina lived thirty years after 
 this and composed masses and hymns for all occasions of 
 the Church, many of which have come down to our own 
 times and are used in our churches now. 
 
582 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 569. 
 “IT WOULD NOT LIVE ALWAY, I ASK NOT TO STAY.” 
 
 Rev. Witu1am Avucustus MUHLENBERG, 1796—1877. 
 
 I consider this hymn among the curiosities of literature. 
 The love of life is something that has been implanted in 
 our very natures. Animals have it. And the possession 
 of reasoning powers only makes the love of it more intense. 
 The Bible commends it, and promises it as the reward of 
 righteousness. We condemn in unmeasured terms any 
 one who so lives as to endanger or shorten it. The noblest 
 monument of the man who wrote the hymn is that he 
 projected and for years presided over St. Luke’s Hospital 
 in New York, the mission of which was to prolong and 
 save it. Although you will join heartily in the singing 
 of it,. it does not express your sentiments unless by 
 disease or misfortune you have become morbid in your 
 thoughts. It was only by a chance that the hymn got 
 into a hymn book. It had been published in a religious 
 newspaper and was offered by Dr. Onderdonk to a committee 
 of the Protestant Episcopal Church which was revising its 
 church hymnal. When this committee came to vote upon 
 the hymns one. by one, Dr. Onderdonk was absent, but the 
 author of the hymn himself was present. The hymn was 
 pronounced very good but rather sentimental and so was 
 rejected, Dr. Muhlenberg, who, by the way, was not sus- 
 pected of being the author, voting against it. Next morning 
 when Dr. Onderdonk found it had been thrown out, he went 
 about among the members of the committee and prevailed 
 upon them to restore it. So into the hymnal it went, and 
 once in, it has stayed in. That was in 1826, and now in 
 1893, after almost seventy years have passed, out of the 
 thirty principal hymnals in use by the Evangelical denom- 
 inations of America but five omit it. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 583 
 No. 570. 
 “AWAKED BY SINAI’S AWFUL SOUND.” 
 
 Rev. Samson Occum. 
 
 When George Whitefield, the English evangelist, visited 
 America in the middle of the last century, one of his converts 
 was an Indian boy of the Mohegan tribe, whose fading 
 glories were later related by Cooper in his novel, “The 
 Last of the Mohicans.” This Indian boy was instructed 
 in a school in Lebanon, Connecticut, and later became a 
 preacher of the gospel, sometime among the Montauk 
 Indians on Long Island and again among the Oneidas in 
 New York. Later he went to England to solicit money 
 for the school at which he had been taught, and attracted 
 much attention there, as the first Indian preacher they had 
 ever heard. He succeeded in raising about ten thousand 
 pounds, and this money raised by the Indian preacher was 
 the financial foundation of Dartmouth College. He has 
 the unique distinction of being the only American Indian 
 who has contributed to our-store of sacred song. 
 
 No. 571. 
 “A MIGHTY FORTRESS IS OUR GOD”—1527. 
 
 Rev. Martin LutuHer, 1483—1546. 
 
 This is a paraphrase of the forty-sixth Psalm. It has 
 been called the battle hymn of Protestantism, for it was 
 written in the very year when the Evangelical Princes 
 delivered their protest at the Diet of Spires, from which 
 the name of Protestant is derived, and it became almost at 
 once the song of the Protestant Churches and people all 
 over Germany. Their armies sang it as they went into bat- 
 
584 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 tle, and their martyrs when they stood amid the flames. It 
 is characteristic of its author and has been called “Luther 
 in Song.” It is as rugged as he and is full of his faith 
 and courage. When he was a Romish monk, he was an 
 earnest, honest one, and he afterward said that “if ever a 
 monk got to heaven by monkery he was determined to get 
 there.” Yet here he is singing: 
 
 “Did we in our own strength confide 
 Our striving would be losing.” 
 
 The hymn was a great favorite with Luther himself, and he 
 often sang it for cheer and comfort. When fatigued with 
 the contest in which he was engaged or dismayed by its 
 dangers, he would say to Melancthon, his companion and 
 helper, “Come, Philip, let us sing the forty-sixth Psalm.” 
 
 No. 872. 
 “QO MOTHER DEAR JERUSALEM.” 
 
 Rev. Davin Dickson, 1583—1663. 
 
 Without doubt the most remarkable hymn in all our 
 collections is the one known by the general name of “The 
 New Jerusalem.” At least two books have been written 
 about it, devoted to the task of tracing it back to its 
 source. It first took definite form in the hands of Bernard, 
 the Monk of Cluny, in the twelfth century, who embodied 
 it in a Latin poem of twelve thousand lines. But a century 
 earlier, Hildebert, another monk of France, had written 
 a poem from which Bernard drew some of his.. And a 
 century earlier still, Peter Damian, an Italian cardinal, had 
 written on the same subject, and farther back than all, 
 Gregory, the Pope, five hundred years before had given the 
 leading thought of the hymn to them all. But even he 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 585 
 
 did not originate it. To the Bible itself in the fragmentary 
 sayings of Paul and the Apocalypse of John must we go 
 for the idea and the imagery of the hymn. The hymn in 
 its oldest English form, has about it a cloud of mystery. 
 It is in the form of an old manuscript in the British Museum, 
 undated, but known to belong to the end of the sixteenth 
 century. It is entitled, “A Song made by F. B. P. to the 
 tune of Diana.” Many have been the conjectures as to 
 whom these initials stand for, and the most probable is 
 that they belong to one Francis Baker, Priest, and that he 
 was a prisoner in the tower of London when Romish priests 
 in England were suffering persecution. A few years later a 
 Scotch Presbyterian minister, Rev. David Dickson, gave 
 to the hymn essentially the form in which it has come down 
 to us. 
 
 No. 578. 
 “JUST AS I AM, WITHOUT ONE PLEA.” 
 Miss CuHarLotTtTe Evxiott, 1789—1871. 
 
 Raratonga is one of the Islands of the Pacific and has 
 a hymn book in its own language. There are two transla- 
 tions of this hymn in it; one by Rev. W. Wyatt Gill and | 
 the other by Rev. Aaron Buzacott, both missionaries on 
 the Island. Mr. Gill had just lost two little boys by death, 
 and on the last Sabbath before they died, he and the boys 
 had sung this hymn together, it being one of their favorities. 
 One of the first thoughts of the bereaved father was to 
 translate the words now so endeared to him into the lan- 
 guage of the people among whom he was laboring. When 
 his companion in the mission, Mr. Buzacott, read the hymn, 
 it interested him so much that he made an independent 
 translation of it himself and both were included in the 
 Island Hymnal. 
 
586 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 8574. 
 “AT EVEN ERE THE SUN WAS SET.” 
 
 Rev. Henry TweE.ts, 1823. 
 
 A great many years ago a great physician came to a 
 little town lying on the shore of a lake, and performed a 
 wonderful cure upon a woman who had been sick of a 
 fever. It was in the house of a fisherman where this oc- 
 curred, and the woman who had been sick was the mother 
 of the fisherman’s wife. They were well known in the place, 
 and the news of the cure spread through the town. As soon 
 as the glare and heat of the day were past, at the evening 
 time, when the sun was setting, the people brought their 
 sick to the fisherman’s house, from all over the town, and 
 the story relates that many of them were healed. This 
 incident, simple though it seems, an English minister thought 
 worthy of enshrining in a hymn. It had been already 
 better done, however, by an American lady, Mrs. Lydia. 
 Huntley Sigourney, in a hymn beginning: 
 
 “Judea’s Summer day went down 
 And lo! from vale and plain, 
 Around the heavenly Healer thronged 
 A sick and sorrowing train.” 
 
 No. 575. 
 “GOD IS THE REFUGE OF HIS SAINTS”—1719. 
 
 Rev. Isaac Watts, 1674—1748. 
 
 Some years ago an English lady while out walking one 
 evening on the bank of a river, saw a man approaching the 
 stream whose strange actions convinced her that he intended | 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 587 
 
 suicide. What to do she hardly knew, but she wanted to 
 prevent the crime if possible, and inspired by a sudden 
 thought, she approached him and repeated the words from 
 the forty-sixth Psalm. “There is a river, the streams 
 whereof shall make glad the city of God,” and immediately 
 walked away. Who the man was she did not know, nor did 
 she know the result of what she had done, but some time 
 after, as she was walking on a street in London, she heard 
 footsteps close behind her, and a voice whispered over her 
 shoulder. “ ‘There is a river the streams whereof shall make 
 glad the city of God,’ and I have found that river.” She 
 turned quickly about, but the man had turned also and was 
 walking rapidly away. She never knew who it was, but 
 she knew by this curious meeting that her use of the words 
 of old David’s Psalm had not only saved a man from 
 suicide but had led him into the life of the Christian. This 
 hymn is Dr. Watts’ version of this Psalm. 
 
 (This incident was related by the lady herself to Dr. 
 Paxton, Professor at Princeton, New Jersey, and by him 
 related to me.) 
 
 No. 576. 
 “JESUS! JESUS! COME AND SAVE US.” 
 Henry BATEMAN. 
 
 The author of this hymn was a business man of London, 
 diligent enough in business to acquire a fortune, fervent 
 enough in spirit to write many a hymn, and “serving the 
 Lord” in many an enterprise of philanthropy and religion. 
 One day he went into a noonday prayer meeting (Wednes- 
 day, September 7, 1862) held in Crosby Hall in London, 
 and while there he heard a prayer in which the words were 
 frequently repeated, “O Jesus! Jesus! come and help and 
 bless.” This prayer suggested to him this hymn. 
 
588 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 577. 
 “THERE CAME TO THE BEACH A POOR EXILE OF ERIN.” 
 “THE EXILE OF ERIN.” 
 
 Tuomas CAMPBELL, 1777—1844. 
 
 Thomas Campbell began writing poetry at an early age. 
 His “Pleasure of Hope,” which is even now almost a classic, 
 was written before he was twenty-two years old, and brought 
 its author at once into prominence. He used his first 
 earnings to visit Germany, and while there he met Anthony 
 McCann and a number of other Irish refugees who had 
 been engaged in the Irish Rebellion of 1798, and had become 
 exiles from their homes. The forlorn condition of these 
 men aroused Campbell’s sympathy and led him to write this 
 song, which soon found its way to Ireland and, set to the 
 air of an old Irish Melody, “Savourneen Deelish,” has 
 become known and loved by almost every native of the 
 Green Isle. This visit of the poet, although it lasted only 
 a year, gave rise to four songs which have become well 
 known the world over. While going from Munich to Luiz, 
 he witnessed from the walls of a convent, the bloody battle 
 of Hohenlinden, and saw the victorious French Cavalry 
 enter the nearest town wiping their bloody swords on their 
 horses’ manes. This battle he described in the piece familiar 
 to every school boy, beginning “On Linden when the sun 
 was low.” Awhile after he visited the battle-field at Ratis- 
 bon, and an incident that occurred there led to his writing 
 “The Soldier’s Dream,” beginning “Our bugles sang truce, 
 for the night cloud had lowered.” 
 
 Before leaving England, Campbell was a frequent visitor 
 at a home where the evenings were spent in singing. A 
 favorite song with him at these musical gatherings was “Ye 
 Gentlemen of England,” and he determined to write words 
 for it himself. Little by little he jotted down the lines of 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 589 
 
 a patriotic song, and while in Germany he gave to it its 
 finishing touches and named it “Ye mariners of England.” 
 His song of sympathy for the Irish Rebels who were exiled 
 from home, had already been published in England, and 
 when he returned there he was arrested for treason, on 
 suspicion that he had not only sympathized with the rebels 
 in their exile but in their rebellion. His trunk was searched 
 for treasonable letters, but instead of them the manuscript 
 of this song, “Ye Mariners of England,” was discovered, and 
 its patriotic sentiments proved its author’s loyalty and he 
 was set at liberty. 
 
 No. 578. 
 
 “ALONG THE BANKS WHERE BABEL’S CURRENT 
 FLOWS”— (Psalm 127). 
 
 JorL Bartow. 
 
 This hymn brings us into contact with one of the most 
 versatile geniuses of a century ago. He was a soldier 
 in the war of the Revolution, a writer of patriotic songs, 
 a preacher, a lawyer, an editor, a bookseller, American 
 Consul at Algiers where he concluded a treaty which led 
 to the release of many captives, and at last American 
 Minister to France. During the Revolutionary War and 
 at its close the most popular hymn book in this country 
 was “Watts’ Psalms and Hymns” but when the colonies 
 separated from the Mother Country, many of these hymns, 
 which had been written by Watts with special reference 
 to Great Britain, needed to be changed to adapt them to 
 the use of an independent people. For example, there is 
 a hymn in many of our books beginning: 
 
 “Eternal Wisdom! Thee we praise, 
 Thee the creation sings.” 
 
590 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 As written by Watts, this piece refers to the “British Isles,” 
 “Albion,” the “Thames” and the “Severn” and has other 
 local allusions. In view of this, the Congregational churches 
 of Connecticut, in 1785, engaged Mr. Barlow to make such 
 alterations in the hymns of Watts as should adapt them 
 to use in Christian churches without regard to their locality. 
 This work Mr. Barlow did. This paraphrase of the one 
 hundred and twenty-seventh Psalm is not an alteration of 
 Watts but the sole work of Mr. Barlow. 
 
 No. 579. 
 “QOH! MEAN MAY SEEM THIS HOUSE OF CLAY.” 
 
 Rev. THomas HornsioweEr GILL, 1819. 
 
 The alteration of hymns has been practiced to such an 
 extent as to be not only grossly unjust to the authors, but 
 an outrage upon common honesty. I have seen hymns 
 addressed to Christ, altered by Unitarians so as to be ad- 
 dressed to God the Father; and by Romanists, to the Virgin 
 Mary; and by Mormons, to Brigham Young. The author 
 of this hymn was brought up a strict Unitarian, but was 
 a great admirer of Watts’ hymns. He read them as Watts 
 wrote them, and many of them again as they had been 
 altered to suit the doctrines of the Unitarian Church, and 
 was first led to doubt the truth of Unitarianism by noticing 
 “the contrast between their native power and beauty, and 
 their shrunken and dwindled plight when shorn of their 
 inspiring theology by Unitarian mutilations.” He there- 
 fore began to study for himself and gradually the fact that 
 Christ is divine became clear to him. When he had become 
 fully convinced of this, he celebrated his new-found faith 
 in this hymn. This fact will give greater significance to 
 the allusions to “the Lord” in every stanza and almost 
 every line of it. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 591 
 No. 680. 
 “STAND UP, STAND UP FOR JESUS.” 
 
 Rev. Greorce Durriexp, 1818. 
 
 In the year 1858 a great revival occurred in Philadelphia, 
 so remarkable that distinguished from others it is usually 
 spoken of as “The Work of God in Philadelphia.” Its 
 acknowledged leader was Rev. Dudley A. Tyng. During 
 this revival he preached one Sunday in Jayne’s Hall, to 
 an audience of five thousand people, from the text (Exodus 
 10:11), “Go now, ye that are men, and serve the Lord.” 
 It was one of the most successful sermons of modern times, 
 for it was thought that at least a thousand persons decided 
 at that time to follow the command of the text. That was 
 on the sixteenth of April, 1858. The Wednesday. following, 
 he went into his barn where a mule was at work on a 
 horsepower shelling corn. He patted the animal on the 
 neck, his sleeve was caught in the machinery, and his arm 
 literally torn out by the roots. He died in a few hours, and 
 just before his death sent a message to the men who had 
 been his associates in the revival work. “Tell them,” said 
 he, “to stand up for Jesus.” 
 
 On the following Sunday Rev. George Duffield preached 
 a memorial sermon, taking for his text (Ephesians 6:14), 
 “Stand therefore having your loins girt about with truth 
 and having on the breastplate of righteousness,” and wrote 
 this hymn, not to be sung but ag a poetic embodiment of 
 the last words of his dead friend. It soon found its way’ into 
 the newspapers and then into the hymn books where it 
 has won for itself, wedded to the stirring tune of “Webb,” 
 a permanent place. 
 
592 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 No. 581. 
 “Q LORD OUR GOD, WITH EARNEST CARE.” 
 
 This hymn is a literary curiosity. Its five stanzas are 
 made up of translations of as many stanzas clipped out of 
 four different Latin hymns, written by three different 
 authors, in three different centuries and in at least two 
 different countries. The originals of the first and fourth 
 stanzas are by Gregory the Great, Pope of Rome in the 
 sixth century. The second and third by Hilary, who lived 
 in Gaul in the fourth century, and the fifth by some unknown 
 author who lived in the seventh century. The translations 
 are also by different hands, the first four stanzas being 
 the work of Rev. John Mason Neale, and the fifth that of 
 some unknown translator. 
 
 No. 682. 
 “JESUS AT THY COMMAND”—1774. 
 “O’ER THOSE GLOOMY HILLS OF DARKNESS”—1772. 
 
 Rev. WinuiAM WILLIAMS, 1717—1791. 
 
 The history of missions contains no more wonderful 
 story than that of work in the Islands of the Pacific. It 
 was the first mission undertaken by the London Missionary 
 Society, a society whose relation to missionary effort in 
 Great Britain is about the same as that of the American 
 Board in this country. Its first band of missionaries sailed 
 from London August 10, 1796. Early in the morning of 
 that day their vessel swung out into the river Thames, 
 bearing at the masthead a flag the like of which had 
 never before floated on the breeze. It was purple, with 
 three white doves bearing olive branches in their bills. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 593 
 
 The shore was crowded with friends who waved to them 
 tearful farewells, for they expected never to see them again 
 until they should meet them in heaven. As the ship moved 
 slowly down the river the company gathered on her deck 
 sang the hymn: 
 
 “Jesus at thy command 
 We launch into the deep.” 
 
 After a voyage of more than half a year the same com- 
 pany gathered on the ship’s deck saw a long low range of 
 hills outlined dimly along the horizon. It was the Island 
 of Tahiti, to whose inhabitants they had come to tell the 
 gospel message. Soon the canoes of the Islanders were 
 dancing in the waves about the ship, and the natives heard 
 for the first time the music of Christian song as the 
 mission band sang the hymn: 
 
 O’er those gloomy hills of darkness 
 Look my soul, be still and gaze, 
 All the promises do travel 
 On a glorious day of grace. 
 Blessed Jubilee 
 Let thy glorious morning dawn.” 
 
 These two hymns thus mark the beginning of a mission 
 enterprise which has spread over all the Islands of the South 
 Pacific Ocean, with a history unparalleled in the annals 
 of mission work. 
 
 No: 583. 
 “LEOMINSTER” (Tune). 
 
 GEorGE WILLIAM Martin, 1828—1881. 
 
 This tune, associated with Dr. Bonar’s hymn, “A few 
 more years shall roll,” is usually credited to Sir Arthur 
 
594 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 S. Sullivan, who harmonized it, but the melody was com- 
 posed by George William Martin, of whom this incident 
 is told: Prince Albert, husband of Queen Victoria, had 
 composed a piece of music, and sent a request to Sir 
 George S. Smart, a noted chorister, to come to Bucking- 
 ham Palace with a few choir boys to perform it. Young 
 Martin was one of the boys who went. When they reached 
 the presence of His Royal Highness, he handed a copy 
 of his music to Martin with the question, “Can you sing 
 that at sight?” 
 
 “Yes, sir,” came the quick reply, and he did it quite to 
 the Prince’s satisfaction. 
 
 There seems nothing in this incident to us in democratic 
 America worth relating, but things are different in England, 
 and the musical party had no sooner gotten outside the 
 palace gate than young Martin got a tremendous whack 
 on the ear from their leader for using so common a title 
 as “Sir” in addressing the husband of the Queen. 
 
 No. 584. 
 “AUSTRIA” (Tune). 
 
 Franz Jos—EpH Haypn, 1732—1809. 
 
 This piece was composed for the words of a national 
 hymn, and was first performed in public on the birthday 
 of the Emperor of Austria, February 12, 1797. Mendelsohn 
 once made use of it in a manner which added to its 
 popularity, as well as to the wonder with which the 
 people regarded him. He was in London in 1842 and 
 went one summer Sunday evening to St. Peter’s Church. 
 As he entered the congregation were singing this tune. 
 Mendelssohn was asked to play the voluntary at the close 
 of the service, and took this tune which the people had 
 just sung, for his theme, and for a full half hour improvised 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 595 
 
 variations of it, never repeating himself, until it seemed 
 as if every possible use had been made of it. And yet a 
 few evenings later at another Church, when asked to take 
 the same theme, he played an entirely different arrangement 
 of it, with new and wonderful changes and all improvised 
 as he played. 
 
 No. 585. 
 “EVAN” (Tune). 
 
 Rev. Witu1AM Henry HAVERGAL. 
 Dr. LowEtL Mason. 
 
 Very little is known of the circumstances under which 
 most of our music was written. This tune, however, is 
 an exception. Robert Burns, the Scottish poet, once visited 
 the house of Dr. Laurie, and when he left there was found 
 on a table in the room he had occupied a little poem of 
 six stanzas. It was the poet’s prayer for each member of 
 the family whose hospitality he had enjoyed. Half a 
 century later Rev. William Henry Havergal, a minister 
 of the Church of England, composed music for this poem. 
 A copy of his song crossed the ocean and fell into the 
 hands of Dr. Lowell Mason, who was much pleased with 
 it. He selected from it four strains and arranged them into 
 a hymn tune; so that while in our books of church song the 
 tune to which Dr. Mason gave the name “Evan” is credited 
 to Mr. Havergal, to Dr. Mason belongs the credit of fitting 
 it for our use in religious worship. 
 
 No. 586. 
 “HASTINGS” (Tune). 
 
 Dr. Tuomas Hastines, 1784—1872. 
 
 Composed by Dr. Thomas Hastings for words of his 
 own writing; but though he acknowledged the hymn to be his 
 
596 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 he signed the tune with a fictitious name “K.—L.—F. — 
 F.—.” The reason for this he gives as follows: ‘I had found 
 that a foreigner’s name went a great way, and that very 
 ordinary tunes would be sung if Palestrina, or Pucitta, 
 etc., were over them, while a better tune by Hastings would 
 go unnoticed.” This seems to indicate that the admiration 
 of the present generation for imported goods comes to 
 them naturally by inheritance. 
 
 No. 887. 
 “GANGES” (Tune). 
 
 This tune was composed not far from the time when 
 Occum’s hymn ws written. Its author lived in or near 
 Troy, New York, but who or what he was is quite unknown. 
 It is not impossible that the tune was written for the words 
 of Occum as it is found in books published early in the 
 century under the name of “Indian Philosopher,” and 
 accompanied by Occum’s hymn, “Awaked by Sinai’s awful 
 sound.” 
 
 No. 588. 
 “PAX TECUM” (Tune.)—1878, 
 
 Rev. G. T. Caldbeck was for many years a missionary in 
 China. While there he became greatly impressed by the 
 beauty of the hymn written by Rev. E. H. Bickersteth 
 beginning: 
 
 “Peace, perfect peace.” 
 
 and although unskilful in music, he wrote for it a tune and 
 sent it in manuscript to England, to the author of the 
 hymn. It was there corrected a little and soon after 
 published. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 597 
 No. 589. 
 “SHIRLAND” (Tune). 
 
 SAMUEL STANLEY, 1767—1822. 
 
 About a hundred years ago a little congregation of wor- 
 shippers met in what was known as Carr’s Lane Meeting 
 House, Birmingham, England. After a little the singing in 
 that church began to attract attention, and the congregation 
 increased. In a few years more the singing had become 
 famous, and it was no unusual thing for members of other 
 congregations not far distant to slip out of their own 
 churches as soon as the sermon was over, and run to Carr’s 
 Lane Meeting House to listen to the closing hymn. Samuel 
 Stanley, the composer of this tune, was-the leader of the 
 singing at this church, and it was his skill as a leader, as 
 well as his ability as a musician that made the music 
 there so famous. 
 
 No. 590. 
 “SELMA” (Tune). 
 
 Ropert ARCHIBALD SMITH, 1780—1829. 
 
 A hundred years ago, a silk weaver’s boy in the town 
 of Reading, England, was the wonder of the town for his 
 skill in playing on such a rustic whistle as all boys know 
 how to make. When a little older the whistle gave place 
 to the flute and this again to the violin. Musical talent 
 was not highly appreciated by his father, who tried his 
 best to teach him what he thought the far higher art of 
 weaving at a loom. His success was poor, and often when 
 he came to see what progress he was making with his weav- 
 ing, he would catch him scratching musical notes with a 
 
598 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 pin on the frame work of the loom. The boy became a 
 skilful musician, leader of a famous choir in Edinburgh, 
 composed a great deal of church music, this tune among 
 others, and many well-known secular songs. 
 
 No. 591. 
 “YORK” (Tune). 
 
 There is no land on the face of the earth in which the 
 singing of hymns has borne so prominent a part in its 
 history as in-Scotland. They did not call them hymns but 
 Psalms, for the words were paraphrases and usually awk- 
 ward and uncouth ones, too, of the Psalms of David. The 
 people sang them in their kirks, in their homes, as they 
 worked in the fields, or walked on the roads. They en- 
 couraged each other with them when they went into battle, 
 and voiced in them at its close their victory or defeat. 
 They sang Psalms when hunted through forests and swamps, 
 and caves, and when about to suffer martyrdom for their 
 faith. A few of the old tunes they used have come down 
 to us, and they should be retained in service if only to 
 remind us of the wonderful history interwoven with them 
 through more than three centuries. “York” is one of 
 them, and it is supposed to have been put into its 
 present form by John Milton, father of the poet who wrote 
 “Paradise Lost.” It has been a very popular tune in 
 England, and it is said that within the memory of people 
 now living it was used as a lullaby song by half the nurses 
 of England, and the chimes of many country churches 
 played it six or eight times over every twenty-four hours. 
 The tune was intended to be sung fast. In the days when 
 tunes were scarce, it has been known for “York” to be 
 sung fifteen times in one week in the same church. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 599 
 No. 592. 
 Henry J. GAUNTLETT, 1806—1876. 
 
 The little church at Olney, England, is an important 
 spot to lovers of sacred song. It was here that John Newton 
 ministered and with William Cowper wrote the hymns 
 which have endeared them both to Christian people all over 
 the world. After Newton there came a minister named 
 Gauntlett, who was a good musician, but he had a little 
 boy who was a better one; so much better that at nine years 
 of age he was appointed the organist of his father’s church. 
 Later he went to London and became one of the leaders 
 if not the pioneer in a movement that has effected a com- 
 plete revolution in the music of the church. Turn to the 
 index of composers in any hymnal published within the 
 last ten years and compare it with the similar index in 
 earlier books, and a new set of music writers will be seen 
 to have come to the front. Barnby, Dykes, Hopkins, Monk, 
 and Sir Arthur Sullivan will be found furnishing more tunes 
 than almost all others put together. And Mr. Henry J. 
 Gauntlett, the son of the Olney minister, opened the way 
 for them all. The church music of today owes much to him. 
 
 No. 593. 
 “AVON” (Tune). 
 
 Hucu Wiison, 1764—1824. 
 
 It is said that no tune book of any importance has been 
 published in Great Britain for the last sixty years that 
 does not contain this tune. And almost the same thing 
 can be said of books published in this country. It was 
 composed by a Scotch shoemaker, but it required a lawsuit 
 to find it out. Editors were in the habit of assigning it 
 
600 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 to almost any one, apparently, whom their fancy suggested, 
 but at last a Glasgow publisher, who actually owned the 
 copyright, brought suit against someone who had published 
 the tune without permission, and it was proven that Hugh 
 Wilson, a poor shoemaker, had composed it. He employed 
 his spare time in study, made sundials for those who 
 wanted them, led the Psalm singing in the village Kirk, 
 started the first Sunday school in the town where he lived, 
 and in all ways made his life as useful as he could. He 
 composed a great many tunes, but when he was dying he 
 caused the manuscript copies to be destroyed, only three 
 or four escaping. He named this tune “Fenwick” after 
 the town where he was born, but in Great Britain it is 
 now known as “Martyrdom.” 
 
 No. 594. 
 
 “THOU HOLY SPIRIT, WE PRAY TO THEE.”—Coverpate. 
 
 “NOW PRAY WE ALL GOD THE COMFORTER.”—A. T. 
 RUSSELL. 
 
 “NOW ON THE HOLY GHOST WE CALL, FOR PER. 
 FECT——-—Fry. 
 
 “TO. THEE THOU HOLY SPIRIT NOW.”—Fry. 
 
 “HOLY SPIRIT! GRANT US OUR DESIRE.”—J. Anperson. 
 
 “OH! HOLY GHOST TO THEE WE PRAY.”—Dr. J. Hunr. 
 
 “NOW CRAVE WE OF THE HOLY GHOST.”—R. Masstr. 
 
 “NOW PRAY WE TO THE HOLY GHOST.”—Grorce 
 MacDona.p. 
 
 “NOW ON THE HOLY GHOST WE CALIF. 0. Gib 
 J. D. Burns. 
 
 The above are all translations of the German: 
 “NUN BITTEN WIR DEN HEILIGEN GEIST.” 
 
 “IN PEACE AND JOY I NOW DEPART, ACCORDING—’— 
 C. WINKWworTH. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 601 
 
 “WITH PEACE AND JOY FROM EARTH I GO.”—Miss Fry. 
 
 “GOD’S WILL BE DONE! WITH JOY. OF HEART.”-J. 
 ANDERSON. 
 
 “GLADLY FROM EARTH AND TIME I CEASE.”—Dr. J. 
 Hunt. 
 
 “THY WILL BE DONE! WITH JOYFUL HEART,’ J: 
 ANDERSON. 
 
 PIN = PEACE AND JOY 1 NOW DEPART, IT IS— =k: 
 
 MAssIE. 
 
 “IN PEACE AND JOY AWAY I GO.”—GeEo. MacDonaxp. 
 
 “IN PEACE AND JOY I NOW DEPART, AS—’—GeorcE 
 
 MacDona.p. q 
 
 “IN JOY AND PEACE I ONWARD FARE.”—N. L. Frotu- 
 
 INGHAM. 
 
 
 
 The above are all translations of the German by Martin 
 Luther: 
 
 “MIT FRIED UND FREUD ICH FAHR DAHIN.” 
 
 Not long after the hymn of Martin Luther was written 
 beginning: 
 
 “Mit Fried und Freud ich fahr dahin,” 
 
 a party of nearly a hundred fishermen were engaged in 
 their work on the ice between Copenhagen and an Island 
 in the Sound that runs between Denmark and Sweden, when 
 suddenly the ice gave way and began running out with 
 the current. They were soon separated from each other 
 and about thirty of the party were drowned. While they 
 were still near together, one of them who had been religiously 
 trained called to the others, “Dear brethren, let us not fall 
 into despair because we shall lose our lives! but let us 
 prove by our conduct that we have been hearers of God’s 
 word.” And then they all joined in singing together these 
 
602 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 hymns; the first a prayer to the Holy Spirit for faith 
 and strength, and the second a metrical version of the 
 Song of Simeon, 
 
 “Now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace.” 
 
 No. 596. 
 “HOLY SPIRIT, ONCE AGAIN.”—Miss C. Winkworth. 
 
 “COME, O COME, THOU QUICKENING SPIRIT, THOU—” 
 —CHARLES W. SCHAEFFER. 
 
 “COME, THOU SPIRIT EVER LIVING.”—R. Masstr. 
 The above are all translations from the German: 
 
 “KOMM, O KOMM, DU GEIST DES LEBENS.”—Hetnricu 
 HELp. 
 
 In some cities of this country where the German element 
 was strong, the watchmen, as they went about the streets 
 at night, were accustomed in early times to call the hour 
 of the night and to add something of the condition of affairs 
 for the information of the wakeful citizens. “Twelve o'clock 
 and all’s well;” “one o’clock and a starlight night.” This 
 custom came from the Fatherland, where the watchman 
 often added to his hourly announcement a stanza from 
 some hymn or song. 
 
 The story is related by Kubler that in a town in Northern 
 Germany a very poor woman, who with her two children 
 had had nothing to eat for four days, was driven to despair 
 and in the night she resolved to murder her children. She 
 was just taking up the youngest, with a knife in her hand, 
 when the watchman, who at that moment passed under 
 her low window, and saw through a hole in the shutter 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 603 
 
 what she was intending, suddenly knocked and entered the 
 room. He inquired about her trouble, gave her a little 
 money, and promised to bring her help. And then he went 
 out to his beat and as he called the hours through the 
 streets of the city he sang a stanza of his hymn: 
 
 “And when e’er a yearning strong 
 Presses out the bitter cry 
 
 ‘Ah my God, how long, how long?’ 
 Then O let me find Thee nigh, 
 
 And thy words of healing balm 
 
 Bring me courage, patience, calm.” 
 
 No. 596. 
 
 “AGAIN THE CIRCLING SEASONS TELL.”—W. J. Copr- 
 LAND. 
 
 “HAIL THE JOYFUL DAY’S RETURN.”—R. CAMPBELL. 
 
 “BLEST JOYS FROM MIGHTY WONDERS WROUGHT.”’— 
 J. M. NEALE. 
 
 “ROUND ROLL THE WEEKS OUR HEARTS TO GREET.” 
 —wW. J. BLew. 
 
 “JOY! BECAUSE THE CIRCLING YEAR.”—J. ELLerTon 
 and F. J. A. Horr. 
 
 “AGAIN THE SLOWLY CIRCLING YEAR.”—E. CaswELt. 
 
 “BLEST SEASON! WHICH WITH GLADNESS FRAUGHT.” 
 —J. D. CHAMBERS. 
 
 These are translations of the Latin hymn “Beata nobis 
 gaudia.” Hilary of Poitiers, 305—367. 
 
604 STORIES OF THE GREAT. 
 
 About the year 305 there was born in France—it was 
 not called France then, but Gaul—a boy who later became 
 one of the greatest men of the age. His parents were idol- 
 aters and he was brought up a heathen. He was well 
 educated and in his studies he came across a copy of the 
 Bible which, out of curiosity, he began to read. He himself 
 tells the story how step-by step his reading brought him 
 out of heathenism into Christian faith. 
 
 “When I found,” he says, “in Exodus, how God was called 
 ‘IT am that I am,’ and when I read in Isaiah (40:12) of a 
 Deity who ‘held the wind in His fists,’ and again (66:1) of 
 Him who said, ‘Heaven is my throne and earth is my foot- 
 stool,’ then this surpasssed all my heathen conceptions of 
 grandeur and power. And when I read (Psalms, 138:7) how 
 this great God loved and cared for His children, so that we 
 could say, ‘though I walk in the midst of trouble, Thou wilt 
 revive me,’ ‘Thou shalt stretch forth thine hand against the 
 wrath of mine enemies, and Thy right hand shall save me, 
 then was I drawn towards this Mighty Being by a sentiment 
 of confidence and trust.” 
 
 And then he found the gospel of John—it was a new book 
 then—and its opening sentences that told of the Word, 
 “which was with God and which was God,” made the whole 
 system of Christian theology clear to him and he became a 
 Christian. The Arian heresy, which dethroned the Christ 
 for whose sake he had turned from the idolatry of his ances- 
 tors, soon spread over the land, and against it he fought 
 with tongue and pen; and when by and by its priests out- 
 numbered those who stood with him, he was banished from 
 the land. He had a wife and daughter at home, and there 
 is still to be found a letter which Abra, Hilary’s daughter, 
 wrote him while he was in exile; but more important than 
 Abra’s letter to her father, is Hilary’s answer to his 
 daughter. In it he tells her to keep her soul and her conduct 
 pure; and after much counsel he ends by enclosing two 
 hymns which she may use in the worship of God, one in the 
 morning, and the other in the evening. The evening hymn 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 605 
 
 is lost, but the morning hymn still exists, beginning in the 
 Latin, ‘Lucis largitor splendide’— 
 
 “Thou Splendid Giver of the light.” 
 
 This is the oldest Latin hymn, and Hilary is the oldest 
 Latin hymn writer, and Abra, his daughter, was the first 
 singer of these new hymns which have in later years 
 enriched our hymnody. 
 
 No. 597. 
 “EWING” (Tune). 
 
 ALEXANDER EwIne, 1830. 
 
 Just as some of our sweetest hymns have come from 
 authors whose only claim to literary fame rests on a single 
 hymn, so some of our sweetest tunes come from composers 
 who are not professional musicians. The composer of this 
 tune is a paymaster in the English Army, with the rank of 
 Lieutenant-Colonel, and wears a medal gained by service 
 in the war between England and China in 1860. It was 
 composed for the words of Bernard’s hymn beginning: 
 
 “For thee, O dear, dear Country,” ~ 
 
 but is usually used for another part of the same hymn 
 beginning, “Jerusalem, the Golden.” Hymn tinkers alter 
 nearly all our hymns and tune menders play all sorts of 
 pranks with our music. While Colonel Ewing was absent 
 in China, they got hold of his tune and, without so much as 
 saying “by your leave, sir,” they changed the time to suit 
 themselves and published it. Speaking of this he says, “In 
 my opinion the alteration of the rhythm has very much vul- 
 garized my little tune. It now seems to me a good deal like 
 a polka. I hate to hear it.” 
 
606 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 598. 
 “O’ER THOSE GLOOMY HILLS OF DARKNESS.” 
 
 Rev. Witu1AM WILuiAMs, 1717—1791. 
 
 The author of this hymn spent fifty years in traveling 
 throughout the length and breadth of his native land preach- 
 ing the gospel. On one occasion he stopped over night in 
 a little Welsh village, and next morning, arising before the 
 sun, he saw a long low range of hills lying dark under the 
 mists, but behind them in the eastern sky, the rays of the 
 morning were beginning to give promise of approaching day. 
 The imagery of this morning scene among the hills he 
 transferred to this missionary hymn. 
 
 No. 599. 
 “BETHANY” (Tune). 
 
 This tune, to which the name of Dr. Lowell Mason is 
 given as composer, brings into curious contact old times 
 and new, things sacred and things secular. Dr. Mason set 
 the tune to the hymn beginning, “Nearer, my God, to Thee,”’ 
 and its fitness for these words has kept the two together in 
 all our hymnals. But the tune is only an adaptation of an 
 old song. Nearly a hundred years ago, a young Irish poet, 
 of rollicking disposition and habits, began the issue of a 
 series of songs, set to the ancient music of Ireland. These 
 melodies were arranged for him by Sir John Stevenson, an 
 Trish violinist. They became immensely popular, and Tom 
 Moore’s “Trish Melodies” were heard at the theaters, con- 
 cert rooms, on the streets, and in the homes of the people. 
 Among these was one, still a favorite everywhere. It began 
 with the words: 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 607 
 
 “Oft in the stilly night, 
 
 Ere slumber’s chain has bound me, 
 Fond memory brings the light 
 
 Of other days around me.” 
 
 The notes of the first line of this song are the same as those 
 of the first line of “Bethany,” which is based all the way 
 through on the old Irish song. 
 
 No. 600. 
 “HERALD ANGELS” (Tune). 
 
 This tune is a fragment taken from a musical composi- 
 tion of Mendelssohn, entitled the “Festgesang,” written to 
 celebrate the fourth centenary of the invention of print- 
 ing and first performed at Leipzig, June 23, 1840. The 
 German words sung to the first line were “Gutenberg der 
 grosse Mann.” 
 
 No. 601. 
 Grorck Frepertck HANpbEL, 1685—1759. 
 
 Just two hundred years ago, a German doctor started in 
 his carriage to visit one of the German dukes. He had a 
 little boy who was very fond of music, but who had been 
 forbidden by his father to play or sing, as he considered 
 music only an amusement and not a profession. The boy, 
 knowing that at the old castle where his father was going, 
 there were music rooms and musical instruments, made up 
 his mind to accompany him, if possible, on this trip, and 
 when the carriage had gone a little way along the road, the 
 boy was found running behind it as fast as his little legs 
 would carry him. He was picked up, and promising good 
 behavior was taken along. Arriving at the castle, he was 
 
608 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 left pretty much to himself, and soon found his way to the 
 chapel and the organ. In spite of parental commands he 
 had already learned to play by stealth, and the Sunday 
 afternoon after the chapel service was over and he supposed 
 everybody had left the room, he mounted the organ stool 
 and began to play. The duke himself, however, had re- 
 mained behind and heard with astonishment the playing of 
 the six-year-old child. His influence induced the father to 
 consent that his boy should have a. musical education. This 
 was the beginning of the musical career of George Frederick 
 Handel, the composer of the “Oratorio of The Messiah,” 
 and who has been called the “Monarch of Composers.” 
 Most of the tunes of Handel now to be found in our hymnals 
 are extracts from oratorios or operas he wrote. Thus the 
 tune “Samson” comes from the oratorio of that name. It is 
 the chorus beginning: 
 
 “Then round about the starry throne” (1742). 
 “Solomon” is from a solo beginning: 
 “What though I trace,” 
 in the oratorio of “Solomon” (1748). 
 “Theodora” is from the solo in the oratorio of that name 
 beginning: 
 “Angels ever bright and fair” (1749). 
 
 “Saul” is from the “Dead March” in the oratorio of that 
 name (1738). 
 
 “Mamre” is from the solo: 
 “Shall I on Mamre’s fertile plain,” 
 in the oratorio of “Joshua” (1747). 
 
 “David” is adapted from an opera entitled “Sosarme” 
 (1732) ; 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 609 
 “Georgia” is an adaptation of a song beginning: 
 “See the conquering hero.” 
 “Saxony” is from a song in an opera entitled “Siroe” 
 (1728). 
 
 “Goss” is from a duet beginning, “Cease thy anguish,” in 
 the Oratorio “Athalia” (1733). 
 
 There are, however, three tunes composed by Handel for 
 as many of Charles Wesley’s hymns. The celebrated come- 
 dian Rich was proprietor of Covent Garden Theater in 
 London when Handel’s: oratorios were performed there. 
 Mr. Rich’s wife had been converted at a Methodist meeting 
 and had made the acquaintance of Mr. Wesley. At her 
 request Handel wrote a tune named “Gospel” for Mr. 
 Wesley’s hymn beginning: 
 
 “Rejoice the Lord is King;” 
 
 ) 
 
 one entitled “Cannons” or ‘‘Chandos” for the hymn, 
 
 “Sinners obey the gospel call’; 
 
 and one named ‘“‘Kedron”’ for the words, 
 
 “OQ Love Divine, how sweet thou art.” 
 
 No. 602. 
 
 LoweLtt Mason, 1792—1872. 
 
 About the year 1820, a young man from Massachusetts 
 became clerk in a bank in Savannah, Georgia. His aptitude 
 for music had made him the !eader of the choir in his native 
 town, and in Savannah he soon became the conductor of 
 the choir of the leading Presbyterian church of the city. 
 The collections of church music of the day were not satis- 
 factory to him, and to satisfy his own desire for something 
 
610 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 better he began collecting tunes himself. When he had 
 enough for a book, he obtained leave of absence from his 
 work, and came north to Philadelphia to get it published. 
 He was not working for money, and he offered the copy- 
 right of his collection to the publishers of that city, asking 
 no compensation but a few copies of the book for his own 
 use. But even at this price he could find no one willing to 
 undertake its publication. He made the same proposal to 
 Boston publishers but with no better success, and was about ~ 
 to return to Savannah, unsuccessful and discouraged, when a 
 musical gentleman in Boston, whom he casually met, asked 
 to see his collection. He was much pleased with it, showed it 
 to the Handel and Haydn Society, then the foremost musi- 
 cal society in Boston, and this society published the book, 
 giving its compiler an interest in the profits. The book 
 became immensely popular and quickly ran through seven- 
 teen editions. The young man was Lowell Mason, and this 
 event decided the course of his life. He gave up his posi- 
 tion at Savannah and became the organist at Dr. Lyman 
 Beecher’s Church in Boston, and from that time until the 
 end of his life was identified with the church music of the 
 country. Together with Dr. Thomas Hastings, he may be 
 said to have revolutionized the sacred music of the land. 
 He delivered lectures, conducted conventions, taught classes, 
 composed tunes, stimulated others to similar work, and in 
 all possible ways sought to arouse the interest of the people 
 in better music for their church services. And even now, 
 after so many others have arisen both in this country and 
 England as composers of sacred music, his name stands 
 most prominent in nearly every hymnal of the church. 
 
 No. 603. 
 
 FELICE DE GIARDINI, 1716-1796. 
 
 In 1750, an Italian violinist made his first appearance in 
 London, and by his superb playing created a great sensa- 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 611 
 
 tion. He remained in England more than thirty years, and 
 although he was erratic, selfish, and unpleasant, he main- 
 tained his popularity among the people by his great skill 
 upon the violin. While there the Countess of Huntingdon, 
 who had become deeply interested in the Methodist Move- 
 ment and was devoting her wealth to the establishing of 
 churches and employment of preachers, used her influence 
 upon the great violinist to get him to compose a few pieces 
 of sacred music for use in the Methodist churches. The 
 tune named “Athens” was one of these. Late in life he 
 started a comic opera in London which failed. He was in 
 no sense a religious man. 
 
 No. 604. 
 
 JEAN Baptiste FAurg, 1830. 
 
 Half a century ago or more, a boy was found drawing 
 crowds about him on the streets of Paris by the marvelous 
 voice with which he sang. Friends were found for him and 
 he received a musical education, while his voice grew purer 
 and finer as it became more cultivated. Everyone was 
 prophesying a brilliant future for him, when suddenly he 
 lost his voice, and after waiting months hoping for it to 
 return, he turned to the study. of instrumental music. 
 Awhile after, thinking of the voice he had lost, he bethought 
 himself of prayer, and prayed “give me back my voice and 
 I will use it for charity and for good.” His voice gradually 
 returned and he became the great church singer of Paris, 
 and wrote an ode to charity which has become celebrated. 
 “Palm Branches” is the work of his genius, 
 
 No. 605. 
 
 Rev. Joun Fawcett, 1739—1817. 
 
 When twenty-five years old, John Fawcett became the 
 pastor of a little Baptist church among the mountains of 
 
612 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 Yorkshire, England. His salary was twenty-five pounds a 
 year, equivalent to about one hundred and twenty dollars 
 of our money. Eight years later he accepted a call to a 
 prominent London church, and made his preparations to go, 
 but when the leave-taking came, his people gathered about 
 him with so much sorrow at the parting, and such evident 
 affection for him, that he put his goods, which were already 
 loaded upon wagons, back into the house, and sent word to 
 the London church that he could not come. It was a fortu- 
 nate thing for the song service of the church, for he put the 
 experience he had just passed through into that hymn, 
 which has become so precious: 
 
 “Blest be the tie that binds 
 Our hearts in Christian love.” 
 
 The sequel is that he remained pastor of that little church 
 for more than fifty years, until a stroke of paralysis ended 
 his ministry and his life. How he managed to support a 
 wife and family upon so meager a salary is partly explained 
 by a notice printed on the flyleaf of a hymn book which he 
 compiled, and which read as follows: 
 
 “At Brearly Hall, in Midgely, near Halifax, a pleasant 
 and healthy situation. Youths are genteely boarded and 
 trained up.in useful learning, with great tenderness, fidelity, 
 and care, and upon reasonable terms.” 
 
 No. 606. 
 “JESUS LOVES ME, THIS I KNOW.” 
 
 Miss Anna B. Warner, 1822. 
 
 In 1880, Miss Warner published a novel entitled, “Say and 
 Seal.” One of the heroes of the book is a little motherless 
 boy named Johnny Fax, who learns the story of the love 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 613 
 
 of Jesus from his day school teacher, Mr. Linden, and his 
 Sunday-school teacher, Faith, Derrick. Johnny is taken 
 sick, and these two teachers become his nurses. The little 
 boy is never so happy as when he is nestling in Mr. Linden’s 
 arms, and forgets his suffering and falls alseep, while he 
 tells him Bible stories or sings to him some children’s hymns. 
 The day on which the little boy died, he was very restless, 
 and had asked Mr. Linden to “walk,” and so wrapped in his 
 teacher’s arms he was being carried back and forth across 
 the room. The motion soothed his restlessness and soon he 
 said, “Sing,” and so Mr. Linden, as he walked with the 
 little dying boy, sang to him softly, the words of this hymn: 
 
 “Jesus loves me this I know 
 
 For the Bible tells me so. 
 
 Little ones to Him belong, 
 
 They are weak but He is strong.” 
 
 The author of the hymn in writing about it says that, 
 “for the time Johnny Fax was so intensely real, so vividly 
 in my heart, that the hymn was written for him, as if he 
 had been a living child.” 
 
 No. 607. 
 FreLtix MENDELSSOHN-BaArRTHOLDY, 1809—1847. 
 
 One evening a friend entered a room where a young man 
 was seated apparently buried in thought with an open Bible 
 before him. He started up as he saw his visitor and his face 
 was gleaming with light. 
 
 “Tisten,”’ said he, and then he read from the book before 
 him, that passage from the First Book of Kings: “And 
 behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and strong wind 
 rent the mountains, and brake in pieces the rocks, before 
 the Lord; but the Lord was not in the wind, and after the 
 wind an earthquake; but the Lord was not in the earth- 
 
614 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 quake, and after the earthquake, a fire; but the Lord was 
 not in the fire; and after the fire a still small voice.” 
 {I Kings, 19:11, 12.) This was Felix Mendelssohn, and he 
 read the words which had inspired him to write that won- 
 derful Oratorio of “Elijah.” Nine years of labor did the 
 musician put into that composition, and then on August 
 26, 1846, he led in its first performance at the annual musi- 
 cal festival at Birmingham, England. A great audience 
 gathered from all over England greeted his appearance, and 
 remained spellbound as the musical drama proceeded, and 
 when at the close the composer moved away from his place 
 on the stage, cheer upon cheer greeted his ears from every 
 side. It was for him a moment of splendid triumph, but a 
 triumph that cost him his life, for even while he was receiv- 
 ing the congratulations of kings and princes, upon the great 
 work he had composed, he became weak from exhaustion. 
 
 “Play, play,” said a friend to him just afterward. 
 
 “T cannot play,” was the reply, “I have no strength,” and 
 within a year he had died. 
 
 No. 608. 
 Rev. SAMUEL DunN. 
 
 A gentleman once invited another to go with him to an 
 outdoor religious service. He said, describing it, that when 
 they entered the town he found himself marched in a proces- 
 sion with a lot of praying and singing men, to a position just 
 in front of a booth occupied by a company of wandering 
 actors, where he soon discovered that it would be almost 
 impossible for him to preserve his gravity. He saw directly 
 before him the clown of the company, grinning by the side 
 of a huge, black dog standing on its hind legs with clerical 
 bands around its neck and one of the tracts issued by the 
 man, at whose invitation he had gone, dangling from his 
 paw. But while he was finding it so hard to repress a smile, 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH ~ 615 
 
 not a muscle of his leader’s face was moved. He was there 
 with an important, message, which he intended to deliver. 
 With a clear voice he gave out a hymn, and his men sang 
 with all their voices, and they had need to, for the actors’ 
 band struck up and the clown began to caper. When the 
 singing was ended, several men prayed, and then he himself 
 was called upon to speak, but failed to be heard above the 
 din from the stage. Then the leader tried, and when he 
 failed he stood silent holding up one after another, large 
 placards, with scripture sentences printed on them. At last 
 the players tried throwing fireworks among the people on the 
 preachers’ stand, and a party of rough miners, who up to 
 this point had Sniuyed the fun, decided that this was not 
 fair play, and made a grand onset on the players’ band and 
 drove them all from the scene, and then the leader secured 
 a quiet crowd and gave to them an earnest gospel sermon. 
 Such a man must certainly have been earnest and such a 
 man must certainly have been brave. It was Samuel Dunn. 
 
 No. 609. 
 “WEBB” (Tune). 
 
 Grorce JAMES Wess, 1803—1887. 
 
 This tune, which is associated in all minds with the 
 missionary hymn, beginning: 
 
 “The morning light is breaking,” 
 
 was written on the ocean in 1830, as a pein song. It 
 was first published with the words: 
 
 “Tis dawn, the lark is singing.” 
 
 For forty years Webb was organist of the Old South Church, 
 Boston, and was a Swedenborgian in religion. 
 
616 * STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 No. 610. 
 “EVENTIDE” (Tune). 
 
 This tune first appears in “Hymns Ancient and Modern.” 
 The general charge of this book was in the hands of Sir 
 Henry Baker, while Dr. Monk had charge of the musical 
 matter. One evening they were going out together, when 
 they suddenly remembered that there was no tune provided 
 for Lyte’s hymn “Abide with Me,” and on the spur of the 
 moment Dr. Monk sat down and wrote. it, inside of ten 
 minutes, although one of his assistants sat at a piano within 
 six feet of him, playing a Fantasia by Thalberg. 
 
 No. 611. 
 “KILMARNOCK” (Tune). 
 
 Nert Doveuas, 1776—1862. 
 
 In the same year when our independence as a nation was 
 declared, a boy was born at Greenock, a little seaport town 
 of Scotland. The boy was fond of boats and of the sea, and 
 so he naturally became a sailor. When eighteen years of 
 age, he was sailing on a privateer engaged in the war be- 
 tween England and France, and their ship was lying at the 
 port where he was born, when news came of Lord Howe’s 
 great victory over the French fleet. His vessel with others 
 was ordered to fire a salute. Neil was helping to handle a 
 cannon when, by a premature discharge, his right arm was 
 torn off, his right cheek carried away, and his eyesight 
 destroyed. The boy had always been a favorite, and friends 
 eathered round him after this calamity and helped in every 
 possible way to make his life cheerful. At their suggestion 
 he learned to sing, and progressed so rapidly that he was 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 617 
 
 soon teaching music himself, and this he kept on doing with 
 great success until old age compelled him to give it up. 
 He composed a hundred and fifty pieces of sacred music, 
 and a few secular songs. 
 
 No. 612. 
 “ST. MATTHEW” (Tune). 
 
 Composed by William Croft, an English organist. We 
 often hear of persons being affected to tears by the reading 
 of some hymn which stirs their emotions. This tune 
 affords an instance of the same result following the per- 
 formance of a piece of music. At a great musical festival 
 at York, England, in 1823, the celebrated singer Catalini 
 heard this tune sung and was so affected by it that she 
 could with the greatest difficulty regain her composure 
 enough to sing the song: 
 
 “Angels ever bright and fair,” 
 which she was expected to do at the close of the singing 
 of this piece. 
 No. 618. 
 “HYMNS ANCIENT AND MODERN.” 
 
 Rev. Sir Henry WituiaMs Baker, 1821—1877. 
 Dr. Wiuut1am Henry Monk, 1823—1889. 
 
 Without doubt the most remarkable hymnal ever com- 
 piled is the English book entitled, ““Hymns Ancient and 
 Modern.” It was first published in 1861 and its immense 
 popularity can be imagined from the fact that in the twenty- 
 eight years following over twenty-seven millions of copies 
 were sold. The literary work was done by a syndicate of 
 
618 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 about forty clergymen all connected with the Church of 
 England, with Rev. Sir Henry Williams Baker as their 
 leader. Upon him fell the larger share of the work, but it 
 was not any superiority in the hymns selected that gave to 
 the book its popularity, so much as the peculiar beauty and 
 fitness of its tunes. The musical editor was Dr. William 
 Henry Monk. Some of the music he composed himself and 
 he was wonderfully successful in obtaining the aid of the 
 best living composers of church music. He was an enthu- 
 siast in his profession. Tunes came to him at all sorts of 
 times and in all sorts of places. The tune named “Aber,” 
 which he composed for the words “O perfect life of love,” 
 came to him in the night, and he got out of bed to note it 
 down. The tune “Advent,” sometimes named ‘“Beverly,” 
 written for the words “Thou art coming, O my Savior,” 
 was composed on a railway train. “Baster Hymn” was 
 written in competition for a prize of five: guineas, which 
 had been offered by an English Musical Society for the 
 best music for the words: 
 
 “Jesus Christ is risen today.” 
 
 and which was awarded to this tune. “Eventide,” written 
 for the words: 
 
 “Abide with me, fast falls the eventide,” 
 
 was undertaken on the spur of the moment and completed 
 within ten minutes, while one of Thalberg’s Fantasias was 
 being played on a piano only a few feet distant from where 
 the composer sat. But it was Monk’s music and his skill 
 in selecting music which gave to the hymn book named its 
 phenomenal success. So that it has been pithily said con- 
 cerning it that while “in a dozen years from the date of its 
 publication not twenty of its original hymns were sung as 
 written, in the churches, not twenty of its tunes were 
 unsung in the same churches.” 
 

 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 619 
 No. 614. 
 “THE CREATION” (Oratorio). 
 
 When Francis Joseph Haydn was old and feeble, in 1809, 
 the people of Vienna desired to do him honor, and so 
 arranged for a performance of this oratorio with all possible 
 arrangement for effective performance. Haydn had to be 
 carried to the theater. When the music reached the place 
 where occurs the words, “Let there be light,’’ Haydn arose, 
 and pointing toward heaven said, “It comes from thence,” 
 and then the people remembered that Haydn had done his 
 work under the influence and help of prayer, and knew that 
 he felt that he had been inspired from heaven. 
 
 No. 618. 
 
 “ST. ALPHEGE” (Tune). 
 
 Dr. Henry J. GAUNTLETT. 
 
 While the composer was at dinner one evening, a mes- 
 senger came from the church to tell him that the prayer 
 tune for a hymn they were to sing that evening, beginning: 
 
 “The hymn of glory sing we,” 
 
 was mislaid, and asking what should be done. “Give me 
 some paper,” said Dr. Gauntlett, and in a few minutes this 
 tune was written and sent back by the messenger. 
 
 No. 616. 
 
 Rev. JouHN Baccnus Dykes, 1823—1876. 
 
 Many of the tunes which have become standards among 
 us, are regular, and solid in their composition, and are 
 
620 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 applicable to the words of almost any of the old meters in 
 which they are written. To compose a tune that in addi- 
 tion to suiting the meter also embodies the sentiment of a 
 particular hymn 1s comparatively a recent improvement in 
 our song worship. Rev. J. B. Dykes, who died in 1876, may 
 almost be said to be the originator of the idea. Many of 
 his tunes were written with the purpose of making the music 
 the exponent of one particular hymn, and it was his desire 
 that the words and the music might become so fitted to 
 each other as to become inseparable companions. To these 
 tunes he gave names which are suggestive of the theme. 
 Examples are to be found in the tunes named “Veni 
 Creator,” written for a hymn beginning: 
 
 “Come Holy Ghost, Creator, Come”; 
 
 “St. Crosse,” for a hymn on the Crucifixion; “Anatolius,” 
 for the hymn beginning: 
 
 “The day is past and over”; 
 
 written by an old Greek hymn writer by that name. 
 “Nicwa,”’ written for the hymn beginning: 
 
 “Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty,” 
 
 which is a hymn on the Trinity, Nicea being the town 
 in which the famous Council met which proclaimed the 
 “Nicene Creed,” in which the doctrine of the Trinity was 
 first formulated. “Olivet,” written for the Ascension hymn 
 beginning: 
 
 “Thou art gone up on high,” 
 and named for the Mount of Olives from which Christ 
 
 ascended; “Melita,” written for the hymn for sailors, 
 beginning: 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 621 
 
 “Eternal Father! strong to save, 
 Whose arm doth bind the restless wave.” 
 
 the tune being named for the island where St. Paul was 
 shipwrecked; “Requiescat,”’ written for the hymn of rest, 
 beginning: 
 
 “Now the laborer’s task is over.” 
 
 Dr. Dykes was a vicar of the Church of England, and 
 he made the composition of a tune as much a religious 
 service as the writing of a sermon, always offering a short 
 prayer before commencing to compose a piece of music. 
 He made his family his critics. It was the practice for his 
 children to spend Sunday evenings singing hymns to the 
 music their father had written for them, and as they sang 
 they offered suggestions and criticisms which he not infre- 
 quently adopted. 
 
 No. 617, 
 “OLD HUNDRED” (Tune). 
 
 Many attempts have been made to trace this tune to its 
 source, and at least one entire book has been devoted to the 
 effort, but all without success. Its first appearance, so far 
 as known, was in what is known as the “Genevan Psalter” 
 in 1551. This book was first. published in 1548 by Clement 
 Marot and then contained thirty psalms in the French 
 language. John Calvin, the theologian about whose doc- 
 trines people quarrel so much these days, induced him to 
 add to this, and two years later a second edition was pub- 
 lished containing fifty psalms. The tune of “Old Hun- 
 dred” was not in either of these books, but, Marot having 
 died, Calvin induced his friend Beza to continue the work 
 and in 1551 he issued a new edition with thirty-four new 
 Psalms, and in this “Old Hundred” appeared, set to the 
 
622 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 words of the one hundred and thirty-fourth Psalm. Very 
 little church music at that time was strictly original. Many 
 of the tunes in this Psalter are known to be but scraps of 
 other music arranged together in a new way, and there are 
 come evidences that this grand old tune had such an ignoble 
 origin. The tune found its way to England very soon and 
 was published there set to the one hundredth Psalm in 
 1562. It then went by the name of “The Hundredth.” By 
 and by the Psalm book of Sternhold and Hopkins, then in 
 use, was superseded by that of Tate and Brady, and this 
 tune, because it came out of the old book, was dubbed 
 “Old Hundredth,” which in later times was shortened to 
 “Old Hundred.” . 
 
 No. 618. 
 “MY COUNTRY, ’TIS OF THEE.” 
 
 Rev. SaAMuEL FrANcIs SmitH, 1808. 
 
 The author of this hymn tells the story of its origin. He 
 says: “I was one dismal day in the month of February 
 standing near my window and casually turning over a col- 
 lection of German songs which had been presented to me by 
 Lowell Mason, one of the most noted musicians of that time. 
 I came to one which I liked. My attention was attracted 
 to the words, which were of a patriotic nature, and the 
 impulse came over me to make a patriotic hymn for my 
 own country. I began at once and at the end of half an 
 hour put the piece into my portfolio and went to my supper, 
 thinking no more of the circumstance. The next time I 
 went to Boston I took the song with me and gave it to Mr. 
 Mason. He did not refer to it at our next meeting and it 
 passed wholly out of my mind. On the next Fourth of 
 July, as I was passing Park Street Church, I was attracted 
 by the sound of music. I entered and found the building 
 filled with boys and girls engaged in celebrating the day. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 623 
 
 Glancing over a program held by a person in front of me, 
 I saw that the last piece was a song entitled, ‘My Country, 
 ‘tis of Thee.’” The tune to which we sing it, and which 
 we have rechristened “America,” is of disputed origin. It 
 was probably composed by Henry Carey, an Englishman, 
 who was born in 1685 and died in 1743. A public banquet 
 was given in 1740 to celebrate the capture of Porto Bello, 
 a South American city, by Admiral Vernon of the English 
 Navy. At this feast Carey sang a song, the words and 
 music of which were supposed to be his own. The words 
 were the ones which altered a little are now used in Great 
 Britain as a national hymn, beginning: 
 
 “God bless our: gracious Queen,” 
 
 and the music is the same as that to which we sing, 
 
 “My Country, ’tis of Thee.” 
 It can scarcely now be claimed as a national hymn, for 
 Prussia, Hanover, Brunswick, Saxony, Sweden, and other 
 European nations make use of it similar to ours. So that 
 it has almost become an International Hymn. If Carey, 
 
 the composer, needs additional honor, it may be added that 
 he also wrote the song entitled: 
 
 “Sally in Our Alley.” 
 
 He ended his life by suicide. 
 No. 619. 
 
 “GOD OF MY LIFE, WHOSE GRACIOUS POWER.” 
 
 Rev. Cartes Wesiey, 1708—1788. 
 
 This hymn well illustrates the skill with which editors 
 have often by pruning fitted a hymn of private experience 
 
624 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 to public worship. The whole hymn contains fifteen stanzas, 
 and in them the author recounts particular instances of 
 God’s providential care of him. He tells of deliverances 
 from shipwreck, fever, and other diseases, and from death 
 itself. Out of these the editors have culled a stanza here 
 and there fit for general use. 
 
 No. 620. 
 “HEAR, LORD, THE SONG OF PRAISE AND PRAYER.” 
 Wiiu1am Cowper, 1731—1800. 
 
 Mr. Cowper, one day in 1789, wrote a letter to a friend 
 sn which he said, “My friend, the vicar of the next parish 
 (Olney), engaged me day before yesterday to furnish him 
 next Sunday with a hymn to be sung on occasion of his 
 preaching to the children of the Sunday school, of which 
 hymn I have not yet produced a syllable.” He got the 
 hymn finished, however, before Sunday, and this is it. 
 
 No. 621. 
 “IN THE HOUR OF TRIAL, JESU, PRAY FOR ME.” 
 James Montcomery, 1771—1854. 
 
 In 1834, a lady asked the author of this hymn to write 
 something in her album. He compiled and wrote there this 
 hymn, entitling it “Prayers for Pilgrimage,” and basing it 
 on the words of Jesus to Peter, “I have prayed for thee, 
 that thy faith fail not.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 625 
 
 No. 622, 
 “IN SLEEP’S SERENE OBLIVION LAID.” 
 Joun Hawkeswortu, 1715—1773. 
 
 John Hawkesworth did not have the advantages of early 
 education, but was trained to mechanical occupation. He 
 taught himself, however, and acquired such a reputation as 
 a writer as to receive the degree of LL.D. One night, about 
 a month before his death, he was unable to sleep, and so 
 occupied the time in composing this hymn, which in the 
 morning he dictated to his wife. 
 
 No. 628. 
 “STRONG SON OF GOD, IMMORTAL LOVE.” 
 ALFRED, Lorp Tennyson, 1809. 
 
 The author of this hymn, while at Trinity College, Cam- 
 bridge, England, about 1828, formed an intimate friendship 
 with Arthur H. Hallam, a son of the historian. Hallam 
 afterward became engaged to Tennyson’s sister. Hallam 
 had finished his college course and was studying law. In 
 1833, with his father, he visited the Continent, and while at 
 Vienna a sudden rush of blood to the head caused his death. 
 As Tennyson described it, “God’s finger touched him and 
 he slept.” The impressions produced by this sudden death 
 of his intimate friend led Tennyson to write what is perhaps 
 his best poem, “In Memoriam.” This is the introduction to 
 that poem. . 
 
626 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 624. 
 “TAKE MY LIFE AND LET IT BE.” 
 
 Miss Frances Ripper Haverear, 1836—1879. 
 
 The author of this hymn went for a five-day visit to the 
 home of some friends. It was in 1874. There were ten 
 persons in the house, some unconverted and some Chris- 
 tians, but as she says “not rejoicing Christians.” She 
 prayed, “Lord give me all in this house,”’ and as she writes 
 it in her somewhat exuberant style, “And He just did! 
 Before I left the house every one had got a blessing. The 
 last night of my visit I was too happy to sleep and passed 
 most of the night in praise and renewal of my own conse- 
 cration, and these little couplets formed themselves and 
 chimed in my heart one after another till they finished 
 with, ‘Ever, only, All for thee.’ 2 
 
 No. 625. 
 “THY WORD, O LORD, THY PRECIOUS WORD ALONE.” 
 
 AtrreD MIpLANE, 1825. 
 
 One hymn has sometimes led to the writing of another. 
 The author of this hymn was one Sunday morning walking 
 along the shore of an English lake thinking of Cardinal 
 Newman’s hymn, “Lead, kindly Light,” the circumstances 
 that led to its being written, and the later career of its 
 author, whom he had just seen, arrayed in all the glory of 
 a Cardinal at a requiem mass. His thought was that the 
 light that, Newman sought was a delusive one like the “Will 
 o’ the Wisp,” and that the only safe light to follow in time 
 of doubt and uncertainty is the word of God. With this 
 thought he took out his memorandum book and wrote this 
 hymn. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 627 
 No. 626. 
 “WHAT CAN WASH AWAY MY STAIN?” 
 
 Rev. Ropert Lowry, 1826. 
 
 A man, whose wicked life was troubling him, was travel- 
 ing by night on a railway train. He stopped at a station 
 and a workman passed along with his hammer testing the 
 wheels, and as he went from wheel to wheel he sang softly 
 to himself the words: 
 
 “What can wash away my stain? 
 Nothing but the blood of Jesus. 
 
 What can make me whole again? 
 Nothing but the blood of Jesus.” 
 
 The words of the song brought to the troubled heart in the 
 car above him the message of peace, and he went on his 
 way, rejoicing in the “blood which cleanseth from all sin.” 
 
 No. 627. 
 “HARK THE GOSPEL NEWS IS SOUNDING.” 
 
 Rev. Hucu*Bourne, 1772—1852. 
 
 WILLIAM SANDERS. 
 
 This has been called “The Primitive Methodist Grand 
 March,” from the fact that it is much used by them in out- 
 door processions. It was once being sung at the dusk of 
 evening in a little English hamlet, and a young man who 
 was just then anxiously thinking of his soul’s greatest need, 
 was leaning against a wall a little way off. He heard the 
 music, and the words of the refrain were borne to him too, 
 
628 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 on the cool evening air, “none need perish.” It was the 
 message he needed just at that time, and it led him to 
 Christ. 
 
 No. 628. 
 “AH, HOW SHALL FALLEN MAN.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Watts, 1674—1748. 
 
 A good deal is said and said justly about the altering or 
 mending of hymns. A hymn becomes perhaps a favorite 
 with us, and we find out who its author was, and there is a 
 sort of bond of friendship between us, for did he not write 
 a hymn we have learned to love? Well, perhaps he did and 
 perhaps he didn’t. Here is one written by the inventor of 
 hymns, Dr. Watts, but it has been so amended and emended, 
 transposed and altered, that only a single line remains just 
 as its author wrote it. That line is worthy of note; it is the 
 third line of the first stanza: 
 
 “Tf he contend in righteousness.” 
 
 No. 629. 
 “MY JESUS AS THOU WILT.” 
 
 Rev. BENJAMIN ACHMOLKE, 1672—1737. 
 
 There was a time in Germany, from about 1650 to 1750, 
 when religion was at a very low ebb. Lutheranism had, as 
 one expresses it, been petrified from living conviction into 
 dead dogma, and most of the people while giving a formal 
 observance to religious services, applied very little of it to 
 their lives. It was the first part of the eighteenth century 
 of which it was said that in Germany no satire could be 
 witty except at the expense of the Bible, and Bible texts or 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 629 
 
 sacred hymns were made the frequent subject of jest and 
 laughter. At that time there arose in Geimany a movement 
 looking to more spiritual living, which was afterward in 
 contempt called Pietism. The Pietists prohibited many 
 forms of amusement, were evangelical in their doctrine, and 
 as the name implies taught the highest. piety in life and 
 thought. Although very different from the Methodist move- 
 ment which arose in England three-quarters of a century 
 later, it still in many respects bore a striking resemblance 
 to it. Methodism and Piétism were alike a reaction from a 
 formal lifeless religious condition; they both obtained their 
 names from the ridicule of their opponents, and each gave 
 rise to what might be called a new style of religious hymns. 
 The author of this hymn was a Pietist, 
 
 No. 630. 
 “SAVIOR, VISIT THY PLANTATION.” 
 
 Rev. Joun Newton, 1725—1807. 
 
 John Newton wrote in his diary in 1775, “I usually make 
 one hymn a week to expound at the Great House.” The 
 “Great House” was a large unoccupied residence in Olney, 
 the use of which Newton had obtained for the weekly 
 prayer meeting of his people. A hymn that can be “ex- 
 pounded” is a hymn that will live. Newton’s hymns are 
 not of high poetic merit, but they can be “expounded,” and 
 so they fit imto human experience, and meet a want of 
 Christian singers. Those weekly prayer meetings at the 
 “Great House” in Olney must have been of unusual interest. 
 Cowper, the poet, was a regular attendant; so bashful that 
 he could seldom be induced to take any part, and yet gifted 
 in prayer as much as in poetry, but Newton himself ex- 
 pounding to his people one of his own hymns must have 
 given to those gatherings a peculiar charm. Imagine him 
 reading for the first time the hymn: 
 
630 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “Savior, visit Thy plantation! 
 Grant us, Lord, a gracious rain! 
 
 All will come to desolation, 
 Unless Thou return again.” 
 
 We can almost imagine we hear his voice. “Ah, how I 
 remember the time when I was working on a plantation on 
 the African coast. We were only ten degrees from the 
 equator and the heat was almost unbearable. From No- 
 vember to May no rain fell and the ground became dry and 
 parched. Nothing grew; nothing could grow. ‘The little 
 slips of lemon plants I had set out during the rainy season 
 of the year before, which then looked gay and green, 
 were drooping and likely to die. Nothing that we could do 
 was of any help; help could only come from the sky. How 
 we watched the clouds along the horizon, and hoped they 
 would not keep at a distance, but would come to us with 
 their reviving showers. Just as it is in our spiritual lives, 
 there come times when our religious life seems dried up. 
 There is no growth, no fruit, no beauty. Our hearts seem 
 dry and stony. We think of the times when our spirits 
 were nourished by God’s word, and we were happy, and we 
 compare those times with these and think what a sad de- 
 cline there is. We need a rain! a rain from heaven! A 
 shower of God’s grace. Let us pray for it my people, that 
 from this very hour while we are gathered here, God may 
 begin to revive His work in our hearts.” 
 
 And so out of his own experience he would expound to 
 them the hymn. And then perhaps he would tell them the 
 story how once his master on the plantation sneeringly said 
 to him as he pointed to the little plants he had set out, 
 “Who knows but by the time these grow up and bear, you 
 may go home to England, obtain the command of a ship 
 and come back to eat their fruit.’ But just what he said to 
 me so tauntingly actually happened, for I did go home to 
 England, and became Captain of a ship, and I really did 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 631 
 
 go back and saw those very plants I had set out grown to 
 trees and bearing fruit.” 
 
 No. 631. 
 “QO MASTER, IT IS GOOD TO BE.” 
 
 Rev. AktTHUR PENRHYN STANLEY, 1815—1881. 
 
 It is a little remarkable that when the Bible has been 
 versified from beginning to end and almost every scene it 
 depicts made the subject of many hymns, so noteworthy 
 an event as the Transfiguration should have been overlooked. 
 Charles Wesley, with his six thousand hymns, has none 
 of this subject, nor Watts, nor Doddridge. The fact that 
 in all English hymnology there was no Transfiguration hymn 
 was brought to the attention of Dean Stanley, and it led 
 him to write this hymn. 
 
 No. 632. 
 Mrs. Ceci Frances ALEXANDER, 1823. 
 
 In the house of a gentleman in County Tyrone in the 
 North of Ireland, it was the custom for each member of 
 the family to deposit in a box in the father’s study, such 
 compositions either in poetry or prose as they chose to 
 write. This practice was begun with the children of the 
 family as soon as they could write. It was understood that 
 the writing was to be disguised so that the authors of 
 the pieces would not be known. Every Saturday evening the 
 box was emptied and the compositions read and talked 
 about by the family. Soon after one of the little daughters 
 of the family learned to write, scraps of poetry began to 
 make their appearance in the box, and as she grew older 
 these poetic bits became longer and better, and it was not 
 long until the father and mother had discovered that their 
 
632 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 daughter Fannie had the true gift of poetry. She is now 
 the wife of Rev. William Alexander, Bishop of Derry, who 
 has himself written some very good hymns, but none so 
 popular as those of his wife. She has written nearly four 
 hundred, and one little book of hers entitled “Hymns for 
 Little Children” has reached a sale of more than a quarter 
 of a million of copies. She receives quite an income from 
 her literary work, all of which she devotes to the support of 
 a school for deaf mutes located near her home. 
 
 Baths u-9e No. 633. 
 “HARK, THE VOICE OF JESUS CALLING.” 
 
 Rey. Dantet Marcu, 1816. 
 
 The author of this hymn was to preach in Philadelphia 
 on the eighteenth of October, 1868, to the Christian Associa- 
 tion of that city. At the last moment almost, he learned 
 that one of the hymns that had been selected was not 
 suitable to his theme, which was based on the words in 
 Isaiah, 6:8, “Here am I, send me.” In “great haste,” he 
 says, he wrote this hymn to be substituted for the other, 
 and it was sung from the manuscript. Although written 
 so hurriedly it is scarcely ever altered in the collections 
 containing it. 
 
 No. 634. 
 “LORD, WHILE FOR ALL MANKIND WE PRAY.” 
 
 Rev. Joun ReEYNELL WREFORD. 
 
 When Queen Victoria ascended the throne of England, 
 there was a new inspiration given to the poets of that 
 country, and songs and hymns were brought out in great 
 numbers on subjects connected with the new Queen or the 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 633 
 
 nation. This was one of the number, and it was intended 
 as a prayer for the nation under its new ruler. 
 
 No. 635. 
 “TO-DAY THE SAVIOR CALLS.” 
 
 Tuomas Hastincs. 
 
 Sometimes a hymn is sung under circumstances which 
 make it almost prophetic. On the evening when the Chicago 
 fire broke out, Mr. D. L. Moody spoke at Farwell Hall 
 to an audience of three thousand persons. During the 
 meeting this hymn was sung, and ten persons expressed 
 their determination to begin the Christian life. As they 
 went out into the street, the flames were seen rising high 
 against the sky, and three of the number perished in the 
 conflagration. 
 
 No. 636. 
 “DAY IS DYING IN THE WEST.” 
 
 Miss Mary A. LatHupury. 
 
 You know the story of “Ten Times One is Ten” written 
 by Dr. Edward Everett Hale. Dr. Hale formulated a 
 motto for one of these ““Ten Times One Clubs.” It was: 
 
 “Look up and not down, 
 Look out and not in, 
 Look forward and not back, 
 Lend a hand.” 
 
 Miss Mary A. Lathbury saw these mottoes on the wall of 
 a friend’s parlor in 1874, in Orange, New Jersey, and con- 
 ceived the thought of a “Look up Legion” which has grown 
 
634 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 into a membership of many thousands among the boys and 
 girls of the Methodist Church. This same Miss Lath- 
 bury has “lent a hand” in our service of song, by- writing this 
 and other hymns. This one was written in the summer of 
 1880 at the request of Rev. John H. Vincent as a vesper 
 song for meetings of the “C. L. §. C.,” of which he was 
 the head. 
 
 No. 637. 
 “CHRIST, FOR THE WORLD WE SINv.” 
 
 Rev. SAMUEL WOLCOTT. 
 
 In the year 1869, the Young Men’s Christian Associa- 
 tions of Ohio met in convention in one of the churches 
 of Cleveland. Across the end of the audience room above 
 the pulpit, they had hung in evergreen letters the motto, 
 “Christ for the world, and the world for Christ.” Dr. 
 Wolcott saw the motto as he sat in the meeting; it fixed 
 itself in his mind, and on his way home, as he walked along 
 the street, he put it into the words of this hymn. 
 
 No. 638. 
 “BEYOND THE STARRY SKIES.” 
 
 In most books, this hymn is credited to Rev. James 
 Fanch alone or coupled with Dr. Daniel Turner, both 
 English Baptists, but their version is probably an enlarge- 
 ment of an earlier piece composed by John Berridge, a very 
 eccentric but very devoted minister of the Church of 
 England, and his brother, who was a humble porter. 
 
 _ The story is told that the clergyman called on his 
 
 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 635 
 
 brother to take a letter for him, and received the reply that 
 he “couldn’t go as he was writing a hymn.” ‘“That’s my 
 business,” said the preacher, “you take the letter and Ill 
 finish the hymn.” When the porter got back his clerical 
 brother had not yet completed the hymn, the last stanza 
 proving too much for him. 
 
 “O, I have that,” cried the porter, and added the four 
 last lines a little differently from our present version: 
 
 “They brought his chariot from above, 
 To bear him to his throne. 
 Clapped their triumphant wings and cried, 
 ‘The glorious work is done.’ ” 
 
 No. 639. 
 “FRIEND AFTER FRIEND DEPARTS.” 
 
 JAMES MONTGOMERY. 
 
 When Montgomery was in middle life (forty-six) there 
 came to Sheffield where he lived a clergyman of the Church 
 of England to be curate of the church in that city. Although 
 Montgomery was a Moravian he soon formed a close friend- 
 ship with the curate. They compiled a hymn book together, 
 each furnishing many of his own composition, while to- 
 gether they edited the hymns of other writers, altering, and 
 clipping, and adding to them in a way which was reckless 
 of all authority or respect; but however much they may 
 have hurt the feelings of other poets, their own friendship 
 was cemented very closely by the work, so that when, 
 after six years of companionship, Dr. Cotterill died, 
 Mr. Montgomery enshrined his grief in the words of this 
 hymn, 
 
636 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 No. 640. 
 “RETURN, O WANDERER TO THY HOME.” 
 
 Tuomas HASTINGS. 
 
 Not far from the year 1830, a minister at Utica, New 
 York, was preaching a sermon on “The Prodigal Son.” 
 Two hundred converts were present. At the close of the 
 sermon the preacher cried with very tender emphasis, 
 “Sinner, come home! Come home! Come home!” The 
 author of this hymn was present. He had already returned 
 to his Father himself, but the words so impressed him that 
 he made them the keynote of a hymn which has been very 
 effective in revival services ever since, and so has perpetu- 
 ated the Utica sermon. 
 
 No. 641. 
 “FROM GREENLAND’S ICY. MOUNTAINS.” 
 
 Rev. R. HEsBer. 
 
 The second stanza of this hymn gives an example of 
 correct description: 
 
 “What though the spicy breezes 
 Blow soft o’er Ceylon’s isle.” 
 
 A few years after the hymn was written its author went 
 to India as Bishop of Calcutta and when off the Island of 
 Ceylon he noted in his journal, “Though we were too far 
 off Ceylon to catch the odors of the land, yet it is, we 
 are assured, perfectly true that such odors are perceptible 
 to a very considerable distance. In the straits of Malacca 
 a smell like that of a hawthorn hedge is commonly experi- 
 enced, and from Ceylon at thirty or forty miles, under 
 certain circumstances a yet more agreeable scent is inhaled.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 637 
 No. 642. 
 “JESUS, I LOVE THY CHARMING NAME.” 
 
 Rev. Puimure Doppripce. - 
 
 The name of Jesus often remains with the aged and 
 feeble-minded after other names are forgotten. There is 
 a story of an old minister who had grown quite feeble 
 in mind from long illness, who instantly roused himself 
 when some one in his presence spoke of Christ with doubt 
 of his divinity and his equality with God. “Stuff! poison!” 
 he exclaimed, “do not let it into your minds!” and then 
 he repeated this hymn with vigor and emphasis. As soon 
 as he had finished it he relapsed again into apparent indif- 
 ference to the persons and the conversation around him. 
 
 No. 648. 
 “IF YOU CANNOT ON THE OCEAN.” 
 
 Mrs ELvten Huntinepon Gates. 
 
 About this hymn the author says, “The lines were written 
 upon my slate, one snowy afternoon, in the winter of 1860. 
 I know, as I know now, that the poem was only a simple 
 little thing; but somehow I had a presentiment that it 
 had wings, and would fly into sorrowful hearts, uplifting 
 and strengthening them.” 
 
 No. 644. 
 JOHANN Wa.ruer, 1496—1570. 
 
 In a little German village there lived a man who worked 
 at the trade of a tailor through the week and then on 
 
638 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 Sundays played the organ at the village church. For 
 this last service, although everyone said his music was 
 wonderful, the Parish paid him a-sum equivalent to 
 twenty dollars a year. With a wife and half a dozen 
 children to support, they-were always poor; so poor indeed 
 and so hopeless of better condition that the pastor of the 
 little church urged him to go to the city and play to the 
 prince, “for,” said he, “the court organist cannot possibly 
 play so well as you.” But the modest musician refused to go. 
 
 One night there came the cry of fire, and the musician’s 
 little cottage with all that it contained was burned to 
 ashes. Then he bethought him of his pastor’s words, and 
 decided to go to the city. His pastor gave him a letter 
 to the prince, and a few days later he stood at the great 
 stone steps of the palace, and was driven away by a guard 
 who thought him a beggar. He turned to go away and 
 stood for a moment not knowing what to do, while hot 
 tears found their way down his cheeks. Just then a pleasant- 
 voiced man accosted him, and finding that he wished to 
 see the prince, took him into his own little room, for he 
 proved to be the prince’s chamberlain. To him he told his 
 story and gave his letter, and was told to wait a while and he 
 should see the prince, and, while he waited, to go into the 
 chapel and amuse himself by playing on the great organ. 
 Seating himself there he hardly dared to touch the keys 
 of an instrument so much grander than anything he had 
 ever seen, but he softly played the music used among 
 the Germans then to the words: 
 
 “Commit thou all thy griefs 
 And ways into His hands, 
 
 To His sure trust and tender care, 
 Who earth and heaven commands.” 
 
 Then as the sound of the music overcame his bashful- 
 ness he forgot himself and drew from the great organ such 
 floods of melody as had never filled the place before. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 639 
 
 Suddenly a hand was laid upon his shoulder and a pleasant 
 voice addressed him, “Well dene, my new organist! Stop 
 playing now and talk with my chamberlain.” It was the 
 prince himself to whom the chamberlain had already told 
 the story and who had stolen in to hear for himself what 
 the poor musician could do. The chamberlain told him 
 that he was to be from that time organist to the prince, 
 with a home for his family and a salary that to him seemed 
 princely. At first he could searcely believe his ears, but 
 in a moment the tears ran down his cheeks again, only 
 this time they were tears of joy. ‘What will my dear wife 
 say when I tell her this?” he cried, and then with eyes 
 lifted to the sky he repeated the words of the Psalm, “Oh 
 give thanks unto the Lord, for He is good, for His mercy 
 endureth forever.’’ He is celebrated most as a musician, 
 but he wrote a few hymns. 
 
 No. 646. 
 
 Tuomas AUGUSTINE ARNE, 1710—1778. 
 
 Son of a wealthy London upholsterer, and intended by 
 his father for a lawyer. He was forbidden to play at 
 home, but managed to convey a spinet to his room, and 
 to learn the use of the keys by muffling the strings with 
 a handkerchief. One day his father called at a gentleman’s 
 house where a musical party was in full blast and was 
 both amazed and disgusted to see his boy filling the place 
 of first fiddler. After this, however, he was allowed to 
 study at home and soon became skilful. “Rule Britannia” 
 was the closing song in a piece entitled “Alfred,” written 
 jointly by David Mallet and James T hompson, author of 
 “The Seasons.” The words were set to music by Dr. 
 Arne, to celebrate the anniversary of the accession of 
 the House of Hanover and first sung in a temporary theatre 
 erected at Bucks, where the Prince of Wales resided. Dr. 
 Arne’s last words were those of song. He was attempting 
 
640 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 to illustrate with his voice a musical idea, when his voice 
 faltered, the sounds grew fainter, and song and breathing 
 ceased together. 
 
 No. 646. 
 “JESUS, SHEPHERD OF THE SHEEP.” 
 
 Rev. Henry Cooke. 
 
 This hymn may be more interesting to us if we know 
 something of its author. It is not a familiar name in our 
 hymn books, indeed so far as known this is the only hymn 
 he ever wrote, and yet it seems pretty certain that the one 
 who could write such a hymn as this could write others. 
 Henry Cooke ‘was an Irishman with the wit of his race, and 
 their eloquence too. He was pastor of a Presbyterian 
 Church in Ireland, at a time when the pulpits and the pews 
 of his denomination in Ireland were poisoned through and 
 through with the doctrines of Unitarianism. He became the 
 champion of orthodoxy, and for half a lifetime, waged 
 relentless war against the heresy that was in the churches. 
 He was tireless in his work, writing, debating, preaching, 
 planning to re-establish Christ as divine in the faith of 
 the Irish Church. In this he was successful, and he lived 
 to see his denomination in Ireland re-established as an 
 orthodox Trinitarian body. If such a person should write a 
 hymn, and but a single one, it could not well be other than 
 this one is, full of the faith of Christ. Rev. John Hall, of 
 New York, was the pupil and friend of its author. 
 
 No. 647. 
 
 “JESUS, IN THY DYING WOES.” 
 
 Rey. Tuomas B. Potuocx. 
 
 By comparing the accounts given of the crucifixion of 
 Christ in the different gospels, it can be found that while 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 641 
 
 on the cross Jesus spoke at seven different times. He 
 prayed for those who were crucifying Him, “Father, for- 
 give them! for they know not what they do.” He said to 
 the thief, “To-day shalt thou be with me in paradise.” And 
 to his mother, as she stood with John, the beloved disciple, 
 “Woman, behold thy son.” At the ninth hour, he cried to 
 God again, “Why hast thou forsaken me,” and said to his 
 friends, “I thirst,” and then at the end he cried, “It is 
 finished,” and offered the prayer, ‘Father, into thy hands 
 I commend my Spirit.” These words, which are called 
 sometimes “The seven words of Christ upon the cross,” have 
 been woven into a hymn, of seven parts, referring, respec- 
 tively, to these seven sayings of Christ. The first part 
 begins with the line: 
 
 “Jesus, in Thy dying woes.” 
 
 No. 648. 
 
 “WHEN MY FINAL FAREWELL TO THE WORLD I HAVE 
 SAID.” 
 
 M. F. Hearn. 
 
 During the visit of Moody and Sankey to Great Britain 
 in 1875, an infidel, a man past middle life who for years 
 had zealously attacked the Christian religion on all possible 
 occasions, began attending their meetings for the avowed 
 purpose of scoffing at the service and, as he said, “expos- 
 ing the humbug.” One night Mr. Sankey sang this hymn, 
 and when he came to the stanza: 
 
 “There are little ones glancing about in my path, 
 In want of a friend and a guide. 
 There are dear little eyes looking up into mine, 
 
 Whose tears might be easily dried. 
 
642 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 But Jesus may beckon the children away, 
 In the midst of their grief and their glee; 
 * Will any of them at the beautiful gate 
 Be waiting and watching for me!” 
 
 the memory of a baby face that had once looked up into his, 
 but which had been long ago “beckoned away,” came up 
 before him so vividly, that he was melted to tears, and 
 the truth of a living Christ, in whose presence his child 
 was living, made of the man who came an infidel, an 
 earnest Christian worker. 
 
 During the Moody and Sankey meetings at the Taber- 
 nacle built for their use in Chicago, a man arose and related 
 his own experience. He said that he had been so intem- — 
 perate that two years before, when his mother died, on his 
 way to notify some neighbors that she was dying, he stopped 
 at a saloon and got drunk. He had recently come to Chicago | 
 to put himself into a reformatory institution and had got 
 drunk on his way to the city. One Sunday he wandered 
 into the Tabernacle to rest, being broken down physically 
 and mentally by drink. Mr. Sankey sang this hymn, and it 
 set him to thinking about his mother and that word of all 
 others, said he, “had power to touch my hardened heart.” 
 All Sunday night he had paced the streets unable to think 
 of anything but his mother in heaven, waiting and watching 
 for him, and on Monday he had gone back to the revival 
 services and been converted there. 
 
 No. 649. 
 “THERE IS A LAND OF PURE DELIGHT.” 
 Rey. Issac Warts. 
 
 Dr. Talmadge in one of his sermons says, “I do not 
 know how we shall stand the first day in Heaven. I 
 once gave out in church the hymn: 
 
 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 643 
 
 ‘There is a land of pure delight 
 Where saints immortal reign. 
 
 Infinite day excludes the night 
 And pleasures banish pain.’ 
 
 “An old man standing in front of the pulpit sang heartily 
 the first stanza, and then he sat down weeping. I said 
 to him afterward, ‘Father Linton, what made you cry over 
 that hymn?’ 
 
 “He answered, ‘I could not stand it, the joys that are 
 coming.’ ” 
 
 No. 650. 
 “COME, MY SOUL, THY SUIT PREPARE.” 
 
 Rev. JoHn NewTon. 
 
 In very olden times, there lived a king who surpassed 
 in the splendor of his court all who had lived before 
 him. His name signified “the peaceful king.” It is re- 
 lated of him that once upon a time he went to one of the 
 celebrated shrines of his land to offer sacrifices to his 
 God, and this he did in a manner befitting his wealth and 
 rank, for he offered a thousand burnt offerings upon the 
 altar there. The God he worshipped responded to the 
 splendid gift by appearing to him in a dream by night and 
 saying to him, “Ask what I shall give thee.” You will 
 find the story recorded in the First Book of Kings, 3:5. 
 In commenting on this story, Matthew Henry, the quaint 
 old English divine, says that, “Whatever God sends down 
 to us in a promise, we ought to send back to Him in a 
 prayer.” 
 
 John Newton was a firm believer in the power and efficacy 
 of prayer, and taking this response of Solomon’s God, to 
 the worship of his subject as his theme, he wrote this hymn 
 to be sung at the little prayer meeting at Olney. Rev. 
 
644 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 Charles Spurgeon was in the habit of having one or two 
 stanzas from this hymn chanted softly each Sunday by his 
 great congregation just before his prayer. 
 
 No. 661. 
 “CHRIST IS BORN, TELL FORTH HIS FAME.” 
 
 Sr. Cosmas (died about 760). 
 
 This hymn takes us back twelve hundred years, and to 
 the land where the Christ was born whose birthday it 
 commemorates. An orphan boy was adopted by a man 
 who had one boy of his own, and the two lived for a time 
 together at Damascus, then went together to the Monastery 
 of St. Saba, in the wilderness between Jerusalem and the 
 Dead Sea, and there spent their lives together as monks. 
 They both had poetic tastes and stimulated each other in 
 the writing of hymns by selecting the same theme for their 
 poems, and trying in friendly rivalry to see which should. 
 best succeed. St. Stephen, who wrote the hymn “Art thou 
 weary, art thou languid,’ was the nephew of one of these 
 boys, St. John of Damascus, and all three were monks to- 
 gether in St. Saba. 
 
 No. 682. 
 “FATHER! I OWN THY VOICE.” 
 
 Rev. SAMUEL WOLCOTT. 
 
 The author of this hymn tells the story of its origin, and 
 of all the others he has written as well, as follows: 
 
 “In the year 1868, Rev. Darius E. Jones requested me 
 to mark for him the published hymns which I would use 
 in a new collection. After a partial performance of this 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 645 
 
 service, near the close of the year, the query arose in my 
 mind, ‘Can I not write a hymn?’ I was then in my fifty- 
 sixth year, had never put two rhymes together, and had 
 taken it for granted that I was as incompetent to write 
 a hymn or even a stanza as to work a miracle. However, 
 I resolved that I would try to write a hymn of five stanzas, 
 and proceeded to plan it precisely as I would plan a sermon. 
 I said, the first stanza shall be a recognition of God the 
 Father; the second, a recognition of Christ the Redeemer; 
 the third, a prayer to God the Father; the fourth, a 
 prayer to Christ the Redeemer, and the fifth shall blend 
 the two in one address. All this, you understand, without 
 any train of thought in my mind; and a perfect recipe for 
 wooden stanzas it would be difficult to frame. I went to 
 work to fill out my plan, and the result was the hymn as it 
 now stands, ‘Father! I own Thy voice.’ 
 
 “T cannot express to you my surprise when I found that 
 I had written what could actually be sung. I sent the 
 hymn to Mr. Jones, who was so much pleased with it that 
 he composed a tune to it, and inserted both in his ‘Songs 
 for the New Life’ (Chicago, 1869). I have not seen the 
 hymn in any other collection, but I retain a natural predi- 
 lection for it. I soon tried my hand again. The Young 
 Men’s Christian Association of Ohio met in one of our 
 churches, with their motto, in evergreen letters over the 
 pulpit: ‘Christ for the World, and the World for Christ.’ 
 This suggested the hymn, ‘Christ for the world we sing.’ ” 
 
 No. 653. 
 “ANGELS HOLY, HIGH, AND LOWLY.” 
 
 Pror. Joun Stuart BLACKIE. 
 
 If there is nothing of special interest to be said about, 
 a hymn as to its origin or use, we can often clothe it with 
 
646 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 ‘new value in our use of it by some little glimpse of its 
 author, as to what sort of man he was, how he looked, 
 acted, spoke. Here is a scrap by the author of this hymn, 
 which, I am sure, will make us feel a little better acquainted 
 with him and make his hymn more enjoyable. He says: 
 “T sometimes wish myself back in the Middle Ages, when 
 the minstrel was the only teacher, and when singing was 
 almost the only sermon. And I will tell you why; reading 
 is a stupid, dull kind of thing, but singing stirs up the whole 
 soul. In the best days of the world there was no reading 
 and no books at all. Homer never saw a book, never could 
 have seen a book. I think we see a great deal too many 
 books. A great number of people become mere reading 
 machines having no living functions at all. I would like 
 some time to give you a lecture on the logic of education. 
 It simply means that you must learn to use your legs, your 
 arms, your ears, your tongues, and your throats—every part 
 of your soul and your body—rather than be crammed up 
 with all sorts of things, and then measured with red tape 
 by a gentleman from London. Especially if you wish to 
 be happy cultivate song. I am rather a young-old boy, 
 and I am one of the happiest creatures under the sun at this 
 moment; and my amusement is to sing songs. In railway 
 coaches, and other places, I see a number smoking what 
 they call tobacco. Well, whatever may be said about that, 
 it is not an intellectual or a moral stimulant, and the 
 flavor of it is not at all like the rose, or any poetic thing 
 I know. It is essentially a vulgar sort of amusement. My 
 amusement is to sing songs. At home I am always singing 
 Scotch songs; and abroad, when those wretches are smoking, 
 I hum to myself, ‘Scots wha hae,’ ‘A man’s a man for a’ 
 that,’ and songs of that kind. I advise you to do the same. 
 Your soul will become a singing bird, and then the devil 
 won’t get near it.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 647 
 
 No. 654. 
 
 “HOW FIRM A FOUNDATION, YE SAINTS OF THE 
 LORD.” 
 
 Dr. C. S. Robinson relates that once in the old oratory 
 at evening devotion in Princeton Seminary the elder 
 Dr. Hodge, then venerable with years. and piety, paused as 
 he read this hymn, preparatory to the singing, and in the 
 depth of his emotion was obliged to close his delivery of 
 the final lines with a mere gesture of pathetic and adoring 
 wonder at the matchless grace of God in Christ, and his 
 hand silently beat time to the rhythm instead: 
 
 “T’ll never—no never—no never—forsake!” 
 
 No. 656. 
 “LORD OF ALL BEING; THRONED AFAR.” 
 
 OLIVER WENDELL HoLMEs. 
 
 Most people have read those two delightful books, ‘“The 
 Autocrat of the Breakfast Table” and “The Professor 
 at the Breakfast Table,” both written by Dr. Oliver Wendell 
 Holmes and both of which before being published as books 
 appeared as-serials in the Atlantic Monthly. In the num- 
 ber of that periodical for December, 1859, the last of the 
 papers making up “The Professor at the Breakfast Table” 
 appeared, and it ends as follows: ‘And so my year’s record 
 is finished. The Professor has talked less than his prede- 
 cessor (The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table), but he has 
 heard and seen more. Thanks to all those friends who 
 from time to time have sent their messages of kindly 
 recognition and fellow feeling. Peace to all such as may 
 
648 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 have been vexed in spirit by any utterance the pages have 
 repeated. They will doubtless forget for the moment the 
 difference in the lines of truth we look at through our human 
 prisms, and join in singing (inwardly) this hymn to the 
 Source of the light we all need to lead us, and the warmth 
 which alone can make us all brothers.” Then follows this 
 beautiful lyric. 
 
 No. 686. 
 “Q THOU FROM WHOM ALL GOODNESS FLOWS.” 
 
 Rev. THomas HAwEIs. 
 
 This hymn deserves a place among missionary hymns 
 if for no other reason than that it afforded to a devoted 
 missionary comfort and strength under persecution. No 
 doctrine of the Christian faith is so obnoxious to Mohamme- 
 dans as that of the Divinity of Christ, for it gives to Him 
 the place they want for Mohammed. Rev. Henry Martyn, 
 when a missionary among them, records that, “It is this 
 doctrine which exposes me to the contempt of the learned 
 Mohammedans, in whom it is difficult to say whether pride 
 or ignorance predominates. Their sneers are more difficult 
 to bear than the brickbats that the boys sometimes throw 
 at me; however, both are an honor of which I am not 
 worthy. How many times in the day have I occasion to 
 repeat the words: 
 
 ‘If on my face, for Thy dear Name, 
 Shame and reproaches be; 
 
 All hail, reproach, and welcome, shame, 
 If Thou remember me.’ ”’ 
 
 On June 12, 1812, the scene is repeated. One of the Viziers 
 (it is in Persia) says to him: “You had better say, ‘God is 
 God, and Mohammed is the prophet of God.’ 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 649 
 
 Martyn replied: “God is God, and Jesus is the Son of 
 God.” 
 
 They were fiercely enraged, and cried out in wrath and 
 contempt, and one said: “What will you.say when your 
 tongue is burnt out for this blasphemy?” 
 
 “Thus,” continues Martyn, “I walked away alone to my 
 tent, to pass the rest of the day in heat and dirt. ‘What 
 have I done,’ thought I, ‘to merit all this scorn? Nothing, 
 I trust, but bearing testimony to Jesus.’ I thought over 
 these things in prayer, and found that peace which Christ 
 hath promised to His disciples.” 
 
 No. 657. 
 “THERE IS AN EYE THAT NEVER SLEEPS.” 
 
 Rev. J. C. Wauuace, 1793—1841. 
 
 This hymn is a fine statement of the power of prayer, and 
 may, therefore, be called worshipful, but there is not a 
 word in it of prayer itself. Duffield fitly appends to it the 
 incident related by Edward Pierrepont, in his book, “From 
 Fifth Avenue to Alaska.” Mr. Pierrepont was on a hunting 
 expedition in the mountains of Wyoming and became lost. 
 He was alone, without food, fire, or shelter in the midst 
 of a driving snowstorm. “The snow flakes,’ he says, 
 “became thicker than ever. Round and round we wheeled. 
 My hands became nearly too numb to guide the horse, 
 and it seemed as if we should never reach the place of 
 descent. We could hardly see twenty feet ahead; all sides 
 looked perpendicular; and, although up at this great alti- 
 tude, not a glimpse could I catch of the surrounding country. 
 The bare ridge was about one mile in circumference, and 
 my former horse tracks had long ago been obliterated. At 
 last I recognized a curiously twisted fir, and saw that I 
 had been merely making a circle. In despair, knowing 
 that at this altitude without fire the morning would find 
 
650 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 me frozen, strangely there came to my mind these words of 
 Tennyson: 
 
 ‘More things are wrought by prayer 
 -Than this world dreams of’; 
 
 and 1 earnestly prayed that for one moment the storm might 
 abate and allow me a glimpse of where I was. Hardly had 
 I uttered the words when one of the most striking incidents 
 of my life took place. It may have been a mere coincidence, 
 but I was so impressed with the occurrence that I could 
 but feel that the act, which the memory of Tennyson’s lines 
 prompted, had something to do with the phenomenon which 
 so quickly followed. Suddenly the wind lulled; the snow 
 ceased falling; the heavy shrouds of mist which hung over 
 the valley and mountain tops lifted; and low in the west 
 the declining sun, having but brief time to light, shone 
 brightly. The huge, lone ranges, as far as the eye could 
 reach, sparkled in their new white robes; and the winding 
 stream near which the old camp lay seemed but a mile 
 distant. Even the tired old horse raised his head as if 
 encouraged with new life. I soon found the hitherto hidden 
 descent, and quickly gained the lower ridge, the gradual 
 slope of which I knew would bring me back to camp. For 
 full thirty minutes the sky remained clear, with the excep- 
 tion of large fleecy clouds driving across its face; then, as 
 suddenly, the wind swept through the valleys, and all 
 became dark and threatening as before.” 
 
 No. 658. 
 
 “LET US GATHER UP THE SUNBEAMS.” 
 
 Mrs. ALBERT SMITH. 
 
 Philip Phillips, who by his services of song held all over 
 the world acquired the title of “the Singing Pilgrim,” once 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 651 
 
 held a service in the Jerry McCauley Mission in Water 
 Street, New York. It was on a Sunday evening, and the 
 room was crowded with the most vicious characters of the 
 city. Just as the exercises were about to begin, Kit Burns, 
 a notorious and desperate character, and a band of about 
 thirty “roughs” marched up the aisle and seated themselves 
 directly in front of Mr. Phillips. He feared they intended 
 to make trouble, but with a prayer for help he began the 
 service. 
 
 By and by some one called out from the door, “Kit, 
 you’re wanted.” 
 
 Rising at once in his seat, Kit sent back the answer, 
 “Tell ’em to go to h—ll.” 
 
 The singing went on and soon the rowdy outside put 
 his head in at the door again and shouted, “Kit, you're 
 wanted outside.” 
 
 This time Burns stood up again and in his hoarse voice 
 called out, “Tell ’em this is the first Jesus meeting I’ve 
 ever been at, and I shall stay till it’s out.” The power of 
 song had enchained him. During the meeting this song 
 was sung with its eft repeated refrain, “Then scatter seeds 
 of kindness.” A few days after, one of the women who had 
 been present at the meeting was found drunk on the street 
 near by. She was taken into the mission room where she 
 lay for some time sleeping off her drunken stupor. When 
 she awoke she looked around, and not recognizing the sur- 
 roundings concluded she was in the “Tombs” and began to 
 talk to herself. “Now I'll have to stay here thirty days. 
 My business will all go to sticks! I know that policeman, 
 d—n him! when I get out I'll fix him!” But just here she 
 looked more carefully about the room and saw that she 
 had mistaken the place, and then the talk went on: 
 ‘“Humph! I ain’t in the Tombs after all. Where am I?— 
 Oh, I see, I’m in that place where they scatter seeds of 
 kindness.” The matron overheard her, spoke to her, gave 
 her a bath, and a cup of tea. Some friends gathered about 
 
652 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 her, and before she left the place she was converted. She 
 died not long after, having remained steadfast to the end. 
 
 No. 659. 
 “I GAVE MY LIFE FOR THEE.” 
 
 Miss F. R. HAvVERGAL. 
 
 On one occasion when Philip Phillips held a service of 
 song in Philadelphia, Mr. R. Pearsall Smith, well known 
 as the author of “The Rest of Faith,” was in thé audience. 
 Shortly after he wrote to Mr. Phillips, asking him to visit 
 his father’s house and sing some of his songs there. “My 
 father,’ wrote Mr. Smith, “is a good man, but although 
 all his children are Christians, he has never made a pro- 
 fession. Now I have faith to believe that if you will go 
 there and sing some of your songs, he will give his heart to 
 Christ.” 
 
 Mr. Phillips went to the old man’s house, no one being 
 present outside the family except Rev.. Alfred Cookman 
 and himself. He sang song after song, the old white-haired 
 man listening attentively. At last Mr. Phillips sang this 
 piece, and at its close the old man asked, “‘Will you please 
 sing that over again?” So the piece was repeated. When 
 the stanza: . 
 
 “T spent long years for thee 
 In weariness and woe; 
 . That one Eternity 
 Of joy thou mightest know! 
 I spent long years for thee, for thee! 
 Hast thou spent one for me?” 
 
 was finished he was weeping. ‘Let us pray,” said Mr. 
 
 seem and at its close the old man gave himself to 
 hrist. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 653 
 No. 660. 
 “PRAISE GOD FROM WHOM ALL BLESSINGS FLOW.” 
 
 Tuomas Ken. 
 
 One of the singular uses to which this doxology has been 
 put was on the occasion of an important election in Ohio, 
 October 15, 1884. On the evening of that day an immense 
 crowd filled the street in New York City in front of the 
 headquarters of the Republican Party, where the news as 
 it was received over the wires was being given to them 
 through a stereopticon. It was at two o’clock in the 
 morning and the crowd was uproariously singing, “We 
 won't go home ’till morning.” At this hour came the last 
 message announcing the success of the party in the distant 
 state, and immediately following it the stereopticon flashed 
 out the line: 
 
 “Praise God from Whom all blessings flow.” 
 “Good Night!” 
 
 A deep-toned man in the throng pitched the tune, and a 
 mighty volume of song swelled upward as they sang the 
 doxology to its close. Then the lights went out and the 
 crowd dispersed to their homes. 
 
 No. 661. 
 
 “PRAYER IS THE SOUL’S SINCERE DESIRE.” 
 
 JAMES MontTGOMERY. 
 
 When the author of this hymn was eighty-three years of 
 age, he conducted the family worship in the home where 
 he lived, and it was noticed that he was especially fervent 
 
654 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 in prayer. Well might he have been so for it was the last 
 time his voice was heard on earth. At the close of the 
 prayer he retired to his room, where he was found the next 
 day unconscious on the floor. He had had an apoplectic 
 stroke sometime during the night, and died that afternoon. 
 The incident is worth relating in connection with this hymn 
 because it illustrates in the case of the poet himself the 
 words of the stanza: 
 
 “Prayer is the Christian’s vital breath, 
 The Christian’s native air, 
 
 His watchword at the gates of death, 
 He enters Heaven with prayer.” 
 
 No. 662. 
 “ROCK OF AGES, CLEFT FOR ME.” 
 
 Rev. Augustus Topuapy. 
 
 An American minister entered an Armenian church in 
 Constantinople and joined them in their worship, although 
 he understood not a word of what was said. During the 
 singing of a hymn he noticed many of the people in tears, 
 and was curious to know what hymn so affected them. 
 Upon inquiry he found it was a Turkish translation of 
 “Rock of Ages, cleft for me.” 
 
 No. 663. 
 “SAINTS OF GOD! THE DAWN IS BRIGHTENING.” 
 
 Mrs. Mary MaxweE.u. 
 
 In the year 1875, Rev. Sheldon Jackson, then Superintend- 
 ent of Home Missions in the West under the Presbyterian 
 
 ’ 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 655 
 
 Board wanted a “home mission hymn.” Not finding what 
 he wanted among existing hymns, he offered two prizes, 
 one of fifty dollars for a poem and one of a hundred dollars 
 for a hymn. The offer was published in two hundred 
 religious newspapers, and thus became widely known: Seven 
 hundred pieces were offered in competition, and a committee 
 consisting of Dr. 8. I. Prime of the New York Observer, 
 Dr. Thomas 8. Hastings, and Rev. Edwin F. Hatfield, 
 examined them. This hymn was chosen from the entire 
 list as best adapted to use as a Home Missionary Hymn. 
 It is an interesting incident that its author refused to accept 
 the prize she had earned except upon the condition that 
 her name should not be divulged, and so the hymn was 
 made public as written by “A Lady of Virginia.” Eight 
 or ten years later she permitted her name to be attached 
 to it. 
 
 No. 664. 
 “TAKE ME, O MY FATHER, TAKE ME.” 
 
 Rev. Ray PAuMEnr. 
 
 A hymn that succeeds in bringing comfort and cheer to 
 but a single life when comfort and cheer are needed has 
 surely done a worthy work, and the author of this hymn 
 knew to a certainty that this hymn yielded such result. 
 An English lady had been very ill; too weak to speak or 
 scarcely think, and during these weary hours the words of 
 this hymn had been her comfort. When she recovered, so 
 great was her sense of gratitude for the good she had received 
 from them, that she took pains to write to Dr. Palmer, 
 and to thank him for the service he had rendered her. 
 
656 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 665. 
 “THE MORNING LIGHT IS BREAKING.” 
 
 Rev. S. F. SMITH. 
 
 It is not often given to one person to write a hymn which 
 shall become the national hymn of a great people, and 
 another which shall become the rallying song of a great — 
 religious enterprise. Yet the author of this hymn has done 
 it in the hymn: 
 
 “My country, ’tis of thee.” 
 
 and this one before us. It has been his privilege also, as 
 he himself says, to hear it sung in five or six different 
 languages in Europe and Asia. It is a favorite with the 
 Burmans, Karens, and Telegus in Asia and among the 
 Portuguese Protestants in their own country and in Brazil. 
 It has also been translated into Siamese. So that it can 
 fairly be said to be sung around the world. 
 
 No. 666. 
 “THERE IS A LAND IMMORTAL.” 
 
 Tuomas MacKeEttuer. 
 
 A boy in New York City at fourteeen years of age 
 became a compositor on a weekly paper in that city. Soon 
 after he entered the employment of the Harpers and became 
 proofreader. While hard at work during the day, he spent 
 his spare time at night in writing verses of one sort or 
 another. He was poor and had much of the support of 
 the family to provide. Later he went to Philadelphia and 
 became proofreader in a type foundry there. By and by 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 657 | 
 
 he was allowed to invest his little savings in buying a 
 small interest in the business. And at last he became the 
 head of the firm of MacKeller, Smiths, and Jordan, the 
 great type founders of Philadelphia. He kept up his habit 
 of writing poetry after his day’s work was over, and one 
 evening while writing a piece for a friend, a fancy struck 
 him of a religious nature. “I laid aside,” he says, “the 
 work in hand and pursuing the new idea, I at once produced 
 the hymn: 
 
 “There is a land immortal.” 
 
 No. 667. 
 
 “THOU ART GONE TO THE GRAVE BUT WE WILL 
 NOT DEPLORE THEE.” 
 
 REGINALD HEBER. 
 
 Written in December, 1818, in memory of an only child 
 which died in that month, aged six months. Of this event 
 Heber wrote, “I am myself more cut down than I thought 
 I should be, but I hope not impatient. I do not forget 
 that to have possessed her at all, and to have enjoyed the 
 pleasure of looking at her and caressing her for six months 
 was God’s free gift, and still less do I forget that “He who 
 has taken her will at length, I hope, restore her to us.” 
 
 No. 668. 
 “UPWARD I LIFT MINE EYES,” 
 
 Rev. Isaac WATTS. 
 
 In 1777 (June 3), Rev. John Newton wrote to a friend 
 “give my love to your friend. I dare not advise; but if she 
 
658 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 can quietly return at the usual time, and neither run in- 
 tentionally into the way of the smallpox, nor out of the 
 way, but leave it simply with the Lord, I shall not blame 
 her. My prescription is to read Dr. Watts’ Psalm one 
 hundred and twenty-one every morning before breakfast, 
 and pray. over it till the cure is effected. 
 
 ‘Hast thou not given thy word 
 To save my soul from death, 
 And I can trust my Lord 
 To keep my mortal breath? 
 I'll go and come, 
 Nor fear to die. 
 Till from on high 
 Thou call me home!’ ” 
 
 This is the “Psalm one hundred and twenty-one,” which 
 Dr. Newton advised the use of in case of smallpox. 
 
 No. 669. 
 
 “WE COME TO THE FOUNTAIN, WE STAND BY THE 
 WAVE.” 
 
 Rev. Geo. W. BETHUNE. 
 
 This hymn is unique in that it is a hymn especially for 
 use at the rite of baptism by immersion, and yet it was 
 written by a minister of the Dutch Reformed Church, who 
 was thoroughly antagonistic to the peculiar doctrine of 
 immersion. It is not a little strange, too, that it was 
 written at the request of a Baptist clergyman, Rev. J. S. 
 Holmes, who wanted it for the “Baptist Hymn and Tune 
 Book” of which he was the editor. -Referring to the request 
 that had been made of him Dr. Bethune said, “I have the 
 vanity to think that I can write a better hymn of that 
 kind than any that I have seen in their collections.” And 
 this is the hymn he wrote. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 659 
 No. 670. 
 “THERE IS A HAPPY LAND, FAR, FAR AWAY.” 
 
 ANDREW YOUNG. 
 
 The author of this hymn tells its origin as follows: He 
 was spending the evening at a house where the lady and 
 her family were musical. “After tea, the lady of whom 
 I speak, played, among other pieces of music, one which 
 was entitled, ‘The Siege of Delhi’ (Clive’s, not Clyde’s 
 siege). As is well known, in that selection there occurs 
 a very sweet air—soft, pathetic, and yet with an influence 
 that stirs while it enamours the sense. My friend played 
 it so beautifully that I requested a repetition of it and 
 after that begged for another repetition, and yet another, 
 until I would for some time have nothing else played. My 
 soul was won by its charm and rapture, and I was for the 
 time being, like ‘one beside himself,’ as if carried away to 
 another world of being by some potent and mysterious in- 
 fluence. Leaving the house shortly afterward, and still in 
 an excited state of feeling, I was filled with but one strong 
 controlling desire, viz., to write words appropriate, as far 
 as possible (for I had the rhythmic faculty), to the highly 
 devotional suggestiveness of the music. During the entire 
 night my heart throbbed with a strange emotion; thoughts 
 thronged my brain; words began to take a melodious flow, 
 and in the early morning hours my first act was to sit 
 down and write the words of a hymn, identical almost in 
 every particular with those now composing it. 
 
 “That was fifty years ago, and yet, even now, I feel, 
 notwithstanding that long intervening lapse of time, with 
 its many experiences, as if the inspiration with which 
 Divine Providence was pleased to bless me on that memor- 
 able occasion (for I at. least can never forget it) had 
 occurred only yesterday. For if ever there was an in- 
 breathing in a human soul of a heaven-born inspiration, 
 
660 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 I am as certain as I live that it was when I wrote the 
 words of ‘The Happy Land.’ Little remains to be told. 
 Of the composer of the soul-captivating air, I have never 
 been able to learn anything. Some persons in writing 
 lately on the subject of the hymn have spoken of the air 
 referred to as being an old Indian melody, one that possibly 
 had been heard in the Indian ‘forest primeval,’ many and 
 many a year ago. I do not think anything of the kind. 
 The music of the ‘Siege of Delhi’ is probably not more 
 than seventy or eighty years old, and very likely the work 
 of a British composer. But whoever the writer of it was, 
 I would gladly give something to know and to express my 
 very great acknowledgment for its blessed inspiration.” 
 
 No. 671 
 
 “IT REMEMBER A VOICE WHICH ONCE GUIDED MY 
 WAY.” 
 
 “COME THIS WAY, MY FATHER.” 
 
 Hon. A. W. WILDEs. 
 
 The little song “Come this way, my Father,” was writ- 
 ten by me during a season of great affliction occasioned by 
 the loss of my darling little Frank (the hero of the story). 
 The narrative and song were first published in the Water- 
 ville Mail in the year 1850. The scene of the occurrence 
 was Boothbay, a little harbor about fifteen miles east of 
 Bath, Maine. i 
 
 During a short visit to the seashore of our state, some 
 two years since, with a party of friends, it was proposed 
 one bright afternoon that we should make up a party and go 
 down the harbor on a fishing excursion. 
 
 We accordingly started, and after sailing about three 
 miles, a young lady of the company declined going fur- 
 
 ) 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 661 
 
 ther, and requested us to land her on one of the small 
 islands in the harbor, where she proposed to stay until 
 our return. My little boy, then about four years old, pre- 
 ferred remaining with her. Accordingly we left them and 
 proceeded some six miles further. We remained out much 
 longer than we intended, and as night approached a thick 
 fog set in from the sea, entirely enshrouding us. Without 
 compass, and not knowing the right way to steer, we groped 
 our way along for some hours, until we discovered the 
 breaking of the surf on the rocks of one of the islands, but 
 were at a loss to know which one of them. I stood up in 
 the stern of the boat, where I had been steering, and 
 shouted with all my strength. I listened a moment, and 
 heard through the thick fog and above the breaking of 
 the surf, the sweet voice of my boy calling, “Come this 
 way, father—steer straight for me—I’m waiting for you!” 
 We steered by that sound, and soon my little boy leaped to 
 my arms with joy, saying, “I knew you would hear me, 
 father!” and nestled to sleep on my bosom. The child 
 and the maiden are both sleeping now. They died in two 
 short weeks after the period I refer to, with hardly an in- 
 terval of time between their deaths. Now, when tossed 
 upon the rough sea of life, without compass or guide, 
 enveloped in fog and surrounded by rocks, I seem to hear 
 the sound of that cherub voice calling from the bright 
 shore, “Come this way, father!—steer straight for me!” 
 When oppressed with sadness, I take my way to our quiet 
 cemetery, and still, as I stand by one little mound, the 
 same musical voice echoes from thence, “Come this way, 
 my father! I’m waiting for thee!” With this I enclose 
 a correct copy of the song. 
 Yours very truly, 
 A. W. WILDEs. 
 I remember a voice 
 Which once guided my way, 
 When lost on the sea, 
 Fog-enshrouded I lay; 
 
662 
 
 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 ’Twas the voice of a child, 
 As he stood on the shore— 
 It sounded out clear 
 O’er the dark billows’ roar, 
 “Come this way, my father! 
 Steer straight for me, 
 Here safe on the shore 
 I am waiting for thee.” 
 
 I remember that voice, 
 As it led our lone way, 
 *Midst rocks and through breakers 
 And high dashing spray; 
 How sweet to my heart 
 Did it sound from the shore, 
 As it echoed out clear 
 O’er the dark billows’ roar. 
 “Come this way, my father, 
 Steer straight for me, 
 Here safe on the shore 
 I am waiting for thee.” 
 
 I remember my joy _ 
 
 When I held to my breast 
 The form of that dear one, 
 And soothed it to rest; 
 For the tones of my child 
 
 Whispered soft to my ear, 
 “T called you, dear father, 
 
 I knew you would hear 
 The voice of your darling, 
 Far o’er the dark sea, 
 
 While safe on the shore 
 I was waiting for thee.” 
 
 That voice now is hushed 
 Which then guided my way, 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 663 
 
 The form I then pressed 
 Is now mingling with clay; 
 But. the tones of my child 
 ' Still sound in my ear, 
 “T am calling you, father! 
 O can you not hear 
 The voice of your darling, 
 As you toss on life’s sea, 
 For on a bright shore 
 I am waiting for thee.” 
 
 I remember that voice— 
 
 In many a lone hour 
 It speaks to my heart 
 
 With fresh beauty and power, 
 And still echoes far out 
 
 Over life’s troubled wave, 
 And sounds from the loved lips 
 
 That he in the grave, 
 
 “Come this way, my father! 
 
 O steer straight for me! 
 Here safely in heaven 
 
 I am waiting for thee!” 
 
 No. 672. 
 
 “GIVE TO THE WINDS THY FEARS.” 
 “COMMIT THOU ALL THY GRIEFS.” 
 
 PauL GERHARDT. 
 
 Not far from the town of Warsaw in Poland, there still 
 is standing a peasant’s house, which has above its door an 
 iron tablet upon which appears the figure of a raven with a 
 ring in its beak and underneath it in the German language 
 the first four lines of this hymn. To account for this 
 
664 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 iron , late, with its raven, and its ring, and its inscription 
 a wonderful story must be told. 
 
 There lived near by at one time a German peasant named 
 Dobry. He had not been able to pay his rent, and the 
 landlord had threatened to eject him from his house. It 
 was in the dead of winter, and the poor peasant had thrice 
 appealed for mercy, but in vain. The next day he and 
 his wife and little ones were to be turned out into the cold 
 and the snow. But Dobry did not lose courage or hope. 
 If man would not show mercy, God would, and gathering 
 his family about him he kneeled and prayed for help from 
 the God of the poor, and when the prayer was ended, they 
 began to sing together this hymn. 
 
 At one of the pauses between the stanzas, a tapping on 
 the window was heard. Dobry ran and opened it, and a 
 tame raven which had been trained by Dobry’s grand- 
 father and then set at liberty, hopped in, bearing in its 
 beak a jeweled ring. This was identified as one that had 
 been lost by the King, who rewarded Dobry handsomely 
 for returning it, and later built for him a house for his 
 own, and put this iron plate above the door. 
 
 No. 673. 
 “JUST AS I AM, WITHOUT ONE PLEA.” 
 
 Miss CHARLOTTE ELLIOTT. 
 
 A little street waif once entered the office of a New 
 York City missionary and-held up a torn and dirty piece 
 of paper. ‘Please, sir,” said the boy, “father sent me to 
 get a clean paper like this.” It was a copy of this hymn, 
 and the father wanted a clean one like it, because his little 
 girl, sister of the boy whom he had sent, liked it and used 
 to sing it while she lived, and when she died they had 
 found this dirty, worn copy of it in her pocket, and now 
 
 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 665 
 
 in memory of the dead child he wanted a clean copy to 
 frame and hang up in his room. 
 
 No. 674. 
 JOHN Berrince, 1716—1793. 
 
 One of the most eccentric and at the same time earnest 
 men who ever lived became a vicar of the Church of Eng- 
 land. He would never limit himself to any parish but in 
 spite of bishops he went far and wide over England preach- 
 ing in churches if permitted, if not, in barns or fields. The 
 formal, worldly men he met whether clergy or laity were 
 rebuked by him without stint and they called him “The 
 old devil.” 
 
 Once when riding in a section where he was not known 
 to preach, he was accosted by a stranger riding along the 
 same road, and as they talked the stranger said, “Do you 
 know Berridge? They tell me he is a troublesome, good- 
 for-nothing fellow.” 
 
 “Yes, I know him,” was Berridge’s reply. “And I assure 
 you half his wickedness has not been told.” 
 
 And when they reached the place where Berridge was 
 to preach, the stranger went into a pew and was astounded 
 in a few moments to see his traveling companion step into 
 the pulpit. “Is it possible,” he cried, at the close of the 
 service, “Can you forgive me; will you admit me to your 
 house?” 
 
 “Yes, and to my heart,” was the bluff reply. 
 
 He never married, and he gives the reason. He prayed 
 about it and asked God for a sign; then he opened the 
 Bible to see what verse his eye should light on first. The 
 first verse he saw said nothing applicable to the subject 
 in hand, but the second time he tried it he struck the 
 plain command, “Thou shalt not take to thee a wife,” and 
 he didn’t. But these are only the eccentric characteristics 
 
666 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 of the man. He was full of courage and cheerfulness all — 
 his life long, and when he came to die and someone said to 
 him, “The Lord has enabled you to fight a good fight.” 
 
 “Blessed be His name for it,” was the answer. 
 
 “He will soon call you up higher.” 
 
 “Ay, Ay,” was the reply, “higher! higher! higher!” 
 
 No. 675. 
 “BLESSING, HONOR, THANKS AND PRAISE.” 
 
 Rey. CHARLES WESLEY. 
 
 The Wesley brothers, who together founded the great 
 Methodist Church and gave to the Church Universal a 
 splendid legacy of song, came by their love of hymns and 
 singing by inheritance. When John was a puny child he 
 and a hymn were almost the only things saved from the 
 burning parsonage. And the last words of the mother of 
 the Wesleys were, “Children, as soon as I am released, sing 
 a Psalm of praise to God.” The children obeyed their 
 mother’s injunction by singing this hymn, and they kept 
 on singing hymns, until they joined her in heaven. 
 
 No. 676. 
 “NEARER, MY GOD, TO THEE.” 
 
 Mrs. 8S. F. Apams. 
 
 A writer in the Sunday School Times, tells the following 
 incident concerning this hymn! 
 
 “You never knew our neighbor, Mrs. G—— so I must 
 tell you of her in the first place. She was one of the most 
 
 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 667 
 
 lovable women I ever knew—always cheerful and sym- 
 pathetic. Although she never seemed to realize it, she 
 was the leading spirit in all our Christian efforts, inspiring 
 us all with her bright sunny ways. Mr. G was just 
 such a husband as you would wish such a woman to have. 
 A lovely daughter, two promising boys, and a little curly- 
 headed tot, the pet of all, completed the happiest home 
 circle it has been my good fortune to enter. In the spring 
 of that year, Mrs. G had a severe illness. After many 
 weeks of suffering, she rose from her sick bed, but with 
 the loss of her reason. The woman we had so admired 
 and honored was a complete wreck, henceforth to be a 
 burden in the home she had before made so happy. 
 
 “T knew Mr. G to be a man of deepest piety. Often 
 I had heard him, in our prayer-meetings, thank God for ‘a 
 religion that could comfort us in the darkest hours of 
 trial.’ My own religious experience was quite limited then, 
 and I confess I was wondering whether he found grace 
 sufficient to support him under this terrible blow—whether 
 he could say, ‘As for God, His way is perfect.’ 
 
 “When the evening came for the next prayer meeting, 
 he was at his post as usual. His face was pale, but other- 
 wise calm, even peaceful. He had always led the congre- 
 gation in singing; and when the meeting had progressed a 
 little, our pastor, who was leading, asked him to start 
 ‘Nearer, my God, to Thee.’ From the first words, the old 
 hymn I had known from my childhood began to take on a 
 new meaning. I had thought it a beautiful conception, and 
 I liked the music; but tonight it was the impassioned out~ 
 pouring of a soul filled with intensest longing for God, as 
 the weary, benighted, storm-driven traveler longs for home. 
 The song was soon a solo. Every heart in the little con- 
 gregation was stirred. Tears choked our utterance and 
 blinded our eyes. The singer seemed unconscious that he 
 sang alone, or that he had any hearers save God. What 
 infinite pathos he threw into the pleading, 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
668 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 ‘There let the way appear 
 Steps unto heaven: 
 All that Thou sendest me, 
 In mercy given: 
 Angels to beckon me 
 Nearer, my God, to Thee! 
 Nearer to Thee.’ 
 
 “It was not a pleading that the afflicting hand might be 
 removed, but for a faith that could pierce the gloom and 
 recognize it as the hand of love. Even while he asked the 
 answer came. A note of victory shook the air as he 
 sang: 
 
 ‘Out of my stony griefs 
 Bethel I’ll raise; 
 
 So by my woes to be 
 
 Nearer, my God, to Thee! 
 Nearer to Thee!” 
 
 “T felt certain that he had had an experience like that of 
 Moses on Sinai, for his face shone; and we knew that the 
 most joyous man among us that night was he over whose 
 home there hung so dark a pall of misery.” 
 
 No. 677. 
 “ALL HAIL THE POWER OF JESUS’ NAME.” 
 
 Rey. E. Prrronet. 
 
 It was Sunday; we were marching to our first battle. 
 We waded through miles,of sand and numberless streams. 
 Overcome by the heat, men dropped from the ranks, and 
 even horses fell out by the way. To nerve the heart and 
 quicken the step we sang the stirring army songs. At last 
 
 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 669 
 
 the cannons were heard in our front, and we knew the 
 vedettes were at work. We soon smelt powder, and 
 thought of home. We soon were foot-weary and exhausted, 
 and the power of song was exhausted too. Suddenly the 
 colonel rode up to us, in company with the general, and 
 exclaimed: “For Heaven’s sake, give them something to 
 cheer them on!” Instantly that grand old hymn, “Corona- 
 tion,’ came to our minds: 
 
 “All hail the power of Jesus’ name! 
 Let angels prostrate fall; 
 
 Bring forth the royal diadem, 
 And crown Him Lord of all.” 
 
 We sent it forth, and it flew up and down that extended 
 column until the whole army was inspired by the hymn. 
 The boys sped onward to battle as if charged by a thousand 
 galvanic batteries; and while the heavens were ringing with 
 song, the God of nations seemed calling unto his angels to 
 descend and lead us on to victory. At midnight the enemy 
 had fled; and as I lay with my head pillowed on my gun- 
 stock, the full, round moon looked down upon the living 
 and the dead, seeming to say to us: “The song for the 
 church is the song for the army.” 
 
 No. 678. 
 “THERE IS A SPOT TO ME MORE DFAR.” 
 
 Rev. Wm. Hunter. 
 
 At one of the Pittsburgh Conference love feasts the 
 eloquent and gifted James G. Sansom, for forty-two years 
 an earnest and faithful Methodist preacher, narrated the 
 circumstances of his conversion in such a graphic and 
 effective manner that it electrified the entire congregation, 
 
670 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 and left a profound impression on all hearts. Dr. Hunter 
 was present and heard the recital, and while Sansom’s 
 pathetic tones were still lingering in his memory he trans- 
 lated the experience into verse. The hymn thus originated 
 became at once a great favorite, and was widely and fre- 
 quently sung by the Methodists of the time. It was gen- 
 erally known as “Sansom’s Hymn,” and appeared in the 
 “Minstrel of Zion” set to a tune called “Sansom.” As both 
 the singer and the song have now passed away, and as the © 
 hymn is not readily accessible to all, I venture to reproduce 
 it in its entirety, and add that it is not only a fair speci- 
 men of Dr. Hunter’s powers of versification, but it remains 
 as a tribute to the memory of one of the most faithful, 
 eloquent, and genial Christian ministers Methodism has 
 ever given to the world. The hymn reads: 
 
 “There is a spot to me more dear 
 Than native vale or mountain, 
 
 A spot for which affection’s tear 
 Springs grateful from its fountain. 
 
 ’Tis not where kindred souls abound, 
 Though that is almost heaven, 
 
 But where I first my Savior found, 
 And felt my sins forgiven. 
 
 “Hard was my toil to reach the shore, 
 Long tossed upon the ocean; 
 
 Above me was the thunder’s roar, 
 Beneath, the wave’s commotion; 
 Darkly the pall of night was thrown 
 
 Around me, faint with terror; 
 In that dark hour how did my groan 
 Ascend for years of error. 
 
 “Sinking and panting, as for breath, 
 I knew not help was near me; 
 
 And cried, ‘O save me, Lord, from death! 
 Immortal Jesus, hear me!’ 
 
 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 671 
 
 Then quick as thought I felt Him mine, 
 My Savior stood before me; 
 
 I saw His brightness round me shine, 
 And shouted ‘Glory! glory!’ 
 
 “O sacred hour! O hallowed spot! 
 Where love divine first found me; 
 
 Wherever falls my distant lot, 
 My heart shall linger round thee: 
 
 And when from earth I rise to soar 
 Up to my home in heaven, 
 
 Down will I cast my eyes once more 
 Where I was first forgiven.” 
 
 No. 679. 
 “SOFTLY AND TENDERLY, JESUS IS CALLING.” 
 
 An accident occurred to the engine of a train running 
 through the mountains of Tennessee and the passengers 
 were delayed at a little village hotel, while the damage 
 was being repaired. A lady and a gentleman among the 
 passengers were shown into the little dismal parlor, in one 
 corner of which stood an old-fashioned piano badly out of 
 tune. The only other occupant of the room was an old 
 lady, who was evidently a boarder there. Outside it was 
 dark and rainy, but this did not seem to interfere with the 
 comfort of a group of loafers who smoked under the parlor 
 window. To pass away the time the young lady sat down 
 to the piano, and after playing a waltz or two, struck into 
 “Old Hundred.” At this the old lady came over to the 
 piano and spoke. 
 
 “T was thinking, my dear” she said hesitatingly, “that 
 if you could sing a little mite, just some old hymn or some- 
 thing it would seem real good. Who knows but it would 
 help them poor boys out there? They’re most likely away 
 
672 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 from their homes and their mothers, and it ain’t probable 
 they hear much good music—The Lord’s music, you know.” 
 
 After some hesitation the young lady consented, and to- 
 gether they sang hymn after hymn, the old lady listening 
 with evident delight. Outside the men laid down their 
 pipes and all conversation stopped that they might the 
 better hear. By and by the young lady sang alone: 
 
 “Softly and tenderly Jesus is calling, 
 
 Calling for you and for me! 
 
 See, on the portals He’s waiting and watching, 
 Watching for you and for me. 
 
 Come home! Come home! ye who are weary 
 
 Come home! 
 
 Earnestly, tenderly, Jesus is calling, 
 
 Calling, O Sinner, come home!” 
 
 ’ As the last sweet strain died away one young man on 
 the outside, with a face better than that of most of those 
 about him, stealthily brushed away a tear. Just then the 
 message came that the train was ready and the singers went 
 on their way. Several years later this same gentleman 
 stood in a little group of men who were listening to the 
 words of an evangelist and gospel singer, who had just 
 been singing to an audience the words of this very song. 
 When he had finished he turned to the group and said, “I 
 remember well the first time I heard that hymn. It was 
 in a little hotel in the mountains of Tennessee, where I 
 had been squandering my substance, a real Prodigal Son. 
 There came one afternoon a little company of people who 
 were delayed by an accident to the train, and one or two 
 of them began singing around the piano. The lady’s voice 
 I shall never forget. She sang one of my mother’s old 
 hymns and then this one ‘Come home.’ Wherever I went 
 the next few days, I seemed to hear that voice saying, 
 ‘Come home’—and the end of it was I came.” 
 
 “Not the end, sir,” said the astonished gentleman. And 
 
 
 
 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 673 
 
 then he told him his part of the story and how the white- 
 haired old lady had prompted the singing, and her thought 
 that it might do some of the boys on the outside good. 
 
 No. 680. 
 “THE BEST FIFTY AMERICAN HYMNS.” 
 
 In 1889 The Observer of New York offered a prize of 
 fifty dollars for the list of fifty hymns by American au- 
 thors most nearly conforming to the general verdict of all 
 the competitors. Six hundred and ninety-nine lists were 
 received, but two hundred and seventy-three of them had 
 to be rejected because of some imperfection so that four 
 hundred and twenty-six lists competed. The fifty hymns 
 receiving the highest number of votes are given below 
 with their standing in the list and the number of votes 
 each received, 
 
 
 
 1. “My faith looks up to Thee.”—Ray Paumer.... 417 
 2. “One sweetly, solemn thought.’”—Puorsr Cary 407 
 3 “My country ’tis of thee.’—S. F. Smiry........ 380 
 4. “Stand up, stand up for Jesus.,.—G. Durrietp.. 380 
 5. “Softly now the light of day.”"—G. W. Doang.... 373 
 6. “I love thy kingdom Lord.”—T. Dwicur........ 373 
 7. “More love to Thee, O Christ.”—E. Prentiss.... 367 
 8. “I love to steal awhile away.”—Puorse H. Brown 349 
 9. “I would not live alway.”,—-WM. A. MuHLENBERG. 335 
 10. “Gently, Lord, oh! gently lead us.’”—T. Hastines, 321 
 11. “The morning light is breaking.”—S. F. SmirnH.. 302 
 
 12. “There is &n hour of peaceful rest.”—W. B. 
 TAPPANe rane coe i... . ts Ca 266 
 
 13. “’Tis midnight; and on Olive’s brow.’”—W. B. 
 TAPPANDE ee eee... RO wel: 262 
 14. “Thou art the Way, to Thee alone.”—G. W.DoaNng 250 
 
 15. “It came upon the midnight clear.”—E. H. Spars 238 
 
674 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 16. “Hail to the brightness of Zion’s glad morning.” — 
 
 Tac HASTINGS 5 .°s%« 2061 t. a ee ietelante bith: SsrAaetaiey se 
 17. “O Love divine, that stooped to share.”—O. W. 
 HouMES.. 3) sss) o Seo Seales ing else pee 
 18. “Savior, Thy dying love.”—S. D. PHELPS...... 
 19. “He leadeth me, oh blessed thought.”—J. H. 
 (GFL MORE oi biniae: Gi ewer pte ae Soe a eagles eae 
 20. “Shout the glad tidings, exultingly sing.”—W. A. 
 MGHEEN BEB Gietics Aascaennsiavchccyl s Peaxionslatp uns eheiatss fee 
 
 21. “Calm on the listening ear of night.”—E. H. Sears 
 22. “Jesus, these eyes have never seen.” —Ray PALMER 
 23. “Like Noah’s weary dove.”—W. A. MUHLENBERG 
 24. “Blessed Savior, Thee I love.”—G. DUFFIELD... 
 25. “The Spirit in our hearts.” —H. U. ONDERDONK. . 
 26. “Lord of all being, throned afar.”—O. W. HotMEs 
 27. “Lord; I am Thine, entirely Thine.”—S. Daviss.. 
 28. “Shall we gather at the river.”—R. Lowry....... 
 29. “Pass me not, O gentle Savior.”—F. J. Crossy. 
 30. “Savior, who Thy flock art feeding.”—W. A. 
 
 Grete BEG Wie 20 Wie nc -sia.)0 we soaks fee o's tone waebayees 
 31. “Safe in the arms of Jesus.”—F. J. CrosBy...... 
 32. “How calm and beautiful the morn.”—T. Hastines 
 33. “Jesus, keep me near the cross.”—F. J. Crossy.. 
 34. “He that goeth forth with weeping.” —T. Hastines 
 35. “Lord, with glowing heart I’d praise Thee.”— 
 
 Silin Kreya iaree watids: bal goblets oi vette ayaa 
 36. “My days are gliding swiftly by.”—D. NELson.. 
 37. “Delay not, delay not, oh sinner draw near.”— 
 
 The FASHENGS 4 og Jf% eet aie ces de eee OL 
 38. “Oh! where are kings and empires now?’—A. C. 
 Goxne..'T. At tisgesd «i. sintearteee eer ae 
 39. “To-day, the Savior calls..—T. Hasrines...... 
 
 40. “O God, beneath Thy guiding hand.”—L. Bacon 
 41. “Softly fades the twilight ray.”—S. F. SmirnH.... 
 42. “How beauteous were the marks divine.”—A. C, 
 
 GOD) f 6  . Sots slid ee 
 43. “Blest Comforter Divine.”—L. H. SIGoURNEY.... 
 
 
 
 217 
 
 200 
 
 
 
 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 675 
 
 44. “Almost persuaded now to believe.’—P. P. Buiss 134 
 45. “The day is past and gone. The evening.”— J. 
 
 SLBUAND Haze. Gia biiyoclsicf ds VEEL eS aromas har edag , 134 
 
 46. “I need Thee every hour.”—A. 8S. HAWKEs..... 2 130 
 47. “Knocking, knocking, who is there?’—H. B. 
 
 DIREC Es Se, SF ae en ERP PO MER ERE fn | 127 
 
 48. “Take me, oh my Father, take me.”—Ray PALMER 126 
 49. “Come, Jesus Redeemer, abide Thou with me.”— 
 
 Uk SBTC Tc A ee a san cia eso voy o, 3 + oR dl oe cat eee 124 
 50. “We may not climb the heavenly steeps.”— J. G. 
 VVC ETT ER Mercia were ai ciie ss cress o> « « o gratia utepatene 123 
 No. 681. 
 
 “JESUS, MY LORD, TO THEE I CRY.” 
 
 EuizA H. Hamiuton. 
 
 Right in the track of the terrible tornado that devastated 
 a considerable part of Louisville on the night of Thursday, 
 March 27, 1890, was one of the Mission Sunday schools 
 conducted by students of the Southern Baptist Theological 
 Seminary. Ten of the scholars in this school were killed 
 in the storm, several of them at their homes. In the fated 
 “Falls City Hail,” where many children were gathered in 
 some festivity, and where several lodges were in session 
 and most of the loss of life occurred, two of the children 
 of our school were caught by the falling timbers and walls, 
 and though not seriously hurt were imprisoned, so as to 
 see no way of escape. The little girls thought their end 
 had come, and their minds reverted to the Sunday school 
 songs they had learned, and they began to sing, with their 
 weak and tremulous voices, the hymn “Take me as I am,” 
 composed by Eliza H. Hamilton, and set to music by Ira 
 D. Sankey. Amid the roar of the tornado and the thunder 
 and lightning that accompanied it, their little voices 
 
676 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 sounded through the ruins of the building, where some 
 scores of others had been instantly crushed to death. They 
 sang what seemed singularly appropriate and touching: 
 “Jesus, my Lord, to Thee I cry, 
 Unless Thou help me I must die; 
 Oh, bring Thy free salvation nigh, 
 And take me as I am. 
 
 “No preparation can I make, 
 My best resolves I only break, 
 Yet save me for Thine own name’s sake, 
 And take me as I am. 
 
 “Behold me, Savior, at Thy feet, 
 Deal with me as Thou seest meet; 
 Thy work begin, Thy work complete, 
 And save me as I am.” 
 
 I think I shall never sing that song again without think- 
 ing of those little girls shut in by the ruins, and finding 
 their only consolation in the lessons and songs they had 
 learned at the mission Sunday school. 
 
 No. 682. 
 “MERCY AND JUDGMENT ARE MY SONG.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Warts. 
 
 At a Fourth of July celebration in Westfield Connecticut, 
 1846, the Rev. Mr. Waldo, a Revolutionary veteran, was 
 present, and at the dinner table told the following incident: 
 
 He remarked that there was a single incident ae came 
 within his personal knowledge, which he believed was not 
 
 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 677 
 
 generally known. It was that Washington, on the day that 
 he assumed the command of the American Army at Cam- 
 bridge, read and. caused to be sung the one hundred and 
 first Psalm, a portion of which is published: 
 
 “Tf I am raised to bear the sword, 
 I'll take my counsel from Thy word; 
 Thy justice and Thy heavenly grace 
 Shall be the pattern of my ways. 
 
 . “No sons of slander, rage and strife, 
 Shall be companions of my life; 
 The haughty look, the heart of pride, 
 Within my doors shall ne’er abide. 
 
 “T’ll search the land and raise the just 
 To posts of honor, wealth, and trust; 
 The men that work Thy holy will, 
 
 Shall be my friends and favorites still. 
 
 “Tn vain shall sinners hope to rise 
 By flattering or malicious lies; 
 Nor while the innocent I guard, 
 Shall bold offenders e’er be spared. 
 
 “The impious crew (that factious band), 
 Shall hide their heads or quit the land, 
 And all that break the public rest, 
 Where I have power, shall be suppressed.” 
 
 This Psalm the reverend worthy deacon lined off to the 
 company in true primitive style, a line at a time, which was 
 sung to the tune of “Old Hundred” that tune being, as the 
 old veteran said, “just the thing for it.” 
 
678 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 No. 688. 
 “THE LORD’S MY SHEPHERD, ’LL NOT WANT.” 
 FRANCIS Rowse. 
 
 One of the English ladies who went to the Crimea with 
 Florence Nightingale to nurse the sick and wounded 
 soldiers, found in a Scutari hospital a Highlander near 
 death, and yet hard against God. She spoke to him, but he 
 would make no answer. He even drew the sheet up over 
 his head to keep her from speaking to him again. The 
 next time she went through that ward he saw her coming 
 toward his cot, and he covered his face again. Seating 
 herself beside the bed, she began to repeat, in a low, kind 
 voice, the Nursery Psalm: 
 
 “The Lord’s my Shepherd, Ill not want, 
 He makes me down to lie 
 In pastures green. He leadeth me 
 The quiet waters by.” 
 
 She noticed that before the psalm was finished, his hand 
 went up to his eyes under the sheet. The next time she 
 
 came, he was quite ready to listen to what she had to say - 
 
 of Jesus and His love. He gave his heart to the Lord, and 
 five days later he died in great peace. 
 
 The Nursery Psalm was used to touch a chord that was 
 not quite paralyzed by his bitter enmity against God. It 
 was “mony a weary mile” from his mother’s knee in the 
 Highland cottage where, with her loving hand on his bonny, 
 bright head, she had taught him the dear old psalm, to the 
 Crimean hospital, where a rough, hardened soldier, he lay 
 dying; yet the mother’s love, like Christ’s tenderness, 
 reached all the way, and drew him back to God. 
 
 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 679 
 
 No. 684. 
 “JOHN BROWN’S BODY” (Tune). 
 
 The tune of “John Brown’s Body” had its origin before 
 the words that are now known or remembered in connection 
 with it. It was sung before the War of the Rebellion, as 
 long ago, at least, as 1856, to words which do not now 
 remain in use, at certain New England camp meetings and 
 revival services. Two members of the Boston tihilitia com- 
 pany called the “Tigers,” happening to be at a camp meet- 
 ing in a small town in New Hampshire, heard the song 
 sung to religious words, and remembered the air. The name 
 of one of these men was Purington, and of the other John 
 Brown. Not long after this the war broke out, and the 
 “Tigers” were made a part of the Twelfth Massachusetts 
 Regiment of Volunteers, which rendezvoused at Fort 
 Warren, in Boston Harbor. Here the two men already 
 
 named, Purington and Brown, formed, with two others, 
 named ‘Edger ly and Greenleaf, a quartette, and the quartette 
 sang, among its other songs, all sorts of words of their own 
 “getting up” to this tune. 
 
 John Brown was a good-natured Scotchman, and the 
 members of the quartette say they sang “John Brown this 
 and John Brown that” to the tune, until, by an almost un- 
 conscious change, the hero of them was changed from John 
 Brown, of the “Tigers” to John Brown, of Harper’s Ferry, 
 and the grand and simple verse came into existence: 
 
 “John Brown’s body lies a-mouldering in the ground 
 But his soul is marching on.” 
 
 Before this time the masses of the North had not been in 
 exact sympathy with the purposes of John Brown, but the 
 excitement of the early days of the war called out a senti- 
 ment which these words exactly fitted. Whenever the 
 soldier quartette were in Boston they were called upon to 
 sing this song. The Twelfth Regiment took it up. Samuel 
 
680 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 C. Perkins, of Brockton, a member of Maitland’s Band, 
 which was stationed with the Regiment at Fort Warren, 
 wrote down the air while a soldier whistled it. Then the 
 band played it every day. When Edward Everett formally 
 presented the set of colors of the Twelfth Regiment on 
 Boston Common, the speech of acceptance being made by 
 Colonel Fletcher Webster of the Regiment, the tune was 
 played, and the multitude fairly went mad over it. The 
 band played the tune going up State Street in June, 1861, 
 and the soldiers sang it as they marched along. The crowd 
 along the sidewalk took up the air and joined in the chorus: 
 
 “Glory, glory, hallelujah, 
 His soul is marching on!” 
 
 Soon after the regiment sang it in marching through New 
 York on the way to Baltimore, with the same effect. It 
 spread at once through the army and throughout the coun- 
 try, and became the anthem of the Union. In December, 
 1861, Mrs. Julia Ward Howe wrote for the air the words 
 beginning, 
 
 “Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the 
 Lord.” 
 
 which was called “The Battle Hymn of the Republic,” 
 and soon became immensely popular, but never sup- 
 planted in common use the old, simple words. This is the 
 story of the origin of “John Brown’s Body,” as told by the 
 members of the band and the regiment with which it had its 
 use as a popular song. 
 
 No. 685. 
 “JESUS, I MY CROSS HAVE TAKEN.” 
 Rev. H. F. Lyrts. 
 
 At a large assembly, a Sunday school anniversary, it was 
 found that the speakers expected had failed, and none 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH ~ 681 
 
 was ready to take their places. After some Singing the 
 meeting became dull, and the interest seemed to be dying 
 out. The superintendent, who had set his heart on success, 
 was anxious, and at a loss what to do, but finally gave a 
 general invitation to the scholars to repeat any texts or 
 hymns they had learned. He was pleasantly answered, but 
 only for a short time. A stranger on the platform had noticed 
 on the front seat a boy of Jewish caste, with piercing eyes, 
 and wondered why he was there. In the midst of deep 
 silence he arose and repeated: 
 
 “Jesus, I my cross have taken, 
 All to leave and follow Thee; 
 Naked, poor, despised, forsaken, 
 Thou, from hence, my all shalt be’— 
 
 in a voice so thrilling as to move the whole audience. Many 
 eyes were moist, for the story of the young Jew was known. 
 The father had told him he must either leave Sunday school 
 or quit home forever, and the hymn showed what he had 
 given up to follow Christ. The meeting was inspired with 
 new life. Friends gathered round him at the close, and 
 business men united in securing him a situation by which 
 he could earn his own living. 
 
 No. 686. 
 “NOTHING BUT LEAVES, THE SPIRIT GRIEVES.” 
 
 Mrs. Lucy E. AKERMAN, 1816—1874. 
 
 This hymn was suggested by a sermon by Moncure D. 
 Conway from the text, Mark 11:13. “And when He came 
 to it He found nothing but leaves.” 
 
 A man heard Mr. Sankey sing the melody “Nothing but 
 leaves.” The words “nothing but leaves” stuck to him, so 
 
682 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 he committed the hymn to memory and sang it to himself 
 when he was alone, or as he walked the busy streets. And 
 what was the result? He said that every line and every 
 word told him undeniable truths that went straight to his 
 heart. He overhauled his whole life—over fifty years— 
 and he said, “I could not find a single ear of good grain; 
 nothing but leaves, withered leaves!” And that thought 
 led him to seek the Lord until he found peace in Him, and 
 then bore living fruit for Jesus. 
 
 No. 687. 
 “THE OLD OAKEN BUCKET.” 
 SAMUEL WoopwoRrTH. 
 
 Woodworth was a printer, and intemperate. He was in 
 the habit of dropping into the liquor saloon kept by a man 
 by the name of Mallory. One day after drinking a glass 
 of brandy and water, he smacked his lips and declared that 
 Mallory’s brandy was superior to any drink he had ever 
 tasted. 
 
 “No” said Mallory, “you are mistaken; there was a drink 
 which we both once thought was far ahead of this.” 
 
 “What was it?” asked Woodworth. 
 
 “The fresh water we used to drink out of the old oak 
 bucket that hung in the well, when we came in from the 
 field on a sultry day.” 
 
 “True,” cried Woodworth, and a tear stood on his cheek 
 as he said it. Going to his printing office he seated himself 
 at a desk, and began to write: 
 
 “How dear to my heart are the scenes of my childhood.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 683 
 No. 688. 
 “THE SONG OF THE SHIRT.” 
 
 Tuomas Hoop. 
 
 Tom Hood was prompted to write this song by the condi- 
 tion of thousands of working women in the city of London. 
 It was the work of a single evening. He handed it to his 
 wife to read. 
 
 “Now mind Tom, mind my words,” said she, “this will 
 tell wonderfully. It is one of the best things you ever did.” 
 
 Awhile after Mark Lemon, Editor of London Punch, 
 found a letter in his morning mail, enclosing a poem, and 
 a letter from its author, saying that the poem enclosed had 
 been rejected by three London journals, and asked him not 
 to return it but to throw it into the wastebasket if he did 
 not think it worth using, as he was sick of the sight of it. 
 It was this same “Song of the Shirt.” Mr. Lemon liked 
 it although some of his co-editors did not, and it was pub- 
 lished in Punch, December 16, 1843. It created a great 
 sensation. It trebled the sale of the paper. People of 
 every class were moved by it. It was sung on the streets 
 and in palaces. And when Tom Hood died a monument was 
 placed above his grave, paid for by a great popular sub- 
 scription on which was placed an inscription he himself had 
 desired, ‘‘He sang the Song of the Shirt.” 
 
 No. 689. 
 “ABIDE WITH ME, FAST FALLS THE EVENTIDE.” 
 
 Rev. H. F. Lyte. 
 
 A young man left his home in the country and came to 
 New York City, where he fell into temptation and ere long 
 
684 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 was far on the road to ruin. One evening as he passed along 
 the street on his way to join his vicious companions, he 
 heard the sound of singing and caught the words: 
 
 “Abide with me, fast falls the eventide, 
 The darkness deepens, Lord with me abide.” 
 
 He stopped as suddenly as if arrested by the hand of God, 
 for these were the words and this was the song his mother 
 sang to him every night, as she put him to bed, and her 
 image and all the sweet memories of his childhood’s home 
 came rushing into his mind. He turned back and entered 
 the church from which the music came, found different 
 friends and companions there and became a Christian. 
 
 No. 690. 
 FOR A SEASON CALLED TO PART.” 
 
 Rev. Joun NEwTon. 
 
 It is doubtful if ever a more intimate friendship or close 
 affection existed between pastor and people, than that which 
 grew up between John Newton and his church at Olney. 
 The Olney hymn book which has become celebrated in 
 hymnology consisted of the hymns which week after week 
 Newton and Cowper had prepared for use in the weekly 
 prayer meeting of his people, and this hymn is a good 
 illustration of the way in which they made common lot of 
 the experiences of their lives. In the year 1776, Newton 
 was the victim of a tumor on his thigh and in November 
 of that year he decided to go to London to undergo a sur- 
 gical operation for its removal. This was before the day of 
 aneesthetics and the operation would be painful, and pos- 
 sibly fatal. So at the prayer meeting before his departure 
 this hymn written for the occasion was read and sung 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 685 
 
 together by pastor and people. The knowledge of these 
 circumstances under which it was written will interpret to 
 us its words. The hymn beginning ‘“‘As the sun’s enlivening 
 eye,” is the same hymn. 
 
 No. 691. 
 “COME O MY SOUL! IN SACRED LAYS.” 
 
 Rev. THomas BLAcKLOcK. 
 
 This hymn is a specimen of what can be accomplished in 
 spite of great obstacles. A Scotch boy was stricken with 
 smallpox when six months old, from which he recovered 
 only with the total loss of his sight. But in spite of this he 
 obtained a liberal education, was for a short time pastor 
 of a church in Scotland, then the head of a school for boys, 
 the author of several books, and the writer of good poetry. 
 A friend said of him that he had known him to dictate 
 thirty or forty verses of poetry as fast as they could be 
 written down, but the moment he was at a loss for a word 
 to his liking, he would stop and seldom resume his work 
 until some later time. It is probable, therefore, that this 
 hymn was composed in this way, being dictated by the blind 
 poet as rapidly as it could be written down. 
 
 There is in the second stanza a reminder of a very re- 
 markable characteristic of his writing, namely, that he 
 excelled in accurate descriptions of the world of nature, 
 although his eyes had never seen the things his words 
 described. The author of the hymn has left for us a portrait 
 of himself in verse: 
 
 “Straight is my person, but of little size, 
 
 Lean are my cheeks, and hollow are my eyes; 
 My youthful down is like my talent, rare, 
 Politely distant stands each single hair. 
 
 My voice too rough to charm a lady’s ear, 
 
 So smooth a child may listen without fear.” ete. 
 
686 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 692. 
 “EIN’ FESTE BURG” (Tune). 
 
 Martin Lutuer, 1483—1546. 
 
 Composed in Coburg Castle where Luther was protected 
 during the meeting of the diet at Augsburg. In great 
 anxiety he here wrote the hymn, composed the tune, and 
 sang it. Both tune and words have been often used in later 
 works. Meyerbeer in “Les Huguenots” puts it into the 
 mouths of an old Huguenot soldier and his companions as 
 their death song. Mendelssohn introduces the music into 
 -his “Reformation Symphony.” Bach uses it in several 
 cantatas. Raff in an overture, and Wagner in his “Kaiser 
 March.” Mendelssohn’s use of it is probably the most in 
 keeping with the name and work of its composer. The 
 first part of his symphony is broken and confused, but in- 
 termixed at intervals with strains from Luther’s Song. This 
 is like the beginning of Luther’s work, when his doctrines 
 were just becoming known to the people. Gradually the 
 din grows louder and harsher, but Luther’s music is heard 
 more frequently and distinctly, and now and then a strain 
 rises clear and loud above the noise, and at length in the 
 climax of the symphony, all the instruments sweep together 
 into the notes of Luther’s hymn. 
 
 No. 693. 
 “AM I A SOLDIER OF THE CROSS?” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Warts. 
 
 It was the custom with many ministers of the time of 
 Watts to write a hymn nearly every week with which to 
 close the sermon of the following Sunday, and the hymn 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 637 
 
 was then sung by the congregation. A great many of the 
 hymns of Watts, and Doddridge, and Beddome were thus 
 written. 
 
 One winter Sunday in 1727 in a little English church, 
 the minister gave out as his text, the words of Paul to the 
 Christians at Corinth, “Watch ye, stand fast in the faith, 
 quit you like men, be strong” (I Cor. 16:13). Those were 
 the days of long sermons and many heads. The preacher 
 first described Christian courage, and then Seer some 
 of the occasions for it: 
 
 “Piety in the presence of unchristian people. 
 
 Courage before infidels and scoffers. 
 
 In the practice of unfashionable virtues. 
 
 In pleading the cause of the oppressed. 
 
 In reproving sin. 
 
 In works of reformation. 
 
 In the peculiar circumstances of daily life, as when a 
 servant is forced to tell the truth. 
 
 Martyr faith, 7. e., passive valor in bearing affliction, 
 and in enduring persecution.” 
 
 And then at the close of the sermon, to enforce its teach- 
 ings he repeated this hymn, and it was then first sung by 
 his hearers. 
 
 No. 694. 
 “COME WE WHO LOVE THE LORD.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac WATTs. 
 
 There was once a difficulty in the choir of a New England 
 church, presided over by a somewhat celebrated minister, 
 named Samuel West. The choir had refused to sing, and 
 the pastor gave out this hymn, and after reading it solemnly 
 through, looked up at the rebellious choir and said, ‘‘Please 
 commence with the second stanza.” This reads, 
 
688 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “Let those refuse to sing 
 Who never knew our God, 
 But children of the heavenly King, 
 May speak their joys abroad.” 
 
 It is needless to say that the choir chose to sing rather 
 than by silence to apply to themselves the classification of 
 those who refused. 
 
 No. 695. 
 “DEAR LORD, AND MASTER MINE.” 
 
 Tuomas H. Guu. 
 
 The author of this hymn after preparatory education de- 
 clined to enter Oxford, because he could not sign the 
 “Thirty-nine Articles” required for admission, the doctrines 
 to which he objected being those of the Trinity and the 
 Divinity of Christ. He was the son of Unitarian parents, 
 and had been trained in their faith. From the age of nine- 
 teen to twenty-six he devoted himself to the study of the 
 Greek New Testament, until as he himself records, “The 
 assiduous perusal of the Greek Testament for many years 
 showed me clearly that Unitarianism failed to interpret the 
 Book of Life. As truth after truth broke upon my gaze, 
 God put a new song into my mouth.” This is one of the 
 “new songs,” and its language, especially in the first stanza, 
 is appropriate to the change that had come to him from 
 opposition and unbelief, to faith and loyalty. 
 
 No. 696. 
 “HE LEADETH ME, O BLESSED THOUGHT.” 
 
 Rev. J. H. Grmmore. 
 
 The author of this hymn had been talking one evening at 
 the prayer meeting of a Baptist church in Philadelphia, 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 689 
 
 about the twenty-third Psalm, and had been especially im- 
 pressed with the blessedness of being led by God, of the 
 mere fact of His leadership altogether apart from the way 
 in which He leads, or what He leads us to. At the close of 
 the service he went to the home of one of the deacons of 
 the church, and there in conversation the same subject was 
 continued. As they talked, the blessedness of this leader- 
 ship so grew upon him that taking out his pencil he wrote 
 the hymn, just as it now stands, and handed it to his wife. 
 Without his knowledge she sent it to a Baptist paper and 
 it was published. Three years later he went to Rochester, 
 New York, to preach and was shown into the church soon 
 after his arrival in town. As he entered he took up a hymn 
 book, saying to himself, “I wonder what they sing here.” 
 The book opened at his own hymn and this was the first 
 that he knew that it had found a place among the songs of 
 the Church. The hymn has become very popular, and has 
 been translated into many languages for missionary use. 
 The tune by Wm. B. Bradbury, “‘He leadeth me,” was 
 composed for this hymn. 
 
 No. 697. 
 “Q THOU GOD, WHO HEAREST PRAYER.” 
 
 Jos1sH CoNnpbeEr, 1789—1855. 
 
 The author of this hymn fell from his horse while riding 
 one day, and met with very severe injuries, which confined 
 him to his bed for a while and nearly ended his life. It 
 was while so confined and suffering from his injury that he 
 wrote this hymn. One stanza contains a couplet, now 
 usually omitted, referring directly to his condition: 
 
 “Listen to my feeble breath 
 Now I touch the gates of death:” 
 
 and the whole hymn is his prayer for recovery. 
 
690 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 698. 
 “WE SHALL MEET BEYOND THE RIVER.” 
 
 Rev. Joun Arxrnson, 1835. 
 
 The author’s mother had recently died (February, 1867) 
 and he was alone one night in his study near midnight, and 
 was thinking of the mother he had lost, and also of revival 
 services in which he had just been engaged. Under the 
 influence of these thoughts, the substance of this hymn, as 
 he says, “seemed to sing itself into my heart. I said to 
 myself, I had better write that down or I shall lose it, and 
 there in the silence of my study, not far from midnight, I 
 wrote the hymn.” 
 
 No. 699. 
 “COMMIT THOU ALL THY GRIEFS.” 
 
 Paunt GERHARDT. 
 
 Near the close of the last century, a pastor was Chaplain 
 to the Swedish Embassy in Paris, and preached alternately 
 in Swedish and in German. One Sunday this hymn was 
 being sung, as a pale man entered, took his seat in the last 
 pew, and resting his head on his hand, looked on to his 
 neighbor’s book, but did not sing. At the end of the hymn 
 the Chaplain took for his text the words of the Psalm on 
 which the hymn is based (Psalm 37:5), “Commit thy way 
 unto the Lord! Trust also in Him, and He shall bring it to 
 pass.” When the sermon was over, the stranger sprang to 
 his feet, pressed forward and took the preacher by the hand 
 exclaiming, ‘You have saved my life.” Then he related how 
 he had come from Germany to Paris, and built up a pros- 
 perous business, but in consequence of the war had lost 
 everything and with his family was plunged into poverty 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 691° 
 
 and distress. In his misery he had resolved to throw him- 
 self into the Seine, and was on his way thither when the 
 sound of the singing had reminded him of brighter days, and 
 had drawn him into the chapel to hear it through. The pas- 
 tor’s sermon had completed what the hymn had begun, and 
 given him new courage. The pastor helped him to employ- 
 ment and he regained his old position as a merchant and 
 remained faithful to the church, but during the reign of 
 terror left Paris and settled in Bremen. Later on the pastor 
 also quitted Paris and went to Bremen too, and was recog- 
 nized by his former friend, who found for him an appoint- 
 ment there. 
 
 No. 700. 
 “JERUSALEM MY HAPPY HOME.” 
 
 Tapers bo? oe hie 
 
 This hymn, which had its inspiration in the old Latin 
 hymn of St. Bernard of Cluny, from which we get our 
 “Jerusalem the Golden” and several other hymns, has a 
 somewhat curious history. 
 
 A manuscript was discovered some years ago in the British 
 Museum, with a notation that it had been bought at an 
 auction sale in 1844. Upon examination it proved to be a 
 collection of songs quite miscellaneous in character, and 
 evidently dating from the reign of Queen Elizabeth. One 
 of these songs was headed, “A dittie most excellent for 
 every man to reade, that doth intend for to repent, and 
 to amend with spede,” to the tune of “A Rich Merchant- 
 man,” or “John come kiss me now.” Another piece was 
 entitled, “The Parliament of Devils.” Among the collec- 
 tion is one which is entitled, “A Song made by F. B. P. to. 
 the tune of Diana.” This is the song, but who its author 
 was has ever been subject for discussion. There was a cer- 
 tain Francis Baker Porter, a Roman Catholic priest and 
 
692 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 author, who was imprisoned in the Tower of London, during 
 the reign of Queen Elizabeth, and many think that from 
 behind the prison walls he sang this song of longing for the 
 liberty of Heaven. Others with more earnestness than evi- 
 dence construe the initials “F. B. P.” to mean Francis Baker, 
 priest. This seems less probable than the other. But who- . 
 ever “F. B. P.” may have been, his song was knocked about 
 until the auctioneer at last knocked it off to the buyer for 
 the British Museum, where it lay buried until resurrected 
 and polished up for the song service of these later days. 
 
 No. 701. 
 “SAFE IN THE ARMS OF JESUS.” 
 
 Fanny Crossy (Mrs. Van Alstyne). 
 
 The author of this hymn, blind from infancy, has 
 written more than three thousand hymns. Many of them, 
 as might be expected, of little value, but many others that 
 have become classic in the hymnody of the Church. The 
 facility with which she throws her ideas into verse is well 
 illustrated by this hymn, which was written in twenty min- 
 utes, for Mr. W. H. Doane, who suggested the subject and 
 waited while she composed it. On another occasion he 
 called on her one afternoon and asked for a hymn to be 
 sung at a service that evening, and while he waited she 
 composed the hymn: 
 
 “Jesus keep me near the cross.” 
 
 She had a wonderful memory, as witness this incident. 
 Mr. Philip Phillips, the “Singing Pilgrim,” called upon her 
 at one time and gave to her eighty subjects upon which he 
 wished her to write hymns. Forty of these he left with 
 her. Not a word of the hymns on any of these subjects was 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 693 
 
 written down, until one day she sent for Mr. Phillips, and 
 dictated to him as he wrote, the whole forty hymns. She 
 had written secular songs as well as sacred, that have 
 become popular, as for instance, “Hazel Dell,’ “Rosalie 
 the Prairie Flower,” ‘“There’s Music in the Air,” ete. 
 
 No. 702. 
 “OH, SWEETLY BREATHE THE LYRES ABOVE.” 
 
 Rev. Ray PAuMeEr. 
 
 During the winter of 1842-1843, there was a revival of 
 religion in the church over which Dr. Palmer presided. At 
 one communion service quite a number of converts had been 
 received into the church, and as part of the service “O 
 happy day that fixed my choice” had been sung. At the 
 next communion, several others were to be received, and as 
 the pastor did not like to repeat the use of the same hymn, 
 he composed this one to be used in its stead. 
 
 No. 708. 
 “PORTUGUESE HYMN” (Tune). 
 
 It is an ancient custom of European sovereigns to employ 
 in their service a number of boy singers who perform the 
 music in the chapels where their royal employers worship. 
 These choirs are called “Children of the Chapel Royal,” 
 and they are led and taught by another servant of the sover- 
 eign, called the “Chapel Master.” This person follows the 
 sovereign from place to place wherever he may go. Marcus 
 Portugal was Chapel Master to the King of Portugal and 
 composed this music as an offertory piece, that is, a tune 
 to be played in the church while the people were bringing 
 
694 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 their contributions to the plate. His royal Master visited 
 Brazil in 1808, and Portugal went with him, remaining there 
 until he died in 1834. When Dom Pedro, Emperor of 
 Brazil, the same who, in 1876, in company with President 
 Grant, started the machinery of the Centennial Exposition 
 at Philadelphia into motion, was a little boy, this Marcus 
 Portugal still led the music of the Chapel service where he 
 worshipped in Rio Janeiro. 
 
 No. 704. 
 “OH, COME AND LET US ALL WITH ONE ACCORD.” 
 
 ANON. 
 
 This is a version of the ninety-fifth Psalm, written by 
 some unknown author, and at some unknown time, but it is 
 evidently old. In the time of Baxter, who died in 1689, it 
 was a common thing so to compose a hymn, that it could be 
 sung in either of two meters. This was done by including 
 the necessary words to lengthen the lines in brackets so that 
 the hymn would make sense either with or without their 
 use. Some of Baxter’s hymns were written in this way, and 
 this hymn is one of the same sort, as it can be reduced to 
 a long meter by striking out two syllables from each line, 
 as thus: 
 
 “OQ come let all with one accord, 
 Lift up our voice and praise the Lord, 
 Let us this evening bless His name, 
 Yea, let us magnify the same.” 
 
 No. 705. 
 “COME THOU FOUNT OF EVERY BLESSING.” 
 
 R. Rosinson. 
 
 There is a story which concerns the Rev. Dr. Muhlen- 
 berg, author of the hymn “I would not live alway,” and 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 695 
 
 concerns also the fourth stanza of this hymn. The Doctor 
 had a pupil whose self-righteousness disturbed him, and 
 one day he handed him a slip of paper on which he had 
 written a version of this stanza corrected to suit the 
 occasion. 
 
 “I did seek Thee when a stranger 
 Looking for the fold of God! 
 
 I to save my soul from danger, 
 Earned redemption in Thy blood.” 
 
 Its effect upon the student is not recorded. 
 
 No. 706. 
 “Q LITTLE CHILDREN, SING.” 
 “JESUS, YOUR LORD AND KING.” 
 
 Miss ANNA B. WARNER. 
 
 In 1860 there was published a novel entitled “Say and 
 Seal.” It was the joint work of two sisters, who had 
 years before made themselves famous by the production of 
 “The Wide, Wide World,” one of the most widely read 
 novels ever written. One of the principal characters in 
 “Say and Seal” is a man by the name of Linden, who makes 
 his appearance in a little village on the shore of Long 
 Island Sound, as teacher of the village school. He is 
 provided with a boarding place by the school committee and 
 this boarding place provides another important character in 
 the story, in the person of Faith Derrick the daughter of 
 the family. Mr. Linden becomes a favorite among the 
 families of the poor and the sick, and the children all be- 
 come his friends. One New Year’s Day he and Faith start 
 upon a round of visits, to sick and needy families, with 
 
696 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 a sleigh full of provisions, and clothing and toys. One of 
 the last visits made is at a home where a large family of 
 children greet them, for each of whom as well as for the 
 common table there is a special gift. When all have been 
 distributed one of the children, little Mary, says to her 
 mother, “Ma, will Mr. Linden sing for us today?” “TI 
 dare say if you ask him pretty,” is the reply, and then it 
 is discovered that when Mr. Linden meets these people in 
 their homes he is in the habit of singing to them songs and 
 hymns. And so after some urging Mr. Linden sings for 
 them a “Child’s Christmas Hymn” of five stanzas begin- 
 ning: 
 
 “O little children, sing. 
 
 Jesus, your Lord and King 
 
 For you a child became: 
 
 On that bright Christmas day 
 
 He in a manger lay, 
 
 Who hath the one Almighty name!” 
 
 Of course the story is all fiction, and as to most of it, 
 the two sisters, who wrote it in its preface say that the 
 public shall never know what part each wrote; but as to 
 this little hymn as well as two others which in the story 
 Mr. Linden sings to a little boy who is sick and is soon to 
 die, one of the sisters Miss Anna B. Warner confesses that 
 they are of her composing. 
 
 No. 707. 
 “1.0! GOD IS HERE, LET US ADORE.” 
 GERHARD TERSTEEGEN. 
 
 Rev. Joun WEsLEY, Translator 
 
 This hymn has been in use in mission work to encourage 
 those engaged in it when lonely in a heathen land. Rev. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 697 
 
 Dr. Coke and Rev. Benjamin Clough, the first an old mis- 
 Sionary and the other a new recruit in the service, were 
 together in Hindostan, when Dr. Coke exclaimed to his 
 young companion, “My dear brother, I am dead to all but 
 India.” 
 
 The thought of such complete consecration cheered the 
 young man, who was tempted to homesickness, and he 
 began to sing a stanza of this hymn, not now often included 
 in our hymnals: 
 
 “Glad the toys of earth we leave, 
 
 Wealth, pleasure, fame, for Thee alone ; 
 To Thee our will, soul, flesh, we give, 
 
 Oh, take, oh, seal them for Thine own.” 
 
 And as he sang the aged misssionary joined him in the song, 
 and so together, the old man nearly through, and the young 
 man but just begun, made the hymn at once a renewal of 
 their consecration to the work of missions, and a prayer 
 for divine approval. 
 
 No. 708. 
 “O LORD, I WOULD DELIGHT IN THEE.” 
 
 Rev. Joon Rywtanp. 
 
 The author of this hymn when a young man was engaged 
 to be married to a young lady who was taken with a 
 - dangerous sickness, from which it was feared, she would - 
 not recover. Filled with anxiety he called at her home to 
 inquire about her, and was told by the servant that if he 
 would return in half an hour he could hear the opinion of 
 the doctors who were then holding a consultation on the 
 case. He went away to an empty house near by, and sitting 
 down on a large stone, wrote this hymn, expressive of his 
 trust in God amid trouble. When he called at the house 
 
698 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 again he received a-favorable report; the young lady re- 
 covered and later they were married. 
 The same hymn is often used in a different meter, be- 
 ginning: 
 “Tord I delight in thee.” 
 
 In the author’s manuscript there is appended to this hymn 
 the date of December 3, 1777, and this note: “TI recollect 
 deeper feelings of mind in composing this hymn than per- 
 haps I ever felt in making any other.” 
 
 No. 709. 
 “WOODMAN SPARE THAT TREE.” 
 
 GrorGE P. Morris. 
 
 Years ago when New York City was smaller than at 
 present, the author of this song, was one day driving with 
 a friend near Bloomingdale. The friend suggested that 
 they turn into a woodland road to look at an old tree, 
 which as he said had been planted by his grandfather, near 
 the cottage where he was born. On the way he told how the 
 old tree whenever he saw it brought back the old times 
 when, as a happy boy with father and mother and sisters, 
 he had sat under its shade. 
 
 As they approached the tree, they saw an old man, with 
 his coat off, and an ax. “What are you going to do?” 
 . Inquired Mr. Morris’ companion, “You are surely not going 
 to cut down that tree?” 
 
 “Yes I am though,” was the blunt reply. 
 
 Further talk brought out the fact that the old man was 
 now the owner of the cottage and did not fancy having the 
 great tree so near his house, and besides he wanted it for 
 firewood. In reply to the question, how much it was worth, 
 he said, “About ten dollars,” and the result was a bargain 
 
” 
 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 699 
 
 struck on the spot, and the money paid, by which he agreed 
 to let the tree stand, his daughter who stood by agreeing 
 that it should stand as long as she lived. This incident 
 led Mr. Morris to write the song: 
 
 “Woodman spare that tree.” 
 
 No. 710. 
 “JOYFULLY, JOYFULLY ONWARD I MOVE.” 
 
 Rev. Wm. Hunter. 
 
 Rey. J. M. Thoburn, a Methodist missionary in India, 
 relates that at one time, he was traveling at the foot of the 
 Himalaya Mountains, in a section of the country, strange 
 to him, and the shades of evening were gathering about 
 him, as he was pressing forward in search of shelter for the 
 night. The country was infested with wild beasts and 
 other dangers beset him as he moved on in the silence. 
 Suddenly a wailing sound from a distant spot broke on the 
 air and as he listened it seemed to be coming nearer. At 
 last it was made out to be a human voice, and a few mo- 
 ments later the voice of song could be distinguished. It 
 was a native Hindoo, singing in his own language, but 
 with the old tune familiar in America, this hymn of Dr. 
 Hunter’s: 
 
 “Joyfully, joyfully onward I move 
 Bound for the land of bright spirits above.” 
 
 The hymn was composed while the author was riding on 
 horseback over the mountains of West Virginia, the thought 
 in his mind being the reward of the faithful itinerant at the 
 end of his work, and the hymn was nearly complete before 
 he had an opportunity to write it down. As soon as he 
 
700 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 reached a stopping place, he alighted from his horse, and 
 like Charles Wesley, calling for pen and ink, committed the 
 
 words to paper. 
 
 NOG 11s 
 “LEAVE GOD TO ORDER ALL THY WAYS.” 
 GrorGE NEUMARK. 
 
 Miss C. WinxkwortH, Translator. 
 
 Several of our hymns were composed as parts of novels, 
 with no thought of their ever being used for public wor- 
 ship; but here is one which is unique in that a novel has 
 been written, which weaves the facts known about its 
 author and its origin into a very pretty love story. Its 
 title is, “The Lutanist of St. Jacobi’s.” It is by Catherine 
 ‘Drew, and can be found in Munroe’s “Seaside Library.” 
 
 No. 712. 
 
 “MINE EYES HAVE SEEN THE GLORY OF THE 
 COMING OF THE LORD.” 
 
 Mrs. Jutia Warp Howe. 
 
 This hymn was published in the Atlantic Monthly, Feb- 
 ruary, 1862. A Methodist minister then in Putnam, Ohio, 
 saw it and was so charmed with it that he committed it to 
 memory at once. He became an army chaplain, was cap- 
 tured by the Confederates and sent to Libby Prison. He 
 was an enthusiastic singer, and soon had the prisoners hold- 
 ing a regular service of song every evening. Here this 
 wonderful song was first sung, and it did much to keep up 
 the courage of those unfortunate prisoners. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 701 
 
 Not long after, this Methodist minister, who was none 
 other than the celebrated Chaplain McCabe, was released 
 from Libby and came to Washington. A great meeting of 
 the Christian Commission was held in the Hall of Repre- 
 sentatives just at that time (winter of 1863-1864), and the 
 hall was crowded in every part. While Geo. H. Stewart, 
 of Philadelphia, President of the Commission, was speaking, 
 a door opened at the side of the platform and a tall man, 
 slightly stooped, entered. There was a glance between him 
 and the speaker, and then he took a seat near by and the 
 speech went on. At its conclusion, Chaplain McCabe was 
 introduced and sang this hymn, as only he could sing it. 
 As he neared the end of the song, the tall stooping man 
 was seen to write on a scrap of paper, which went to Mr. 
 Stewart. It was a request from Abraham Lincoln, for he it 
 was, the President of the nation, that Chaplain McCabe 
 would repeat the song. As he came forward to do so, he 
 prefaced the singing with a message which the Union pris- 
 oners in Libby had commissioned him to bring to the Presi- 
 dent. It was that, notwithstanding the terrible suffering 
 they were enduring there, they wanted him “not to mind 
 them and to allow no sympathy for them to prevent his 
 marching straight onward until the rebellion was crushed, 
 slavery extinguished, and the Union restored.” And then 
 he sang once more the “Battle Hymn of the Republic,” the 
 audience joining in the chorus. With each succeeding stanza 
 the enthusiasm rose higher, until at last, with an expres- 
 sion absolutely impossible to describe, he sang the closing 
 couplet: 
 
 “As He died to make men holy 
 Let us die to make men free.” 
 
 The audience were almost wild as they shouted rather than 
 sang the final chorus. 
 
702 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 7138. 
 “RESCUE THE PERISHING, CARE FOR THE DYING.” 
 
 FANNY CRrossy. 
 
 The author of this hymn, though blind, often visited the 
 Sunday schools and missions about New York. On one 
 occasion she was visiting one of the missions, when her own 
 hymn, “Rescue the Perishing,” was sung. At its close a 
 young man arose and said, “It was this hymn that brought 
 me to Christ. I was passing along the street one night, 
 ragged and hungry, my time and. money having been wasted 
 in drink. I heard some voices singing: 
 
 ‘Rescue the perishing 
 
 Care for the dying 
 Snatch them in pity 
 
 From sin and the grave.’ 
 
 I followed the sound of the voices and found myself in a 
 little mission meeting. I took a back seat just to hear the 
 hymn through. I was just ready to perish that night, but 
 that hymn saved me. I wish I could see the one who wrote 
 that hymn.” And in a few minutes they led the blind 
 woman, who had written the words, up to the man who 
 had been saved by the words of her hymn. 
 
 No. 714. 
 “HIS MOTHER’S SONGS.” 
 “Beneath the hot midsummer sun 
 The men had marched all day; 
 
 And now beside a rippling stream 
 Upon the grass they lay. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 
 
 “Tiring of games and idle jests, 
 As swept the hours along, 
 They called to one who mused apart, 
 ‘Come, friend, give us a song.’ 
 
 “*T fear I cannot please,’ he said; 
 ‘The only songs I know 
 
 Are those my mother used to sing 
 For me long years ago.’ 
 
 “ ‘Sing one of those,’ a rough voice cried, 
 ‘There’s none but true men here; 
 To every mother’s son of us 
 A mother’s songs are dear.’ 
 
 “Then sweetly rose the singer’s voice 
 Amid unwonted calm, 
 ‘Am I a soldier of the cross, 
 A follower of the Lamb?’ 
 
 ““And shall I fear to own His cause’— 
 The very stream was stilled, 
 And hearts that never throbbed with fear 
 With tender thoughts were filled. 
 
 “Ended the song; the singer said, 
 As to his feet he rose, 
 ‘Thanks to you all, my friends; good night 
 God grant us sweet repose.’ 
 
 “ «Sing us one more,’ the captain begged; 
 The soldier bent his head, 
 Then glancing round, with smiling lips, 
 ‘You'll join with me,’ he said. 
 
 “We'll sing this old familiar air, 
 Sweet as the bugle call, 
 
 703 
 
704 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “All hail the power of Jesus’ name, 
 Let angels prostrate fall.” 
 
 “Ah! wondrous was the old tune’s spell 
 As on the singer sang, 
 Man after man fell into line, 
 And loud the voices rang. 
 
 “The songs are done, the camp is still, 
 Naught but the stream is heard; 
 But ah! the depths of every soul 
 By those old hymns are stirred. 
 
 “And up from many a bearded lip, 
 In whispers soft and low, 
 Rises the prayer the mother taught 
 The boy long years ago.” 
 
 No. 716. 
 “THE OLD PSALM TUNE.” 
 
 Mrs. H. B. Stowsn. 
 
 “You asked, dear friend, the other day, 
 Why still my charmed ear 
 Rejoiceth in uncultured tone, 
 That old psalm tune to hear? 
 
 “T’ve heard full oft in foreign lands 
 The grand orchestral strain, 
 Where music’s ancient masters live, 
 Revealed on earth again. 
 
 ‘‘And well I feel the magic power, 
 When skilled and cultured art 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 705 
 
 Its cunning web of sweetness weaves 
 Around the captured heart. 
 
 “But yet, dear friend, tho’ rudely sung, 
 That old psalm tune hath still 
 A pulse of power beyond them all 
 My inmost soul to thrill. 
 
 “Those halting tones that sound to you, 
 Are not the tones I hear; 
 But voices of the loved and lost 
 Then meet my longing ear. 
 
 “T hear my angel mother’s voice— 
 
 Those were the words she sung; 
 
 I hear my brother’s ringing tones, 
 As once on earth they rung: 
 
 “And friends that walk in white above 
 Come round me like a cloud, 
 And far above those earthly notes 
 Their singing sounds aloud. 
 
 “There may be discord, as you say; 
 Those voices poorly ring; 
 
 But there’s no discord in the strain 
 Those upper spirits sing. 
 
 “For they who sing are of the blest, 
 The calm and glorified, 
 Whose hours are one eternal rest 
 On Heaven’s sweet flowing tide. 
 
 “Their life is music, and accord; 
 Their souls and hearts keep time 
 
 In one sweet concert with the Lord— 
 One concert vast, sublime. 
 
706 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “And thro’ the hymns they sang on earth 
 Sometimes a sweetness falls, 
 
 On those they loved and left below, 
 And softly homeward calls. 
 
 “Bells from our own dear fatherland, 
 Borne trembling o’er the sea— 
 The narrow sea that they have crossed, - 
 The shores where we shall be. 
 
 “Oh sing, sing on, beloved souls; 
 Sing cares and griefs to rest; 
 Sing, till entranced we arise 
 To join you ’mid the blest.” 
 
 No. 716. 
 “CROWN HIM LORD OF ALL.” 
 Miss L. M. Latrmenr. 
 
 In 1835, when Rev. Edward Webb, D.D., and other mis- 
 sionaries sailed for India, the last words they heard from 
 their native land were: 
 
 “Crown Him Lord of all.” 
 
 “They hushed their breath, that noble band, 
 
 To catch the last farewell; 
 
 The dear home shore receding fast 
 With every ocean swell. 
 
 Above the city’s noise and din 
 A song rose on the air 
 
 A song of triumph and of joy 
 From loved ones gathered there. 
 
 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 707 
 
 AJ] hail the power of Jesus’ name!’ 
 
 And,- clear as bugle call, 
 
 The words came floating on the air, 
 Oh! ‘crown him Lord of all!’ 
 
 They caught the spirit of the hymn, 
 Danger and death looked small 
 
 To those brave ones, who gave their lives 
 To crown Him Lord of all. 
 
 “A battle hymn, that song sped on, 
 The world for Christ, the call— 
 . For every island of the sea 
 Shall crown Him Lord of all. 
 On Himalaya’s sunny slope, 
 By Delhi’s kingly wall, 
 They lay their lives down at His feet, 
 And crown Him Lord of all. 
 
 “The Southern Cross begins to bend, 
 
 The morning dawns at last 
 
 Idol and shrine, and mosque and tower 
 At Jesus’ feet are cast. 
 
 Triumphant Zion, lift thy head, 
 Let every burden fall. 
 
 Come cast your trophies at His feet, 
 And crown Him Lord of all.” 
 
 No. 717. 
 “RAIN ON THE ROOF.” 
 
 Coates KINNEY. 
 
 Mr. Kinney gives this account of the origin of the song: 
 “The verses were written when I was about twenty years 
 of age, as nearly as I can remember. They were inspired 
 
708 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 close to the rafters of a little story-and-a-half frame house. 
 The language, as first published, was not composed, it came. 
 I had just a little more to do with it than I had with the 
 coming of the rain. The poem, in its entirety, came and 
 asked me to put it down, the next afternoon, in the course 
 of a solitary and aimless squandering of a young man’s 
 time along a no-whither road through a summer wood. 
 Every word of it is a fact, and was a tremendous heart 
 throb.” 
 
 The words were sent to Emerson Bennett, at that time 
 editor of The Columbia, at Cincinnati, who threw them 
 aside, as not being quite up to The Columbia’s standard! 
 A few days later, the publisher of the paper, Mr. Penrose 
 Jones, rummaging in the drawers of rejected manuscripts, 
 came across Mr. Kinney’s, and, holding it up, wanted to 
 know, “What the dickens do you mean, Mr. Bennett, by 
 putting this here?” The next day it went into print in 
 The Columbia, and immediately afterward, to the surprise 
 and disgust of Mr. Bennett, it went all over the world. 
 
 No. 718. 
 “A LIFE ON THE OCEAN WAVE.” 
 
 Epes SARGENT. 
 
 “A Life on the Ocean Wave” was written for Henry 
 Russell. The subject of the song was suggested to me as 
 I was walking one breezy, sun-bright morning in spring, on 
 the Battery, New York, and looking out upon the ships and 
 the small craft under full sail. Having completed my song 
 and my walk together, I went to the office of The Mirror, 
 wrote out the words, and showed them to my good friend, 
 George P. Morris. 
 
 After reading the piece, he said, “My dear boy, this is not 
 a song; it will never do for music; but it is a very nice little 
 lyric; so let me take it and publish it in The Mirror.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 709 
 
 I consented, and concluded that Morris was right. Some 
 days after the publication of the piece, I met Russell. 
 “Where is that song?” asked he. 
 
 “T tried my hand at one and failed,” said I. 
 
 “How do you know that?” 
 
 “Morris tells me that it won’t answer.” 
 
 “And is Morris infallible? Hand me the piece, young 
 man, and let us go into Hewitt’s back room here, at the 
 corner of Park Place and Broadway, and see what we can 
 make out of your lines.” 
 
 We passed through the music store. Russell seated him- 
 self at the piano; read over the lines attentively; hummed 
 an air or two to himself; then ran his fingers over the keys, 
 then stopped as if nonplussed. Suddenly a bright idea 
 seemed to dawn upon him; a melody had all at once floated 
 into his brain, and he began to hum it, and to sway himself 
 to its movement. Then striking the keys tentatively a few 
 times, he at last confidently launched into the air since 
 known as “A Life on the Ocean Wave.” 
 
 “T’ve got it!” he exclaimed. It was all the work of a few 
 minutes. I pronounced the melody a success, and it proved 
 so. The copyright of the song became very valuable, though 
 I never got anything from it myself. It at once became a 
 favorite, and soon the bands were playing it in the streets. 
 A year or two after its publication, I received from England 
 copies of five or six different editions that had been issued 
 there by competing publishers. 
 
 No. 719. 
 “’D BE A BUTTERFLY.” 
 
 Tuomas Haynes Bay ty. 
 
 Thomas Haynes Bayly and his bride were visiting Lord 
 ‘Ashtown, when, on going to the drawing-room after dinner, 
 
710 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 one day, the gentlemen found it deserted, and Mr. Bayly 
 went to the garden in pursuit of the ladies. Seeing him, 
 they playfully hid themselves in the winding avenues. He 
 followed floating laughs and laces a while, and then sat 
 down in a tempting arbor. When the ladies joined him, he 
 showed them the manuscript of “I’d be a Butterfly,” that 
 moment written. Mrs. Bayly composed an air, and it was 
 sung that evening to a large party assembled in their honor. 
 
 No. 720. 
 “IN THY CLEFT, O ROCK OF AGES.” 
 
 FANNY CROSBY. 
 
 “Not long since, I was called to see a member of my 
 church who was very ill. His disease prostrated him, in 
 mind and body, to the last degree; and there was a look 
 about him which I did not like. During one of my visits 
 I told him of a little song I knew, which I called ‘my song,’ 
 because I like it so much, and am constantly singing it. I 
 asked him if he would like to hear it, at the same time 
 fearing he might be too sick and weak. 
 
 “He answered in a voice I could scarcely hear: ‘Yes; sing 
 it, please.’ So I sang: 
 
 ‘Hide Thou me——’ 
 
 as found in ‘Gospel Hymns,’ page 374. As I sang the last 
 verse he was completely overcome, and wept so as to alarm 
 me for a moment, for he was very weak. But he soon 
 regained composure; and I knelt by his bed in prayer. 
 
 “As I was about to go, he said: ‘Will you not sing one 
 verse of that song, again, for me?’ 
 
 “T replied: ‘Yes, indeed, and gladly, the whole of it, if 
 you choose.’ Then closing his eyes, he listened very quietly. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 7il 
 
 “After this second singing, he asked: ‘Is that all?’ T told 
 him, ‘Yes: it has only three verses,’ 
 
 ““Oh,’ he exclaimed, ‘there ought to be forty thousand of 
 them! It has done me so much good—so much good!’ 
 And, for the first time during his illness, there came a bright 
 expression upon his face. 
 
 “T never go to see him now, but that he calls for the song. 
 He is better; and I believe the song ‘turned the scales’ in 
 his favor. Well, I thought I would try to compose a couple 
 more verses for him; and, today, when I sang them, with 
 the others, his delight was great. I send the hymn to you, 
 as I now have it. You will see that my verses are inserted, 
 and appear, alternately, with the others; the words which 
 are not mine bearing the quotation marks.” 
 
 “HIDE THOU ME.” 
 
 Z “Thou art my hiding place’— 
 (Psalm 32:7). 
 
 “In Thy cleft, O Rock of Ages, 
 Hide Thou me. 
 When the fitful tempest rages, 
 Hide Thou me. 
 Where no mortal arm can sever, 
 From my heart, Thy love forever, 
 Hide me, O Thou Rock of Ages 
 Hide Thou me.” 
 
 When cares my earth-path darken, 
 Guide Thou me. 
 May I, then, for Thy voice hearken, 
 Call Thou me. 
 Let Thy grace prevent my straying; 
 Keep me steadfast watching—praying; 
 Keep me, O Thou Rock of Ages, 
 Close to Thee. 
 
712 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “From the snare of sinful pleasure, 
 Hide Thou me; 
 Thou my heart’s eternal treasure, 
 Hide Thou me. 
 When the world its power is wielding, 
 And my heart is almost yielding, 
 Hide me, O Thou Rock of Ages, 
 Hide Thou me.” 
 
 . In the time of pain and weakness, 
 Help Thou me; 
 Give me, still, of faith and meekness; 
 Help Thou me. 
 If in spirit sore and broken, 
 Cheer me with some dear love-token; 
 Help me, O Thou Rock of Ages, 
 Help Thou me. 
 
 “Tn the night of lonely sorrow, 
 Hide Thou me; 
 Till, in glory, dawns the morrow, 
 
 Hide Thou me. 
 
 In the sight of Jordan’s billow, 
 Let Thy bosom be my pillow; 
 
 Hide me, O Thou Rock of Ages, 
 
 Hide Thou me.” 
 
 No. 721. 
 “MAIST ONIE DAY.” 
 
 The following beautiful lines were composed by Timothy 
 Swan, the well-known author of the celebrated tunes 
 “China” and “Poland,” when in the seventy-fifth year of 
 his age. They. were sent to his son, then a resident of New 
 York: 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 713 
 
 “Ye ken, dear bairn, that we maun part; 
 When death, cauld death, shall bid us start; 
 But when he’ll send his dreadfu’ dart 
 
 We canna say. 
 Sae we'll be ready for his dart 
 
 Maist onie day. 
 
 “We'll keep a’ right an’ gude wi’in. 
 
 Our walk will then be free fra’ sin; 
 Upright we’ll step thro’ theck and thin, 
 
 Straight on our way; 
 
 Deal just wi’ a’, the prize we’ll win 
 
 Maist onie day. 
 
 “Ye ken there’s Ane wha’s just and wise, 
 Has said that a’ bairns should rise 
 An’ soar aboon the lofty skies, 
 And there shall stay; 
 Being well prepared, we’ll gain the prize 
 Maist onie day. 
 
 “When He wha made a’ things just right, 
 Shall ca’ us hence to realms of light, 
 Be it morn, or noon, or e’en, or night, 
 We will obey. 
 We'll be prepared to ta’ our flight 
 Maist onie day. 
 
 “Our lamps we’ll fill brimfu’ o’ oil, 
 That’s gude and pure—that wulna spoil; 
 We'll keep them burnin’ a’ the while, 
 
 To light our way. 
 
 Our walk bein’ done we’ll quit the soil 
 
 Maist onie day.” 
 
714 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 722. 
 “MERTON” (Tune). 
 
 Henry K. OLiver. 
 
 General Oliver was for twenty years the director of music 
 and organist of the North Church in Salem, from 1828 to 
 1849. One Sunday in 1843, during the pastorate of the 
 Rey. Dr. John Brazer, the hymns for the entire day, six in 
 number, were sent before service to the director, that he 
 might leisurely select appropriate tunes. These were all 
 fixed upon, excepting the sixth, which was to close the after- 
 noon service, it being Dr. Doddridge’s beautiful hymn, “Ye 
 golden lamps of heaven, farewell!” 
 
 All through the day the director could recall no tune 
 which he thought well adapted to the words. The clergy- 
 man had got well on in his sermon in the afternoon, and 
 the director had made no selection; as, however, he was 
 conning the words over, more intent upon them than upon 
 the words of the preacher, a melody floated into his mind, 
 and taking paper and pencil, ke secured it, adding the parts 
 in score for his own use, and then giving to each singer his 
 part on a slip. The singers were of rare excellence, both in 
 voice and skill; and the new tune, given with earnestness 
 and effect, took at once. 
 
 The next day General Oliver accidentally met Dr. Brazer, 
 who inquired about the new tune, its author, and where it 
 could be found, adding that he did not remember ever to 
 have heard it before. 
 
 “T never did myself,” replied its author; and then con- 
 fessing that he had employed his time otherwise than in 
 attending to the sermon, asked the good minister to forgive 
 his neglect. 
 
 “Oh, yes,” said Dr. Brazer, “but look a moment; have I 
 not a right to complain that you, a member of my church, 
 a teacher in my Sunday school, and the leader of my choir, 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 715 
 
 should have set so bad an example as to be seen by the 
 singers writing music, instead of listening to my preaching?” 
 
 “Yes, yes; I have done evil, in that view of the case,” 
 was the reply. “But the thought came suddenly, and had I 
 not penciled it down it would have been lost; and now, 
 being secured, it may possibly do some good in its way. I 
 accept the reproof; but tell me, suppose that while we were 
 leading the worship at our end of the church, and the people 
 and their minister were joining therein, either in voice or in 
 spirit, as they should do, some new thought which had not 
 occurred to you during your work at the sermon. in your 
 study should suddenly suggest itself, would you not just 
 quietly pencil it down on the margin of your notes, so that 
 we, the people, might have the benefit of it?” 
 
 “Oh, yes,” replied Dr. Brazer; “I have done that many 
 times, and with good effect too.” 
 
 “Yes, yes,” was the retort; “so I have heard. Now don’t 
 you think it wrong for the minister of the parish, seated, as 
 he is, in open sight of all the worshipers, to be seen of all 
 scribbling marginal notes while the choir is endeavoring to 
 lead the people in their songs of praise? Hey, Doctor, 
 whose notes are the more sinful—yours of the margin or 
 mine of the score? So, in the way of rebuke, let’s call it 
 an even thing, and if sin it be, let’s sin no more.” 
 
 A hearty laugh followed between the friends, and it was 
 agreed that “sauce for a goose would be sauce for a gander.” 
 
 “Olden-Time Music.” 
 
 No. 723. 
 “O SACRED HEAD ONCE WOUNDED.” 
 
 St, BERNARD OF CLAIRVAUX 
 
 This hymn may fairly take its place among missionary 
 hymns, for after being translated from Latin into German, 
 and from German into English, it has again been translated 
 
716 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 from the English into many of the languages of heathen 
 countries, and has been found useful there. Rev. Dr. 
 Schwartz, a celebrated missionary to India, made this his 
 dying song. He was thought to be already dead, and his 
 fellow missionary, with several native Tamil converts, gath- 
 ered at his bedside, began to sing this hymn in the Tamil 
 tongue. While they sang the first stanza, no sign of recogni- 
 tion or consciousness came from the still form before them, 
 but when they stopped at the close of the stanza, the voice 
 they supposed to be hushed in death took up the second 
 stanza of the hymn, and sang it through with clear and 
 distinct utterance, and then was heard no more. 
 
 No. 724. 
 “BLOW YE THE TRUMPET, BLOW!” 
 
 Rarely was there ever witnessed a scene of more 
 thrilling interest than that of the reunion of the Old 
 and New School divisions of the Presbyterian Church, 
 which took place in Pittsburgh in May, 1869. On the day 
 appointed the two bodies met in their respective places, 
 and then, having formed in the street in parallel columns, 
 joined ranks, one of each assembly arm in arm with one of 
 the other, and so marched to the place where the services 
 were to be held. As the head of the column entered the 
 church, already crowded, save the seats reserved for the 
 delegates, the audience struck up the hymn, “Blow ye the 
 trumpet, blow!” and when all were in their places, “All 
 hail the power of Jesus’ name!” After the reading of the 
 Scriptures came the hymn of Watts, “Blest are the sons of 
 peace.” 
 
 The interest of the occasion culminated when Dr. Fowler, 
 the moderator of the New School Assembly, at the close of 
 his remarks, turned to Dr. Jacobus, the moderator of the 
 Old School Assembly, and said: “My dear brother mod- 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 717 
 
 erator, may we not, before I take my seat, perform a single 
 act symbolical of the union which has taken place between 
 the two branches of the church? Let us clasp hands!” 
 This challenge was immediately responded to, when all 
 joined in singing the grand old doxology of Bishop Ken, 
 “Praise God from whom all blessings flow!” And at the 
 conclusion of Dr. Jacobus’ remarks, amid flowing tears and 
 with swelling hearts, the thousands present joined in sing- 
 ing the precious hymn, written just about a century before, 
 by that grand and tuneful Baptist minister, John Fawcett, 
 himself a convert of ‘George Whitefield, “Blest be the tie 
 that binds.” Little did those happy Presbyterians think or 
 care that two of the hymns for this hour of their supreme 
 gladness were furnished by Methodists, one by a Congrega- 
 tionalist, one by an Episcopalian bishop, and one by a 
 Baptist, while their own denomination did not furnish a 
 single one. 
 
 No. 725. 
 “CONVERTED TUNES.” 
 
 John Newton was once an infidel and libertine, profane, 
 and blasphemous, and yet when he had been converted and 
 
 wrote the hymn: 
 
 “How sweet the name of Jesus sounds, 
 In a believer’s ear,” 
 
 no one refused to sing the hymn because of the former life 
 of its author. No one would refuse to worship in a church 
 built upon the spot where once a whiskey distillery had 
 stood, but would the rather rejoice at the new use to which 
 the ground was put. Why should not the same reason 
 justify the adoption into sacred music of a tune once used 
 for secular purposes? Charles Wesley once stood in the 
 open air in an English seaport town and began to sing. This 
 
718 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 was his way of gathering an audience, and his purpose was, 
 when the people had been drawn together, to preach to them 
 a gospel sermon. But as he sang, there came along a party 
 of sailors, “half seas over” with their grog, and drowned the 
 hymn with a rollicking song of their own. With character- 
 istic quickness of wit he challenged them to return in the 
 afternoon and he would sing them a new song to their own 
 tune. They came at the appointed time and so did Mr. 
 Wesley, and to their own carousing music of “Nancy 
 Dawson” he sang a song he had in the meanwhile composed, 
 beginning with the words: 
 
 “ Tisted into the cause of sin 
 Why should a good be evil? 
 Music alas! too long has been 
 
 Pressed to obey the devil.” 
 
 Not a few of the tunes now in good and regular standing 
 in our collections of sacred music began their careers in 
 some opera love song, or other purely secular sphere. 
 
 A tune called “Opal” in “The Plymouth Collection” is a 
 familiar old song accompanying the words: 
 
 “Fresh and strong the breeze is blowing.” 
 
 Another in the same book called “Emerald” is a song com- 
 posed by Thomas Haynes Bayly for the words: 
 
 “Shades of evening, close not o’er us.” 
 
 Another in the same book called “Bdellium” was originally 
 the air of a very indecent song, afterward used by Robert 
 Burns to better words beginning: 
 
 “Saw ye my ain love?” 
 
 In the same book a tune called “All’s Well” is adapted 
 from a song of the sixteenth century called “Begone, Old 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 719 
 
 Care,” which was itself altered from a piece called “The 
 Queen’s Jig.” It became obsolete, but in 1792 was revived 
 and became popular again, in a pantomime ballet called 
 “William Tell,” performed at “Sadler's Wells,” the oldest 
 theater in London. The tune called “Bruce,” in the same 
 book, is only a slightly changed form of an old Scotch air 
 called “Hey tuttie, taittie,” which an old tradition Says was 
 the marching song of Robert Bruce at the battle of Ban- 
 nockburn in 1314. Robert Burns gave to it a fresh popu- 
 larity by writing for it the ode beginning: 
 
 ) 
 
 “Scots, wha ha’e wi’ Wallace bled, 
 Scots, wham Bruce has often led,” ete. 
 
 The tune of “Ellesdie,” often used for the hymn begin- 
 ning, “Jesus I my cross have taken,” was at first a secular 
 song beginning: 
 
 “Go, forget me! why should sorrow 
 O’er that brow a shadow fling?” 
 
 The words were written by Rey. Charles Wolfe, the same 
 who wrote the piece entitled: 
 
 “The burial of Sir John Moore.” 
 
 “Weber” is made up out of the opening chorus of the opera 
 of “Oberon,” where fairies come dancing upon the stage 
 
 singing: 
 
 “Light as fairies, foot can fall, 
 Pace ye elves, your master’s hall.” 
 
 “Ganges” was an East Indian love song. “Cranbrook” an 
 old song of the sea, the words beginning: 
 
 “Come all my jolly sailors all.” 
 
720 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “Belmont,” a simple song beginning, “My mother bids me 
 bind my hair,” and the tune “Diana,” or “New Jerusalem,” 
 was an old English ballad beginning: 
 
 “Q man in desperation.” 
 
 The tune called “Smyrna” is an extract called “Batti Batti” 
 from the opera of “Don Giovanni.” “Herold” is the prayer 
 of “Zampa,”’. the opera by Herold for whom the tune is 
 named. “Arcadia” was arranged by Thomas Hastings from 
 the opera of “Orpheus,” by Offenbach; and “Ariel” was 
 taken in the same way by Lowell Mason from Mozart’s 
 “Magic Flute.” 
 
 No. 726. 
 “COME TO JESUS JUST NOW.” 
 
 There is in our “Gospel Hymns” a piece not in any way 
 entitled to be called a hymn. It dignifies it too highly 
 almost to call it a ditty. Each stanza is nothing but a four 
 times repeated sentence. It originated in England, prob- 
 ably among the Methodists, but no one knows where or 
 when. Rev. Newman Hall, an English Congregational 
 minister, celebrated for his earnestness in all evangelistic 
 movements, left a dinner party one evening at the town of 
 Hull, to go out to preach to a throng who had gathered in 
 the street. As he approached the spot someone was singing 
 to the crowd: 
 
 “Come to Jesus, come to Jesus, 
 Come to Jesus just now.” 
 
 Mr. Hall caught up the words and made them the theme 
 of an earnest extemporaneous sermon. Soon afterward he 
 repeated it in his own church to his own people, and a while 
 later, when kept from his ordinary work by sickness, he 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 721 
 
 wrote and condensed it into a little tract, and two thousand 
 copies were printed. It met with a wonderful reception, 
 and was called for in all directions, until at last accounts it 
 had been translated into thirty languages and nearly four 
 millions of copies had been printed, and the demand stil] 
 goes on. So much for the casual singing of a song to a 
 crowd gathered on the street. 
 
 No. 727. 
 “EMMELAR.” 
 
 In the later hymn books compiled by Rey. C. 8S. Robin- 
 son, four tunes will be found either composed or arranged 
 by “Emmelar.” No such name appears in any list of musical 
 composers either American or European. But if the three 
 syllables of the word are separated, they will be found to 
 stand for three letters of the alphabet, “M. L. R.,” and these 
 are the initials of Dr. Robinson’s own daughter, whose 
 maiden name was Mary L. Robinson. She is now the wife 
 of Mr. Frank Gaylord, and resides with her husband in 
 Paris, where he is engaged in evangelical work. She is 
 credited with good musical taste, and assisted her father by 
 the composition or arrangement of these pieces for his books. 
 Here are the tunes to which her name is attached, “Clyde,” 
 “Armstrong,” “LaMonte,” and “Carolyn.” 
 
 No. 728. 
 
 “T KNOW THAT MY REDEEMER LIVES AND—” 
 
 Rey. CuHartes WESLEY. 
 
 Among the curiosities of literature, some of our well- 
 known hymns deserve a place. Such a hymn as the one 
 beginning, 
 
722 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 “Tn the Cross of Christ I glory,” 
 
 when we find its author to have been a Unitarian, is surely 
 deserving of such a position. So is the beautiful hymn for 
 use at the rite of baptism by immersion, 
 
 “We come to the fountain, we stand by the wave,” 
 
 written by Rev. Geo. W. Bethune, a minister of the Dutch 
 Reformed Church, and a non-believer in the Immersionists’ 
 view of baptism. And reversing the order, a hymn on de- 
 nominational union by Rev. Benjamin Beddone, beginning, 
 
 “Let party names no more 
 The Christian world divide.” 
 
 And here is a hymn by the great poet of Methodism, which 
 sings in joyful confidence the pet doctrine of Calvinism 
 and the abhorrence of every Methodist, the doctrine of 
 “Divine Sovereignty.” 
 
 “He wills that I should holy be! 
 What can withstand His will? 
 
 The counsel of His grace in me, 
 He surely shall fulfill.” 
 
 No. 729. 
 “Q HOLY GHOST, THOU FOUNT OF LIGHT.” 
 ‘Ante oF St. Victor. 
 
 Rev. Epwarp Caswatu, Translator. 
 
 One is not likely to suspect how some of the hymns, which 
 have within the last decade or two found acceptance in our 
 

 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 723 
 
 service of song, carry us far back into the past, when all 
 the singing was done by the priests in Latin or Greek, and 
 the music was severely simple. This hymn as written in 
 Latin by Adam of St. Victor was a “sequence,” and 
 “sequences” had a curious origin. The service of the old 
 Roman Church provided for the reading of a lesson from 
 the Epistles and another from one of the Gospels. Between 
 the two, the officiating deacon had to pass from one part 
 of the chancel to another, and while he was doing this the 
 worshipers sang an “Alleluia” to give him time to make 
 the change decorously and with dignity; and to lengthen 
 out the time, they lengthened out the final note, until the 
 last syllable came to be nearly interminable, and every one 
 was heartily tired of it. So a sort of a “rhythmical prayer” 
 was invented to be sung in this interval instead of the long 
 drawn-out “Alleluia,” and many of the priestly poets of 
 those times composed such prayers to which the name of 
 “sequences” was given. 
 
 No. 730. 
 “ETERNAL LIGHT! ETERNAL LIGHT!” 
 Rev. Tuomas BINNEY. 
 
 The author of this hymn was a Congregational minister 
 who for many years while pastor of a London church bore a 
 conspicuous part in the religious life of England. Earlier 
 
 in life he was pastor of a church on the Isle of Wight, and 
 while there, as the story goes, he was walking one night when 
 the whole sky seemed brilliant with stars shining like the 
 eyes of God. Led by the stars looking down upon him, 
 he thought of the eye of God, forever on him, by night as 
 well as by day, and enshrined the thought in this hymn. 
 
724 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 No. 731. 
 “HALLE” (Tune). 
 
 In an opera called “Le Nozze di Figaro,” composed by 
 Mozart, there is a song sung by a barber commencing with 
 the words: 
 
 “Haply your Lordship may be for dancing, 
 T to such prancing, 
 Play the guitar.” 
 
 It is not now known whether the music was composed by 
 Mozart with the other parts of the opera, or was one of the 
 popular airs of the day, introduced by him into his com- 
 position. Dr. Thomas Hastings arranged this barber’s song, 
 
 and set to it an evening hymn of his own, beginning: 
 “Now from labor and from care.” 
 
 He gave to it the name of “Halle” and by this name it has 
 
 ever since remained in popular use in America. In 1861, 
 
 Dr. W. H. Monk again seized upon the old barber’s song 
 
 and arranged it for the words of Keble’s hymn: 
 
 “Sun of my’ Soul, Thou Savior dear,” 
 
 and published it in “Hymns Ancient and Modern” under 
 the name of “Hursley.” The tune has traveled under several 
 
 aliases, sometimes as “Keble,” when associated with Keble’s , 
 
 hymn, again as “Pascal,” and still again as “Stillorgan,” 
 and in some books it loses all identity and appears simply 
 as a “Huguenot Air,” but to Dr. Hastings belongs the 
 credit of first introducing it to sacred music. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 725 
 No. 782. 
 “NEAR THE CROSS WAS MARY WEEPING.” 
 
 JACOBUS DE BENEDICTUS. 
 
 Here is a hymn which has needed a good deal of expurga- 
 tion to make it worthy of a place in our Protestant hymnals. 
 It was originally written as a song of worship of the Virgin 
 Mary. Its author is not certainly known, but it is attributed 
 to Jacobus de Benedictus, an Italian nobleman who lived 
 in the thirteenth century. In addition to his true name given 
 above, he had another by which he was as often called 
 “Jacoponus,” which meant “Big James” or “Silly James.” 
 In many of his actions he was a clown and a buffoon. On 
 one occasion he covered himself with sticky grease and then 
 rolled himself in feathers of various colors, and in this 
 elegant attire appeared at the wedding of his niece. This 
 is a specimen of his eccentricities which gave to him the 
 name of “Silly James,” but he had many sterling qualities, 
 and he wrote many a hymn. 
 
 This hymn, if we study its history, brings us into contact 
 with one of the fanatical crazes of the middle ages. In 
 the eleventh century there rose a sect called “Flagellants,” 
 who proclaimed the doctrine of self whipping, as an atone- 
 ment for their own sins and for the sins of others, too. 
 The craze spread rapidly through nearly all the countries 
 of Europe, and processions of men, women, and even chil- 
 dren passed through the cities and villages whipping their 
 naked backs and singing religious songs as they marched. 
 This hymn was the one most frequently used, and it became 
 known and popular in every corner of Europe, as sung by 
 these processions of Flagellants. 
 
726 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 733. 
 “Q JESUS, SWEET THE TEARS I SHED.” 
 
 Rev. Ray PALMER. 
 
 A curious circumstance revealed the origin of this hymn. 
 It was floating about in the religious periodicals with simply 
 the name “Palmer” attached as author, which was quite 
 indefinite. At last a hymn book compiler was led to use 
 it in his book, but was obliged to cut off a stanza to make 
 it fit his page. This disfigurement brought the author 
 to him, bewailing with gricf the mutilation of his hymn. 
 Apology was offered and accepted, and then Dr. Palmer 
 confessed that the verses of this hymn were more than 
 usually dear to him because they described a real experience 
 he had once had, an outburst of actual tears in view of 
 the thought of Jesus dying on the Cross. 
 
 No. 734. 
 “WELCOME HAPPY MORNING.” 
 “Rortunatus,” V. H. C. 
 
 Rev. Joun Euuerton, TRANSLATOR. 
 
 Singing this hymn in these days, we should not forget 
 one singer who sang it in other days and different circum- 
 stances. There lived in the town of Prague, almost five 
 hundred years ago, a layman who became as active and 
 able a reformer of the abuses which had crept into the 
 Romish Church, as did Luther in Germany. He held dispu- 
 tations with the defenders of Rome, circulated the literature 
 of the reformers, and endeavored to defend John Huss, the 
 great reformer and martyr, when he was under arrest and 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 727 
 
 in prison. At last his own turn came, and the fagots of 
 the martyrs’ fire piled about him, the blaze was kindled, 
 and as it rose about him, he sang this song: 
 
 “Welcome happy morning, 
 Age to age shall say, 
 Hell to-day is vanquished, 
 
 Heaven is won to-day.” 
 
 No. 738. ° 
 “HARK FROM THE TOMBS A DOLEFUL SOUND.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Warts. 
 
 This can scarcely be called a missionary hymn, and yet 
 it has had a great influence on American Missionary Work. 
 A boy of fifteen years, gay and ambitious, was with a 
 party of his cousins, who were playing jokes on him, when 
 as another joke they began to sing this hymn, to the tune 
 of “Bangor,” for the sake of seeing what effect it would 
 have upon him. As they sang it slowly and solemnly and 
 without a smile, he sat silent. It pierced into his very soul, 
 and for the first time he felt himself to be a sinner and in 
 danger of being lost. His conversion took place soon after, 
 and he became one of the five who met at the historical 
 haystack in Williamstown, Massachusetts, and out of this 
 grew the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign 
 Missions. -His name was Samuel’J. Mills. 
 
 No. 736. 
 
 “MEAR” (Tune). 
 
 This tune is linked to a hymn, which in New England 
 at least, in the olden time was always sung to its music, 
 
STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 whose childhood was spent there, the old 
 e whose voices sang it 
 
 728 
 
 and to anyone 
 tune must recall memories of thos . 
 then but who now sing “the New Song” in Heaven. A 
 
 few years ago a little poem appeared in a Hartford, 
 Connecticut, paper, which tells the story of this old tune 
 so well that it is worth repeating: 
 
 “T heard the words of the preacher 
 As he read that psalm so dear, 
 Which mother sang at our cradle 
 
 To the ancient tune of Mear. 
 
 “And I felt her angel presence, 
 As sung were those blessed words; 
 My heart was with rapture filling, 
 As sweet as the song of birds. 
 
 “T longed for the land of summer, 
 Life’s river, with waters clear, 
 For the calm, sweet eyes of mother, 
 Who sang the old tune of Mear. 
 
 “To-day that e’er-welcomed cadence 
 Of song floated back to me; 
 
 Over the paths of my childhood 
 It lovingly came, all free. 
 
 “T thanked the good All-Father 
 For this memory bright and clear; 
 The saintly smile of my mother, 
 And her low voice singing Mear. 
 
 “Ah, me! the father has rested 
 Many and many a year; 
 The mother who sang by our cradle 
 Has gone to a higher sphere. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 729 
 
 “Brothers and sisters have parted; 
 
 Some live in the Better Land, 
 And some are waiting their summons, 
 
 Sojourners yet on life’s strand. 
 
 “I feel when we meet up yonder, 
 Where cometh no sigh nor tear, 
 Our mother will softly sing us 
 That grand old tune of Mear.” 
 
 N0.787. 
 “GREAT GOD, WHEN I APPROACH THY THRONE.” 
 
 Rev. W. H. Batuvurst: 
 
 “The story is told of a merchant whose life was once saved 
 at the price of another man’s in a shipwreck. He was aided, 
 as the waves tossed him helpless and exhausted up against 
 a cliff, by the outstretched hand of a longshoreman; but, 
 even while he sank down upon the rock where he was saved, 
 he had the unspeakable horror of beholding his rescuer 
 swept off the foothold and instantly drowned before his 
 eyes. He could never get over the shock; he was not crazed, 
 he was as strong and bright as ever. But whenever he had 
 finished his business errand, he would go up to the salesman 
 of whom he bought his goods, and, taking his hand, would 
 say gently, “A man died for me!” He never omitted 
 this act; some thought him queer, but he always came back 
 to remove his hat, put out his hand, and almost whisper, 
 “A man died for me.” His eyes would be moist, his tones 
 would be tremulous, but he was not crazy—only reverent 
 and grateful—as he said his quiet little sentence, “A man 
 died for me.” 
 
730 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 No. 738. 
 -“HELMSLEY” (Tune). 
 
 This tune was an old English love song sung by Mistress 
 Anne Catley at “Sadler’s Wells,” the oldest theater in 
 London, in a play called “The Golden Pippin” to the words: 
 
 “Guardian Angels now protect me 
 Send me back the youth I love.” 
 
 Tt was also used as a dancing tune, and became a common 
 street ballad. Here Thomas Olivers, the famous converted 
 shoemaker, heard it. Like all the Methodist preachers of 
 that day, he was on the watch for good music for the 
 church, and hearing this song on the street, he seized upon 
 its melody and arranged it into this tune, which was at 
 first known by the name of “Olivers” but was afterward 
 called “Helmsley.” 
 
 No. 739. 
 “MONSON” (Tune). 
 
 Here is an instance of a tune composed by a son for a 
 hymn written by his mother. Rev. 8S. R. Brown was one 
 of the first American Missionaries to Japan. He was the 
 son of Mrs. Phoebe H. Brown, who wrote the hymn begin- 
 ning, “I love to steal awhile away,” and this tune was 
 composed for these words and the name given to it of 
 the town in Massachusetts in which his mother lived. After 
 his mother’s death, he wrote of her this tribute: “To her 
 I owe all I am, and if I have done any good in the world, 
 to her under God it is due. She seems even now to have 
 me in her hands, holding me up for work for Christ, and 
 His cause, with a grasp I can feel.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 731 
 
 No. 740. 
 “QO LORD THY WORK REVIVE.” 
 
 Mrs. PHorese H. Brown. 
 
 Long before there was any foreign missionary society in 
 America, through which monies could be contributed for 
 that cause, a poor woman in Massachusetts became inter- 
 ested in the heathen, and although her life was a constant 
 struggle with poverty, she used to save small sums of 
 money which she was in the habit of sending to English 
 missionaries in Africa and India, through a Christian mer- 
 chant in Philadelphia, who had ships sailing to those 
 countries. It is not strange that the son of such a mother 
 should enter the mission field, and one of the earliest 
 missionaries to Japan was Rey. 8. R. Brown, the only son 
 of this poor Massachusetts woman. Lovers of hymns know 
 her well as the author of the hymn beginning: 
 
 “T love to steal awhile away 
 From every cumbering care.” 
 
 And here is another of her hymns, written for use when 
 Christians meet to pray for an advancement of Christ’s 
 cause both at home and abroad." 
 
 No. 741. 
 “Q THOU MY SOUL FORGET NO MORE.” 
 
 KRISHNU PAL. 
 
 In the year 1781 John Thomas, a young Englishman of 
 twenty-four years listened to a sermon in an English 
 
 1 For this son’s tribute to his mother see No. 739. 
 
732 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 church preached by Dr. Samuel Stennett, the same who 
 wrote our hymn, “Majestic sweetness sits enthroned.” The 
 text was the words of Christ in John 6:27: Labor not 
 for the meat which perisheth, but for that meat which 
 endureth unto everlasting life,” ete. The result of that 
 sermon was the young man’s conversion. He had just 
 finished his studies as a physician and had secured an 
 appointment as a naval surgeon, and been assigned to 
 an East Indiaman bound for Bengal. On landing in Cal- 
 cutta, he longed for Christian companionship, and adyver- 
 tised in the India Gazette, November 1, 1783. No mission- 
 ary had yet told the story of the Cross in India, and his 
 advertisement brought no response. This young man was 
 the first Englishman to study the Hindoo language for the 
 purpose of preaching the gospel in it. Later he returned 
 to England and was the first appointed missionary to India, 
 the celebrated Carey going with him as his assistant. 
 Together these men spent years in work among the natives 
 without seeing a single convert. At the end of that time a 
 Hindoo carpenter while at work fell and broke his arm. 
 Dr. Thomas was called to set the broken limb, and when 
 he had done this he told the Gospel story to the crowd that 
 had assembled. The carpenter whom he had helped heard 
 the story and wept as he heard it, and soon he came to 
 the missionaries to hear more about it. He was converted, 
 renounced his caste, and was baptized in the Ganges, 
 becoming thus the first convert to Christianity in the mission. 
 He became an ardent student, wrote tracts for his people, 
 and composed several hymns. This one has been trans- 
 lated for our use into English by Dr. Marshmann and is 
 the only hymn in our English collections written by a 
 Hindoo. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 733 
 
 No. 742. 
 “HAIL, TRANQUIL HOUR OF CLOSING DAY!” 
 Rev. Leonarp BAcon. 
 
 In 1845, the Congregational Churches of Connecticut ap- 
 pointed a committee to compile for their use a new hymnal. 
 The author of this hymn, who was one of that committee, 
 wanted to include in the collection the hymn of Phoebe H. 
 Brown beginning “I love to steal awhile away,” but Rev. 
 Dr. Nettleton, in whose “Village Hymns” that hymn first 
 appeared and who owned the copyright, refused permission 
 for its use. So Dr. Bacon wrote this hymn to take its place, 
 and some people have thought that he imitated Mrs. 
 Brown’s work closely enough to be entitled to the name of 
 plagiarist. 
 
 No. 748. 
 Sir ARTHUR 8. SULLIVAN. 
 
 It is a pleasant thing when we become familiar with the 
 name of someone who ministers by his music or his writings 
 to our week-day pleasure, to find that the same one is 
 in sympathy with us in our religious moods as well. I 
 remember with what pleasure I once learned that a western 
 gentleman famous for the dry drollery of his stories and 
 lectures, could make one cry as well as laugh, and that he 
 preached as good sermons as he wrote jokes. And so I 
 think we shall esteem all: the more highly the man who 
 composed in lighter vein, the musie of “Pinafore,” and 
 “Patience,” when we find him also to be the writer of 
 some of the sweetest of our sacred songs. 
 
734 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 No. 744. 
 “I LAY MY SINS ON JESUS.” 
 “I WAS A WANDERING SHEEP.” 
 
 Rev. Horatius Bonar. 
 
 The author of these hymns was in the habit of holding 
 special Sabbath School Services for the children, and he 
 wrote for each such service a special hymn, the singing 
 of which was followed by a short address. The hymns 
 above named were some of those written for these children’s 
 services. 
 
 No. 745. 
 “THE HEAVENS DECLARE THY GLORY LORD.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac WATTs. 
 
 Dr. C. S. Robinson relates the following incident: 
 
 “Once, as I entered the observatory of Harvard College, 
 at the close of day, a friend who had led me there asked 
 that I might be shown the new instrument that had just 
 been introduced. The professor replied, courteously, “Yes; 
 I think there may be time enough yet for him to see a 
 star if you will find one.” 
 
 My companion “found one” by looking in a worn little 
 book of astronomical tables lying there on the desk, and 
 replied quietly, “There is one at 5:20.” So in a hurried 
 instant, the covering was stripped off from the great brass 
 tube, and prone upon his back, under the eyepiece, lay the 
 enthusiastic professor. While my friend stood by with 
 what seemed a tack hammer in his hand, I noticed that 
 he kept his eyes on a tall chronometer clock near us. 
 Suddenly two sounds broke the impressive stillness; we had 
 been waiting for the star. One was the word “there” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 735 
 
 spoken by the professor, the other was the tap of the 
 hammer on the stone top of the table by my companion. 
 Both occurred at the same instant—the same particle of 
 the instant—they were positively simultaneous. But the man 
 who spoke the word could not see the clock; he was looking 
 at the star that came swinging along till it touched the 
 spiderweb line in his instrument; and the other man who 
 struck the hammerstroke could not see the star; he was, 
 looking at the second-hand on the dial plate. When the 
 index in its simplicity of regular duty marked twenty 
 minutes after five there fell the click on the stone; and 
 then, too, there came on in the heavens, millions of miles 
 away, one of God’s stars, having no speech, but rolling 
 in on time, as he bade it ages ago. Then I was invited 
 to look in and see the world of light’ and beauty as it 
 swept the next fiber in the tube. But afterward I went 
 curiously to the book and found that it had been published 
 ten years before, and that its calculations ran far away 
 into the future, and that it had been based on calculations - 
 a thousand years old. And God’s fidelity to the covenant 
 of nature, here now almost three thousand years after 
 David had made the nineteenth Psalm, had brought the 
 glorious creature of the sky into the field of Harvard 
 College’s instrument just as that patient clock reached 
 the second needed for the truth of the ancient prediction. 
 Need I say that those two professors almost wondered (so 
 used to such things were they) at the awestruck devotion, 
 the hushed reverence, with which I left the room. 
 
 No. 746. 
 “THERE IS A CITY GREAT AND STRONG.” 
 
 Rev. Dennis WorTMANn. 1835. 
 
 This hymn is simply an extract from a long poem en- 
 titled “Reliques of the Christ” written by a man who did 
 
736 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 not know before that he could write poetry at all. “Suffer- 
 ing,” he says, “from nervous prostration and unable to sleep, 
 the beginning of this poem came to me one night in Novem- 
 ber, 1871.” The first three stanzas were thought out then, 
 or rather came to him almost involuntarily, and more came 
 the same way the next morning, and so for seventeen years, 
 at odd moments, when the inspiration seized him, he worked 
 away at the idea he had conceived. When published, the 
 book became popular and ranks among the best produc- 
 tions of modern times. 
 
 No. 747. 
 “LORD JESUS THINK OF ME.” 
 
 SYNESIUS. 
 
 It was Simon, “a man of Cyrene,” (Matthew 27:32) 
 who was compelled to bear the cross upon which Christ 
 ’ was crucified. Among those who were scattered abroad 
 after Stephen was killed were some who were men of Cyrene. 
 And in the church at Antioch there was a leader named 
 “Tucius of Cyrene.” This Cyrene was the principal city 
 of Northern Africa, and its citizens bore frequent part in 
 the affairs of the early church. About 400 years after 
 Christ. there came into notice there a philosopher named 
 Synesius, who bore the unique distinction of being able to 
 trace his lineage back without a missing link through seven- 
 teen centuries. Of this Gibbon, the historian, took notice and 
 said it was unequalled in the history of mankind. He 
 was a pagan, but he married a Christian wife, and under 
 her influence became a semi-Christian (if such a thing can 
 be) himself. His ability and character were such that he 
 was by and by made a bishop of the Church. He wrote 
 some poetry, and from one of his odes this hymn has been 
 translated by Rev. A. W. Chatfield, a vicar of the Church 
 of England. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 737 
 No. 748. 
 “TAKE MY LIFE AND LET IT BE.” 
 
 Miss F. R. Haveracau. 
 
 This hymn was written in 1874, and four years later, 
 in 1878, the author wrote a letter which is a fine commen- 
 tary on one of its stanzas. She says, “The Lord has shown 
 me another little step, and of course I have taken it with 
 extreme delight. ‘Take my silver and my gold,’ now means 
 shipping off all my ornaments (including a jewel cabinet 
 which is really fit for a countess) to the Church Missionary 
 House, where they will be accepted and disposed of for 
 me. I retain only a brooch or two for daily wear, which 
 are memorials of my dear parents; also a locket with the 
 only portrait I have of my niece in heaven. But these I 
 redeem so that the whole value goes to the Church Mission- 
 ary Society. I had no idea I had such a jeweler’s shop; 
 nearly fifty articles are being packed off. I don’t think 
 I need tell you I never packed a box with such pleasure.” 
 
 No. 749. 
 “THE SANDS OF TIME ARE SINKING.” 
 SOU; CHRIbl sheioe! HE FOUNTAR ES 
 
 Mrs. ANNE Ross Cousin. 
 
 Samuel Rutherford was one of the heroic old Scotch 
 Covenanters of whom the world was not worthy. Settled 
 as the minister of a little church in a secluded valley in the 
 South of Scotland in a village called Anwoth, he made him- 
 self known and his influence felt all over England and 
 Scotland and across the channel on the Continent. By 
 
738 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 and by the Established Church began to persecute him. 
 They banished him from the little town he loved, and 
 burned the books he had written, and at last cited him to 
 appear before Parliament on a charge of treason. He was 
 ill when the summons came and soon was dying. He sent 
 back word to his persecutors, “I am summoned before a 
 higher court; that first summons I behoove to answer; and 
 ere a few days arrive, I shall be where few kings and great 
 folks come.” 
 
 A few days later, as the sun was sinking, a friend said 
 to him, “What think ye now of Christ?” And the answer 
 came, “O, that all my brethren in the land may know what 
 a Master I have served, and what peace I have this day! 
 I shall sleep in Christ, and when I awake I shall be satisfied 
 with His likeness. This night shall close the door, and put 
 my anchor within the veil; and I shall go away in a sleep 
 by five of the clock in the morning. Glory! glory to 
 my Creator and Redeemer forever! I shall live and adore 
 Him. Oh, for arms to embrace Him. Oh, for a well-tuned 
 harp! Glory! glory dwelleth in Immanuel’s land.” 
 
 He died at the time he predicted. That was two hundred 
 years ago and more, but within the last fifty years a 
 Scotch lady, reading his biography, and coming upon these 
 last words, wove them into a poem of nineteen stanzas, from 
 which have been culled these two hymns. Some of the 
 old Covenanter’s earlier sayings, but more especially these 
 dying words, “Glory, glory dwelleth in Immanuel’s land,” 
 she enshrined in her poem. 
 
 No. 750. 
 “THOUGH NOW THE NATIONS SIT BENEATH.” 
 This hymn has passed through more metamorphoses than 
 
 a butterfly. About the year 1800 there was a hymn book 
 published in England which contained it in its original form, 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 739 
 
 and which assigned its authorship to Sarah Slinn. Who 
 this lady was, when or where she was born, where she lived 
 or when or where she died, has never been ascertained. This 
 once she comes into public notice, and immediately retires 
 into obscurity. Some years later Leonard Bacon, a theo- 
 logical student at Andover, altered the hymn, leaving out 
 parts and adding others, and republished it. A few years 
 later Rev. Asahel Nettleton revised it again and inserted 
 it in a book he compiled. The compilers of a new hymn 
 book a few years later liked it well enough to use it, but 
 changed it again, and later still Leonard Bacon, by this 
 time a pastor in active service, revised it once more, and 
 included it in still another hymn book. By this time, as may 
 well be imagined, there was not much left of Sarah Slinn, 
 only a distant resemblance to her hymn in two lines, and 
 it usually stands accredited in the books to Leonard Bacon, 
 who was the first and the last “tinker” who tried to mend 
 her verses. 
 
 No. 761. 
 “LOVE DIVINE ALL LOVE EXCELLING.” 
 
 Rev. CHARLES WESLEY. 
 
 “Come unto Me all ye that labor and are heavy-laden, 
 and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn 
 of Me for I am meek and lowly in heart; and ye shall 
 find rest to your souls” (Matthew, 11:28,29). Did you ever 
 notice that these words of Christ describe two different 
 kinds of rest? In one He offers to give to the heavy- 
 laden who come to Him, in the other one that they shall 
 find for themselves who take His yoke upon them and 
 learn of Him. Charles Wesley had made this discovery, 
 and he embodied it in the second stanza of this hymn, the 
 fourth line of which he wrote, “Let us find that second rest.” 
 But some hymn tinker who had not made the discovery 
 
740 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 spoiled the force of Wesley’s allusion by changing the 
 line to read, “Let us find the promised rest.” 
 C. S. Rosrnson. 
 
 No. 752. 
 “0, GOD OF ABRAHAM EVER SURE.” 
 
 Rev. LEONARD Bacon. 
 
 In 1845, the Congregational Churches of Connecticut ap- 
 pointed a committee to prepare for their use a new hymnal. 
 The author of this hymn, who was one of this committee, 
 desired to use in the collection the hymn of Mrs. A. B. 
 Hyde, beginning “Dear Savior, if these lambs should stray.” 
 This hymn first appeared in the “Village Hymns” of Dr. 
 Nettleton, and he owned the copyright. Dr. Bacon asked 
 permission to copy the hymn into the new collection and 
 was refused ( so he set to work to make a subsitute, and this 
 is the result. Some people have been ungracious enough 
 to say that his admiration for Mrs. Hyde’s hymn led him 
 to imitate it in his own too closely to warrant any claim to 
 originality on his part. 
 
 No. 753. 
 “YE SERVANTS OF GOD, YOUR MASTER PROCLAIM.” 
 Rev. CHARLES WESLEY. 
 The warrant and the encouragement for Christian Mis- 
 sions are found in the last words of Christ to His disciples, 
 as they are given by Matthew and Mark. “Go ye into all 
 
 the world and preach the gospel to every creature.” 
 
 “All power is given unto Me in heaven and in earth,” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 741 
 
 “Lo I am with you alway even unto the end of the world.” 
 
 In the year 1744 England was at war with France, and 
 her people were in great fear of an invasion of her shores 
 to dethrone her reigning king, George II, and restore to 
 the throne the House of Stuart. In the general excitement, 
 the Methodists were accused of being secret friends of 
 France and of working in her interest. Their meetings 
 were broken up by mobs, their preachers were impressed 
 into the army, and even the Wesleys were placed under 
 arrest. In the midst of these troublous times, the great 
 Methodist leaders published a little pamphlet of hymns 
 for the encouragement of their followers, and to draw from 
 the very persecutions through which they were passing 
 strength to be faithful to the cause they had espoused. 
 This little pamphlet was entitled “Hymns for Times ‘of 
 Trouble and Persecution.” This hymn was one of the number 
 it contained, and the special use for which it was intended 
 is set forth in its heading, “To be sung in a Tumult.” It 
 embodies the words of Christ given above, and is therefore 
 a fitting hymn with which to begin a missionary meeting. 
 
 No. 754. 
 “SHINE, MIGHTY GOD, ON ZION SHINE.” 
 
 Rev. Isaac Watts, altered by Joel Barlow. 
 
 This is a varaphrase of the sixty-seventh Psalm. The 
 title given to this Psalm in the Bible is “A prayer ‘for 
 the enlargement of God’s Kingdom, to the joy of the 
 people end the increase of God’s blessings.” 
 
 This designates it as an appropriate missionary hymn. 
 Dr. Watts gave to it, however, a somewhat narrow scope 
 and applied it to the British Nation. He wrote the first 
 line “Shine, Mighty God! on Britain Shine,” and in the 
 third stanza he wrote the last two lines: 
 
742 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “While British tongues exalt His praise, 
 And British hearts rejoice.” 
 
 In this form the hymn came to this country, and up to the 
 time of the American Revolution it was so sung in American 
 churches. It was this sort of a hymn book that was in use 
 in the New Jersey church near which there was a battle 
 between the British and the Continentals. It is said that 
 the minister of the church was encouraging the boys who 
 were fighting, when their stock of paper for gun wads gave 
 out. As soon as he knew the situation, he ran into the 
 meeting house and soon came rushing out again with his 
 arms full of hymn books which he quickly distributed among 
 the soldiers shouting, “Give ’em Watts, boys! give ’em 
 Watts.” At the end of the war, the churches thought these 
 local allusions in the hymns no longer appropriate, and 
 so they engaged the services of Joel Barlow, a Connecticut 
 lawyer and poet, who had been an army chaplain through 
 the war and had written many a stirring patriotic song 
 for the soldiers’ use, to revise these hymns and take the 
 “British” out of them. His work was exceptionally happy 
 in the case of this Psalm, for he not only restored it to 
 the original sentiment of the Poet of Israel, but gave to us 
 in it for these later days an excellent missionary song. 
 
 No. 756. 
 “NOW LET OUR SOULS ON WINGS SUBLIME.” 
 
 Rev. Tuomas Grpsons, 1720—1785. 
 
 Dr. Gibbons was one of the industrious workers of 
 his times, adding to the ordinary duties of a pastor the 
 work of teaching logic, metaphysics, ethics and rhetoric at 
 an academy, delivering weekly lectures, writing books on 
 theology, and adding to all of these frequent attempts at 
 poetry, Like many other preachers of his day he often 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 743 
 
 closed his sermons with a hymn composed for that especial 
 purpose, and this hymn was given at the end of a sermon 
 from the text, “Then shall the dust return to the earth 
 as it was, and the spirit shall return unto God who gave 
 it.” Ecclesiastes, 12:7. 
 
 No. 756. 
 “NOT ALL THE BLOOD OF BEASTS.” 
 
 Isaac WATTS 
 
 When Henry Obookiah, the Sandwich Island heathen boy, 
 who came to this country and was educated here, asked 
 how it could be that Jesus being only one person could 
 make atonement by his death for everyone—so many, his 
 teacher was at a loss for a moment how to make it plain 
 to him; then she loosed from the fringe of her dress a 
 handful of little beads, and placed them in one of the 
 boy’s hands, and then suddenly drew off her diamond ring, 
 and placed it in his other hand, and asked him which was 
 the most valuable. Heathen though he was, he caught the 
 idea in an instant that Watts so aptly puts into the stanza: 
 
 “But Christ the heavenly Lamb 
 Takes all our sins away, 
 A sacrifice of Nobler Name, 
 And richer blood than they.” 
 
 No. 757. 
 
 “COME, THOU SOUL TRANSFORMING SPIRIT.” 
 
 Rev. JoNaATHAN Evans, 1748—1809. 
 
 The author of this hymn worked in a ribbon factory until 
 he was twenty-one years of age; he had up to that time 
 
744 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 received no religious instruction, and was a companion of 
 the degraded and profligate. When twenty-eight years of 
 age he was converted and began at once to work for Christ. 
 He remained a business man all his life but soon began to 
 preach and to gather neglected children together for reli- 
 gious instruction. He fitted up a boathouse on the bank 
 of a canal as a place for religious meetings, and this soon 
 grew into a chapel, where he was soon installed as pastor. 
 He was something of a doctor also and attended to. the 
 bodily ailments of his people as well as to their spiritual 
 troubles. 
 
 No. 758. 
 “ST. ANNE” (Tune). 
 
 There is a great deal said as to the right of any editor 
 to alter the words ofa hymn from those originally used 
 by its author, but right or wrong, it is so often done that 
 very few hymns stand now in our collections as they 
 were first written. It is perhaps not as generally known, 
 or at least it is not so often referred to, that the music 
 of our tunes has been as often tampered with as the words 
 that are sung to them. This tune called “St. Anne,” 
 written now almost two hundred years ago (1708) by the 
 organist of Westminster Chapel, and named in honor of 
 the Church of St. Anne at Westminster, is an instance of 
 this tune-tinkering proclivity. In his “Studies of Worship 
 Music,” Dr. Curwen gives seven different forms in which he 
 has found the tune in recent English Collections, and the 
 tune in “Laudes Dominw’ differs from them all. In the 
 year 1872, the Prince of Wales recovered from a severe ill- 
 ness and a celebration was held in the Crystal Palace at 
 London, commemorating his safe recovery. For this festi- 
 val Sir Arthur Sullivan composed an elaborate Te Deum, 
 in the course of which he introduced the music of this tune. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 745 
 No. 759. 
 
 “FREE FROM THE LAW, O HAPPY CONDITION.” 
 P? Ps Briss: 
 
 “YET THERE IS ROOM! THE LAMB’S BRIGHT HALL 
 OF SONG.” 
 
 Horatius Bonar. 
 
 Mr. W. J. Orsman is an evangelist who has earned the 
 name of “The Apostle of the Costermongers,” in one of 
 the lowest parts of London. He uses bands of singers who 
 sing Gospel songs on the street corners and in open spaces, 
 where crowds can be gathered. One Sunday afternoon Mr. 
 Orsman was sent for to visit a dying man in “Wilderness 
 Row,” who had been first led into the gospel meetings by 
 the singing of these songs, and afterward had been con- 
 verted. The sick man spoke of the help these gospel songs 
 had been to him and said, “Oh, if I could only hear them 
 once more before I die.” Mr. Orsman’s band of singers was 
 at that moment singing on the street not far away, and 
 they were sent for to come to the house. They stood out- 
 side on the pavement under the window where the man lay 
 dying, like serenaders, and softly sang the pieces he had 
 asked for, while he listened and smiled at the words which 
 had to him such deep meaning then. 
 
 No. 760. 
 
 “MY GOD, MY FATHER, WHILE I STRAY.” 
 
 Miss CHARLOTTE ELLIOTT. 
 
 There is a sweet little story told of an English choir 
 boy who had been sick with scarlet fever, and when the 
 
746 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 fever had gone had not strength enough left to recover. 
 One Sunday evening his bed had been drawn close to the 
 open window, so that he might see the people as they 
 gathered for vesper service. He heard the bells as they 
 rang, and when they had stopped he heard the sound of 
 the organ in the church where he had been used to sing, 
 and then it stopped, and he lay with closed eyes for a while 
 and then he heard the organ again and he knew the people 
 were coming out of the church, and soon he heard the 
 sound of footsteps on the gravel walk up to the house 
 where he was. 
 
 “Tift me up, mother,” he whispered. “The choir boys 
 are coming, I can hear them. Wave my handkerchief to 
 them, mother.” 
 
 The tramping of the feet stopped under his window, and 
 a boy’s voice said, “We want to sing to Claude.” 
 
 “Tet them sing, mother; let me hear them just once 
 more.” And so the mother nodded permission from the 
 window, and gathered there in the glow of the sunset the 
 choir boys sang to their sick companion: 
 
 “My God, my Father, while I stray 
 Far from my home, in life’s rough way, 
 Oh, teach me from my heart to say, 
 Thy will be done!” 
 
 and as they sang, the dying boy raised his voice too, and 
 with what strength he could command, he joined them 
 as they sang: 
 
 “Tf Thou shouldst call me to resign 
 What most I prize, it ne’er was mine, 
 I only yield Thee what is Thine, 
 Thy will be done.” 
 
 When the hymn was finished the choir boys walked quietly 
 away and Claude whispered to his mother, ‘Mother, write 
 over my grave, ‘Thy will be done.’” And so he died. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 747 
 No. 761. 
 “THERE IS A HAPPY LAND.” 
 
 ANDREW YOUNG. 
 
 A college student in Virginia, somewhat proud of his 
 attainments, thought to himself that if ever he became a 
 Christian it would be through some eloquent sermon by 
 some distinguished pulpit orator. On one occasion he was 
 hunting deer, when the sound of a woman’s voice singing 
 caught his ear. Following it, he soon came to a log cabin 
 in the mountains, beside which an old negro woman was 
 busy washing clothes, and singing as she worked. As he 
 came nearer he noticed that she was blind as well as old, 
 and so she did not notice that she had a listener to her song. 
 As she bent over her tub, she would sing softly to herself 
 the words: 
 
 “There is a happy land, 
 Far, far away,” 
 
 and now and then she would stop her work and straighten 
 up, and turning her sightless eyes towards the sky, would 
 change the tune and sing at the top of her voice until the 
 whole woods seemed full of the song: 
 
 “There is a land of pure delight 
 Where saints immortal dwell, 
 Infinite day excludes the night 
 
 And pleasures banish pain.” 
 
 After a while the young man made his presence known 
 and said to her, “Auntie, I see you are blind.” 
 
 ‘No, Massa, I is not blind, I can’t see you, nor dese 
 trees and rocks, nor dese yer mountains, but I can see into 
 de kingdom, I can see de ‘Happy land, far, far away.’” — 
 
748 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 The student proud of his education and attainments was 
 taught a lesson. He went away silent and thoughtful, and 
 afterward said that it was not any eloquent sermon that 
 brought him to Christ but the forest song of the happy 
 negro woman. 
 
 No. 762. | 
 “Q LOVE THAT WILL NOT LET ME GO.” 
 
 Rev. Grorce MATHESON. 
 
 “Written,” the author says, “Gn the Manse of Innellan 
 one summer evening in 1882. It was composed with extreme 
 rapidity, and I felt myself rather in the position of one 
 being dictated to, than of an original artist. I was suffering 
 from extreme mental distress, and the hymn was the fruit 
 of pain.” Innellan was the place in Argylshire, Scotland, 
 where the author was the minister. He became blind in 
 boyhood, but in spite of this he graduated with honors, and 
 became a useful minister. 
 
 No. 763. 
 “WHEN I SURVEY THE WONDROUS CROSS.” 
 
 Isaac WATTS. 
 
 “IN THE CROSS OF CHRIST I GLORY.” 
 
 J. BOwRING. 
 
 A celebrated French infidel once told the brilliant French 
 statesman Talleyrand of his chagrin at his lack of success 
 in devising a scheme which should supersede Christianity. 
 He had endeavored to bring into vogue a system of bene- 
 volence and religion based on rationalism, but had not been 
 able to produce a system that people would accept. “What 
 shall I do?” asked he of Talleyrand. 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 749 
 
 “T hardly know,” was the reply, “what you can do? Still,” 
 said he, after a moment’s pause, and with a smile, “there is 
 one plan you might try.” 
 
 “What is it?” eagerly asked the other. 
 
 “T recommend to you,” said Talleyrand, “that you be 
 crucified for mankind, and rise again the third day.” The 
 reply came like a flash of lightning, and the infidel reformer 
 stood for a moment awed by the stupendous fact suggested 
 to him, 
 
 C. S. Roprnson. 
 
 No. 764. 
 “JAPHET” (Tune). 
 
 This tune first appeared in Robinson’s “Laudes Domint” 
 in 1884. It is an arrangement of the music in Rubinstein’s 
 “Song of the Children of Japhet” in “The Tower of Babel,” 
 and takes its name from this. The arrangement is by Mr. 
 Charles Fitzsimmons, organist of the Madison Avenue 
 Presbyterian Church, New York. 
 
 No. 765. 
 “ELLERTON” (Tune). 
 
 E. J. Hopkins. 
 
 This was composed for the hymn beginning: 
 “Savior, again to Thy dear Name we raise.” 
 
 by John Ellerton, for whom the tune is named. This tune 
 is now usually printed with four parts, but as originally 
 written and used, it had a common melody running through 
 it all, but the harmonies were changed for each stanza of 
 the hymn. 
 
750 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 766. 
 “CQ LOVE, WHO FORMEDST ME TO WEAR.” 
 
 JOHANN SCHEFFLER. 
 C. WInKworTH, Translator. 
 
 In 1722, a German missionary in Madras sang this hymn, 
 and was so delighted with it, that he wished his native 
 scholars to share it with him. He began to work upon a 
 Malabar rendering of it the same evening, and did not rest 
 until he had finished it, two hours after midnight. His 
 version met with such success that he translated more 
 than a hundred hymns from the German into the native 
 tongue, and they are still sung in Southern India. 
 
 C. S. RoBinson. 
 
 No. 767. 
 
 “SOMETIMES A LIGHT SURPRISES.” 
 
 WILLIAM COWPER. 
 
 It is sometimes of interest to know the source from which 
 a poet draws his inspiration. In the margin of the “Olney 
 Hymns” where this hymn first appeared Cowper puts a 
 reference to let us know that the phrase in the last two 
 lines of the second stanza: 
 
 “Let the unknown to-morrow 
 Bring with it what it may.” 
 
 was taken from Matthew 6:34, “Take, therefore, no 
 thought for the morrow, for the morrow shall take thought 
 for the things of itself, sufficient unto the day is the evil 
 thereof,” and that the thought of the first lines of the last 
 stanza, come from the prophecy of Habakuk, 3: 17-18: 
 “Although the fig tree shall not blossom,” ete. 
 

 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 751 
 
 No. 768. 
 “AND ARE WE YET ALIVE?” 
 
 Rev. CHARLES WESLEY. 
 
 The author’s title to this hymn was “At the Meeting of 
 Friends,” and Methodists have honored it, by using it al- 
 most without exception as the opening hymn at the annual 
 meetings of their Conference. 
 
 Rev. Dr. Thomas H. Stockton of Philadelphia, when near 
 death, had lingered on beyond what any of his friends had 
 thought it possible for him to do. He had fallen into a 
 sleep from which none of those near him expected he would 
 awake on.earth, when suddenly he roused himself and see- 
 ing that he was still in the flesh, he repeated the first stanza 
 of this hymn. 
 
 No. 769. 
 “AND CANST THOU, SINNER, SLIGHT.” 
 
 Mrs. AsicaAit B. Hype. 
 
 It was at the house of Rev. Lavius Hyde, in Ellington, 
 Connecticut, that Mrs. Phoebe Brown was asked by the 
 lady who was her next-door neighbor, why she walked along 
 the roadside in the twilight, until near her house, and then 
 went back again. This was the discourteous question 
 which drew the poetic answer from Mrs. Brown, which has 
 become almost a classic among us: 
 
 “T love to steal awhile away 
 From little ones and care, 
 And spend the hours of setting day 
 In gratitude and prayer.” 
 
752 STORIES OF THE GREAT. 
 
 The wife of the minister was the friend of the poor painter’s 
 wife who wrote the verse and she herself wrote several 
 hymns. This one was sent to Rey. Ashael Nettleton, and 
 was often used by him in revival services in the New Eng- 
 
 land States. 
 
 No. 770. 
 “A PILGRIM THROUGH THIS LONELY WORLD.” 
 
 Str Epwarp Denny, 1796. 
 
 John Gambold, Bishop of the Moravian Church in Eng- 
 land, and a hymn writer of some repute, wrote a poem en- 
 titled “John’s Description of Jesus,” in which occurs this 
 passage: : 
 
 “Cheerful He was to us! 
 But let me tell you, sons, He was within 
 A pensive man, and always had a load 
 upon His spirits.” 
 
 These-lines are placed at the head of Sir Edward Denny’s 
 hymn in the book in which it first appeared, and the hymn 
 is evidently based upon the quotation. 
 
 No. 771. 
 
 “ACQUAINT THYSELF QUICKLY, O SINNER, WITH 
 GOD.” 
 
 Wituiam Knox, 1789-1825. 
 
 A farmer’s son in Scotland, the tenant of fertile farms 
 under a Scottish Duke, became dissipated, with the usual 
 result of loss of property and place. Then he drifted to 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 753 
 
 Edinburgh, and obtained employment by writing for the 
 newspapers of that city. Then he began to write a cer- 
 tain style of poetry in pensive vein, and these pieces he 
 collected into little books and published them. This hymn 
 is one of these, and it is based on the words of Eliphaz, the 
 Temanite, one of Job’s “Miserable Comforters” as they 
 are found in Job, 22: 21, 27, and 28: “Acquaint now thy- 
 self with him, and be at peace. ‘Thereby good shall come 
 to thee. Thou shalt make thy prayer unto him, and he 
 shall hear thee and thou shalt pay thy vows. Thou shalt 
 also decree a thing and it shall be established unto thee, 
 and the light shall shine upon thy ways.” 
 
 No. 772. 
 “AWAKE, MY SOUL, AND WITH THE SUN.” 
 “GLORY TO THEE, MY GOD, THIS NIGHT.” 
 
 THomas Ken. 
 
 Those who are troubled with insomnia will find a fellow 
 sufferer in the author of-our splendid doxology, and will 
 appreciate some of his verses which he called “Anodynes.” 
 They were composed during the night hours when sleep for- 
 sook him, and sometimes in hours of pain by day. One of 
 these reads: 
 
 “Pain keeps me walking in the night; 
 I longing lie for morning light; 
 Methinks the sluggish sun 
 Forgets he this day’s course must run. 
 O heavenly torch! Why this delay 
 In giving us our wonted day? 
 I feel my watch, I tell my clock, 
 I hear each crowing of the cock; 
 
754 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 Even Egypt, when three days 
 The heavens withheld the solar rays 
 And all in thickest darkness dwelt, 
 Night more affecting never felt.” 
 
 The line “I feel my watch” is explained by the fact that — 
 the sleepless bishop had a watch so constructed that he 
 could by his fingers “discern the time to half a quarter of 
 an hour.” This watch still exists and is preserved as a 
 precious relic. Another of his “Anodynes” is as follows: 
 
 “As in the night I restless lie, 
 
 I the watch-candle keep in eye; : 
 The innocent I often blame : 
 For the slow wasting of its flame. | 
 My curtain oft I draw away, : 
 Eager to catch the morning ray; 
 
 But when the morning gilds the skies, 
 
 The morning no relief supplies.” 
 
 the sun” was a favorite with the author himself, and it is 
 said that he often sang it himself to the accompaniment 
 
 Ken’s morning hymn beginning “Awake my soul and with 
 of his lute, when he rose from his bed. 
 
 No. 773. 
 “PRECIOUS PROMISE GOD HATH GIVEN.” 
 
 NATHANIEL NILEs, 1835. 
 
 The author of this hymn was a lawyer doing business in 
 New York City, and residing in Morristown, New Jersey. 
 He wrote it on the margin of a newspaper in the railway 
 car between his home and his office. 
 

 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 755 
 
 No. 774. 
 “FAIREST LORD JESUS! RULER OF ALL NATIONS.” 
 
 Richard Storrs Willis is neither the author nor the trans- 
 lator, but may be called the discoverer of this hymn. It 
 comes from Westphalia, and it with the melody attached 
 called the “Crusaders’ Hymn” was wont to be sung ac- 
 _ cording to tradition by German Knights of the Crusade, 
 in the twelfth century while marching to Jerusalem. The 
 popularity of both words and music in Germany may be in- 
 ferred from the statement made by Mr. Willis that a few 
 years ago in a missionary meeting in Germany, three voices 
 began the singing of it, but before they had proceeded far 
 hundreds had joined them in the singing. 
 
 No. 776. 
 “SOW IN THE MORN THY SEED.” 
 JAMES MONTGOMERY. 
 
 Every Whitsunday (Seventh Sunday after Easter) all 
 the Sunday schools in the town of Sheffield, England, where 
 Montgomery lived were accustomed to meet in one of the 
 public squares of the city and exchange greetings and sing 
 together. For a quarter of a century, Mr. Montgomery 
 composed a new hymn each year for-the use of these meet- 
 ings. This was the hymn written for the year 1832. As 
 many as twenty thousand children sometimes joined in 
 these open-air services. 
 
756 . STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 776. 
 “PEACE, DOUBTING HEART! MY GOD’S I AM.” 
 
 Rev. CHARLES WESLEY. 
 
 In 1826 an English mail boat named the M aria in the 
 West India Ocean was within sight of the Island of Antigua, 
 with a number of missionaries with their families on board, 
 when a terrible storm arose; the boat was wrecked, and 
 all were lost except one lady, the wife of one of the mis- 
 sionaries. She tells the story that when the storm arose 
 and consternation spread among the passengers and crew, 
 a little boy, the son of one of the missionaries, commenced 
 singing a stanza of this hymn: 
 
 “When passing ‘through the watery deep, 
 I ask in faith His promised aid, 
 The waves an awful distance keep 
 And shrink from my devoted head; 
 Fearless their violence I dare, 
 They cannot harm for God is there!” 
 
 and did much by his singing to calm the fears of the terror- 
 stricken people. 
 
 No. 777. 
 “LIGHT OF THE LONELY PILGRIM’S HEART.” 
 
 Epwarp Denny, 1796. 
 
 Sir Edward Denny was an Irish Baron, a member of 
 the denomination known as “Brethren.’’ He was a firm 
 believer in the second coming of Christ and wrote this 
 hymn as a prayer for His speedy appearance, giving to it 
 the title, “The Heart Watching for the Morning.” The 
 
 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 757 
 
 sense in which we usually use the hymn is different from 
 the one he had in mind when he wrote it. 
 
 No. 778. 
 “SHALL WE GATHER AT THE RIVER.” 
 
 Rev. Ropert Lowry. 
 
 This hymn was written on a sultry afternoon in July, 
 1864, in the author’s study in Elliott Place in Brooklyn, 
 New York, and when he had written the hymn, he sat 
 down at his parlor organ and composed the tune for it, 
 which has ever since been used with it. 
 
 No. 779. 
 “SERVANT OF GOD, WELL DONE! REST FROM .. .” 
 
 JAMES MONTGOMERY. 
 
 A Methodist minister by the name of Thomas Taylor, 
 preaching one Sunday in an English town declared that he 
 hoped to die an old soldier of Jesus Christ, with his sword 
 in his hand. Although then in apparently good health, he 
 died the next day, and James Montgomery wrote this hymn 
 to his memory. 
 
 No. 780. 
 “THE CHURCH’S ONE FOUNDATION.” 
 
 Rev. S. J. STONE. 
 
 “When the Pan Angelican Synod some few years ago 
 was held in St. Paul’s in London, the whole body of dig- 
 
758 . STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 nitaries, belonging to the whole English Establishment, 
 entered the cathedral in the presence of an immense con- 
 gregation, which rose to receive the procession, singing: 
 
 “The Church’ s one Foundation is Jesus Christ the Lord.” 
 RoBINSON. 
 
 No. 781. 
 
 “THE VOICE OF FREE GRACE CRIES, ESCAPE TO THE 
 MOUNTAIN.” 
 
 Rev. RiGHARD BURDSALL. 
 
 The author of this hymn was one day about the year 
 1796, passing a public house, or what we should in these 
 days call a barroom, and as he passed he overheard a song, 
 the air of which pleased his fancy so much that, though no 
 poet and having never tried to be, he wrote these words to 
 fit the barroom melody, and they have poetry enough in 
 them to have floated them along to our time, and religion 
 enough to have kept them in our church hymn books. 
 
 No. 782. 
 “PRAISE TO THE HOLIEST IN THE HEIGHT.” 
 
 Rev. Joun H. Newman. 
 
 We have several hymns that were written as parts of 
 novels, and here is one that occurs in a drama, or to be 
 precise a dramatic poem, by Cardinal Newman. The poem 
 is entitled, “The Dream of Gerontius.” In it Gerontius 
 dies and holds a dialogue with an angel, hears choirs of 
 angels sing, and this hymn he hears in his dream, sung by 
 the “Fifth Choir of Angelicals.”’ 
 
 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 759 
 No. 7838. 
 “LORD, A LITTLE BAND AND LOWLY.” 
 Mrs. M. E. SHELLY. 
 
 “At a Sunday school meeting in Manchester, the Rev. 
 John Curwen one evening gave a lecture on singing. He 
 sang a very pretty and simple tune, to which he said he 
 had no suitable words, and wished that someone would 
 write a hymn to it. I wrote these verses and gave them to 
 him after the close of the meeting.” So says the author of 
 the hymn. The tune which gave rise to the hymn was a 
 German one, and has attained great popularity in English 
 Sunday school collections under the name of “Glover.” 
 
 No. 784. : 
 “LORD, I KNOW THY GRACE IS NIGH ME.” 
 Rev. H. D. Gans. 
 
 While living in New York, Dr. Ganse was called to visit 
 a family in Freehold, New Jersey, which was in affliction. 
 While there, at night as he crossed the threshold of his 
 bedroom the first couplet of this hymn ran through his 
 mind, unannounced. It was midwinter in a farmhouse and 
 his room had no fire, so he composed the remainder of 
 the hymn in bed, in the darkness, and completed it as he 
 says “with no little feeling” before he slept. 
 
 No. 785. 
 
 “ON JORDAN’S STORMY BANKS I STAND.” 
 
 Rev. SAMUEL STENNETT. 
 
 “T’ll tell you what, I heard singin’ to-night that made me 
 wish I was in heaven, or good enough to go there,” said an 
 
760 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 old backwoodsman to his wife, as, entering their log hut, 
 he sat down to his evening meal. 
 
 “Where did you hear it?” she asked. 
 
 “At our neighbor’s up yonder. They must feel something 
 I don’t know about, or they couldn’t sing so.” 
 
 “When they first came here,” said his wife, “I thought 
 they were proud and stiff; but they were real good neigh- 
 bors, and I heard after they were good church folks too.” 
 
 “Well,” said he, “I mean to go to church tomorrow, and 
 see if I can’t hear some singin’ like that.” 
 
 The singer knew that her neighbors were ignorant, rough, 
 and unbelieving, nearing the decline of life, and unwilling 
 to be approached on the subject of religion. One glorious 
 summer evening, as the sun was going down, the lady seated 
 herself at the window, and involuntarily tuned her voice 
 to sing. When near the close of the hymn, she cast her eyes 
 to the field where her neighbor was at work, and saw that 
 he was listening intently. Instantly the thought flashed 
 into her mind, “Oh, if I could raise that poor man. to think 
 of heaven.” She closed her refrain, and then commenced: 
 
 “On Jordan’s stormy banks I stand,” 
 
 singing it “with the spirit and the understanding also.” 
 And as she sang, the old man listened, almost spellbound. 
 The singer wished to glorify God by leading one of His 
 creatures to think of Him. “I will sing God’s praises when- 
 ever he can hear me, and perhaps he may be led to praise 
 the Lord himself,” was her resolve. The next Lord’s day 
 the old man was at church. This cheered the lady, and she 
 said, “I will sing whenever he comes.” Ere another week 
 was closed he was at work again. This time she sang: 
 
 “Just as I am, without one plea, 
 But that Thy blood was shed for me.” 
 
 Slowly but distinctly she sang, that he might take in the 
 full meaning of the words, and feeling their sweet pathos 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 761 
 
 in her inmost soul she sang the hymn. The listener shook 
 his head, and rubbed his hand quickly over his eyes. The 
 next Lord’s day evening he was among the people of God, 
 earnestly inquiring the way of salvation. Being thus suc- 
 cessful in bringing the husband in the way of life, the 
 singer next tried to draw the wife, and so one day invited 
 her into the parlor to hear her piano. She had never seen 
 or heard such an instrument, and was wonderstruck. The 
 lady called her daughters to her side and all joined in sing- 
 ing, “All hail the power of Jesus’ Name,” to the old tune, 
 “Coronation.” 
 
 “Do you like that?” asked the lady. 
 
 “Oh, it’s nice. I b’l’eve I heered that tune somewhere 
 when I was a girl, but I’ve forgot.” 
 
 “Probably you heard it at church. It is often sung there. 
 We cannot sing the praises of Jesus too often, for He came 
 to save us poor sinners.” Then they all sang, “Come, hum- 
 ble sinner, in whose breast,” etc. When the woman arose 
 to go, she was invited to “Come again.” 
 
 “Oh, U’ll come often if I can hear you sing.” 
 
 “Mother, you take a strange way to win souls!” 
 
 “Why nob, my daughter? Has not God commanded that 
 whatsoever we do, should be done to His glory? And if 
 He has given us voices to sing, should we not use them in 
 His service? There are many ears that will listen to a 
 hymn for the sake of the tune, that will not hear a word 
 from the Bible. Our voices and our musical instruments 
 should all be employed in winning lost souls.” 
 
 No. 786. 
 “GOD OF ALL GRACE AND MAJESTY.” 
 
 Rev. CHARLES WESLEY. 
 
 Mr. Wesley was at one time with a large party of friends 
 who had met to dine together, when the whole party was 
 
762 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 exceedingly amused at some anecdote related either by 
 Mr. Wesley himself or one of the preachers who accom- 
 panied him. The hearty laugh was followed, as usual, by 
 a momentary silence; and just when the conversation was 
 about to be resumed, Mr. Wesley stood up, and all eyes 
 were, of course, turned to him. He paused a moment, and 
 then lifting up his hand in a manner quite his own repeated 
 with solemn voice a stanza of this hymn: 
 
 “Still may I walk as in Thy sight, 
 My strict observer see; 
 
 And Thou by reverent love unite 
 My child-like heart to Thee; 
 
 Still let me, till my days are past 
 At Jesus’ feet abide; 
 
 So shall He lift me up at last 
 And seat me at His side.” 
 
 The effect may be easily imagined. It was as happy as in- 
 stantaneous. The full stream of feeling was diverted into 
 the right channel, and the pleasures of the parlor, became 
 a preparation for the services of the sanctuary. 
 
 No. 787. 
 “HOSANNA BE THE CHILDREN’S SONG.” 
 
 JAMES MoNnTGOMERY. 
 
 In the year 1829 the author of this hymn wrote as 
 follows: 
 
 “It has occurred to me that a Sunday school Jubilee in 
 the year 1831, fifty years from the origin of Sunday schools, 
 might be the means of extraordinary and happy excitement 
 to the public mind in favor of these institutions.” The 
 suggestion met with general approval and the Jubilee was 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 763 
 arranged for September 14, 1831, the birthday of Robert 
 Raikes. All over Great Britain immense gatherings were 
 held, and the largest churches and public halls were in- 
 adequate to contain the throngs of friends of Sunday schools 
 who assembled. As had been predicted by Mr. Mont- 
 gomery, the Sunday school as a religious institution re- 
 ceived a tremendous impetus from these Jubilee meétings. 
 It was fitting that the man who had first conceived the idea 
 of the Jubilee should furnish for it its opening song. Mr. 
 Montgomery was asked to write a hymn for the occasion 
 and this hymn was his response to the invitation. It was 
 sung on that day in all the Jubilee Assemblies in Great 
 Britain, and took at once a favorite place in the “Sunday 
 school song collections.” 
 
 No. 788. 
 “ON THE MOUNTAIN’S TOP APPEARING.” 
 
 Rev. Tuomas KE tty. 
 
 A hundred years ago there were no ocean cables or 
 swift steamers to bear quick news of the world’s doings. 
 The London Missionary Society which had at its first meet- 
 ing decided that the island of Tahiti should be its first 
 mission field, was compelled to wait for three long years 
 before any tidings came from the missionaries they had sent 
 there. Each year upon the anniversary of its organization 
 a great meeting was held in London at which were gathered 
 the friends of missions from all the British Isles. Reports 
 were heard, addresses listened to, sermons preached, and 
 for each annual meeting some poet wrote a hymn. Among 
 the most ardent of its friends was an Irish preacher cele- 
 brated alike for his scholarly learning, his deep piety, and 
 his active interest in every work of philanthropy. Just 
 before the fourth gathering of the Society, news had come 
 from the little band of workers far away in the Pacific 
 
764 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 Sea, that they had been kindly received by the natives, 
 their message heard with attention and interest, and they 
 entertained bright hopes of success in their work. This 
 news soon found its way to the Irish preacher who was poet 
 as well as preacher, and drew from him a hymn “On the 
 good news from Tahiti” based on the words of Isaiah: 
 “How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of Him 
 that bringeth good tidings that publisheth peace.” The 
 meeting in London following the reception of this “good 
 news from Tahiti” was a very enthusiastic one, and Thomas 
 Kelly’s hymn was there first sung. 
 
 No. 789. 
 “DAILY, DAILY, SING THE PRAISES.” 
 
 This hymn written in England by a clergyman of the 
 Church of England, as a processional hymn, to be sung by 
 boys as they marched into a quiet church in Yorkshire, 
 found its way into the heart of Africa, and translated into 
 the language of the land, became the death song of another 
 band of boys as they passed through the gates of martyr- 
 dom into the Temple not made with hands. It happened 
 at the Uganda Mission, where Bishop Hannington was 
 afterwards murdered, on January, 1885, and the story is 
 simply told in an English paper: 
 
 “Two native lads who had been kidnapped, but subse- 
 quently released, reported that they had been taken with 
 Kakumba, and Ashe’s boy as also Serwanga, a tall, fine 
 fellow, a baptized lad, whom Majasi, the leader of the 
 hostile party, had caught, and Duta’s wife Sarah and her 
 child, to a place outside the capital. That Serwanga, 
 Kakumba, and Ashe’s boy had been tortured by having 
 their arms cut off, and they were then bound alive to a 
 scaffolding under which a fire was made, and they were 
 slowly burned to death. Majasi and his men mocked them 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 765 
 
 and bade them pray now if Jesus Christ would rescue them 
 from his hands. The dear lads clung to their faith and in 
 the fire they sang: 
 
 “Daily, daily, sing the praises 
 Of the city God hath made.” 
 
 No. 790. 
 “TO-DAY THOU LIVEST YET.” 
 
 A young law student was ill in Berlin. The doctor 
 - directed his bed to be moved to a corner of the room where 
 the light would not trouble him. On this side of the room 
 there was but a thin partition between him and the occu- 
 pants of the adjoining room, and before he had lain there 
 long he heard these words repeated over and over again 
 by some one on the other side of the partition: 
 
 “To-day thou livest yet, 
 To-day turn thou to God! 
 For ere to-morrow comes 
 Thou may’st be with the clod.” 
 
 These words fixed themselves in the sick man’s memory 
 and led to his conversion. It happened that a little boy had 
 not learned his lesson at school that day and these lines 
 were the part he had been unable to commit to memory, 
 and his father had put him into the corner of the room next 
 to the place where this sick man lay, to learn the verse and 
 he was repeating it over and over to fix it in his mind, I 
 would like to have those who believe that events come by 
 chance, tell me how many shakes of the dice box would 
 probably bring about. such a coincidence of time and place 
 and circumstances as were required to bring that sick sinner 
 into the reach of that child’s voice just when he was 
 repeating that verse. It is easier to believe that: 
 
766 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 “Deep in unfathomable mines 
 Of never failing skill. 
 
 He treasures up His bright designs 
 And works His sovereign will.” 
 
 No. 791. 
 “COME, LORD, THE DROOPING SINNER CHEER.” 
 
 In January, 1759, a woman named Hannah Harrison was 
 giving an exhortation at a Methodist meeting in York- 
 shire, England. Five or six young men entered the room 
 just as she was repeating the stanza: 
 
 “Come, Lord, the drooping sinner cheer, 
 Nor let thy chariot wheels delay! 
 Appear, in my poor heart, appear! 
 My God! My Savior, come away.” 
 
 One of these young men twenty-two years of age, was 
 struck with the words, and said, in writing of it afterwards, 
 “T was cut to the heart. I could neither speak nor stir, 
 I was convinced there was something in religion which I 
 had never known. I returned home but these words, ‘My 
 God! My Savior, come away,’ were continually sounding 
 in my heart, and from that time another young man and 
 I forsook our trifling company.” This was Mr. John Atlay. 
 He was converted and afterwards became a_ successful 
 preacher of the Gospel. 
 
 No. 792. 
 “MY JESUS, STAY THOU BY ME,” 
 
 In the year 1796 the army of France, which was then 
 at war with Germany, was defeated by the Army of Arch- 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 767 
 
 duke Charles. A horde of fugitives from the defeated army 
 swept through a little town angry at their defeat and glad 
 of an opportunity for revenge. So they plundered the town, 
 murdering such of its inhabitants as had not fled to the 
 forests, and set fire to the buildings. A German mother 
 was watching at the bedside of a child too sick to be taken 
 to the forest to which her neighbors all had fled. She bolted 
 her cottage door, and sinking to her knees by the cradle 
 of the sick child began to pray. Outside she heard the 
 shouts of the soldiers and the shrieks of their hapless vic- 
 tims. At last her own door was broken in and a French 
 soldier rushed in with bayonet pointed at her. She laid 
 her hands over her child as if to protect it and raised her 
 voice aloud: 
 
 “My Jesus, stay thou by me 
 
 And let no foe come nigh me 
 
 Safe sheltered by thy wing, 
 
 But should the foe alarm me 
 
 O! let him never harm me 
 
 But still thine angels round me sing.” 
 
 The soldier stopped midway in the room, and stood while 
 she prayed, and then stepped softly to the cradle; he laid 
 his hand gently on the sick child’s head, his lips moved, 
 as if to speak, the tears fell down his cheeks, he gave his 
 hand to the woman, and walked away in silence. By and 
 by, she arose from her place and looked out of her window; 
 she saw the soldier still standing at her door, and there he 
 remained, protecting her and her home from the assaults 
 of his comrades until the troop at last marched away from 
 the village and then he joined them. 
 
768 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 793. 
 
 “JESUS, AT THY COMMAND I LAUNCH INTO THE 
 DEEP.” 
 
 AuTHOR UNKNOWN. FIRST APPEARED ABOUT 1774. 
 “O’er the gloomy hills of darkness.” 
 Rev. WiuuiAM WILuiAMs, 1772. 
 
 Early in the morning of the tenth of August, 1796, a vessel 
 swung out into the river Thames at London, to start upon 
 a voyage which was to mark an epoch in the history of the 
 world. A flag of new design floated at her masthead. White 
 doves upon a purple ground bore in their beaks each one 
 an olive branch of green. Upon the deck there stood a band 
 
 of thirty men, who had offered their services for a new enter- — 
 
 prise. Upon the river’s bank had gathered a great crowd 
 
 of those who were their friends or friends of the enterprise — 
 in which they were engaged. And there were tears and | 
 
 prayers and sad farewells, for neither those who went, nor 
 those who bade them go, looked for a meeting until they 
 
 should meet in heaven. This was the Duff, the first Foreign — 
 Mission ship, and this was the first flag of Foreign Mis-— 
 sions, and this the first band of Foreign Missionaries start-_ 
 
 ing on the first Foreign Mission of modern times. And as 
 the ship moved slowly down the river, the friends who were 
 waving farewells from the shore heard wafted to their ears 
 from their friends who stood upon the deck of the ship 
 the first song of Foreign Missions: 
 
 “Jesus, at thy command 
 I launch into the deep 
 And leave my native land 
 Where sin lulls all asleep 
 For thee I would the world resign 
 And sail to heaven with Thee and Thine.” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 769 
 
 Seven months later on a Sunday morning, March 5, 1797, 
 this same mission band, which had been all this time tossed 
 upon the waves of the deep, stood together on the deck of 
 the Duff looking off at a low range of hills which stood 
 dimly outlined against the sky. It was the Island of 
 Tahiti, in the South Pacific, to whose inhabitants they had 
 come to tell the Gospel story. In a few hours the canoes 
 of the Islanders were dancing in the waves all about the 
 ship, and many of the men had clambered up her sides, and 
 swarmed over her deck, to trade or steal. And here in full 
 sight of the land where they were to labor, and above 
 whose hills hung the gloom of heathen darkness, these mis- 
 sionaries gathered close together on the deck of their ship 
 and stilled the babel of unintelligible sounds about them 
 with the music of their hymn, which marks the beginning 
 of that wonderful missionary work, which has filled the 
 Islands of the Pacific with the light of Christian civilization. 
 
 No. 794. 
 “STABAT MATER” (Music). 
 G. A. Rosstnt. 
 
 After Rossini had retired from public life, and had re- 
 solved to write no more music for publication, a celebrated 
 Spaniard (Don Vazela) asked him to write music for the 
 great Latin hymn, “Stabat Mater,” not to be made public 
 but to be performed in his own private chapel. Rossini 
 although very gay in his younger days was a devout 
 Catholic, and quite in sympathy with the subject, and so 
 in spite of his resolution, he accepted the commission and 
 wrote the music. An accident gave it to the public. Don 
 Vazela died, his heirs sold the manuscript, and in an in- 
 credibly short time, the music of “Stabat Mater’ was being 
 sung in the Catholic churches all over Europe. 
 
770 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 796. 
 “DAY OF JUDGMENT, DAY OF WONDERS.” 
 
 Rev. JoHN NEwrTOoN. 
 
 John Newton kept a diary, and from it we get many a 
 glimpse of his daily life and work among the people of the 
 little town of Olney. One day in 1775 he wrote in his diary: 
 “T usually make one hymn a week to expound at the Great 
 House.” The “Great House” was where Newton and 
 Cowper gathered the people together for a weekly meeting. 
 Newton’s hymns have been criticised as “unpoetic,” “tame,” 
 “poor,” “bald,” and “matter-of-fact,” and yet they are 
 hymns that live, and the reason is that they are hymns 
 that can be “expounded.” A hymn that can be expounded 
 is a hymn that will live, because it will fit into human 
 experience, and will touch human want. This is one of the 
 hymns which Newton wrote “to expound.” In his diary 
 he records that on Sunday evening, June 26, 1775, he spoke 
 from a hymn on the day of judgment, and he records that 
 the hymn ‘took him the most cf two days to finish.” The - 
 hymn has become one of the most popular of Newton’s 
 hymns, and has been translated into several languages. 
 
 No. 796. 
 “CRAWFORD” (Tune). 
 
 In Haydn’s Oratorio of “The Creation,” in the account 
 of the third day of Creation, after a recitative with the 
 words taken from Genesis, “And God said let the earth 
 bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree 
 yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon 
 the earth; and it was so,” then comes a soprano solo, be- 
 ginning with the words from Milton’s “Paradise Lost,” 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 771 
 
 “With verdure clad the fields appear, Delightful to the 
 ravished sense.” It is No. 9 of the Oratorio, and this solo 
 forms the air of this tune we know as “Crawford.” 
 
 No. 797. 
 “THE CREATION” (Tune). 
 
 The words for Haydn’s Oratorio, “The Creation” with 
 the exception of those taken verbatim from the Book of 
 Genesis, are arranged from Milton’s “Paradise Lost.” 
 Number 12 begins with the Biblical account of the fourth 
 day of Creation. A recitative with the words, “And God 
 said, Let there be lights in the firmament of Heaven, to 
 divide the day from the night, and to give light upon the 
 earth; And let them be for signs and for seasons, and for 
 days and for years. He made the stars also.” Then follows 
 another recitative with words from Milton, “In splendor 
 bright is rising now the sun, and darts his rays; A joyful, 
 happy spouse. A giant proud and glad, To run his meas- . 
 ured course. With softer beams and milder light, steps on 
 the silver moon through silent night. The space immense 
 of the azure sky innumerous hosts of radiant orbs adorn. 
 And the sons of God announced the fourth day, in song 
 divine, proclaiming thus his power.” Then comes the 
 Angel’s song in perhaps the grandest chorus of the whole 
 Oratorio, beginning with the words: 
 
 “The heavens are telling the glory of God.” 
 
 The air of this chorus forms the air of this tune, to which 
 is appropriately sung the hymn of Addison’s: 
 
 “The spacious firmament on high 
 With all the blue ethereal sky.” 
 
772 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 798. 
 “NOBODY KNOWS DE TROUBLE I SEE.” 
 
 (Negro Slave Song.) 
 
 During and after the war of the Rebellion, the lands of 
 many Southerners known to be actually engaged in the 
 Rebellion, were confiscated by the United States, and in 
 many places parcels of these lands sufficient for homes and 
 small farms were assigned by the government to the negroes. 
 At the close of the war an effort was made by the original 
 owners to regain possession of their lands, and great dis- 
 tress was brought upon the negroes, who had in many cases 
 put these lands under cultivation, built- little cabins upon 
 them, and were growing crops for the support of their 
 families. As Commander of the Freedman’s Bureau, Major 
 General 0. O. Howard, was often made the arbitrator in 
 these contests for the possession of the lands. It is related 
 that at one time shortly after the war, the negroes upon 
 the Sea Islands had come into great trouble over an attempt 
 . to dispossess them of their homes, by the former owners. 
 On the one hand was a lawyer from Charleston, South 
 Carolina, urging the claim of the old slave masters, and 
 on the other the plaint of the defenceless negroes appealing 
 for protection. While awaiting a delay in the proceedings, 
 the General asked the people to strike up one of their songs. 
 There was a moment of silence and then in the midst of the 
 assembly an old colored woman started in alone: 
 
 “Nobody knows de trouble I see.” 
 
 As she advanced with the song one after another fell in 
 until the whole assembly had joined. The melody was so 
 affecting and the words so expressive of the condition in 
 which the singers were placed, that the General, although 
 sitting in the capacity of judge, as well as others who were 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 773 
 
 with him, was scarcely able to refrain from tears, and the 
 effect was more powerful than any argument could have 
 produced. 
 
 No. 799. 
 “BANGOR” (Tune). 
 
 There are at least two tunes by this name. One is a 
 Welsh tune of unknown authorship. The other was com- 
 posed by William Tans’ur, an English composer, whose 
 music was published in 1736. This tune was the innocent 
 cause of an incident which seems ludicrous now. In the 
 early part of the last century, sacred music in Scotland had 
 nearly ceased to exist. The power of reading music was 
 nearly a lost art, and the number of tunes in use was 
 reduced to twelve. By long traditional use these tunes 
 came to be regarded by the common people as hardly less 
 inspired than the Psalms which were sung to them. Dr. 
 Guthrie told a story of an old servant in his family whose 
 reverence for the old Psalms was so great that she would 
 not so much as let her eyes rest on the words of a hymn, 
 and who revered the tunes as highly as the words, and who 
 when new hymns and new tunes were spoken of as likely 
 to come into use, vowed that she “Wad sing the Psalms 
 o’David, to the tunes o’David, and nothing else.” 
 
 The late Dr. Fletcher of London relates that one day the 
 precentor in the church of his father at. Leith, began to sing 
 “Bangor” which was a new tune, and not one of the twelve. 
 He-had scarcely begun to sing when the minister jumped to 
 his feet and taking the great pulpit Bible in both hands 
 brought it down with all his force on the unsuspecting head 
 of the poor precentor, daring him ever to start such a tune 
 in his Kirk again. 
 
774 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 No. 800. 
 “OQ, BLESSED SAVIOR, IN THY: LOVE; 
 Rev. JOSEPH STENNETT. 
 
 In these days when the language we speak contains fifty 
 thousand hymns, and of the making of hymn books there 
 is no end, it is difficult to conceive of a time not very far 
 back when not a dozen hymns existed in the English 
 language. Paraphrases of the Psalms were numerous enough 
 and for the most part as unpoetic as numerous, but of 
 hymns there was none, and none called for. Curious opin- 
 ions prevailed. By many it was urged that only Christians 
 should sing in church. Congregational singing was objected 
 to, because, “when all speak none can hear.” Singing words 
 which others had written, it was urged opened the way for 
 the use of prayers which others had written. Violent con- 
 troversies broke out among the churches, as to who should 
 sing, what should be sung, and even as to singing at all in 
 church. One of the first concessions made to the singing of 
 hymns in the regular church services, was, to permit of the 
 singing of a hymn at the close of the Communion Service. 
 To this objections were effectually silenced by reference to 
 the example of Christ as given in Matthew, 26:30, “and 
 when they had sung an hymn they went out into the Mount 
 of Olives.” Such hymns were first sung in 1673. And 
 it was for this use that the Rev. Joseph Stennett, a Baptist 
 preacher of some celebrity who lived in London, composed 
 and published a little pamphlet of thirty-seven hymns and 
 among them this one. 
 
 No. 801. 
 “COME, MY SOUL, THOU MUST BE WAKING.” 
 
 F. R. L. F. Von, 1654—1699 (Lutheran). 
 
 A life like that of Gladstone refreshes us, by its constant 
 reminder that a life amid the turmoil of politics is not of 
 
HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 775 
 
 necessity inconsistent with a life of earnest piety. Germany 
 as well as England has had such a man, in the author of 
 this hymn. He died two centuries ago, after twenty years 
 of constant and active service in various political capacities, 
 but it has been said of him that he was not more dis- 
 tinguished, by genius and worldly distinction, than by 
 Christian holiness. This hymn received a remarkable illus- 
 tration in the closing moments of its author’s life. It was 
 early morning and the first rays of the dawn broke into his 
 sick chamber. He asked that he might be taken to the 
 window, that he might look once more at the rising sun. 
 After looking steadily at it for some time, he cried out, 
 “Oh! if the appearance of this earthly and created thing 
 is so beautiful, how shall I be enraptured by the unspeak- 
 able glory of the Creator himself!” The thought and the 
 effort to express it overpowered him and he fell back ex- 
 hausted and died. 
 
 No. 802. 
 “JESUS, MY ALL” (Tune). 
 
 There is a very pretty romance connected with this piece 
 of music. A young Irish surgeon practising his profession 
 in Dublin, became involved in a scandal and was com- 
 pelled to quit the country. He went to England, and soon 
 there occurred the first of a series of incidents which by 
 and by gave to him the title of “The Fortunate Irishman.” 
 A lady’s carriage overturned and he was first to reach her 
 and to offer assistance. She was somewhat injured, and 
 asked him to travel with her to her home in London. There 
 she gave him a generous gift, and a general invitation to 
 her house, where he soon after met a young lady of noble 
 birth, who fell in love with him at first sight. Our young 
 surgeon had neither money nor title, and to prevent a 
 marriage of the young lovers, all sorts of expedients were 
 resorted to by the lady’s family. One of the expedients 
 
776 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 
 was the sending her away on several journeys. On one of 
 these journeys while at the town of Bath, the love sick girl 
 wrote a song to her absent darling, which she set to an 
 ancient Irish melody he had often sung to her: 
 
 “What’s this dull town to me? 
 Robin’s not near. 
 
 What was ’t I wished to see, 
 What wished to hear? 
 
 Where’s all the joy and mirth 
 
 Made this town a heaven on earth? 
 
 Oh, these all fled with thee, 
 Robin Adair.” 
 
 The sequel is soon told, love conquered; the lovers were 
 married, enjoyed a happy life, and died over a hundred 
 
 years ago, leaving the story and the song of Robin Adair 
 to find their way down to us together. 
 
 No. 803. 
 Franz Prerer ScHuBerRT, 1797. 
 
 Schubert was a poor man’s son, and gained his first 
 knowledge of music by visits to a piano factory near his 
 
 home, and by practice without a teacher on an old instru- 
 
 ment in his father’s house. When eight years old he com- 
 posed his first piece of piano music. At eleven he sang in 
 the parish choir, at thirteen he was too poor to buy and so 
 was begging music paper from his friends and filling all he 
 got with music of his own. At eighteen he composed the 
 “Brl King,” one of his most celebrated pieces. From this 
 time on everything he touched turned to music. If he saw 
 a beautiful poem, his first thought was to set it to musie¢, 
 and it was just the same if it was a worthless rhyme. Once 
 

 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 777 
 
 when strolling through a little village, he happened to see 
 a volume of Shakespeare, and opening it he read: “Hark 
 hark, the lark at heaven’s gate sings.” At once he ex- 
 claimed “Oh, such a melody has come into my head; If 
 only I had music paper at hand.” <A friend drew some lines 
 on a bill of fare, and there amid the confusion and noise 
 of an inn, he wrote the beautiful song that is known by this 
 title. He was obliged to support himself by his composi- 
 tions, and so he wrote almost continuously; songs and sym- 
 phonies and operas came in rapid succession from his pen, 
 yet he was always poor, and at thirty-one he died, lonely 
 and disconsolate, leaving behind him more than five hun- 
 dred unpublished songs. 
 
 No. 804. 
 GIOACHINO ANTONIO ROSssINI. 
 
 A hundred years ago almost, a family of musicians might 
 have been seen wandering from town to town in Italy, at- 
 tending fairs and other public gatherings, the father play- 
 ing the French horn, and the mother singing. With them 
 wandered their little son, who soon began to add his voice 
 to the songs they played and sang in the Italian villages. 
 His pure soprano voice soon attracted the attention of 
 priests, and he began to sing in the Romish churches, and 
 when eighteen years old to compose. His progress was 
 rapid. The composer and his music became very popular 
 not only in Italy, but in France and England. Rossini 
 was indolent. He often composed in bed, during cold wea- 
 ther to save the expense of a fire, and on one such occa- 
 sion he had just finished a duet for an opera when it 
 slipped from the bed to the floor. He tried to reach it with 
 his hand, but failing in this, rather than get out of his warm 
 bed to get it, he composed another. 
 
778 STORIES OF THE GREAT 
 No. 805. 
 “ON THE FOUNT OF LIFE ETERNAL.” 
 
 Peter DAMIANI, 998—1072. 
 
 Almost a thousand years ago an Italian mother abandoned 
 her babe just born. A servant discovered the luckless boy 
 and cared for him, until by and by the mother relented and 
 received him back again. While he was yet a little boy 
 both parents died, and an older brother took him in charge, 
 but more as a slave than a brother. He sent him into the 
 fields to feed swine. By and by another brother more 
 tender-hearted took note of the amiable disposition and 
 natural ability of the boy and had him educated.’ The 
 boy’s name was Peter, and the name of this brother who 
 befriended him was Damian, and so the boy became 
 known as “Damian’s Peter” or as it would be in Latin, 
 “Peter Damiani.” The scholar soon became a teacher, and 
 his progress was rapid. He soon became a monk, and 
 then Superior of the Monastery, then founder of new 
 monasteries, and soon bishop and cardinal of the Church 
 of Rome. He was a “Dr. Parkhurst” among the corrup- 
 tions of his times. His protest against the terrible wicked- 
 ness of the priests as well as of the people, he put into a 
 book, which was appropriately named “The Gomorrah 
 Book.” It made a great stir. Books were not printed 
 then, but copied by the pen. Those whose crimes were ex- 
 posed by “The Gomorrah Book” borrowed it, claiming that 
 they wanted to have some copies made, and Peter came near 
 never seeing his book again, but at last he got it and it 
 has been preserved and handed down, for us to read if we 
 wish to. Peter was the originator of a curious fanaticism. 
 He found in the monasteries a law that any monk for vio- 
 lation of the monastic discipline, might be whipped with 
 five strokes, to bring him to his senses. Starting from this 
 Peter argued that if five strokes were beneficial, six would 
 

 
 HYMNS OF THE CHURCH 779 
 
 be more so, and if they were inflicted willingly upon one- 
 self, the credit would be greater still. And if these strokes 
 would be placed to one’s credit on the account books of 
 Heaven, when given for one’s own sins, they certainly 
 would if applied for the sins of others. A sort of scale of 
 prices was soon established, by which three thousand strokes 
 paid off for oneself or one’s friends a year of purgatorial 
 punishment. The mania which .we have all read about, 
 under the name of flagellation spread far and wide in 
 Europe, dying away and reappearing in successive cen- 
 turies, and if we congratulate ourselves that our age and 
 country is too enlightened to indulge in such a superstition, 
 we have only to go to the Californian coast to find it still 
 practised by adherents of the Romish. church. And Peter 
 Damiani, the abandoned child, the swineherd, monk, car- 
 dinal and flagellant, was the author of this hymn. 
 
avg R ee ; 5 : iS 
 ‘9 39 ‘Hs Ae 1 Nae ae) st ale . | 
 te bonielbal a) Bar 
 ance ae 
 "haste te base sue caf iat 
 BA sre ABs: -gohiatod ae Ao E 
 eect e Aig ea ere aes ae 
 BF ino Bail) eayige sin "aa trl Oat ajjalle 
 
 fi pee elgs Gaul Bes. Cd BS 
 
 fi: Wee Bai ‘UL OPoiner es of Fires 
 pe hl san A. STS etree 
 
 et bexisnbin. oh 1 ap Sanbiane ita 
 BER ae cub repel ins orl lig 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 INDEX 
 
 NO. PAGE 
 
 A deep and holy awe.. 524 
 A life on the ocean wave 718 
 A mighty fortress is our 
 
 AxOC er aenea rs ee USL 128 
 324 
 571 
 A pilgrim through this 
 lonely world ....... 770 
 Abide with me ...... 75 
 689 
 Acquaint thyself quick- 
 ly, O sinner......... 771 
 Again the circling sea- 
 BOUSY Lellinnete sa sahion 596 
 Again the slowly cir- 
 cling year ....:.... 
 Ah, how shall fallen 
 MABTU SY atet Pape 2783s ee teye 628 
 Ah! lovely appearance 
 recente 50s s FL 446 
 Alas and did my Savior 
 hee + WE Ft 386 
 ? 409 
 Alexander, Mrs. Cecil 
 a MSeereins Siete Pleated Bed 632 
 All glory, laud, and 
 Honore.) ates 160 
 All hail the power of 
 Jesus’ name ........ 79 
 143 
 518 
 677 
 All people that on . 
 earth do dwell ..... 306 
 - All praise to Thee, 
 eternal Lord ....... 21 
 All praise to Thee, my 
 God, this night .... 460 
 All thanks be to God.: 221 
 All ye that pass by, to 
 Jesus draw nigh..... 438 
 Almost persuaded .... Ae 
 38 
 
 544 
 708 
 
 NO. PAGE 
 Alone, yet not alone 
 ami i TG ies came eee 499 522 
 Along the banks where 
 Babel’s+4 i. See eee 578 589 
 Always with us ...... 183 205 
 Am I a soldier of the 
 CHOSS |. si adds roe 34. «24 
 693 686 
 Amazing grace, how 
 sweet the sound .... 441 475 
 And am I only born to 
 GIR 555 Boe ee 112 127 
 And are we yet alive.. 768 751 
 And can it be that I 
 should eaineme ace 287 289 
 And can we forget in ; 
 tasting Nourse wee 350 +369 
 And can’st thou sinner 
 slight 267, seh eur » a 769 751 
 And let this feeble 
 body’ dié «4 i:723.27. 265 266 
 And must I be to judg- 
 MONT Rt eee eee 99 99 
 And now another day 
 1S 'CONGs . kc eee 257 258 
 And they sang a new 
 SONG wh? ineicces ost meaes 314 323 
 Angels holy, high, and 
 lowlyiviee... . sae 653 645 
 Arise, my soul, arise... 327 338 
 502 526 
 Arm of the Lord, 
 awake, awake ...... 216 227 
 Arne, Thomas Augus- 
 fine: tgarcen sae 645 639 
 Art thou weary, art 
 thou languid ....... 562 574 
 565" 807— 
 As I glad bid adieu to 
 the world’aia37. 20: 157-180 
 As thy days, thy ; 
 strength shall be.... 437 471 — 
 
782 
 
 INDEX 
 
 NO. PAGE 
 
 Asleep in Jesus, blessed 
 0 
 At even ere the sun 
 
 was set .-cccsscsees 574 
 “Austria,” tune .----- 584 
 “Avon,” tume ..-+---: 593 
 Awake and sing the 
 
 SONoweeesee ces 200 
 Awake, my soul, and 
 
 with the sun ..------ 712 
 Awake, my soul, to 
 
 meet the day ------ 174 
 
 : 466 
 Awaked by Sinai’s 
 awful sound ...-:-: 570 
 
 Away my unbelieving 
 
 fear cack ues tee coe 447 
 Away with our sorrow 
 and fear ...+.++++: 89 
 
 Bach, John Sebastian. 509 
 “Bangor,” tune 799 
 Be present at 
 
 table, Lord 
 Beethoven, 
 Before Jehovah’s awful 
 
 throne 
 
 aeveeee 
 
 > © eter ene e 9) 
 
 pisses io ele «0» -OLess 
 
 Begin, my tongue, some 
 heavenly theme .-.-- 124 
 Behold a_ stranger at 
 the door ...---+-::: 253 
 Behold the glories of 
 the Lamb 209 
 Behold the mountain 
 of the Lord 
 Behold the Savior of 
 mankind 
 
 Pe ee 
 pleas ¢ © 2.0 
 
 o eu ene’ ? 24s esc? 
 
 Beneath Moriah’s rocky 
 i 227 
 
 eC renardte A ew Cenee me Sane 
 
 Bernard of Clairvaux. 523 
 Berridge, John ...---- 674 
 “Bethany,” tune .-...-- 599 
 
 Beyond the starry skies 638 
 
 Bid us now depart in 
 PEACE ..eeeeeeeeeaee 
 
 Blessing, honor, thanks, 
 and praise 
 
 379 
 586 
 594 
 599 
 215 
 753 
 
 197 
 494 
 
 583 
 479 
 80 
 
 NO. PAGE 
 Blest be the dear unit- 
 ing love .-+-s-+:""* 162 185 
 Blest be the tie that 
 binds ....ceecsesse? . 137 159 
 199 215 
 329 340 
 482a 510 
 Blest joys from mighty 
 wonders wrought ... 596 603 
 Blest season which with 
 gladness fraught ..-- 596 603 
 Bliss, Philip .--------: 247 250 
 Blow ye the trumpet, 
 blow. .ste-ech sleeenes 724 716 
 Bright sparkles in the 
 churchyard ..----+:- 420 452 
 Brightly beams our 
 Father’s mercy ----- 81 71 
 Bring in the lambs, the 
 tender lambs ..---: 379 
 Carey, Alice and Phebe 65 56 
 Cast thy bread upon 
 the waters ...--+-++: 2 285 
 Cheer up, my soul, there 
 is a mercy seat...--- 402 428 
 “Child of the Regi- 
 MGMGE ses Soke eee eae 509 
 Christ, for the worla 
 We SIN@ieie es epider 634 
 Christ is born, tell forth 
 His fame ....---++: 651 644 
 Christ, Thou the Cham- 
 pion of the band .... 373 393 
 Christ whose glory fills 
 the skies .....-+--:- 222 233 
 Christians, awake, sa- - 
 lute the happy morn. 528 548 
 Come, all ye chosen . 
 saints of God ....-- 191 210 
 Come, gracious Spirit, 
 heavenly dove ...--- 198 214 
 Come, Holy Ghost, in 
 love” .<. «7 sneeenen 24 18 
 Come, Holy_ Spirit, 
 come! Jets Tb¥eqshentos 212 
 Come, Holy  Spirt, 
 heavenly dove ...--- 70 60 
 151 173 
 
INDEX 
 
 NO. PAGH 
 Come, humble sinner, 
 in whose breast..... 148 172 
 397 420 
 Come, let us anew our 
 journey pursue ..... 161 185 
 Come, let us join our 
 cheerful songs ...... 163 187 
 Come, let us Join our 
 friends above ...... 538 557 
 Come let us who in 
 Christer 1... s.dasye eke 38 34 
 Come, Lord, the droop- 
 TAP SIMON Seaderaiieey ¢ chet 791 766 
 Come, my soul, thou 
 FOUSIEDG 2 ahewentys 2 801 774 
 Come, my soul, thy 
 Suibseprepare, ....cmais. 650 643 
 Come, O come! in 
 MIOUSHIAVSt aa shan ss 238 244 
 Come, O come, thou 
 quickening Spirit ... 595 602 
 Come, O my soul, in 
 BACred slays. vei i3<33 691 685 
 Come, O Thou all vic- 
 torious Lord ....... 220 231 
 Come, O Thou Traveler 
 TUK GWT Merete ee os" 364 381 
 540 559 
 Come, sacred _ Spirit 
 {TONTMADOVER ost. ss 134 155 
 Come, saints and sin- 
 ners, hear me tell... 412 440 
 Come, Savior, Jesus... 206 219 
 Come, sinners, to the 
 Gospel 20n...¢.: kok AS 30: 
 Come this way, my 
 fathers. “obs 671 660 
 Come, Thou Almighty 
 Blin Oa. ss Sele ec « 331 343 
 Come, Thou Fount of 
 every blessing ..... 173 196 
 705 694 
 Come, Thou soul-trans- 
 forming Spirit ...... 757 743 
 Come, Thou Spirit ever 
 qi INE Mos Sera Bh eae 595 602 
 Come to Jesus ....... 144 169 
 726 720 
 
 783 
 NO. PAGE 
 
 Come, we who love the 
 Lord: snare Areixs).. 171 194 
 211 223 
 273 273 
 694 687 
 
 Come, ye disconsolate, 
 where’er ye languish. 73 62 
 305 311 
 
 Come, ye sinners, poor 
 
 ANOMNECO Ve a yeasts 413 443 
 Come, ye sinners, poor 
 
 and wretched ....... 192 211 
 Commit thou all thy 
 
 griefs.. “i... Sanaicaieey, 169 193 
 
 244 247 
 
 374 393 
 
 672 663 
 
 699 690 
 Converted tunes ...... 725 717 
 “Crawford,” tune ..... 796 770 
 “Creation,” tune ..... 797 771 
 “Creation,” (Oratorio). 5386 555 
 
 614 619 
 Creator, Spirit, by 
 
 Whose aid. ...... 24... 246 249 
 Crown Him Lord of all. 716 706 
 Daily, daily, sing the 
 
 PRISON Er Sira,d Aims gia 262 263 
 
 789 764 
 Daughter of Zion, from 
 
 the: tdusts voe0.cseLs « 147 171 
 Day is dying in the 
 
 WR Mato ats sass. s Spaces 636° 633 
 Day of Judgment, day 
 
 of wonders .°..7..,; 795 770 
 Dear Christian people. 156 179 
 Dear Lord and Master 695 688 
 Depth of mercy, can 
 
 Ameve Dei itiecn sstsl. acxiad a 127 146 
 
 389 413 
 
 467 494 
 Divine and moral songs 212 223 
 Dunn, Rev. Samuel... 608 614 
 Dykes, Rev. John Bac- 
 
 CHusiis cares veg Le 616 619 
 “Harthquake Hymns’... 432 467 
 “Hin Feste Burg” 
 
 (GuNe)>. % «os «ele tera 692 686 
 
INDEX 
 
 784 
 NO. PAGE 
 “Blijah” (Oratorio) .. 252 254 
 “Ellerton” (tune) . 765 749 
 ‘SOMCLAY . wa. wos ee 727) «(721 
 Equip me for the war. 218 229 
 Eternal Light ........ 730 723 
 “Hyan” (tune) sii 0e.0. 585 595 
 “Byentide” (tune) .... 610 616 
 “wing (tune) (<2. 597 605 
 Fairest Lord Jesus, 
 Ruler of all nations. 774 755 
 Far from the world, O 
 Word pal flees sua sls 78 67 
 263 264 
 Father, by Thy love 
 ANd BPOWEN ais. owls 184 205 
 Father, I own Thy 
 VOICED say ve seen, s 652 644 
 Father of life and light 233 241 
 Father of mercies, con- 
 TLESCONG Ta tenors. easse> 234 242 
 Father, what’er of 
 earthly. bliss: .s.4.<h% 35.4 732 
 Faure, Jean Baptiste.. 604 611 
 Faweett, Rev. John ... 605 611 
 Fear not, O little flock, 
 te tod he ee 494 517 
 Felice de Giardini .... 603 610 
 Fifty-first Psalm ...... 439 472 
 Finding no place of rest 550 568 
 Flung to the heedless 
 WaADUSiah. 0. oekes se eas 356 374 
 pea = season called to 
 Ne ee. eae 690 684 
 an That shall I praise 
 CONS ose crecee ees « 240 
 Forever with the Lord. 300 306 
 Free from the law, oh 
 Happy scanwes he eee 120 138 
 759 745 
 Friend after friend de- 
 DArteMsas i. ails aan 2 639 635 
 From all that dwell be- 
 low the skies ....... 07 219 
 From dear New Eng- 
 land’s happy ....... 320 330 
 From deep distress to 
 Theetl pray. wees. «3 432 
 
 NO. PAGH 
 
 From every’ stormy 
 wind that blows..... 146 170 
 
 From Greenland’s icy 
 MOUNTAINS, eae es « 55 46 
 371 391 
 563 576 
 641 636 
 
 From the cross, uplifted 
 high. A0e. ce erecmene 160 
 “Ganges” (tune) ..... 587 596 
 Gauntlett, Henry J. ... 592 599 
 
 Gentle Jesus, meek and 
 milds ss as. cetera 141 163 
 Giardini, Felice de ... 603 610 
 
 Give me the wings of 
 faithxto TIS ye.«,..acidee 484 
 
 Give to the winds thy 
 {Garde cs @ see 244 247 
 414 443 
 672 663 
 
 Glory and honour and 
 PIAS ss ees oe ASB 160 184 
 
 Glory to God, Whose 
 sovereign grace .... 430 465 
 
 Glory to Thee, my 
 God, this night ..... 74 «63 
 72 753 
 
 Go and the Savior’s 
 love. proclaim ...... 34 242 
 
 Go on, go on, go on, 
 £O"-OW pn raga see 312° 321 
 
 God calling yet, shall 
 T*notshear™... > tte 11 
 
 God is our refuge and 
 our strength ....... 345 365 
 
 God is the refuge of 
 His ‘saints -:2:. 233? 54 45 
 271 272 
 575 586 
 
 God moves in a mys- 
 tEViGUs.....ee oalee ete 164 188 
 224 235 
 369 387 
 
 God ah ES: grace and 
 majesty <a. Hee ent 761 
 God of ae life to Thee 261 262 
 
 God of my life what 
 just eretumm:.. 2. anew 429 465 
 
— Hail to 
 
 God of my life Whose 
 
 gracious power ..... 619 
 od Who madest 
 heaven and earth... 240 
 Golden harps are 
 soundings. «0; wees 556 
 Gracious Spirit, Dove 
 GIVINGl Manet cee... 289 
 Gracious Spirit, dwell 
 Withe mere 20 8 566 
 Grander than ocean’s 
 SCOLY Sete ee ee ee 194 
 
 Great God, of wonders 452 
 Great God, the nations 552 
 Great God, what do I 
 
 see and hear ..... 367 
 
 Great God, when I ap- 
 proach Thy throne.. 737 
 “Greenville” (tune)... 510 
 Griffiths, Miss Ann ... 547 
 
 Guide me, O Thou 
 great Jehovah ...... 76 
 544 
 
 Hail Columbia, happy 
 land 474 
 
 Hail the joyful day’s 
 return 596 
 
 the 
 SHOMILEG eters es 
 Hail tranquil hour of 
 closing day 
 “Halle” (tune) 
 “Hamburg” (tune) .. 
 
 Handel, George Fred- 
 erick eee ae ee ee 1 
 Happy the heart where 
 PTAceserelgn o..c... 353 
 Hark, from the tombs 
 a doleful sound ..... 735 
 Hark the Gospel news 
 is sounding ......... 
 — Hark! the herald angels 
 SING sales os dae eee 460 
 Hark. the voice of Jesus 
 callingiesss Soa 633 
 Hark the voice of love 
 and ‘mercy -....:.7.. 403 
 
 INDEX 
 
 NO. PAGH 
 
 623 
 245 
 571 
 291 
 579 
 212 
 
 482 
 570 
 
 NO. 
 
 “Hastings” (tune) . 586 
 ave you on the Lord 
 
 believed: = Foscees, 84 
 
 Haydn, Francis Joseph 249 
 
 532 
 He is gone, a cloud... 529 
 He leadeth me, O 
 blessed thought .... 696 
 Hear, Lord, the song of 
 praise and prayer ... 620 
 Hear my prayer, O 
 heavenly Father “e220 
 Hear, O sinner! mercy 
 hails yous ay Weha 404 
 Hearken to the solemn 
 voice \.) OLE aare. 355 
 “Helmsley” (tune).... 738 
 
 “Herald Angels” (tune) 600 
 Here o’er the earth a 
 
 stranger I roam .... 318 
 High let us swell our 
 
 tuneful notes ...... 241 
 His mother’s songs ... 714 
 Ho, my comrades, see 
 
 the® signal) $2.24... 114 
 Holy as Thou, O Lord, 
 
 i none. Poe 4 tae 39 
 
 Holy Bible, book divine 1 
 Holy Ghost, dispel our 
 
 sadness 12°24) c et. 483 
 Holy Ghost, with light 
 divines Zp. the ake 440 
 
 Holy Spirit, once again 595 
 Hosanna be the chil- 
 
 dren’sigong \ 35, eas st 787 
 How are Thy servants 
 blest inet, 222 Als 245 
 How bright appears the 
 morning star ....... 68 
 How bright these glori- 
 ous spirits shine .... 418 
 How can I sink with 
 Buch *s "prop ss. ee 167 
 How condescending and 
 how*kind «37 fF in2%:. 332 
 How firm a foundation 98 
 654 
 How happy every child 
 of grace? sn. ae. ee 153 
 275 
 
 785 
 
 PAGE 
 595 
 
 73 
 251 
 551 
 549 
 688 
 624 
 237 - 
 431 
 373 
 730 
 607 
 
 327 
 
786 
 
 INDEX 
 
 NO. PAGE 
 
 How happy is the pil- 
 
 grim’s lot 87 
 
 io Sele © #10 fee 
 
 How many pass the 
 guilty night 
 How pleasant 
 see 
 How sad our state by 
 nature is 
 
 eo OP ae ee 
 
 tis ito 
 
 a 
 
 _ How sweet and awful is 
 the place 
 
 How sweet, how heav- 
 enly is the sight.... 8 
 
 How sweet the name of 
 Jesus sounds 
 
 eee eee 
 
 How tedious and taste- 
 less the hours 
 How vain are all things 
 here below 
 “Hymns Ancient and 
 Modern his cs. 3s hee 
 “Hymns for 
 demned Malefactors” 451 
 “Hymns for the Use of 
 Families” 
 of Interces- 
 
 serene 
 
 ee 
 
 ee 
 
 “Hymns on the 
 pected Invasion” 
 
 I am so glad that our 
 Father in heaven ... 117 
 185 
 381 
 394 
 530 
 IT am weary of my sin. 304a 
 
 I ask not now for gold 
 to gild 
 gave my life for thee 118 
 561 
 659 
 
 have a Savior, He’s 
 pleading in glory ... 115 
 
 e 
 
 — 
 
 NO. PAGE 
 
 I hear the Savior say. 284 
 378 
 I heard the voice of 
 Jesus say 
 I know not the hour 
 when my Lord .... 48 
 I know that my Re- 
 
 weer eeeene 
 
 deemer lives ....... 33 
 728 
 
 I lay my sins on Jesus. 560 
 744 
 
 I love Thy kingdom, 
 Lord 197 
 I love to steal awhile 
 
 © ole! ee i6, 6.6 eters 6 eis 
 
 eetaseceeessees 
 
 I once was a stranger. 243 
 I remember a_ voice 
 which once 
 I saw One hanging on 
 a tree 
 I think when I read 
 that sweet story of 
 old 
 
 eeeeeeevee 
 
 eeoreeseoreeseee 
 
 ore 0 2 6 w 6 0 0}s 1 6 8 OS 
 
 I want to be an angel. 526 
 I was a wandering 
 Be 5 ee un 
 I will sing for Jesus... 390 
 I would not live alway 388 
 
 569 
 
 Id be a butterfly...... 719 
 If you cannot on the 
 
 OCCA oka. ke Raseeead 383 
 
 643 
 
 (TIM TOVAUOLAS cata 481 
 I’m a pilgrim bound for 
 
 glory =a are* erate 424 
 I’m a poor sinner and 
 
 nothing at all ...... 268 
 
 lm but a stranger here 119 
 I’m not ashamed to 
 
 own my Lord ...... 
 In evil long I took de- 
 
 lights)... aseceenienaets 313 
 In grief and fear to 
 TheewO- Lords... 
 In sleep’s serene ob- 
 livions laid? «...'. ssa 622 
 
 286 
 399 
 
 461 
 
NO. PAGE 
 
 In the Christian’s home 
 mi Ploryeess. <. ieee. 
 
 In the cross of Christ. . 
 
 In the hour of trial, 
 Jesu, pray for me... 621 
 In the waves and 
 mighty waters 
 In Thine own way, O 
 God of love 
 In Thy cleft, O Rock. 720 
 
 see eee 
 
 “Japhet” (tune) 
 Jerusalem divine, when 
 shall I 
 Jerusalem 
 home 
 Jerusalem the glorious 176 
 Jerusalem the golden.. ped 
 55 
 
 ee ereee 
 
 Cie Oe eat Pt lt wes 
 
 my happy 
 700 
 
 Teo ere 6 ove eee ® 
 
 Jesus, and shall it ever 
 Dee ee een iss Te 
 468 
 582 
 793 
 Jesus Christ, our true 
 Salvation 
 Jesus, I 
 charming name 
 
 Jesus, at Thy command 
 
 Se oe Cle On Ia 
 
 Jesus, I my cross have 
 taken 
 
 CC 
 
 Jesus, in Thy dying 
 woes 
 Jesus, Jesus, come and 
 save us 
 Jesus, keep me near 
 the cross 
 Jesus, Lord, Thy ser- 
 vants see 
 
 er] 
 Cr eC Mec i ee de ht er Yar 
 ee 
 
 217 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Jesus loves me this I 
 know? 7 svete eke ek oe 
 “Jesus my All” (tune) 
 Jesus my all to Heaven 
 is gone 
 Jesus, my Lord 
 Jesus, my strength ... 
 Jesus shall reign 
 where’er the sun ... 
 Jesus, Shepherd of the 
 sheep 
 Jesus show us Thy sal- 
 vation 
 Jesus still lead on ... 
 Jesus, the name _ high 
 over all 
 
 er) 
 
 see eae 
 
 Ce er ir a 
 
 CO Kee aa eae sc 
 
 eee eww eer ene 
 
 Jesus, these eyes have 
 never seen 
 Jesus, Thou 
 deeming Lord 
 Jesus, Thy Blood and 
 Righteousness 
 
 ~~ all-re- 
 
 Jesus, where’er 
 people meet 
 Jesus, your Lord and 
 King >) ee: ee ee 
 Jesu, Thou art my 
 Righteousness 
 “John Brown’s Body” 
 (tune) 
 “Jordan” (tune) 
 Joy because the circling 
 year 
 Joy to the world 
 Joyfully, joyfully on- 
 ward I move 
 Just as I am 
 
 eee eee 
 
 oie. % 668 10, 16) ish.0) 6 
 
 Si 8. eo Use 0 4 a) 0) 08 alojelc 
 
 Tt) Caer 
 
 787 
 NO. PAGH 
 278 
 612 
 775 
 216 
 675 
 225 
 
 d4 
 
788 
 
 INDEX 
 
 NO. PAGE 
 
 Mavour- 
 
 coe 
 
 “Kathleen 
 , 
 
 wes ee 8 oe 6 
 
 Land ahead! its fruits 
 are waving 548 
 Late, late, so late, and 
 dark the night ...... 9 
 277 
 Lead, Kindly Light... 58 
 Leave God to order all 
 thy ways 
 
 coerce sees 
 
 “Leominster” (tune) .. 583 
 Let earth and heaven.. 40 
 Let party mames no 
 more 180 
 Let us gather up the 
 sunbeams 
 Let us with a gladsome 
 YING bs sens Morea ee ks 27 
 Life is weary, Savior, 
 take me 
 Light of the 
 pilgrim’s heart 
 Listed into the cause of 
 
 Peer mt PC a ee te OO tae 
 
 avenue & \e euere tes 0) 6 we) 
 
 658 
 
 era ere creer @ 
 
 506 
 777 
 
 eaten eciy 
 
 eeeeee 
 
 521 
 AGOLE Sweeine eakiss «ons 707 
 Lo, He comes with 
 clouds descending .. 
 Lo, round the throne.. 
 Lo, the day of rest de- 
 clineth 
 Lord, a little band, and 
 lowly 783 
 Lord, as a family we 
 rantelein) Sani ios OBO 233 
 Lord, dismiss us with 
 Thy blessing 
 
 460 
 259 
 
 Pie eS = SA 
 
 Lord, I am Thine, en- 
 tirely Thine ....... 131 
 Lord, I hear of showers 
 of blessing 
 
 Sra ee 
 
 513 
 616 
 
 NO. PAGE 
 Lord, I know Thy 
 
 grace is nigh me ...-. 784 759 
 Lord, in the morning 
 
 Thou shalt hear .... 208 221 
 Lord, it belongs not to 
 
 MY CATE ce eseeeee es 67 «58 
 
 458 487 
 Lord Jesus, think of 
 
 me Staode: aks. eee 747 «736 
 Lord of all being, 
 
 throned afar .....-- 647 
 Lord of Heaven, lone 
 
 GNP Sade csvae tee aos 158 181 
 Lord of Hosts, to Thee 
 
 WE) TRIS en). sete es eels 7 4 
 Lord of the Sabbath, 
 
 hear our VOWS ...... 359 376 
 Lord, teach a little 
 
 child to pray .....-: 236 243 
 Lord, when we bend 
 
 before aceensee io 195 212 
 Lord, while for all man- 
 
 AcinGaweMee os. tects 634 632 
 “Host. Ghords) 3: sas sie 464 492 
 Love divine, all love 
 
 excelling ....csee+-- 37s 333 
 
 Tolento 
 “Maist Onie Day”.... 721 712 
 Mason, Lowell ....... 602 609 
 Maxim, Granville .... 531 550 
 Maxwelton’s braes are 
 
 onic: Hfo. woteateats 149 
 May God unto us gra- 
 
 cious be™ 22... 5... 415 444 
 “Mear” (tune) ......- 736 727 
 Medley, Rev. Samuel... 535 554 
 Mendelssohn-Bartholdy, 
 
 Pelix¢..% <ftcc ieee 607 613 
 Mercy and judgment 
 
 ATC MIDY Loess ais poe 682 676 
 “Merton” (tune)...... 722 714 
 Met again in Jesus’ 
 
 name! -[i3i.j55 eee 513 
 ’Mid pleasures - and 
 
 palaces «.2s.% gas 100 100 
 
 302 307 
 543 560 
 
INDEX 789 
 NO. PAGE NO. PAGE 
 Mighty God while an- Near the cross was 
 Pel tebe. char Pe s.s Lf Bet 9D Mary weeping ...... 732 725 
 Mine eyes have seen Nearer, my God, to 
 thee ROLY |e. saiseccs 109 123 Thee .iisct.seiged 103 109 
 567 580 186 206 
 684 679 293 300 
 é 712 700 417 447 
 “Monson” (tune) ..... 739 730 676 666 
 A Johann C, W. “Nicea” (tune) ...... 465 493 
 Jet) Se oe 250 252 No more, my God, I © 
 “Mi. Blanc” (tune)... 254 255 boast no more ...... 396 420 
 ae in sorrow, oft in Nobody knows’ de 
 Re eS rr kas 461 490 trouble I see ....... 798 772 
 Must Jesus bear the “Northfield” (tune) 513 535 
 cross alone. ......... 159 183 Not all the blood of 
 My country, ’tis of thee 618 622 beasts: <.i.ceiiseetee ser 15 9 
 My days are gliding 88 77 
 SWitblypOVwcoes aces 177 199 756 743 
 My faith looks up to Nothing but leaves.... 686 681 
 [DhGpe tices eet ele 142 165 Nothing either great or 
 370 388 Sina Gr sth ese eres 398 422 
 492 516 Now begin the _ heav- 
 545 564 enlyztheme! snes vere 564 577 
 _ My God, and is Thy Now hush your cries 
 table spread ........ 241 246 and shed no tears.. 459 488 
 My God, I love Thee Now I have found a 
 not:because .......% SU}? 22 PTIGN Ceetd..cs oe Fa 337 ©6349 
 My God, my Father, Now is the accepted 
 while] estray Nc... 558 572 {UIC MO. cs eae 2. 61 
 760 745 Now Israel may say, 
 My heavenly home is and that truly ...... 303 308 
 brighteand Saeko ace 292 299 Now let our souls on 
 My hope is built on wings sublime ...... 755 742 
 nothing else ....... 239 244° Now pray we all God, 
 My Jesus, -as Thou the Comforter ..... 416 446 
 Wilites, tattle on aes oe 629 628 594 600 
 My Jesus, stay Thou Now thank we all our 
 by? meme sosites wes 792 766 GOd vere. ac... <5 Sadeoiers 15 
 My latest sun is sink- Now that the sun is 
 ING PASE ns SaaS A 279 279 gleaming bright .... 276, 277 
 My Lord, how full of 
 Sweet Ets SEN. 13 8 
 My soul repeat His O blessed, Savior, Thy 
 praise) TR, Mm y. Oo:.. 85 74 love”. eis Se eee 800 774 
 My soul through my O come and mourm 
 Redeemer’s ........ 349 368 WIth ME «4.4 eh ees 484 511 
 My thoughts on awful O day of rest and glad- 
 subjects: i dvvitane.’ 266 267 NESS rena ae ate DOSie Des 
 My times of sorrow O do not be dis- 
 and of. joy = tes. Gat 237. 243 couraged ...5.... anu 145 170 
 
790 
 
 O for a closer walk with 
 od 
 
 nifei'e |v. we 06 © 0°06 8 6 
 
 O for a heart to praise 
 on God SR ‘ 
 or a ‘thousan 
 
 i tongues to sing...... 
 O for the death of 
 those 
 O give ye praise unto 
 the Lord 
 O God, look down from 
 Lea VeD setae ne tae 
 O God of Abraham, 
 ever BUTO)s. voce sce. 
 O God of Bethal by 
 whose hand ........ 
 O God of Light and 
 LOVE ans sae ees 
 O God, why hast Thou 
 CASE SAIS LOL Bs satel 0i= 
 O happy day that fixed 
 BU) Viteh, cine satay ite saan aot Ee 
 O happy saints who 
 dwellia:t amie 
 O Holy Father, just 
 ANC bLUCHer Aree. «eels « 
 O Holy Ghost, Thou 
 Fount of Light 
 
 soe reser sreecrre 
 
 we eh eee ee es 
 
 O Jesus Christ, grow 
 AT HOWANGING Bir... 
 O Jesus, my Hope, 
 HORAMOdt Ae Aes . was 
 O Jesus, sweet the tears 
 sheds. ware wens ° 
 O joyful sound of Gos- 
 pel grace... tees 
 
 O little children sing.. 
 O Lord, I would delight 
 in Thee 
 O Lord of Hosts, Al- 
 mighty King ....... 
 O Lerd, our God, with 
 COINOSE oo oe «sie as 0 21s 
 O Lord, our languid 
 souls inspire 
 O Lord, Thou hast re- 
 jected us 
 
 rh ee ee a 
 
 ee ee eee 
 
 INDEX 
 
 NO. PAGE 
 
 304 
 326 
 
 323 
 170 
 
 729 
 
 733 
 
 215 
 706 
 
 400 
 581 
 
 330 
 
 6 
 125 
 
 367 
 
 342 
 
 NO. PAGE 
 
 O Lord, Thy heavenly 
 PTACE TL Sia cw teen ie 5% 525 
 O Lord, Thy work re- 
 vive 
 O love 
 
 740 
 
 Cee eweesin ees eee 
 
 mh AY cit eee ate 431 
 me go 
 O love who formed’st 
 me to wear 
 O Master, it is good 
 
 TOW IDC. Hae cates teeite 282 
 631 
 
 O morning star, how 
 
 O mother dear, Jerusa- 
 lemmerre sae i. aes 46 
 572 
 
 O Sacred Head, now 
 WWOUTIGECLe wien eieieis senate 505 
 VS. 
 
 O sing of Jesus, Lamb 
 of God@enn Bera: 421 
 
 O sometimes the sha- 
 OWS] ale tao. s duet 52 
 
 O tell me no more of 
 +this® world’s “sears 425 
 
 O that the Lord would 
 TRACING. so pe cies on 472 
 
 O Thou from whom all 
 ZOOUNESS ....eeeeeee 62 
 342 
 656 
 
 O Thou who camest 
 from: above).... @4- sean 511 
 
 QO Thou, God, Who 
 hearest prayer .....- 697 
 
 O thou, my soul, bless 
 God, the Lord ...... 368 
 
 O thou, my soul, forget 
 no’ more? 4iet. yes 741 
 O Thou to Whom in 
 ancient times 
 O where are kings and 
 empires *%.. .cisieereeeer 
 O where shall rest be 
 found 
 
 339 
 
 Pee 
 
 O Zion afflicted with 
 wave upon wave .... 242 
 
 545 
 731 
 466 
 748 
 750 
 
 284 
 631 
 
 19 
 
 39 
 584 
 
 528 
 715 
 
 455 
 
 43 
 460 
 498 
 
 52 
 358 
 648 
 533 
 689 
 386 
 731 
 241 
 352 
 
 190 
 290 
 
 246 
 
O’er those gloomy hills 
 of darkness 
 
 eee ee eeee 
 
 Of all that decks the 
 field or bower 
 Oh come and let us all 
 WIT MONE cise fi.» 
 Oh Christ, He is the 
 POUTICAL Bett tera 5's artes 
 Oh! Mean may seem 
 this house 
 Oh, say, can you see by 
 the dawn’s 
 
 eeeeee 
 
 ee Ce Th 
 
 Oh sing to me of 
 heaven ..... seen eed 
 Oh sweetly breathe the 
 Lyres* eke. sone 
 Oh why should the 
 spirit of mortal ..... 
 On Jordan’s stormy 
 
 banks I stand ...... 
 On the fount of life 
 eternal 
 On the mountain’s top 
 appearing 
 
 se ete we eene 
 
 On this stone, now laid 
 with prayer 
 One _ sweetly 
 thought 
 
 solemn 
 
 Only waiting till the 
 shadows 
 Onward, Christian sol- 
 diers, marching 
 Our Father, God, Who 
 art in heaven 
 Out on an ocean all 
 Donadless) tees 22% 
 “Old Hundred” (tune). 
 “Olmutz” (tune) 
 
 Giovanni 
 
 ey 
 
 Palestrina, 
 Pierluigi de 
 Pass me not, O gentle 
 Savior 
 
 149 
 582 
 598 
 
 86 
 704 
 749 
 579 
 
 93 
 294 
 
 80 
 702 
 91 
 
 365 
 785 
 
 805 
 
 11 
 788 
 
 358 
 
 111 
 382 
 
 316 
 507 
 230 
 377 
 
 617 
 255 
 
 568 
 
 INDEX 
 
 NO. PAGE 
 
 172 
 592 
 606 
 
 74 
 
 402 
 
 Patriotic singing ...... 
 “Pax Tecum” (tune) .. 
 Peace, doubting heart! 
 
 My God’s I am ... 
 
 Peace, my heart, 
 calms be: still...: 2223 
 Peace, troubled ~ soul, 
 
 thou need’st 
 People of the living 
 OOM, Aanse os See 
 Pilgrim, burdened with 
 thy sin 
 Plunged in a gulf of 
 dark despair 
 “Portugese 
 CtUNE) Sirs aeons aoe 
 Praise God from Whom 
 all blessings 
 
 ey 
 
 Praise the Lord, His 
 glories show 
 Praise to the Holiest in 
 the 
 Praise ye the Lord, ’tis 
 good to 
 Prayer is the soul’s sin- 
 cere desire 
 
 eee w nn ne 
 ie 6 6.6 » ee oe eyame 
 
 cere we eee 
 
 Precious promise God 
 hath given 
 
 ee ere eee ee 
 
 Rain on the roof...... 
 Rescue the perishing, 
 care for the dying... 
 Return, O wanderer, to 
 thy home 
 Righteous God, Whose 
 vengeful vials 
 Rise, crowned 
 light, imperial Salem 
 Rock of Ages, cleft for 
 me 
 
 eee eee eens 
 
 ee) 
 
 791 
 
 NO. PAGE 
 455 
 596 
 
 497 
 756 
 
 be . 
 
ootecesoeres cee 
 
 INDEX 
 
 792 
 NO. PAGE 
 ps Gioachino An- 
 _ as 804. 777 
 Rout roll the weeks.. 596 603 
 Safe in the arms of 
 JESUS. siscenwesseeds 155 178 
 297 304 
 343 360 
 701 692 
 Sailor, through the 
 Garkness ....4..e0+0: 82 72 
 Saints 4 God, the 
 GS WINWIS oe os ae koe isic 663 654 
 Salvation! O the jose 
 rSOqut aX | At aera ea nic 369 
 Savior, breathe an 
 evening Be Sap eetrtnic 196 213 
 Savior, visit Thy plan- 
 Ba RIOIES eeteea vier es ovs eile 630 629 
 Say, brothers, will you 
 THCCURUS eer e's este mm 384 409 
 Schubert, Franz Peter 803 776 
 See how great a flame. 214 226 
 “Selma” (tune) ...... 590 597 
 Servant of God, well 
 e-SONE> Wi hee vd eb See 779 «757 
 Shall we gather at the 
 Dy Pep GY cae ainiete ase cal te eeeine = 123 141 
 778 757 
 Shepherd of tender 
 Youths | fas,0. «wees re 21 
 shine, mighty God, on 
 TOG AA see am ee 754 741 
 “ghirland” (tune) 589 597 
 Show pity, Lord, 
 BOUL Ys wncs sade eels 14 9 
 132. 151 
 Shrinking from the 
 COld. sites % Scie eS 385 410 
 Since all the varying 
 SCENES Se siile cect ones 36-32 
 Singing for Jesus ..... 130 150 
 Sister thou was’t mild 
 Sas Paging cies eae en 517 538 
 So fades the lovely 
 DIGGING S sig access: « 200 
 Softly and tenderly 
 VeRUS Tes ss 8. olsie oleime 671 
 Sometimes a light sur- 
 prises 750 
 
 NO. PAGH 
 
 Sovereign, Ruler of the 
 skies 338 
 Sow in the morn thy 
 ROCHE. Uc «2 775 
 Sowing the seed by the 122 
 298 
 
 ene.e © 6 6-0 ej are_e ae ee 
 
 Speak gently, it is bet- 
 
 ter far 479 
 Spirit, leave thy house 
 
 of clay See aistre 
 “Sts Alpheaoi (tune).. 
 “St. Anne” (tune). «ss 758 
 “St. Matthew” (tune). 612 
 “Stabat Mater’ (tune) 794 
 Stand up, and bless the 2 
 Stand up, stand up, for 
 
 SJ esQb lec fas on 5. eebeees 133 
 580 
 Stay, Thou insulted 
 Spiritiiodiciic. depueies © « 443 
 Steele, Miss Anne ..... §22 
 Strong Son of God.... 623 
 Sweet hour of pray er.. 417 
 Sweet is the work, my 
 (Od ee oes: « ts. takin 136 
 Sweet the time, ex- 
 Ceeding Wel... cialis wa 31 
 Sweet was the time 
 myhenshirstiseacineeen ate 107 
 Sullivan, Sir Arthur... 743 
 
 Take me, O my Father 664 
 
 _ Take my life and let 
 
 it -bew 48% te he eee 624 
 748 
 
 Take the name of Jesus 
 WIthoryOU. wm ssclet fermen 391 
 Te Deum Laudamus.. 256 
 
 Teach me, my God, my 
 King «0... +-+eeeees 23 
 
 Tell it out among the 
 nations? faerie ster 553 
 
 Tell me the old, old 
 story 
 
 0 6b cles 0 ouwlele.e.ee 
 
 That cor of wrath, that 501 
 
 The Church’s one 
 Foundation y.ssesees 
 
 “The Creation” (Ora- 
 COLI) CPOs elialeka cle ae 614 
 
INDEX 
 
 NO. PAGE 
 
 The day is past and 
 WOOE vous. oscars 
 The day of resurrec- 
 IOWA Macks «os 3's 0's 
 The Exile of Erin.... 
 The fifty best Ameri- 
 can hymns 
 he gathering clouds 
 
 ee 
 
 344 
 
 477 
 577 
 
 » © a,6Jee © sy 
 
 praise 
 
 The great Archangel’s 
 CIUBND TE, vic ohitase eh 
 The harmonious black- 
 isl!) 5 aon gee tee 
 The heavens declare 
 ainspe lOry= cd acres 
 The King of Glory we 
 DF OCMAIIO Et... acrcteciaten 
 The Last Hope ...... 
 The Lord descended. . 
 The Lord is our ref- 
 WE es a A 
 The Lord my pasture 
 shall prepare 
 Phe Lord my Shepherd 
 The Lord’s my light 
 ONGUBE Sor ed eslersts hae 
 The Lord’s my Shep- 
 herd 
 
 ey 
 
 4Phemnost. Chord’... 
 “The Messiah” (Ora- 
 
 COLO lees. ees 
 309 
 
 The Moonlight Sonata 480 
 The morning light is 
 breaking 
 The night was dark, 
 behola™shews ..0.. 253 
 The Old Oaken Bucket 687 
 
 re et 
 
 The Old Psalm Tune. 715 
 The _ praying __ spirit 
 breathews 3. ies. 445 
 
 The royal banners for- 
 ward go 
 
 re ee 
 
 363 
 
 503 
 588 
 
 673 
 470 
 
 ' 10 
 
 276 
 353 
 
 496 
 553 
 734 
 569 
 498 
 
 19 
 512 
 
 42 
 
 54 
 307 
 217 
 434 
 678 
 492 
 253 
 317 
 507 
 656 
 
 397 
 682 
 
 704 
 
 478 
 21 
 
 793 
 NO. PAGE 
 The sands of time are 
 SIN RAM O SE ieee ores « 749 737 
 The Son of God! the 
 Lorde of elite. -p emacs 500 523 
 The Song of the Shirt 688 683 
 The spacious  firma- 
 ment <2i....3 a0 +. ae 42 
 The voice of Free 
 Grace sss) Rae 410 439 
 781 758 
 There came to the 
 beach” 2t.. Youbet 577. 588 
 There is a book that all 
 TAY ohioie hee teehee 77 ~=«66 
 There is a City great 
 and). 54k... Be eee 746 735 
 There is a fountain 
 filled -avith 3.113 Seen 90 84 
 291 293 
 498 522 
 There is a gate that 
 Stands mess. oh acsee 419 451 
 There is a God that 
 reigns above ....... 310 320 
 There is a happy land 307 314 
 670 659 
 761 747 
 There is a land im- 
 MOT Alas see 666 656 
 There is a land of pure 
 delight-s@). 29.25 228s 47 40 
 649 642 
 There is a spot to me 
 more deares. ak) .see 678 669 
 There is an eye that 
 never sleeps ........ 657 649 
 There is no flock how- 
 CV GINS ein eee cars 42 36 
 There were ninety and 
 MING: suktey ee cee ee 71 
 There’s a light in the . 
 WATCO Wile ie cia eseae ets 832 3 
 Thine earthly Sabbath. 175 197 
 Thou art gone to the 
 PIAVCL icles Stace © aes 667 657 
 Thou God of truth and 
 lovee aan 427 462 
 Thou hidden love of 
 God: ovheas eae ae 470 496 
 
INDEX 
 
 794 
 NO. PAGE 
 fee Holy Spirit we 
 RRB ACO SS 594 600 
 Thou Pott flowing Ked- 
 02) yaoi orc 462 491 
 Thou Son of God 
 Whose flaming ..... 07. an0e 
 Though now the na- 
 fiONS Gah tes ~ sidare sees 750 738 
 Though troubles assail. 181 203 
 Three Fishers went 
 sailing Sti). oGie. eae 542 560 
 Through the valley of 
 these (Sih. eeee 121 138 
 Thy word, O Lord, Thy 
 
 precious .......+++- 625 626 
 Time is winging us 
 
 Onin che 3.050) clearer 204 218 
 Tis religion that can 
 
 PING esto cea ees 537 556 
 "Tis the promise of 
 
 CodV aie Fee Sk Fs 116 131 
 To heaven I lift my 
 
 waiting eyes .......- 434 468 
 To Thy temple we re- 
 
 Paitin. ee Shy Se 179 202 
 To Thee I life my soul 311 320 
 To us salvation now .. 325 336 
 To-day the Savior calls 379 401 
 
 635 633 
 To-day thou livest yet 790 765 
 True love can ne’er for- 
 weit Ge. he ots vee 475 500 
 Upward I lift mine 
 CVG enakie. ccaeawe: - 668 657 
 Vain, delusive world, 
 AMAICUa* hacsiee Meee 168 192 
 490 514 
 Vital Spark of heav- 
 enly «flame ......... 202214 
 Were awake, for night 
 BST AS Citas s's:¢ se 25.19 
 Walk in the light!.... 60 51 
 Walther, Johann ..... 644 637 
 -—Watchman, tell us of 
 theres ate he sees 541 559 
 Watts, Rev. Isaac . 456 486 
 
 NO. PAGE 
 
 We are joyously voy- 
 aging over 
 bs come to the foun- 
 
 eee eee eee 
 
 Slee etels e. 6,8 (eee 816 
 
 9 
 
 We aia meet beyond 698 
 
 We speak of the realms 229 
 
 “Webb” (tune) 609 
 Welcome happy morn- 
 
 ing 
 
 ib 06.68 0 0 © 6 Oreo FeO @ 
 
 “Wellesley” (tune).... 
 We're traveling home 
 to Heaven 
 
 Wesley’s “Hymns” .... 
 What a friend we have 
 
 What can wash away 
 
 my 
 What’ means this eager 
 ees our Father does 
 
 When Abraham’s  ser- 
 vant 
 When all Thy mercies, 
 O my God 
 When doomed to death 
 When he cometh . 
 
 ods; be 46) 4 598 © Pee, 
 
 When I can read my.. 
 When I survey the.... 
 
 When Israel freed from 
 When Israel of the 
 Tord rca eee 
 When Jordan hushed... 4 
 When marshalled on 
 the 182 
 264 
 When my final farewell 648 
 When rising from the.. 48 
 When the _ harvest is 
 (Oeste aise eich. < 
 When Thou, my right- 
 eous Judge ee ee 
 Where shall my won- 
 dering’... 2 Soe ee 
 While on the verge of 
 life 
 
 3S Sle © 6:0, 0, eyece ee \euape 6 
 
 516 
 287 
 
 eee eroereser esses 
 
INDEX _ 
 
 NO. PAGE 
 Whosoever heareth 
 SHOUGomMm ets « citetes 3.6 519 540 
 Why should the chil- 
 hiald 4A ..'5 en eee 210 222 
 Why those fears, be- 
 HOMME. os sae 478 504 
 With tearful eyes I 
 lOO Keer er... 187 207 
 Woodman, spare that.. 709 698 
 Worship and thanks... 428 464 
 
 795 
 
 NO. PAGE 
 
 Yankee Doodle ....... 476 501 
 
 Ye servants of God... 753 740: 
 Ye simple souls .that 
 
 SUBVae — cierto s) = viceeaeiore 219 230 
 Yes, my native 
 
 land: ®o ohoe see 423 457 
 
 Yet there is room!.... 299 305 
 
 493 516 
 
 759 745 
 
 tVorkle (tune) sani 591 598 
 
liseat. 3 Aa ; : ; ; 
 Sr Nee 4's es Se ay a > 
 : 4 By 5 
 y sed 3 
 ri Tere 
 
 Pe "Ws, 
 Yt > ppi Bb 20 
 “ ows 4 ‘ - J ~~ 
 
 iS. “ ty 
 et \ mae it 
 A wy! . fee 
 
 
 

 

 

 

 
fron, 
 
 
 
Princeton Theological Seminary-Speer Library 
 
 NT 
 
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