The central Presbyterian. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1856-1908, 1857-10-17

that he would hardly have passed for eleven
years Of age, he was so grave and coed, as
to be at once model and reproof TO lis
sturdier classmates; and, although hin repose
there was nothing peculiarly prepossessing
in his pale face, with its prominent cheek
bones, and a forehead far from lofty, the
moment that some hard question posed the
form, the sparkling eye and the slight ner-
vous figure quivering with the pent-up an
swer, betrayed the genius and the scholar.
Already he had made good proficiency in
French, Latin, and Greek, and had delight
ed his mother, whilst he astonished his COM
panions, by ingenious acrostics and clever
impromptu stanzas; and altogether, with
his quiet, docile disposition, and his preco-
cious attainments, he made glad the heart
of the Rev. Mr.. Pinhorn, who, like many a
disconsolate preceptor before and since, at
last foresaw dim and distant Ararat, and
hailed the youth who should yet comfort
him concerning his work and the toll of his
hands,"
Isaac Watts was born poet, and there
were many things in his early life which
fostered and developed the faculty divine.
His ancestors had been musical his father
was not only man of taste andintelligence,
but was given to 'versing;" and his mother
used to beguile the rainy afternoons. by Of
fering to the boarding school pupils a prize
for the best poetical effusion. On one occa-
sion Mrs. Watts's copper medal was gained
by the following rather saucy couplet of her
eldest son, then seven or eight years old:-
81 write not for iarthng. but to try,
How your farthng writers can outvle'
Afterwards under his excellent instructors
at southampton and Newington, he was in
troduced to the best models, English and
classical.
At fifteen years Of age, new world
opened to his hopes, and, along with the
peace of reconciliation, there flowed into his
mind fresh elements of life and power. In
the right of his Divine Representative, he
now ventured to regard himself as a child
of God, and an heir of the promises; and
oil that ,...ss:r7~eas.;s liis taste. or generous
in ais aspirations, received a proportional
impulse from prospects so unspeakable, and
a calling so divine. The very materials Of
poesy seemed to multiply without limit; for
he had got the clue to the labyrinth, the
key to creations cypher. The stars sang,
and he tried to make his brothers and sis
ter understand the tune: it Numbered, and
he thought of the day when exhausted long
suffering
"shall rend the sky, and burn the sea,
And fling His wrath abroad"
He looked owt on the surging rain-swept
tide, OH the spot where it had once put to
flight Canute and his courtiers, and ex-
claimed
LET cares like wild deluge come,
And 81 ms of sorrow fall,
May ] but safely reach my home,
My God, my Heaven, my All.
There shall | bathe my weary soul
In seas Ol heavenly rest
And not q wave OF trouble roll
Across my peaceful breast ."
Or. on some peaceful evening, he gaZed
across Southampton Water, to trees and
meadows stepped in the sunshine, and re-
membered-'
There is q land Of pure delight,
Where saints immortal reign;
Infinite day excludes the night,
And pleasures Danish pain.
There everlasting spring abides,
And never-withering flowers:
cath like narrow sea, divides
This heavenly land from ours
He took his walk in the New Forest, and
the gypsy outlaws made him thankful that
he did not
'Wauder like an Outcast race,
Without Fathers love-
and the mournful notes and anxious gyra-
tons of the turtle suggested
"Just as we see the lonesome dove
Bemoau her widowed state,
Wandering she flies through all the grove,
Aud mourns her loving mate
"Just 80 our thoughts, from thing to thing,
In restless circles rove;
Just so We droOp and hang the wing
Where Jesus hides His love"
So naturalized in the common mind o
christendom is the language of Watts, that
we're all copies Of his hymn-book to perish
probably half the stanzas could be recovered
from quotations in printed sermons, and il
the pages of Christian biography; and so ne
cessary a supplement to pre-eXisting psalm
ody are these spiritual songs, that we kno'
not of any Church of England collection
which has not adopted some of them, and
was mainly the demand created by thei
popularity which constrained the most eau
tious and conservative of all the churche
to compile those "Translations and Para
phrases" in which the superior poetry c
Logan and Cameron only sets Oft to create
advantage the superior devotion to Watts
But for any book of verse or devotiona
manual, there is reserved an ordeal NOR
trying than the suffrage of public Assem-
bly, or the criticism of an ecclesiastical con
mittee. The Book of books excepted, ther
is little authorship which We care for in tn
sick-room, or which we can tolerate on tn
verge of eternity. But so essentially SCRIP
turaI are the sentiments and sayings whicl
in this case, metre has helped to make mt
morablp, and so near the better countr
must the author have been when he fir'
felt their inspiration, that, like bright shape
or balmy airs blown seaward from the eXot
shore, some of their holiest breathings seel