The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1891-09-16

beautiful book containing 200hymns and
a tune with written music to every hymn.
Hero are 3GO authors of all Christian de-
nominations. OF these, siXty-one nre
women, seventy are English Episcopal
lians, twenty are Scotch Presbyterians,
ten are English Presbyterians, and only
eight are American Presbyterians. Eight
are Nlethodists, ten are Baptists, fourteen
are Congregationalists, and five are
Roman Catholics. The rest are Dissent
ers, Lutherans, Unitarians, Moravians,
Quakers and Independents. Only fifty
four are Americans. Leaving out Isaac
Watts and Charles Wesley most of these
hymns were composed by English Epis-
copalians. Isaac Watts was the founder
of hymnology. Ono hundred and twen-
ty-six of his hymns arc in this book. He
has been dead 142 years, but we are still
singing:
"Welcome Sweet Day of Rest" "How
Beauteous Are Their Feet" "When I
Can Read My Title Clear" "Before Je-
hovah's Awful Throne" ""Am Soldier
of the Cross ?" and many more Of his
composing.
He was very small man with very
large soul. He was only five feet high
and weighed less than hundred pounds
and never married. Hishymns are sung
all over the Christian world. Our grand
parents and parents, ourselves and our
children have all treasured them and be-
come familiar with them.
Charles Wesley, Methodist, has thir-
ty-six hymns in this book-most Of them
inspired from his intense, absorbing love
Of the Saviour-such as "Blow ye the
trumpet, blow" and "Jesus, lover of my
SOUL" He was brother of John Wesley,
the founder of Methodism, who came to
Georgia with him in 1875.
Rev. John Newton has twenty hymns
in this collection. What strange, event.
full life was his. Seized and impressed
for a seaman on board man"..of war
when he was only nineteen years of age
deserted-was caught and flogged and de-
graded-deserted again and hired himself
to slave-trading vessel, Four years af-
forwards he went back to England and
married Mary Catlett, the girl he had
loved for years. He then equippeda sla-
yer of his own, and shipped negroes from
Africa to the West Indies and made a
fortune. In a few years he became dis
gusted. with the business, and studied
Mathematics, Latin, Greek and Hebrew
without teacher. About that time West
ley and Whitfield began their great re-
ligious uprising, and he was converted
and Joined them and went to preaching.
When eighty years old he preached three
times week, and when urged to stop on
account of his feeble health, he replied :
"What! Shall the old African negro
trader and blasphemer stop while he can
speak Mop No wonder that the great
change inspired him to write those beau
full hymns: "Amazing Grace! How
Sweet the SOUND" "One There is Above
All Others" "Glorious Things of Thee
Are Spoken" Saviour, Visit Thy Plan
tation."
And next comes Cowper-the amiable,
lovable, miserable Cowper-whose life
was spent in alternating between hope
and despair, and was sent several times
TO the insane asylum. In his lucid
intervals of hope he composed such
hymns as
'Sometimes Light Surprises"
"There is a Fountain Filled with
Blood"
ooh, for Closer Walk With God," and
many others.
James Montgomery, Moravian. has
| twenty-three hymns in this book. His
early life was full of trouble. He was
| indicted, tried and imprisoned for writing
| a ballad on the fail Of the bastile. Soon
after his release ho wrote an account of
| the riot at Sheffield, and was again i'm
prisoned. The press had but little free
dom in those days, but his gentle, earnest
Christian character finally won for him
the regard of his enemies, and he was
granted pension by the crown. There
are no hymns in this book or any book
sweeter than his. Such, for instance, as
"Oh, where shall rest be found?"
s'Prayer is the souls sincere desire," and
"People Of the living God," etc.
Addison, too, that stately, polished wri-
ter of essays, found time and inclination
to pay poetic tribute to his maker. There
is no poetry more majestic than the
hymns beginning, "When all thy mercies,
oh! my God," and "The spacious firma-
nent on High" And next we have He
ber, the gifted bishop of Calcutta, the
Christian gentleman who never knew a
want, but, nevertheless, spent his life in
charity and missionary work. His
world renowned hymn would have i'm
mortalized him if he had written nothing
else.
"From- Greenland's Icy Mountains
| still stands as the chief of all missionary