The Story of the Hymns and Tunes Part 32

By the time it had won its slow recognition in England, it was probably tuneless, and the compilers of _Hymns Ancient and Modern_ (1861) discovering the fact just as they were finis.h.i.+ng their work, asked Dr.

William Henry Monk, their music editor, to supply the want. "In ten minutes," it is said, "Dr. Monk composed the sweet, pleading chant that is wedded permanently to Lyte's swan song."

William Henry Monk, Doctor of Music, was born in London, 1823. His musical education was early and thorough, and at the age of twenty-six he was organist and choir director in King's College, London. Elected (1876) professor of the National Training School, he interested himself actively in popular musical education, delivering lectures at various inst.i.tutions, and establis.h.i.+ng choral services.

His hymn-tunes are found in many song-manuals of the English Church and in Scotland, and several have come to America.

Dr. Monk died in 1889.

"COME, YE DISCONSOLATE."

By Thomas Moore--about 1814. The poem in its original form differed somewhat from the hymn we sing. Thomas Hastings--whose religious experience, perhaps, made him better qualified than Thomas Moore for spiritual expression--changed the second line,--

Come, at G.o.d's altar fervently kneel,

--to--

Come to the mercy seat,

--and in the second stanza replaced--

Hope when all others die,

--with--

Hope of the penitent;

--and for practically the whole of the last stanza--

Go ask the infidel what boon he brings us, What charm for aching hearts he can reveal.

Sweet as that heavenly promise hope sings us, "Earth has no sorrow that heaven cannot heal,"

--Hastings subst.i.tuted--

Here see the Bread of life, see waters flowing Forth from the throne of G.o.d, pure from above!

Come to the feast Love, come ever knowing Earth has no sorrow but heaven can remove.

Dr. Hastings was not much of a poet, but he could make a _singable_ hymn, and he knew the rhythm and accent needed in a hymn-tune. The determination was to make an evangelical hymn of a poem "too good to lose," and in that view perhaps the editorial liberties taken with it were excusable. It was to Moore, however, that the real hymn-thought and key-note first came, and the t.i.tle-line and the sweet refrain are his own--for which the Christian world has thanked him, lo these many years.

_THE TUNE._

Those who question why Dr. Hastings' interest in Moore's poem did not cause him to make a tune for it, must conclude that it came to him with its permanent melody ready made, and that the tune satisfied him.

The "German Air" to which Moore tells us he wrote the words, probably took his fancy, if it did not induce his mood. Whether Samuel Webbe's tune now wedded to the hymn is an arrangement of the old air or wholly his own is immaterial. One can scarcely conceive a happier yoking of counterparts. Try singing "Come ye Disconsolate" to "Rescue the Peris.h.i.+ng," for example, and we shall feel the impertinence of divorcing a hymn that has found its musical affinity.

"JESUS, I MY CROSS HAVE TAKEN."

This is another well-known and characteristic hymn of Henry Francis Lyte--originally six stanzas. We have been told that, besides his bodily affliction, the grief of an unhappy division or difference in his church weighed upon his spirit, and that it is alluded to in these lines--

Man may trouble and distress me, 'Twill but drive me to Thy breast, Life with trials hard may press me, Heaven will bring me sweeter rest.

O, 'tis not in grief to harm me While Thy love is left to me, O, 'tis not in joy to charm me Were that joy unmixed with Thee.

Tunes, "Autumn," by F.H. Barthelemon, or "Ellesdie," (formerly called "Disciple") from Mozart--familiar in either.

"FROM EVERY STORMY WIND THAT BLOWS."

This is the much-sung and deeply-cherished hymn of Christian peace that a pious Manxman, Hugh Stowell, was inspired to write nearly a hundred years ago. Ever since it has carried consolation to souls in both ordinary and extraordinary trials.

It was sung by the eight American martyrs, Revs. Albert Johnson, John E.

Freeman, David E. Campbell and their wives, and Mr. and Mrs. McMullen, when by order of the b.l.o.o.d.y Nana Sahib the captive missionaries were taken prisoners and put to death at Cawnpore in 1857. Two little children, Fannie and Willie Campbell, suffered with their parents.

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.

Ah, whither could we flee for aid When tempted, desolate, dismayed, Or how the hosts of h.e.l.l defeat Had suffering saints no Mercy Seat?

There, there on eagle wings we soar, And sin and sense molest no more, And heaven comes down our souls to greet While glory crowns the Mercy Seat.

[Ill.u.s.tration: John B. d.y.k.es]

Rev. Hugh Stowell was born at Douglas on the Isle of Man, Dec. 3, 1799.

He was educated at Oxford and ordained to the ministry 1823, receiving twelve years later the appointment of Canon to Chester Cathedral.

He was a popular and effective preacher and a graceful writer.

Forty-seven hymns are credited to him, the above being the best known.

To presume it is "his best," leaves a good margin of merit for the remainder.

"From every stormy wind that blows" has practically but one tune. It has been sung to Hastings "Retreat" ever since the music was made.

"CHILD OF SIN AND SORROW."

Child of sin and sorrow, filled with dismay, Wait not for tomorrow, yield thee today.

Heaven bids thee come, while yet there's room, Child of sin and sorrow, hear and obey.

Words and music by Thomas Hastings.

"LEAD, KINDLY LIGHT."

John Henry Newman, born in London, Feb. 21, 1801--known in religious history as Cardinal Newman--wrote this hymn when he was a young clergyman of the Church of England. "Born within the sound of Bow bells," says Dr. Benson, "he was an imaginative boy, and so superst.i.tious, that he used constantly to cross himself when going into the dark." Intelligent students of the fine hymn will note this habit of its author's mind--and surmise its influence on his religious musings.

The agitations during the High Church movement, and the persuasions of Hurrell Froude, a Romanist friend, while he was a tutor at Oxford, gradually weakened his Protestant faith, and in his unrest he travelled to the Mediterranean coast, crossed to Sicily, where he fell violently ill, and after his recovery waited three weeks in Palermo for a return boat. On his trip to Ma.r.s.eilles he wrote the hymn--with no thought that it would ever be called a hymn.

When complimented on the beautiful production after it became famous he modestly said, "It was not the hymn but the _tune_ that has gained the popularity. The tune is d.y.k.es' and Dr. d.y.k.es is a great master."