Biographical Sketches with Notes on Hymns (continued 2)

In 1912 he wrote a hymn beginning,

which was included in The New Hymn and Tune Book, 1914, but has not passed into other collections.

H.W.F.

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Greenough, James Bradstreet, Portland, Maine, 1833-1901, Cambridge, Massachusetts. He graduated from Harvard College in 1856, was appointed tutor in 1865, assistant professor in 1873, and professor of Latin in 1883. In 1884 he wrote the Latin hymn in four stanzas beginning

Deus omnium creator,

for the tune Harvard Hymn which his friend, John Knowles Paine, professor of music at Harvard, had composed in 1883 for use at the Harvard Commencement dinner.

It is included in The University Hymn Book, 1896, and in The Harvard University Hymn Book, 1926.

H.W.F.

Greenwood, Helen Woodward, Leominster, Massachusetts, April 18, 1880—April 2, 1959, Leominster. She was for many years engaged in secretarial work for the General Alliance of Unitarian Women at 25 Beacon Street, Boston. A hymn by her, beginning

As once again we gather here

is included in the Isles of Shoals Hymn Book, 1908.

H.W.F.

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Hale, Rev. Edward Everett, D.D., Boston, Massachusetts, April 3, 1822—June 10, 1909, Roxbury, Massachusetts. He graduated from Harvard College in 1839, the youngest member of his class. He did not go to the Divinity School, but taught in the Boston Latin School and studied for the ministry under the direction of Rev. S. K. Lothrop and Rev. J. G. Palfrey. He was licensed to preach by the Boston Association and in 1846 was ordained as minister of the Church of the Unity (now the First Unitarian Church), Worcester, Massachusetts. In 1856 he moved to Boston, where he served the South Congregational Church (Unitarian) as minister and minister emeritus until his death. He was a voluminous writer. One of his stories entitled “A Man Without A Country,” and another, “In His Name,” brought him wide reputation. He was a distinguished preacher and a greatly beloved pastor, an ardent advocate of peace who as early as 1871 proposed a “United States of Europe,” and in 1889 outlined a plan for an “International Tribunal.” In 1858 he wrote a hymn “For the dedication of a Church” beginning,

O Father, take this new-built shrine,

which was included in Longfellow and Johnson’s Hymns of the Spirit, 1864, from which Martineau took it for his Hymns of Praise and Prayer, London, 1873.

J. 481 H.W.F.

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Hale, Mary Whitwell, Boston, Massachusetts, January 29, 1810—November 17, 1862, Keene, New Hampshire. Most of her life she was a school teacher in Boston, later in Taunton, Massachusetts, and, for her last 20 years, in Keene. She wrote a good deal of verse. Two of her poems, one on “Home,” and the second on “Music” were written for a juvenile concert in the Unitarian Church at Taunton, April, 1834. A number of her later hymns and poems appeared in The Christian Register, signed by Y.L.E. (the final letters of her name), and in 1840 a volume entitled Poems was published in Boston. Several of her poems are included in Putnam’s Singers and Songs, etc.

Four of her hymns were included in the Cheshire Collection, 1844, viz:

1. Praise for the glorious light,

Written for a Temperance meeting.

2. This day let grateful praise ascend (Sunday)

3. Whatever dims the sense of truth

In Putnam, Singers and Songs, this is entitled “A Mother’s Counsel,” with a quotation from John Wesley’s mother.

4. When in silence o’er the deep (Christmas)

Of these nos. 2 and 3 were taken from her Poems, and nos. 1 and 4 were written for the Cheshire Collection. No. 4 is in Church Harmonies. 1895, but none of her hymns are in current use.

J. 481 H.W.F.

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Hall, Harriet Ware, Boston, Massachusetts, September 15, 1841—March 18, 1889, Boston. She was a lifelong resident of Boston, a member of King’s Chapel. Two small books by her were privately printed, one a collection of poems entitled A Book for Friends, 1888, the other entitled Essays, printed posthumously in 1890. The first book contains a hymn beginning

Lord, beneath thine equal hand,

in three stanzas, 7.7.7.7.D., dated February 10, 1869, and written for the installation of Rev. E. H. Hall at Worcester, Massachusetts, in 1869. It is included in the Isles of Shoals Hymn Book, 1908, the first line altered to read,

Lord, beneath whose equal hand.

H.W.F.

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Ham, Rev. Marion Franklin, D.D., Harveysburg, Ohio, February 18, 1867—July 23, 1956, Arlington, Massachusetts. He was educated in the public schools at Harveysburg, but as a youth moved to Chattanooga, Tennessee to find employment. There he joined the Unitarian Church and, after serving it as a lay reader for several years, was ordained in 1898 as its minister, serving it until 1904. He later served Unitarian churches in Dallas, Texas, 1904-1909; in Reading, Massachusetts, 1909-1934; and in Waverley, Massachusetts, 1934-1939. He began to write verse in 1888, and many of his poems appeared in newspapers and periodicals, some of them being widely reprinted. His collected poems were published in book form in 1896, entitled The Golden Shuttle, which reached a fourth edition in 1910. He then turned to hymn writing, and four of his earliest hymns were included in The New Hymn and Tune Book, 1914, viz:—

1. I hear Thy voice, within the silence speaking, (1913)

2. O Lord of life, Thy kingdom is at hand, (1912)

3. O Thou whose gracious presence shone (Communion) (1912)

4. Touch Thou mine eyes, the sombre shadows falling, (1911)

These are also included in Hymns of the Spirit, 1937, as are five later hymns by him, viz:—

5. As tranquil streams that meet and merge (1933)

6. From Bethany the Master, (Palm Sunday) (1935)

7. Heir of all the waiting ages, (Advent) (1937)

8. Ring, O ring, ye Christmas bells (1932)

9. The builders, toiling through the days (Church dedication) (1925)

In April, 1936, he wrote an Easter hymn

10. Oh, who shall roll the stone away?

which first appeared in the Boston Transcript. It is included in The Hymnal, 1940.

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In his later years he published, or had privately printed, several small booklets containing these and other poems by him: Songs of the Spirit, 1932; Songs of Faith and Hope, 1940; Songs at Sunset, 1951; Songs of a Lifetime, 1953; and In a Rose Garden, 1956. Of these, Songs of a Lifetime contains what he regarded as his best poems, as well as his latest hymns, among them one widely used on United Nations Sunday, beginning,

11. Freedom, thy holy light,

and a fine national hymn,

12. O my country, land of promise,

A number of his hymns have been included in the hymnals of several denominations, and No. 2 was translated into Japanese.

Dr. Ham’s hymns manifest a deep spiritual insight expressed with literary craftsmanship of a high order, which make them among the most notable contributions to American hymnody in the first half of the 20^th century.

H.W.F.

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Harris, Florence, (Mrs. Robert G. Hooke) (1891-1933) wrote in 1907, for the tenth anniversary of Unity Church (Unitarian), Montclair, New Jersey, of which she was a member a hymn entitled “The Founders,” beginning,

Like pilgrims sailing through the night,

which was included in The New Hymn and Tune Book, 1914, and in Hymns of the Spirit, 1937.

H.W.F.

Harris, Rev. Thaddeus Mason, D.D. (1768-1842). He graduated from Harvard in 1787, entered the ministry and served the First Church in Dorchester, Massachusetts (Unitarian) from 1793 until his resignation in 1836. Librarian of the Massachusetts Historical Society. In 1801 he printed a leaflet with a few hymns, which formed the basis for a larger collection of Hymns for the Lord’s Supper, original and selected, [edited] by Thaddeus Mason Harris. D.D. Boston; printed by Sewall Phelps, No. 5 Court Street, 1820. A second edition was printed in 1821. This booklet contains original hymns by Rev. John Pierpont, q.v., Rev. Samuel Gilman, q.v., and others, none of them in use today.

H.W.F.

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Hedge, Rev. Frederic Henry, Cambridge, Massachusetts, December 12, 1805—August 21, 1890, Cambridge, Massachusetts. Son of Professor Levi Hedge of Harvard, he was a very precocious child, ready to enter college at 12 years of age, but his father wisely sent him to Germany, with a tutor, George Bancroft, later a noted historian, where he studied in German schools for 5 years. He then returned to Harvard College, graduating in 1825, followed by a period of study in Harvard Divinity School, where he became an intimate friend of R. W. Emerson. He was ordained minister of the First Congregational Parish (Unitarian) in West Cambridge (now Arlington) Massachusetts in 1829. In 1835 he moved to Bangor, Maine, where he served the Independent Congregational Society until 1850, then serving the Westminster Congregational Church, Providence, Rhode Island, 1850-1856. In the latter year he was called to the First Parish in Brookline, Massachusetts, which he served until 1872. His removal to Brookline enabled him to serve as a nonresident professor of ecclesiastical history in the Harvard Divinity School. He retired from the ministry in 1872 and moved to Cambridge, where he was appointed professor of German language and literature, retiring in 1882. He was a man of extraordinary intellectual ability, one of the most learned of his time, and a pioneer in bringing to this country an acquaintance with German literature and metaphysics. Harvard gave him the degree of D.D. in 1852, and that of LL.D. in 1886. He was one of the editors of the Christian Examiner, author of The Prose Writers of Germany, 1848, of Reason in Religion, 1865, of a volume of Metrical Translations and Poems in 1888, and of a large number of essays and sermons. He was president of the American Unitarian Association 1860-1863. He collaborated with Dr. F. D. Huntington, q.v., in editing Hymns for the Church of Christ, Boston, 1853, to which he contributed three translations from the German:

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1. A mighty fortress is our God, (Ein’ feste Burg)

2. Christ hath arisen! (Goethe’s Faust)

3. The sun is still forever sounding (Goethe’s Faust)

The Unitarian Hymn and Tune Book for Church and Home, 1868, includes his translation from the Latin,

4. Holy Spirit, Fire Divine, (Veni, Sancte Spiritus)

Translated 1862.

His original hymns included in Hymns for the Church of Christ, 1853, are,

5. Beneath thine hammer, Lord, I lie,

Undated but “Written at a time of severe trial and deep depression.”

6. Sovereign and Transforming Grace,

Written for the ordination of H. D. Barlow at Lynn, Massachusetts, December 9, 1829. This fine hymn is appropriate to a service of worship and, with the omission of one stanza, has been widely used.

7. ’Twas in the East, the mystic East,

A Christmas hymn, written about 1853.

8. ’Twas the day when God’s anointed,

Written for a service in Bangor, Maine, held on Good Friday, 1843, in six stanzas, the last three of which, beginning

had considerable use in Great Britain and this country. The whole six stanzas were included in 127 Longfellow and Johnson’s Book of Hymns, 1846, as “Anonymous.” The last three stanzas are in Martineau’s Hymns and in many other collections.

He also wrote a hymn beginning

for his own ordination at West Cambridge in 1829, which was also used at the ordination of F. A. Whitney, at Brighton, Massachusetts, on February 24, 1844, but which passed into no collections.

All these hymns, and two other religious poems, are included in Putnam’s Singers and Songs of the Liberal Faith. Most of them had gone out of use by the end of the 19^th century, but nos. 1, 6 and 8 (beginning It is finished, Man of sorrows,) are in The New Hymn and Tune Book, 1914, and in Hymns of the Spirit, 1937.

By far the best known of Hedge’s hymns is his fine and accurate translation of Luther’s great chorale Ein’ feste Burg (no. 1). This is the version accepted by almost all the Protestant denominations in this country, whereas in Great Britain Thomas Carlyle’s earlier translation (1831) is generally used, although James Martineau included Hedge’s version in his Hymns of Praise and Prayer, 1873, mistakenly attributing it to Samuel Longfellow. Putnam, op. cit., 214, says that it was first printed in W. H. Furness’s Gems of German Verse, which appeared in Philadelphia, without date but undoubtedly in the latter part of 1853, a second edition following in 1859. That Hedge should have sent his translation 128 of the chorale to Furness without delay was natural, because the two men were close friends with a common interest in German literature, and Putnam was the younger contemporary of both, in a position to know that Furness’s little book had appeared on the market a few days, or weeks, ahead of the collection of hymns which Hedge and F. D. Huntington were editing and which they published late in 1853 as Hymns for the Church of Christ.

The earliest record of the hymn, however, is to be found in the autograph letter (now in the Harvard University Library) which Hedge wrote to Rev. Joseph H. Allen, his successor in the pulpit at Bangor, Maine, asking him to recommend hymns for inclusion in the book on which he and Huntington were working. This letter is dated “Providence, March 27th, 1853.” In the course of it Hedge wrote, “I have made a new translation of Luther’s splendid psalm ‘Eine feste Burg ist unser Gott’ Carlyle’s translation not being available.” This statement is followed by the four stanzas of his translation. That book contained no printed tunes, only citing the metre at the head of each hymn as a guide to the organist, but in his letter Hedge goes on with the surprizing statement, “The original is much sung in Germany and therefore I suppose that it will not be difficult to find a tune for it.” Since he must have become familiar with both the words and the music of the famous chorale when he was a youthful student in Germany this remark indicates that the tune was still unknown in America, and that he took little interest in introducing it.

J. 504, 1647 Revised by H.W.F.

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Higginson, Thomas Wentworth, Cambridge, Massachusetts, December 12, 1822—May 9, 1911, Cambridge. He graduated from Harvard College in 1841 and from the Harvard Divinity School in 1847. Entering the Unitarian ministry he served churches in Newburyport, Massachusetts, 1847-1850, and in Worcester, Massachusetts, 1852-1858. He was an ardent Abolitionist and when the Civil War came he entered the Union Army, in which he rose to the command of a Negro regiment. After the war he became a man of letters and published several books and numerous essays. While still a student in the Divinity School he contributed to the Book of Hymns, 1846, which his friends Longfellow and Johnson were preparing, four hymns, which they marked with an asterisk, viz:

1. No human eyes Thy face may see (God known through love)

2. The land our fathers left to us (American Slavery)

3. The past is dark with sin and shame, (Hope)

4. To thine eternal arms, O God, (Lent)

The last two have had considerable use. Both express the pessimistic mood with which the young man viewed the evils of the time.

One of his later poems of social justice has also had some use as a hymn,

His four hymns in the Book of Hymns, with other poems by him, are included in Putnam’s Singers and Songs, of the Liberal Faith, 1875. Of the above hymns those listed as 3 and 5 are included in Hymns of the Spirit, 1937.

J. 521, 1711 H.W.F.

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Hill, Rev. Thomas, D.D., L.L.D., New Brunswick, New Jersey, January 7, 1818—November 21, 1891, Portland, Maine.

He graduated from Harvard College in 1843 and from the Harvard Divinity School in 1845. He served as minister of the First Parish (Unitarian) in Waltham, Massachusetts from 1845 to 1859; was president of Antioch College, Yellow Springs, Ohio, 1859-1862; president of Harvard University, 1862-1868; and minister of the First Parish of Portland, Maine, 1873 to 1891. He was distinguished as a mathematician.

In the earlier part of his career he wrote or translated many hymns which found publication in current periodicals, usually anonymously or signed only with cryptic initials. One by him, beginning,

All holy, ever living One,

was included in a few hymn books of the 19^th century, but has dropped out of use. A few others, mostly written for special occasions, are in Putnam’s Singers and Songs of the Liberal Faith, but none have found other use.

J. 524 H.W.F.

Holland, Joseph Gilbert, Belchertown, Massachusetts, July 24, 1819—October 12, 1881. A newspaper man on the staff of the Springfield Republican who became editor of Scribner’s Magazine in 1870. Author of several books and some poetical pieces. One of the latter, beginning

For summer’s bloom, and autumn’s blight, (Praise in and through all things)

from his Bitter Sweet, 1858, was included in the Unitarian Hymn and Tune Book for Church and Home, Boston, 1868.

J. 529 H.W.F.

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Holmes, Rev. John Haynes, D.D.; Litt. D.; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, November 29, 1879—still living. He graduated from Harvard, summa cum laude in 1902, and from the Harvard Divinity School in 1904. He received the honorary degree of Doctor of Divinity from the Jewish Institute of Religion in 1930, from St. Lawrence University in 1931, and from Meadville Theological School in 1945; Doctor of Letters from Benares Hindu University, India, in 1947, and Doctor of Humanities from Rollins College, Florida, in 1951. He was installed as minister of the Third Religious Society (Unitarian), Dorchester, Massachusetts in 1904, and went to New York in 1907 as associate and successor to Rev. Robert Collyer, q.v., minister of the Second Congregational Unitarian Society, (Church of the Messiah, now called the Community Church of New York) of which he became pastor emeritus in 1949. He withdrew from the Unitarian fellowship in 1919, not on theological grounds but because he preferred a position independent of any denominational label. Throughout his career in New York he has been an outspoken leader in many causes for social betterment, and a prolific author in prose and verse who has published a large number of books, religious and biographical, and of printed sermons. No other American author of his period has written so many fine hymns which have been widely used in this country, in England, and in Japan.

1. Accept, O Lord, this precious gift

8.6.8.6. 3 stas.

Written for dedication on October 31, 1943, of Chapel in the rebuilt Community Church.

2. Accept, O Lord, this temple,

7.6.7.6.7.6. 3 stas.

Written on the occasion of the rededication of the Community Church, December 31, 1922.

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3. All hail the pageant of the years,

8.6.8.6.8.8. 5 stas. Undated

Included in Hymns of the Spirit, 1937.

4. Almighty God, beneath whose eye

C.M.D. 4 stas.

An early hymn written for Labor Day Sunday in 1910.

5. Almighty God, to whom the dark

C.M.D. 3 stas. 8 l.

A Vesper hymn written in 1906.

6. America triumphant! Brave land of pioneers.

7.6.7.6.D. 5 stas.

Written during World War I, in Hymns of the Spirit, 1937.

7. Behold, O God! our holy house,

C.M. 5 stas. September, 1919

Written on the occasion of the burning of the Community Church, September 11, 1919.

8. Be with us, Father, in this place.

Dated 1945.

9. Bless, thou, O God, this fellowship

8.6.8.6.D. 3 stas.

Written for the Installation of Rev. Dana McLean Greeley, B.D., D.D. as President of the American Unitarian Association on October 7, 1958.

10. Bright visions glow across the sky,

8.6.8.6.8.6.8.6. 3 stas.

Written by Mr. Holmes in 1947 on the occasion of his 40^th anniversary as Minister of the Community Church.

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11. God of the nations, near and far.

C.M. 6 stas.

Written before this country entered World War I, for a hymn contest sponsored by the Federal Council of Churches of Christ in America, for use on Peace Sunday. This hymn was widely sung in churches of many denominations.

Included in New Hymn and Tune Book, 1914, and in Hymns of the Spirit, 1937, with alteration in 2^nd sta.

12. God save the people’s cause.

6.6.4.6.6.6.4. 3 stas.

Written in 1939.

13. Great Spirit of the speeding spheres,

L.M. 6 stas.

Written in 1932 on the occasion of the 25^th anniversary of Mr. Holmes as minister of the Community Church.

14. Joy to our hearts! Again we meet!

8.6.8.8.6.6.6.4. 3 stas. 8 l.

A Hymn of reunion, 1920, set to the tune of Antioch.

15. O blessed isle of quiet,

7.6.8.6.D. 3 stas.

Written at the Isles of Shoals in the summer of 1930, and set to an original tune by Robert B. Buxton.

16. O Father, Thou who givest all

L.M. 4 stas.

Written for The Beacon Song and Service Book, Beacon, 1908; included in New Hymn and Tune Book, 1914, and Hymns of the Spirit, 1937.

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17. O God of field and city,

7.6.7.6.7.6.7.6. 3 stas. Prompted, in 1917, by the darkly unfolding experiences of World War I.

18. O God of light and darkness,

7.6.7.6.D. 3 stas. 8 l. Undated.

19. O God, whose law from age to age

8.6.8.6.D. 4 stas. 1910.

20. O God, whose love is over all,

8.6.8.6.D. 3 stas. 1909.

21. O God, whose smile is in the sky

8.6.8.6.D. 4 stas.

Written in 1907 for the Isles of Shoals Hymn Book, 1908, in 4 stas., C.M.D. Included in the New Hymn and Tune Book, 1914, in 5 stas. of 4 l. with revisions approved by the author, and in Hymns of the Spirit, 1937.

22. Old Jubal twanged the bow-string

7.6.7.6.D. 3 stas.

Written for the 25^th anniversary of Clifford Demarest as organist of the Community Church, May 10, 1936, based on Genesis 4.21. “Jubal,—father of all such as handle the harp and the pipe.” An interesting tour de force on the rise of music in praise of God.

23. Onward still and upward

6.5.6.5.D. 3 stas.

Written in 1950, and dedicated to the American Unitarian Association in celebration of the 125^th anniversary (1825-1950) of its founding.

24. O Thou who in chaotic night,

8.8.8.8.8.8. 4 stas.

Written in war time, 1918.

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25. O Thou, whose presence moved before

C.M.D. 6 stas.

Written for use on the 10^th anniversary of his installation as Minister of the Community Church, February 4, 1917.

26. O’er continent and ocean

7.6.8.6.D. 3 stas.

Written for a “Service of Commemoration of a Century of British American Peace,” held in the Church of the Messiah, Montreal, Canada, at a meeting of Unitarian General Conference on September 25, 1917. In Hymns of the Spirit, 1937.

27. Show us thy way, O God!

6.6.8.6. 4 stas.

Printed in The Christian Century in 1936, included in Hymns of the Spirit, 1937, with a correction by the author.

28. The Bethlehem stars are dim tonight

8.6.8.6.D. 3 stas. Dated 1925

29. The voice of God is calling

7.6.7.6.D. 4 stas.

Written in September, 1913 for the Young People’s Religious Union of Boston. In New Hymn and Tune Book, 1914. In Hymns of the Spirit, 1937; widely used in the United States, England, translated into German, Japanese and Spanish.

30. Thou God of all, whose presence dwells

8.8.8.8. 4 stas.

Written some time after World War I. Intended as a protest against nationalistic theism which induced both belligerent nations to claim a monopoly of God.

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31. Thou God of all, whose Spirit moves

8.6.8.6.D 3 stas.

Printed in The Christian Century, May 29, 1940 and in The Christian Register, August, 1940.

32. Thy voice, O God, in every age

8.6.8.6.D. 3 stas.

Written for the Installation of Rev. Donald Harrington at the Community Church of New York on November 19, 1944.

33. To earth’s remote horizons

7.6.7.6.D. 4 stas.

Written in 1949 and first sung on November 27th of that year at a special service in commemoration of the retirement of Mr. Holmes from the active ministry.

34. To Thee, O God, be homage

7.6.7.6.D. 3 stas. 1945.

35. When darkness, brooding o’er the deep

8.6.8.6.D. 4 stas.

Written in 1925 on the occasion of the 100^th anniversary of the founding of the Community Church of New York.

36. Why trust we not our God?

6.6.8.6. 5 stas.

Of the hymns listed above, Nos. 3, 6, 11, 18, 20, 23 and 29 have had the most widespread use.

H.W.F. in collaboration with J.H.H.

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Holmes, Oliver Wendell, M.D., LL.D., Cambridge, Massachusetts, August 29, 1809—October 7, 1894, Boston, Massachusetts. He graduated from Harvard College in the famous Class of 1829, studied medicine and became a practitioner in Boston, and was appointed Professor of Anatomy in the Harvard Medical School in 1847. Although distinguished as a physician his fame is that of a man of letters gifted with a sense of humor which made him one of the wittiest men of his time. Besides important medical treatises he wrote essays, novels, biographical sketches, and poetry which brought him a great reputation in this country and in Great Britain. Much of his poetry is occasional verse, which he was often called upon to write, such as his “International Ode” to be sung to the tune “America” (“God Save the Queen”) on the occasion of the visit of the Prince of Wales in 1860. Oxford University gave him the honorary degree of D.C.L. in 1886. He was a member of Kings’ Chapel, (Unitarian) Boston, and two of his poems are about that church. He contributed The Autocrat at the Breakfast Table to the opening issues of The Atlantic Monthly, 1857-58, published The Professor at the Breakfast Table in 1859, The Poet at the Breakfast Table in 1872. He wrote Elsie Venner, 1861, and two other novels. His poetry was published in Songs in Many Keys, 1861; Humorous Poems, 1865; Before the Curfew, 1888; and in his Complete Poetical Works, in 1895.

Although he made a greater contribution to American hymnody than did any other of the “New England poets” of his era, except Bryant and Whittier, his hymns were incidental literary by-products, for he was not primarily a hymn writer. They include:

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1. Angel of peace, thou hast tarried too long

Written in 1869.

2. Father of mercies, heavenly Friend,

A prayer in time of war. Undated but between 1861 and 1865.

3. Lead where the banners wave last to the sea,

Written as an American national anthem. It appeared in his Songs in Many Keys, 1861, entitled “Freedom, our Queen.”

4. Lord of all being, throned afar, (God’s Omnipotence)

Included in The Autocrat at the Breakfast Table, 1848, under the title of “A Sun-day Hymn.” This is his finest hymn and has had widespread use in many collections.

5. O Lord of hosts, Almighty King,

Entitled “Army Hymn,” and published in The Soldier’s Companion, a hand-book of hymns and scripture readings issued in the fall of 1861, by the American Unitarian Association, for use by soldiers in the Union Army. It is a fine hymn, but with several lines directly referring to the immediate situation which make it unsuitable for present use and which cannot be altered or dropped without mutilating the hymn. In the same collection he wrote an “Additional Verse” appended to “The Star-Spangled Banner,” beginning

6. O Love Divine, that stooped to share,

Written in 1859, a hymn of trust in time of doubt and sorrow.

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Written for the 25^th Anniversary of the Boston Young Men’s Christian Union, May 31, 1893.

8. Thou gracious Power whose mercy lends,

Written in 1869 for the 40^th anniversary meeting of the Harvard Class of 1829. In the Methodist Hymn Book, 1904, altered to read

Of these hymns nos. 4 and 6 have had the most widespread use. Those two, and no. 1 are included in The Pilgrim Hymnal, 1935, and nos. 4, 6, 7 and 8 are in the Unitarian New Hymn and Tune Book, 1914, and In Hymns of the Spirit, 1937.

J. 530, 1649, 1713, rewritten by H.W.F.

Horton, Rev. Edward Augustus, Springfield, Massachusetts, September 28, 1843—April 15, 1931, Toronto, Canada. He studied at the University of Chicago and at Meadville Theological School, from which he graduated in 1868. He served Unitarian churches in Leominster, Massachusetts, 1868-1875; Hingham, Massachusetts, 1877-1880; and the Second Church in Boston, 1880-1892. Thereafter he was active in the work of the Unitarian Sunday School Society. In 1912 he wrote an “Anniversary Hymn” beginning,

We honor those whose work began,

which was included in The New Hymn and Tune Book, 1914.

H.W.F.

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Hosmer, Rev. Frederick Lucian, D.D., Framingham, Massachusetts, October 16, 1840—June 7, 1929, Berkeley, California. He graduated from Harvard College in 1862, and from the Harvard Divinity School in 1869. In October of that year he was ordained minister of the First Congregational Church (Unitarian), Northborough, Massachusetts, where he served for 3 years. He served the Unitarian Church in Quincy, Illinois, 1872-1877; then spent sixteen months in Europe, returning late in 1878 to serve the First Unitarian Church of Cleveland, Ohio, 1878-1892; the Church of the Unity, St. Louis, Missouri, 1894-1899; and the First Unitarian Church, Berkeley, California, 1900-1915, where he remained as minister-emeritus until his death. In 1887 Buchtel College gave him the degree of Doctor of Divinity.

While in the Divinity School he formed a close life-long friendship with William C. Gannett, q.v. Neither wrote any hymns until early middle life, Dr. Gannett’s earliest having been written in 1873, Dr. Hosmer’s in 1875, but thereafter they worked together for nearly four decades to make a contribution to American hymnody comparable to that made by Samuel Longfellow, q.v., and Samuel Johnson, q.v., a generation earlier. Of the two men it has been well said that “Gannett was the better poet, Hosmer the better hymn writer,” and many more of his hymns than of those by Gannett have come into widespread use.

Working together they edited Unity Hymns and Chorals, published in 1880, a revised edition of which appeared in 1911. (J. V. Blake, q.v., was also an editor of the first, but not of the revised edition). In 1885 they published a small collection of their poems entitled The Thought of God in Hymns and Poems, followed by later collections with the same title, 2^nd Series 1894, 3^rd Series 1918. In 1908 Dr. Hosmer gave a series of lectures 141 on hymnody at the Harvard Divinity School, repeated at the Pacific Unitarian School for the Ministry, in Berkeley, California, but these have not been published.

Julian’s Dictionary, pp. 1650-51, lists 27 hymns by Dr. Hosmer, with “annotations—from ms. notes supplied—by the author,” as follows:—

142

1. Father, to Thee we look in all our sorrow (Trust in God)

Written in 1881 upon the death of a member of the author’s congregation, and published in The Thought of God, 1^st Series, 1885.

2. From age to age how grandly rise (Unity)

Written for the annual festival of the Free Religious Association, Boston, June 2, 1899, and first published in Souvenir Festival Hys. 1899. Subsequently altered by the author to “From age to age the prophet’s vision.”

3. From age to age they gather, all the brave of heart and strong, (Victory of Truth)

Written in 1891 for the Dedication of Unity Church, Decorah, Iowa, and published in The Thought of God, 2^nd Series, 1894.

4. From many ways and wide apart, (College or School Reunion)

Dated in The Thought of God, 2^nd Series, 1894, as having been written in 1890.

5. Go not, my soul, in search of Him, (God within)

Written in 1879, printed in the Boston Christian Register, May 31, 1879, and included in The Thought of God, 1^st Series, 1885, with the title “The Indwelling God.”

6. I cannot think of them as dead (Eternal Life)

Written in 1882 and first published in The Thought of God, 1^st Series, 1885, and entitled “My Dead.” In the English collections it is usually given as “We cannot think of them as dead.”

7. I little see, I little know, (Trust)

“A Psalm of Trust” written in 1883, first appeared in 143 the Boston Christian Register, and again in The Thought of God, 1^st Series, 1885.

8. Immortal, by their deed and word (The Spirit of Jesus)

Written in 1880, and first published in Unity Hys. and Carols, Chicago, Illinois, 1880, and then in The Thought of God, 1^st Series, 1885.

9. Many things in life, there are (Mystery in All Things)

Written in 1885 and first published in The Thought of God, 1^st Series, 1885, with the title “Passing Understanding”, and the quotation “the Peace of God which passeth all understanding.”

10. Not always on the Mount may we (On the Mount)

This lesson from the Transfiguration was written in 1882, and published in the Chicago Unity, April 1, 1884. After revision by the author, it was included in the 1^st Series of The Thought of God, 1885.

11. Not when, with self dissatisfied, (Lent)

Written in 1891, and given in The Thought of God, 2^nd Series, 1894, p. 33. It is in The Public School Hymn Book, 1903, and others.

12. O beautiful, my country, (National Hymn)

As “Our Country,” written in 1884, and published in the Chicago Unity Festivals, 1884, and again in The Thought of God, 1885.

13. O Light, from age to age the same, (Dedication Anniversary)

Written in 1890 for the fiftieth anniversary of the Second Congregational Church (Unitarian), Quincy, Illinois. Included in The Thought of God, 2^nd Series, 144 1894, and entitled “From Generation to Generation.”

14. O Lord of Life, where’er they be, (Life in God)

“Written in 1888 for Easter service in Author’s own church,” and first published in the Chicago Unity, and again in The Thought of God, 2^nd Series, 1894. The “Alleluia” refrain, which is added in some collections to each verse, is appended, in the original, to the last verse only.

15. O Name, all other names above, (Trust in God)

Under the title “Found. ‘They that know Thy name will put their trust in Thee’,” this hymn, written in 1878, was given in The Thought of God, 1^st Series, 1885.

16. O Prophet souls of all the years (Unity)

“Written in 1893 for, and sung at, the Unitarian gathering in connection with The World’s Parliament of Religions (World’s Fair) Chicago, Sep. 1893,” and included in The Thought of God, 2^nd Series, 1894, and entitled “One Law, One Life, One Love.”

17. O Thou, in all Thy might so far, (God All in All)

This hymn, given in The Thought of God, 1^st Series, 1885, with the title “The Mystery of God,” was written in 1876, and first published in the New York Inquirer.

18. O thou in lonely vigil led,

This encouragement for lonely workers was written for the “Emerson Commemoration, W.U.C. 1888,” and included in The Thought of God, 2^nd Series, 1894.

19. O Thou, who art of all that is, (Divine Guidance)

Under the title “Through unknown paths,” this hymn 145 was included in The Thought of God, 1^st Series, 1885; it was written in 1877.

20. O Thou, whose Spirit witness bears, (Dedication of a Place of Worship)

Written for the Dedication of the First Unitarian Church, Omaha, February 6, 1891, and published in The Thought of God, 2^nd Series, 1894, with the title “The Inward Witness”, and the subscription “For T.K. Omaha, 1891.”

21. On eyes that watch through sorrow’s night (Easter)

A Carol for Easter Morn, written in 1890 for the author’s congregation, and published in The Thought of God, 2^nd Series, 1894.

22. One thought I have, my ample creed, (The Thought of God)

This is the initial hymn to the collection The Thought of God, 1^st Series, 1885, and supplies the title to the work. It was written in 1880, and first published in the Chicago Unity Hymns and Carols, 1880, and then in The Thought of God, 1885.

23. The rose is queen among the flowers, (Flower services)

Written in 1875, first published in The Sunnyside, a songbook for Sunday Schools, and again in The Thought of God, 1^st Series, 1885, under the title “Flower Sunday.”

24. Thy kingdom come—on bended knee, (Missions)

“Written in 1891 for the Commencement of the Meadville Theological School (Meadville, Pa.) June 12, 1891, and pub. in The Thought of God, 2^nd Series, 1894.” under the title “The Day of God,” and the subscription “M.T.S., June 12, 1891.”

146

“Written in 1879, and first pub. in The Christian Register (Boston) Mar. 22 of that year, under the title ‘The Larger Faith.’” Included under the same title in The Thought of God, 1^st Series, 1885. Sometimes given as “Made lowly wise, we pray no more.”

26. When courage fails, and faith burns low, (Victory of Truth)

Under the title “Loyalty,” this hymn was given in The Thought of God, 1^st Series, 1885. It was written in 1881.

“Written in 1891 for the Dedication of First Unitarian Church, Oakland, California.” Included in The Thought of God, 2^nd Series, 1894, entitled “Holy Place”, and subscribed “For C.W.W., Oakland, Cal. 1891.”

147

This account of Hosmer’s hymns, copied verbatim from Julian’s Dictionary, may be accepted as authoritative as to the date and occasion for each hymn listed, but Canon Julian presumably added the descriptive notations in brackets, and fell into minor inaccuracies, as when he wrote Unity Hymns and Carols for Unity Hymns and Chorals (cf. nos. 3 and 22), and cited the periodical Unity, published in Chicago, as Chicago Unity. By way of further clarification it should be noted that the opening line of no. 12, O beautiful my country, was taken from J. R. Lowell’s great Commemoration Ode, and that Hosmer always wanted it printed ‘O Beautiful my Country’, in recognition of its source. No. 18 was written for the observance by the Western Unitarian Conference of the fiftieth anniversary of Emerson’s famous Divinity School Address. The person initialed as “T.K.” for whom no. 20 was written on February 6, 1891, probably was Thomas Kilpatrick, a layman who did much to make possible the erection of the church in Omaha, which was not dedicated until December 15 of that year. The person initialled “C.W.W.”, for whom no. 27 was written, was Rev. Charles W. Wendte, then minister of the First Unitarian Church in Oakland, California.

Julian’s account of Hosmer’s contribution to hymnody, though no doubt as satisfactory as could be expected at the time it was written, is incomplete in two respects. The latest hymn listed is dated 1899, yet at least three earlier hymns by Hosmer are unaccountably missing, (viz, nos. 32, 33, 41, noted below), presumably because he neglected to send Julian any information about them. More important than these are several later occasional 148 hymns which he wrote in the last three decades of his life, too late for any inclusion in Julian’s Dictionary, and which form a notable addition to the earlier list. Some of them were included in the revised edition of Unity Hymns and Chorals, 1911, and all of them in The Thought of God, 3^rd. Series, 1918, as follows:

28. Across a century’s border line,

Written for the centennial commemoration of W. E. Channing’s famous “Baltimore Sermon” at the General Unitarian Conference, September 26, 1917.

29. All hidden lie the future ways,

Written as a hymn at the christening of children. Not dated.

30. Forward through the ages, in unbroken line,

A hymn of the church universal, written in 1908 for an Installation Service, set to Sullivan’s tune St. Gertrude. In some collections it has replaced Baring Gould’s Onward, Christian Soldiers.

31. Hear, hear, O ye nations, and hearing obey, (Reign of Peace)

Written in 1909 and included in New Hymn and Tune Book, 1914, and, with one word altered in the last stanza, in Hymns of the Spirit, 1937.

32. I came not hither of my will, (Divine Providence)

Written in 1883.

33. Lo, the day of days is here, (Easter)

Written in 1890.

34. Lo, the Easter-tide is here, (Easter)

Written in 1914.

149

35. Now while the day in trailing splendor (Evening)

Written in 1902, published in Louisa Loring’s Hymns of the Ages, 1904.

36. O blest the souls that see and hear,

Written for the National Conference of Unitarian Churches, Chicago, September 27, 1909, in 5 stanzas, beginning “From many ways and far apart.” In The New Hymn and Tune Book, 1914, and Hymns of the Spirit, 1937, this first stanza has been dropped, and the remaining four stanzas printed, beginning as above.

37. O day of light and gladness (Easter)

Written in 1903, published in Louisa Loring’s Hymns of the Ages, 1904, and, slightly revised, in Unity Hymns and Chorals, 1911.

38. The outward building stands complete,

Written for the Dedication of Unity Church, St. Louis, Missouri, October 7, 1917.

39. Through willing heart and helping hand,

Written in 1909 for the Dedication of the Parish House of the First Unitarian Church, Berkeley, California.

40. Thy kingdom come, O Lord.

Written in 1905.

41. Today be joy in every heart, (Christmas)

Written in 1877.

42. Uplift the song of praise,

The first two stanzas of this hymn were written in 1904 and were included in Miss Louisa Loring’s 150 Hymns of the Ages, published in that year. At a later date Dr. Hosmer wrote two additional stanzas and the hymn was thus printed in The Thought of God, 3^rd Series, 1918. In The New Hymn and Tune Book, 1914, and Hymns of the Spirit, 1937, it is set to the tune Yigdal.

43. When shadows gather on our way,

Written in 1904 and published in Miss Louisa Loring’s Hymns of the Ages, 1904.

44. When the constant sun returning,

Reginald Heber in 1827 wrote a single stanza hymn beginning, “God that madest earth and heaven.” In 1912 Hosmer wrote for The New Hymn and Tune Book, 1914, a second stanza, the first line of which is quoted above, to complete the thought. This composite two stanza hymn has since been included in The Pilgrim Hymnal, 1935, and Hymns of the Spirit, 1937.

The period of Dr. Hosmer’s hymn writing covered more than 40 years (1875-1917) and during the latter half of that time he was widely recognized by hymn lovers as the most distinguished hymn writer of his time. Many of his hymns found their way into the collections of various denominations in both this country and Great Britain. Canon Dearmer included 8 in the British collection Songs of Praise, and in the accompanying handbook, Songs of Praise Discussed, calls the hymn O Thou, in all thy might so far, (no. 17) “this flawless poem, one of the completest expressions of religious faith,” and the hymn Thy kingdom come, on bended knee, (no. 24) “one of the noblest hymns in the language.”

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All of Hosmer’s hymns in recent use will be found in both the Unitarian collections—The New Hymn and Tune Book, 1914, and Hymns of the Spirit, 1937, except where initials indicate one or the other book, as follows:—Nos. 1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 7 (N.H.T.B.), 8, 10 (N.H.T.B.), 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26 (H.S.), 29 (H.S.), 30, 31, 32, 34 (H.S,), 35, 36, 37, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43. Nos. 10, 17, 24, 30 and 40 are included in the Protestant Episcopal Hymnal, 1940.

J. 1650 H.W.F.

152

Howe, Mrs. Julia (Ward), New York, New York, May 27, 1819—October 17, 1910, Boston, Massachusetts. Married Samuel Gridley Howe on April 26, 1843. She was a woman with a distinguished personality and intellect; an Abolitionist and active in social reforms; author of several books in prose and verse. The latter include Passion Flower, 1854; Words of the Hour, 1856; Later Lyrics, 1866; and From a Sunset Ridge, 1896. She became famous as the author of the poem entitled “Battle Hymn of the Republic,” beginning,

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord, which, in spite of its title, was written as a patriotic song and not as a hymn for use in public worship, but which has been included in many American hymn books. It was written on November 19, 1861, while she and her husband, accompanied by their pastor, Rev. James Freeman Clarke, q.v., minister of the (Unitarian) Church of the Disciples, Boston, were visiting Washington soon after the outbreak of the Civil War. She had seen the troops gathered there and had heard them, singing “John Brown’s body lies a-mouldering in the grave” to a popular tune called “Glory, Hallelujah” composed a few years earlier by William Steffe of Charleston, South Carolina, for Sunday School use. Dr. Clarke asked Mrs. Howe if she could not write more uplifting words for the tune and as she awoke early the next morning she found the verses forming in her mind as fast as she could write them down, so completely that later she re-wrote only a line or two in the last stanza and changed only four words in other stanzas. She sent the poem to The Atlantic Monthly, which paid her $4 and published it in its issue for February, 1862. It attracted little attention until it caught the eye of Chaplain C. C. McCabe (later a Methodist bishop) who had a fine singing voice and who taught it first to the 122d Ohio Volunteer Infantry regiment to which he 153 was attached, then to other troops, and to prisoners in Libby Prison after he was made prisoner of war. Thereafter it quickly came into use throughout the North as an expression of the patriotic emotion of the period.

J. 1652 H.W.F.

154

Huntington, Rt. Rev. Frederic Dan, D.D., Hadley, Massachusetts, May 23, 1819—July 11, 1904, Hadley, Massachusetts. He graduated from Amherst College in 1839 and from the Harvard Divinity School in 1842. He was minister of the South Congregational Church (Unitarian), Boston, 1842-1855, and from 1855 to 1859 he was Professor of Christian Morals and University Preacher at Harvard College. In 1859 he was ordained priest in the Protestant Episcopal Church and served as rector of Emmanuel Church in Boston from 1860 to 1869, when he was consecrated Bishop of Central New York. In 1853 he collaborated with Rev. Frederic Henry Hedge, q.v., in editing their Unitarian collection, Hymns for the Church of Christ, to which he contributed three hymns,

1. O Love Divine, lay on me burdens if Thou wilt (Supplication)

2. O Thou, in whose Eternal Name (Ordination)

3. O Thou that once on Horeb stood (God in Nature)

The hymn beginning

Father, whose heavenly kingdom lies,

in Longfellow and Johnson’s Hymns of the Spirit, 1864, is a cento taken from no. 2. Hymns for the Church of Christ also includes a good many anonymous hymns, some of which may be by him, though there is no proof that such is the case. Dr. Huntington also collaborated with Dr. Hedge in editing a collection of sacred poetry entitled Elim: Hymns of Holy Refreshment, Boston, 1865, which includes a funeral hymn beginning

So heaven is gathering one by one,

This hymn has been mistakenly attributed to Huntington, but is an altered form of a hymn by E. H. Bickersteth beginning

Thus heaven is gathering one by one.

155

Although Dr. Huntington is known to have written occasional verses in religious themes later in life for his own edification he is not credited with any published hymns after his resignation from his professorship at Harvard, and none of the three listed above are in present use.

J. 544, 1714 Revised by H.W.F.

Hurlburt, (Hurlbut, Hurlbert) William Henry. Charleston, South Carolina, July 3, 1827—September 4, 1895, Cadenabbia, Lake Como, Italy. (His family name is spelled Hurlburt in records at Charleston but at Harvard he was registered as Hurlbut, and in later years he changed the spelling to Hurlbert). He graduated from Harvard College in 1847 and from the Divinity School in 1849. He preached in Unitarian pulpits for a few months but was never ordained as a settled minister; then he studied in the Harvard Law School for a year; then turned to journalism in New York City. After 1883 he spent most of his time in Europe, his last few years in Italy. As a student at Harvard he was a contemporary of Samuel Longfellow and Samuel Johnson and contributed three hymns to their Book of Hymns, edition of 1848, which they also included in their Hymns of the Spirit, 1864, viz:

1. My God, in life’s most doubtful hour,

2. We pray for truth and peace,

3. We will not weep, for God is standing by us

In both books his surname is spelled Hurlbut.

J. 545 Revised by H.W.F.

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Johnson, Rev. Samuel, Salem, Massachusetts, October 10, 1822—February 19, 1882, North Andover, Massachusetts. He graduated from Harvard College in 1842 and from the Harvard Divinity School in 1846. He served from 1853-1870 as minister of the Independent Church, Lynn, Massachusetts which he organized and which ceased to exist when he resigned. He refused to identify himself with any denomination, though in belief he was a Unitarian and in the public mind was associated with the churches which adhered to the liberal wing of the Congregational order. He was author of a book on Oriental Religions, one of the earliest American studies in the History of Religions. In 1846 he and his classmate in the Divinity School, Samuel Longfellow, q.v., while still students, prepared their Book of Hymns, because they and some of their friends thought the Unitarian hymn books then in use were too traditional. This book appeared in enlarged edition in 1848, and made a notable contribution to American hymnody in its freshness of outlook and its inclusion of hymns by hitherto unrecognized writers, notably John Greenleaf Whittier. Johnson contributed 7 hymns to the edition of 1846, viz:

1. Father [Savior] in Thy mysterious presence kneeling (Worship)

2. Go, preach the gospel in my name (Ordination)

3. Lord, once our faith in man no fear could move, (In Time of War)

4. Onward, Christians, though the region (Conflict)

Altered in Hymns of the Spirit, 1864, to

5. Thy servants’ sandals, Lord, are wet (Ordination)

In the edition of 1848 he included

6. God of the earnest heart, (Trust)

157

which he had “Written for the Graduating Exercises of the Class of 1846, in Cambridge Divinity School.” In 1864 he and Longfellow published their second and no less important collection, Hymns of the Spirit, (not to be confused with the book of the same title published in 1937 by the American Unitarian Association). To this volume he contributed 7 more hymns, viz:

7. City of God, how broad, how far, (The Church Universal)

8. I bless Thee, Lord, for sorrows sent (Purification through suffering)

This was “Written at the request of Dorothea L. Dix for a collection made by her for the use of an asylum.” (Miss Dix was engaged in a notable reform of institutions for the insane.)

9. Life of Ages, richly poured (Inspiration)

10. Strong-souled Reformer, whose far-seeing faith (Jesus)

11. The Will Divine that woke a waiting time (St. Paul)

12. Thou whose glad summer yields, (Worship)

13. To light that shines in stars and souls, (Dedication of a Place of Worship)

A number of these hymns have had widespread and long-continued use. Numbers 1, 4, 6, 7, and 9 are included in Hymns of the Spirit, 1937, and stand out as some of the finest examples of American hymnody in their lyrical quality and depth of religious feeling. A few of Johnson’s hymns have found acceptance also in England, the most notable example being No. 7, sung at the consecration of the new Anglican cathedral at Liverpool in 1924, an occasion which the words fitted to perfection. But, since even the existence of the obscure minister in Lynn, Massachusetts, was quite unknown to all but very few of those present, the Samuel Johnson to whom it 158 was attributed was commonly supposed to be the famous 18^th century English lexicographer, and the hymn is mistakenly assigned to him in the latest edition of Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations! Following its use at Liverpool it was sung in Westminster Abbey at a service for the League of Nations in 1935; at the jubilee service for the 25^th anniversary of the coronation of George V; and was one of seven hymns included in the special service prepared by the Archbishops of Canterbury and York for use in parish churches throughout England at the time of the coronation of George VI. Probably no other hymn of American authorship is so widely known or used in British dominions.

J. 604-5, 1583, 1681, 1711 H.W.F.

159

Kimball, Jacob, Topsfield, Massachusetts, February 15, 1761—July 24, 1826, Topsfield. He graduated from Harvard in 1780, studied law, taught school, and tried to make a living at various other occupations, with small success except in the field of music where he was regarded as the outstanding singer, teacher, and composer of his period. He edited Rural Harmony, (Boston, 1793) which he followed with Essex Harmony, (1800) and Essex Harmony, Part II, (1802), which included the only tunes of his own composition which can now be identified as his, except those in the popular Village Harmony (1795) the later editions of which, down to 1821, were probably edited by him. There is evidence that he also wrote poetry, including a number of hymns, some of them perhaps the anonymous ones, otherwise unknown, included in the above-mentioned song books. The one hymn which can be attributed to him with assurance is his excellent metrical version of Psalm 65 which Jeremy Belknap included in his Sacred Psalmody (1795), entitled “A New Version” and beginning

The only other hymns by an American author in Belknap’s Collection is Mather Byles’

republished in 1760.

See Jacob Kimball: A Pioneer American Musician, Essex Institute Historical Collections, XCII, no. 4.

H.W.F.

160

Larned, Augusta, Rutland, New York, April 16, 1835—1924. Author of six volumes of stories for children and of one on Greek mythology and another on Norse mythology. Contributor to various periodicals and for 20 years correspondent and editorial writer with The Christian Register, Boston. She published in 1895 a book of poems entitled In the Woods and Fields from which was taken her hymn on peace of mind,

In quiet hours the tranquil soul,

for inclusion in the Isles of Shoals Hymn-Book, 1908; The New Hymn and Tune Book, 1914 and Hymns of the Spirit, 1937.

H.W.F.

Lathrop, Rev. John Howland, D.D., Jackson, Michigan, June 6, 1880—still living. He graduated from Meadville Theological School in 1903, then entered Harvard where he took an A.B. in 1905. He also studied at the University of Chicago, and the University of Jena. He served as minister of the First Unitarian Church of Berkeley, California, 1905-1911, and the First Unitarian Congregational Church of Brooklyn, New York, 1911 to 1957, when he became pastor emeritus. In 1935 he wrote a hymn for Palm Sunday beginning,

Hosanna in the highest! Our eager hearts acclaim,

which was included in Hymns of the Spirit, 1937, set to St. Theodulph.

H.W.F.

161

Livermore, Rev. Abiel Abbot, D.D., Wilton, New Hampshire, October 26, 1811—November 28, 1892, Wilton, New Hampshire. He graduated from Harvard College in 1833, and from the Harvard Divinity School in 1836. He was ordained minister of the Unitarian Church at Keene, New Hampshire, in November, 1836, and remained there until 1850, when he accepted a call to Cincinnati, Ohio. After a period in New York he was elected president of the Meadville Theological School in 1862, and served in that capacity until 1890, when he retired to his ancestral home at Wilton. He received the degree of D.D. from Harvard in 1888. He was author of a number of books, and of several hymns, printed in Putnam’s Singers and Songs. He was the chief editor of the Cheshire Pastoral Association’s Christian Hymns, 1844, one of the finest and most widely circulated American Unitarian collections, to which he contributed his Communion hymn beginning,

A holy air is breathing round,

This hymn was included in Martineau’s Hymns, 1873, in most American Unitarian collections, and appears in slightly altered form in The New Hymn and Tune Book, 1914, and Hymns of the Spirit, 1937.

J. 680 H.W.F.

162

Livermore, Sarah White, Wilton, New Hampshire, July 20, 1789—July 3, 1874, Wilton. She was an aunt of A. A. Livermore, q.v., and was a school teacher for most of her life. She contributed two hymns to the Cheshire Collection, 1844, viz:

1. Glory to God, and peace on earth, (Christmas)

2. Our pilgrim brethren, dwelling far, (Mission)

These passed into a few other collections.

She wrote a number of others for various church occasions, but they have never been collected for publication.

J. 680 H.W.F.

Long, Hon. John Davis (1838-1915) was born in Buckfield, Maine, October 27, 1838, and died in Hingham, Massachusetts on August 28, 1915. Harvard, A.B. 1857, L.L.D. 1880. He was Governor of Massachusetts, 1880-1883, and Secretary of the Navy, 1897-1902. A member of the First Parish (Unitarian) in Hingham, he wrote one hymn beginning,

The evening winds begin to blow

which was included in The New Hymn and Tune Book, 1914, but which has not passed into other books.

H.W.F.

163

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth, D.C.L., Portland, Maine, February 27, 1807—March 24, 1882, Cambridge, Massachusetts. He graduated from Bowdoin College in 1825. After four years of study in Europe he was appointed to the Chair of Modern Languages at Bowdoin, but removed to Harvard in 1835, upon his election as professor of Modern Languages and Belles-Lettres in the latter College. He retained that Professorship until 1854, when he retired to give himself time for authorship in prose and verse. He became one of the most widely read and beloved poets in the English-speaking world, and after his death a marble bust commemorating him was placed in Westminster Abbey. In the strict sense of the term he was not a hymn-writer, his brother, Samuel Longfellow, q.v., twelve years his junior, far surpassing him in this field, but hymn-book editors have culled selections from his poems which they could use, as follows:

1. Ah, what a sound! The infinite fierce chorus,

From his poem “The Arsenal at Springfield,” published in The Belfry of Bruges, 1845. Four stanzas, beginning as above, are included in The Pilgrim Hymnal, 1935. In S. Longfellow’s and Johnson’s Book of Hymns, 1848, the selected stanzas from this poem begin

Down the dark future through long generations,

and the hymn appeared in this form in other collections.

2. Alas, how poor and little worth,

Tr. from the Spanish of Don Jorge Manrique, (d. 1479), in Longfellow’s Poetry of Spain, 1833.

3. All are architects of fate,

The first three stanzas of Longfellow’s poem, “The Builders,” written in 1846. Included in Hymns of the Spirit, 1937.

164

4. All is of God; If he but wave his hand.

From the poem “The Two Angels,” in his Birds of Passage, 1858; included in S. Longfellow’s and Johnson’s Hymns of the Spirit, 1864.

5. Blind Bartimeus at the gate,

From Miscellaneous Poems, 1841. Included in G. W. Conder’s 1874 Appendix to the (British) Leeds Hymn Book.

6. Christ to the young man said, “Yet one thing more.”

Written in 1848 for the ordination of the poet’s younger brother, Samuel Longfellow; published in the author’s Seaside and Fireside, 1851, and in H. W. Beecher’s Plymouth Collection, 1855, altered to read,

In spite of the occasion for which it was written it is not a hymn but a hortatory poem of five stanzas in a most unusual 10.6.10.6 metre, for which it must have been difficult to find any singable tune.

7. I heard the bells on Christmas Day

This carol was written in 1864, for the Sunday School of the Unitarian Church of the Disciples, Boston, of which Rev. James Freeman Clarke was minister. The entire poem, entitled “Christmas Bells,” has seven stanzas, of which 1, 2, 6 and 7 are in The New Hymn and Tune Book, 1914, in Hymns of the Spirit, 1937, and in The Pilgrim Hymnal, 1935. The omitted stanzas contain references to the Civil War, in progress when the carol was written.

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8. Into the silent land,

A translation from the German poem “Ins Stille Land! Wer Leitet uns hinüber,” by J. G. Salis-Seewis, 1808. Published by Longfellow in Voices of the Night, 1840. Included in Hedge and Huntington’s Hymns for the Church of Christ, 1853, and other American collections.

9. Tell me not in mournful numbers,

Published in Voices of the Night, 1839, as “A Psalm of Life; What the heart of the Young Man said to the Psalmist.” Included in several hymnals in Great Britain and America. In some collections it begins with the second stanza

10. There is no flock, however watched and tended

A cento from the author’s Seaside and Fireside, 1849.

11. We have not wings: we may not soar.

In 1850 the poet wrote “The Ladder of St. Augustine,” a poem in twelve stanzas, based upon a quotation from Sermon III, De Ascensione, by St. Augustine of Hippo, “De vitiis nostris scalam nobis facimus, si vitia ipsa calcamus.” (We shall make a ladder out of our vices, if we tread those vices under foot.) The three stanzas of the hymn are, respectively, the seventh, tenth and second stanzas of the poem.

H.W.F.

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Longfellow, Rev. Samuel, Portland, Maine, June 18, 1819—October 3, 1892, Portland, was the youngest of the eight children of Stephen and Zilpah (Wadsworth) Longfellow. Stephen Longfellow had graduated from Harvard and had become one of the most prominent citizens of Portland. His son Samuel entered Harvard with the Class of 1839, just after his brother, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, more than twelve years his senior, had returned from Europe to begin his professorship at Harvard.

Samuel entered the Harvard Divinity School, from which he graduated in 1846, and served as minister of the Unitarian Church in Fall River, Massachusetts, 1848-51; the Second Unitarian Church, Brooklyn, New York, 1853-1860; and the Unitarian Church, Germantown, Pennsylvania, 1878-1883. In the intervals between these pastorates he did much occasional preaching, and, having independent means and no marital ties, made several prolonged visits to Europe. He had an attractive personality, was witty and highly intelligent, and was an acceptable though outspoken preacher, but he is now remembered for his contribution to American hymnody through the hymns which he wrote and the books which he edited. His accomplishment in this field was greater and more lasting than that of any other American in the middle period of the 19^th century. Its development can best be traced in the books which he published.

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The first of these was A Book of Hymns for Public and Private Devotions, which he and his classmate in the Divinity School, Samuel Johnson, daringly compiled while still students in the School. A not improbable story of the origin of the book reports that their friend, Rev. Francis Parker Appleton, then a young minister at Peabody, Massachusetts, had complained to them about the antiquated hymn-book which he found in use in his church, to which they replied that they would prepare a book for him which would express the religious aspirations of the rising generation. The book appeared in 1846, before either of the young editors had been ordained, and was an immediate success. It was first used in the First Unitarian Church at Worcester, Massachusetts, where Longfellow’s classmate and lifelong friend, Edward Everett Hale, had just been ordained at a service for which Longfellow wrote the ordination hymn, and it was promptly adopted by Theodore Parker for his congregation in Music Hall. The book was re-published in somewhat revised and enlarged form in 1848, and ran to 12 editions. It marked a new epoch in American hymnody because it was the product of young and adventurous but well-trained minds seeking to give utterance to the emotions stirred by the intellectual and political ferment of the times, and because of the new sources to which they turned. They were the first to see and make use of the hymnic possibilities of the poems of John Greenleaf Whittier, and to include in an American hymn-book Newman’s “Lead, kindly Light,” which they had found printed in a newspaper without the author’s name, though they altered the first line to read “Send kindly Light,” and another line further down. From their book it passed into other collections, with variant readings.

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In 1859 Longfellow published a little collection entitled Vespers, hymns for use at the vesper services which he had instituted in his church in Brooklyn. In 1860 he published A Book of Hymns and Tunes for the Sunday School, the Congregation, and the Home, and in 1864 he and Samuel Johnson brought out their second notable book, Hymns of the Spirit, (not to be confused with the hymn book with the same title published by the Beacon Press in 1937). This book contained most of the later hymns written by the two editors, and a good many new hymns by other authors who were glad to contribute them. Its literary level was higher than that of their first book, but it had less popular success, in part, perhaps, because they failed to set the words to tunes, which had become the common practice in the period since their earlier book appeared. In 1876 he brought out A Book of Hymns & Tunes for the Congregation & the Home, a revision of his earlier book with a similar title, in which several of his earlier hymns appear in revised form. In 1887 he printed privately A Few Verses of Many Years.

After his death a small volume entitled Hymns and Verses by Samuel Longfellow was published in 1894 with a very brief introductory note by his niece, Miss Alice M. Longfellow. It included 41 hymns which she thought were his, followed by 30 short poems of no outstanding excellence. Some of the “hymns” included seem never to have come into use as such; some of her attributions were mistaken; she omitted some hymns which he wrote or adapted but cited in his books as “Anonymous” because based on the work of others; and she did not always print the best of extant variant readings. This book, therefore, must be used with caution in compiling the list of Longfellow’s hymns, whether original or adapted.

Before listing his hymns it should be noted that he wrote 169 or edited several other literary works. In 1853 he and his classmate Thomas Wentworth Higginson published a beautiful collection of sea-poems entitled Thalatta. He wrote a memoir of his friend, Rev. Samuel Johnson, 1883; was the author of a Life of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, 1886; and edited Final Memorials of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow in 1887. A volume of his own Essays and Sermons, edited by Joseph May, was published in 1894.

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Alphabetical List of Hymns written or adapted by Samuel Longfellow

Abbreviations:

Bk. Hys. = The Book of Hymns, 1846 or 1848.

H. and V. = Hymns & Verses by Samuel Longfellow, 1894.

Hys. Sp. = Hymns of the Spirit, 1864.

J. (followed by page number) = Julian’s Dictionary of Hymnology.

S. L. = Samuel Longfellow

1. A voice by Jordan’s shore. (Advent)

Printed in Hys. Sp. 1864, under title of “John and Jesus”; in H. & V., no date.

2. Again as evening’s shadow falls. (Evening)

Published in Vespers, New York, 1860, headed “Nox et tenebrae,” in 2 stas. of 8 l., and reprinted in Hys. Sp. 1864, with the title “Vesper Hymn,” in 4 stas. of 4 l.; also in H. & V. in which it is the fourth and concluding hymn of a group called “Vesper Hymns,” and dated 1859, the 3^d and 4^th of which were included in Hys. Sp., 1864.

3. Beneath the shadow of the cross. (Sacrifice)

Written in Fall River, 1848, and published in the Supplement to A Book of Hymns, Second Edition, Boston, 1848, with the title “The New Commandment,” in 3 stas. of 4 l.; in H. & V.

4. Eternal One, Thou living God. (Anniversary)

Written in 1875 for a church anniversary, possibly for the 25^th anniversary of the Preble Chapel in 171 Portland, Maine; 5 stas. of 4 l. In H. & V. the original reading of the last two lines,

are changed to the inferior reading,

5. Every bird that upward springs.

Included in Supplement to Bk. Hys., 1848, attributed to Neale, and also in Hys. Sp., 1864. It is in fact S.L.’s adaptation of part of a hymn by Neale for St. Andrew’s Day, included in his “Hymns for Children”, 1842; see pp. 360-1 of the Collected Hymns, Sequences and Carols of J. M. Neale, 1914. S.L. used stas. 4, 5, 6 and 7 of Neale’s hymn in 8 stas. Of the 16 lines in S.L.’s version 9 are taken unchanged from Neale, 6 contain part of Neale’s wording, and only 1 is wholly S.L.’s. S.L. writing in 1880 said, “I may say that hymn 585, [i.e. Every bird, etc.] is mine—I did not put my name because two lines were not mine—“. (see H. W. Foote, The Anonymous Hymns of Samuel Longfellow, Harv. Theol. Rev. Oct., 1917.) This letter illustrates the fallibility of human memory. In the 32 years which had elapsed since he had adapted Neale’s verses for the Supplement to Bk. Hys. his own contribution to the final result had come to bulk much larger than it really was. S.L. was right in ascribing the hymn to Neale, as he did in 1848 and 1864, tho he might properly have marked it as “Neale, altered.”

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6. Father, give thy benediction. (Dismissal)

One stanza, 8 lines, printed anonymously in Hys. Sp.; described by S.L. as “of no importance”, but included in his H. & V. Listed as “Anon.” in the first edition of the Pilgrim Hymnal. Included in the Isles of Shoals Hymn Book, 1908. (H. W. Foote, The Anonymous Hymns of Samuel Longfellow, Harv. Theol. Rev. October, 1917). See J. 1563.

7. Go forth to life, O child of earth. (Life’s mission)

Written in 1859, included in his Book of Hymns and Tunes for the Sunday School, and in Hys. Sp. 1864, under title “Life’s Mission.” 4 stas. of 4 l.

8. God of the earth, the sea, the sky. (Divine Immanence)

Printed anonymously in Hys. Sp. 1864, under title “God, through all and in you all”; included in H. & V. with l. 2 in sta. 1 altered; no date. (H. W. Foote, The Anonymous Hymns of Samuel Longfellow, Harv. Theol. Rev. October, 1917).

9. God of Truth! Thy sons should be,

No. 550 in Hys. Sp. 1864, where it is listed as “Anon,” because, as he later wrote, it was “founded on a H. of Wesley” though “nearly all mine.” (H. W. Foote, The Anonymous Hymns of Samuel Longfellow, Harv. Theol. Rev., October, 1917).

10. God’s trumpet wakes the slumbering world. (Courage)

Printed anonymously in Hys. Sp. 1864 under title “On the Lord’s Side”; in H. & V., no date. 5 stas. of 4 l.

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11. He, who himself and God would know. (Silent worship)

Printed in Hys. Sp. 1864 as “From Martineau” under title of “Be still, and know that I am God.” This is S.L.’s versification of a passage from Martineau’s sermon, “Silence and Meditation”, no. 17 in “Endeavors after the Christian Life,” in which Martineau paraphrased a few sentences in Pascal’s “Thoughts”, no. 72. Not dated; not included in H. & V. (H. W. Foote, The Anonymous Hymns of Samuel Longfellow, Harv. Theol. Rev. October, 1917.)

12. Holy Spirit, Truth [Light] Divine.

Included in Hys. Sp. under title “Prayer for Inspiration”; also in H. & V., without date. In the introductory note to H. & V. it is stated that this hymn “bears some resemblance to one by Andrew Reed, but after careful investigation they appear to be quite distinct.” In spite of this disclaimer it is clear that the theme of the hymn as a whole, and several of its lines, are borrowed from the hymn, “Holy Ghost, with light divine” by Andrew Reed, 1817. Furthermore, S.L.’s arrangement of this hymn is found in two different versions, the one in H. & V. beginning, “Holy Spirit, Truth divine,” the other, and superior one, beginning, “Holy Spirit, Light divine.” It will be found in this latter form in The New Hymn and Tune Book, 1914, and in Hymns of the Spirit, 1937, in both of which it is attributed to both Reed and Longfellow.

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13. Holy Spirit, source of gladness.

S.L.’s adaptation of Jacobi and Toplady’s version of Gerhardt’s “O du allersusste Freude”; included in Supplement to Bk. Hys. 1848, and in altered form in Hys. Sp. 1864; set down as “Anon.” in both; not included in H. & V.

14. I look to Thee in every need, (Trust)

In Hys. Sp., 1864, with title “Looking Unto God,” and listed as “Anon.”, but included in H. & V. as Longfellow’s. He had not claimed it because its opening stanza was strongly reminiscent of a love-song by Thomas Haynes Bayly, as indicated by S.L.’s pencilled notation in his copy of Hys. Sp. now in the library of Union Theological Seminary, New York, reading “V. 1, T. H. Bayley, alt.” Bayly (not Baylēy) (1797-1839) was an English composer of popular sentimental songs one of which began,

This song, though one of Bayly’s best, is not included in his collected works, but a copy, with his name as its author, is in the Harvard University Library. It 175 was published by C. Bradlee, 107 Washington St., Boston, n.d., the words set “to a favorite Neapolitan melody”, and must have still been well remembered when S.L. was inspired to transfigure the thought of its opening stanza by giving it a profoundly spiritual interpretation. He made no use of Bayly’s second and third stanzas, and changed the metre from 8.6.8.6. double to six line stanzas, 8.6.8.6.8.8., thus making sure that his words would be sung to another tune than the “Neapolitan melody.”

15. In the beginning was the word. (The Word of God)

This was printed in The Liberty Bell, Boston, 1851, in 6 stanzas of 8 lines, and dated “Fall River, Sept. 1850.” Two stanzas are included in Hys. Sp. 1864; also in H. & V., undated.

16. Life of all that lives below.

An adaptation from Charles Wesley; not in Bk. Hys. or Hys. Sp.

17. Life of God, within my soul. (God in the soul)

Only found in H. & V., undated, entitled “A Prayer.” 4 stas. of 4 l.

18. Light of ages and of nations. (Inspiration)

Dated 1860 in H. & V. in which it begins as above with title “In all ages entering holy souls.” It was first printed, however, in Hys. Sp. 1864 as “God of ages,” under title “The word of the Lord abideth forever.” 3 stas. of 8 l.

19. Lo! the earth is risen again. (Easter)

In H. & V. the first line reads “Lo the earth again 176 is risen,” with no date, but Dr. Louis F. Benson owned a copy of the book in which a ms. note was appended to this hymn reading

“In memory of C.J. July 6, 1864 May 12, 1886. Written for the first anniversary of her death, May 12, 1887.”

Several other lines besides the opening one have been re-written, presumably by S.L., to make the later and improved version of the hymn included in Hymns of the Spirit, 1937.

20. Love for all! and can it be? (The Prodigal Son)

Included in Hys. Sp. 1864 under title “Father, I have sinned”; also in H. & V. without date. 6 stas. of 4 l.

21. Now on land and sea descending. (Evening)

This is the 3^d of the Vesper Hymns in H. & V. 2 stas. of 8 l. (See note under “Again as evening’s shadow falls.”)

22. Now while we sing our closing psalm. (Close of worship)

In H. & V., no date; not in Bk. Hys. or Hys. Sp.

23. Now with creation’s morning song. (Morning)

In Hys. Sp. 1864, ascribed to “Breviary”; it is S.L.’s adaptation of E. Caswall’s trans. of “Lux ecce surgit aurea”, beginning “Now with the rising golden dawn”; see Julian’s Dict. pp. 820-821.

24. O church of freedom and of faith. (Installation)

Written in 1891, presumably for the installation 177 of Rev. John Carroll Perkins as minister of the First Parish in Portland in that year. Included in H. & V. Not found elsewhere.

25. O Father, fix this wavering will.

No. 368 in Hys. Sp. 1864, “Anon.” but later acknowledged by S.L. as his though “of no importance.” (H. W. Foote, The Anonymous Hymns of Samuel Longfellow, Harv. Theol. Rev., Oct., 1917.)

26. O God! a temple to thy name.

“Hymn for the dedication of the new chapel of the First Parish, Haverhill.” Dated 1848 in H. & V., but not found elsewhere. 5 stas. of 4 l.

27. O God! Thy children gathered here. (Ordination)

“Hymn for the ordination of Edward Everett Hale” at Worcester, Massachusetts in 1846. Bk. Hys. 1848; H. & V. 1894. 6 stas. of 4 l.

28. O God, thou giver of all good! (Gratitude)

Included in Hys. Sp. 1864, and in H. & V., without date, under title “Give us this day our daily bread.” 4 stas. of 4 l.

29. O God unseen, but ever near.

S.L.’s adaptation of hymn by E. Osler, printed in Hys. Sp. 1864, in 3 stas of 4 l., entitled “At the fountain”. Anon, in index. “It is, in fact E. Osler’s hymn rewritten, 7 of its 12 lines being Osler’s.” The expanded form in later books is 178 attributed to S.L., but should be “E. Osler alt. by S.L.” See Julian’s Dict. pp. 1665, 1681, 833.

This hymn in two stanzas, 8 lines, is found only in C. W. Wendte’s book The Carol: for Sunday School and the Home (1886), where it is attributed to Samuel Longfellow and dated 1886.

31. O Life that maketh all things new.

Written under the title “The light that lighteth every man,” for the 2^d Social Festival of the Free Religious Association 1874, in 2 stas. of 8 l.; afterwards published in A Book of Hymns and Tunes for the Congregation and the Home, Cambridge, 1876, with the title “Greeting”, in 4 stas. of 4 l.; included in H. & V. under title “Behold, I make all things new”, and there incorrectly dated 1878. For use of first line see note under “O Thou whose liberal sun and rain.”

32. O still in accents sweet and strong. (Ordination)

Printed in Hys. Sp. 1864 under title “Behold the fields are white.” H. & V., no date. 4 stas. of 4 l.

33. O Thou, in whom we live and move.

In Hys. Sp. 1864, this begins, “O God, in whom we live and move,” 5 stas. of 4 l. headed “God’s Law and Love.” In H. & V. it begins, “O Thou, in whom we live and move,” the form in which the hymn has passed into later use.

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34. O Thou, whose liberal sun and rain. (Church anniversary)

Included in Hys. Sp. 1864, and in H. & V. no date. 3 stas. of 4 l. (Note the last line, “To Him who maketh all things new”, used later for first line of hymn “O Life that maketh all things new.”)

35. One holy church of God appears. (The church universal)

Dated 1860 in H. & V.; included in Hys. Sp. 1864. 5 stas. of 4 l.

36. Out of every clime and people. (Christmas)

This hymn in two stanzas, 8 lines, with chorus, is found only in C. W. Wendte’s The Carol: for Sunday School and the Home (1886) where it is attributed to S.L. (except chorus).

37. Out of the dark, the circling sphere. (Hope and courage)

Based on a hymn written in 1856 for the 25^th anniversary of the American Anti-Slavery Society, with the title “What of the night?” and beginning, “A quarter of the circling sphere.” See H. & V. for the original version, which S.L. rewrote for Hys. Sp. 1864, in 5 stas. of 4 l. The misplaced comment by Putnam in Singers and Songs of the Liberal Faith, p. 429, that it was “founded on a passage in one of Mr. Martineau’s sermons,” refers not to this hymn but to “He who himself and God would know,” cited earlier in this listing.

38. Peace, peace on earth, the heart of man forever. (Peace on earth)

Included in Hys. Sp. 1864 and H. & V., no date. 2 stas. of 4 l.

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39. Sing forth his high eternal name. (Praise)

Written by request for words to tune “Coronation.” In H. & V. under title “The Lord of all”, no date, 6 stas. of 4 l.

40. Spirit divine attend our prayer.

This hymn appeared in Hys. Sp. 1864, as “Anon.” It is S.L.’s adaptation of a hymn by Andrew Reed, 1829, about half the lines having been re-written. It should be credited to both writers as a joint production.

41. The loving Friend to all who bowed. (Jesus)

Included in Hys. Sp. under title “Jesus of Nazareth”; no date in H. & V. 5 stas. of 4 l.

42. The summer days are come again.

H. & V. includes a song in three 8-line stanzas headed “Summer Rural Gathering”, dated 1859, each stanza beginning, “The sweet June days are come again.” In Hys. Sp. 1864, the second and third stanzas of this song are taken to form a hymn for summer, each beginning, “The summer days are come again”, the concluding quatrain of the last stanza re-written.

43. ’Tis winter now; the fallen snow.

Dated 1859 in H. & V. In Hys. Sp., 4 stas. of 4 l.

44. Thou Lord of life, our saving health. (Dedication of hospital)

“Written for dedication of Cambridge Hospital.” In H. & V., 4 stas. of 4 l., dated 1886.

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45. We sowed a seed in faith and hope.

“Written for the 25^th anniversary of the first meeting of the Second Unitarian Society of Brooklyn”, included in H. & V. under title “The truth shall make you free.” No further use.

46. When from the Jordan’s gleaming wave. (Baptism)

Dated 1848 in H. & V., but it was included in Bk. Hys. 1846, 5 stas. of 4 l.

There are also five hymns, composite in origin and listed as “Anonymous” in Hys. Sp. 1864, which in style and sentiment so closely resemble S.L.’s writings as to suggest that he gave them the form in which they are there printed, viz:—

This is printed in 6 stas., the first four of which are taken from “The Hymn of the Calabrian Shepherds,” printed in William Young’s Catholic Choralist, 1842, but there beginning, “Darker and darker fall around.” The 5^th and 6^th stas. may be by S.L. since he referred to this hymn as it appeared in Hys. Sp. as “founded upon the Hymn of the Calabrian Shepherds,” tho he did not state that he wrote them. (H. W. Foote, The Anonymous Hymns of Samuel Longfellow; and Julian, Dictionary, p. 1627.)

48. Come, thou Almighty Will

This hymn in three stanzas was included as Anon. in Longfellow and Johnson’s Hymns of the Spirit, 182 1864. Its theme was obviously suggested by Ray Palmer’s five stanza translation of the 12^th century Latin hymn Veni Sancte Spiritus, beginning Come, Holy Ghost, in love, published in 1858, from which three lines are borrowed intact, with as many more which only slightly alter Palmer’s words. Since the religious outlook expressed is characteristic of Samuel Longfellow, and the hymn first appeared in Hymns of the Spirit, it seems certain that he was the author but listed it as Anon, because of its composite form. It was included in several later Unitarian hymn books, most recently in The New Hymn and Tune Book, 1914, and in Hymns of the Spirit, 1937. (J. 1623 H.W.F.)

49. Give forth thine earnest cry.

Printed in three 4-line stas. There is no evidence as to the authorship of this hymn, but its sentiment is completely in line with Longfellow’s. Included in Hymns of the Spirit, 1864, and in The New Hymn and Tune Book, 1914.

50. God is in his holy temple.

Printed in four 4-line stas. One line is almost identical with one found in S.L.’s earlier hymn “Written for the dedication of the New Chapel of the First Parish, Haverhill, Mass.”, which had had no use beyond the occasion for which it was 183 written, but which Miss Longfellow included in Hymns and Verses. The recurrence of this line in the hymn here listed suggests the probability that the whole hymn is by S.L. though he preferred to cite it as “Anon.”

51. Supreme disposer of the heart.

This appeared in the 1848 edition of the Book of Hymns, where it is cited as from “Breviary”, and was included by Miss Longfellow in Hymns and Verses with the same citation. She probably assumed that it was a translation by S.L. from a Latin hymn. It is, however, a largely rewritten version of John Chandler’s translation of the hymn Supreme motor cordium, in his Hymns of the Primitive Church, 1837, p. 31. Longfellow retained the general pattern of Chandler’s five stanzas, and kept a few of his lines unchanged, or altered by only a word or two, but rewrote the rest, the fourth and fifth stas. being wholly S.L.’s, differing from Chandler’s in both phrase and significance, and even further from the Latin original.

The Isles of Shoals Hymn Book, 1908, contains a hymn in two stanzas, 8.6.8.6.D., beginning

52. The heavens thy praise are telling,

Given as “Anon.” but Mrs. Emma Marean, q.v., who was exceptionally well informed about that book, attributed it to “Spitta-Longfellow,” i.e., by 184 S. Longfellow based on a German hymn by C. J. P. Spitta. It is possible that this is the case but the original by Spitta has not been traced and Longfellow did not claim this arrangement.

H.W.F.

185

Loring, Louisa Putnam (1854-1924) of Boston and Pride’s Crossing, Massachusetts, compiled Hymns of the Ages, published in 1904. Her literary and musical standards were high, and the book was handsomely printed, but its appeal was limited and it had to compete with several other excellent hymnbooks then on the market for use among Unitarians. It included Miss Loring’s own morning hymn beginning,

O Thou who turnest into morning, (1902)

also included in The New Hymn and Tune Book, 1914.

H.W.F.

Loring, William Joseph, Boston, Massachusetts, October 8, 1795—1841, Boston. He graduated from Harvard College in 1813 and went into business in Boston. He was a lay member of the Unitarian denomination; was president of the Washington Benevolent Society; and was a member of the Horticultural Society. He was probably the author of the hymn beginning,

Why weep for those, frail child of woe,

attributed to “W. J. Loring” in Hedge and Huntington’s Hymns for the Church of Christ, 1853.

H.W.F.

186

Lowell, James Russell, LL.D., Cambridge, Massachusetts, February 22, 1819—August 12, 1891, Cambridge. Son of Rev. Charles Lowell, minister of the West Church (Unitarian), Boston, he graduated from Harvard College in 1838, and entered upon a literary career as a poet, essayist and scholar. In 1855 he succeeded H. W. Longfellow as Professor of Belles Lettres at Harvard and spent the next two years in Europe to increase his knowledge of southern European languages and literature. On his return he was the first editor of The Atlantic Monthly, 1857-1862, then editor of The North American Review, 1863-1872. He was United States Minister to Spain, 1877-1880, and to Great Britain, 1880-1885. He wrote many essays, addresses and poems. These last were published in a succession of volumes, “A Year’s Life,” 1841; “Poems,” 1844-1854; “The Vision of Sir Launfal,” 1845; “A Fable for Critics,” 1845; “The Biglow Papers,” 1848 and 1867; “The Commemoration Ode,” 1865; “Under the Willows,” 1868; and later volumes, his “Complete Poems” appearing in 1895. Though some of his poems show deep religious feeling he made only a slight and indirect contribution to American hymnody, writing only one hymn and one Christmas carol, although stanzas quarried out of his poems have been used as hymns, as follows:—

The 1^st, 3^d and 4^th stanzas of his anti-slavery poem, “Stanzas on Freedom,” written in 1844. It was included in this form in The Soldier’s Companion, 1861, in Longfellow and Johnson’s Hymns of the Spirit, 1864, and in part in Songs of the Sanctuary, N. Y. 1865, beginning

187

2. Once to every man and nation,

In December, 1844, Lowell wrote a poem in 18 stas. of 5 l. entitled “The Present Crisis,” a protest against the war with Mexico. The English hymnnologist, Rev. V. Garrett Horder, took from this poem a number of lines sufficient to make a hymn of 4 stas. which he included, with a few verbal alterations, in his Hymns Supplemental, 1896, and then in his Treasury of Hymns. The English Hymnal included the hymn in 1906, and from this it passed into many collections. In the form commonly used in this country, stanza 1 is that of sta. 5 in the original poem; sta. 2 is that of original sta. 11; sta. 3 is no. 13, original; and sta. 4, part of sta. 6 and part of sta. 8 original. In this form it has had considerable use in this country.

3. Our house, our God, we give to Thee,

Hymn for the dedication of the First Church (Unitarian), Watertown, Massachusetts, on August 3, 1842, in a service in which Rev. Samuel Ripley made the dedicatory prayer and the sermon was preached by Rev. Convers Francis, who had recently left Watertown to accept a professorship at the Harvard Divinity School. Lowell’s Cambridge residence at “Elmwood” was only a short distance from the Watertown line, and Miss Maria White, whom he married in 1844, belonged 188 to the Watertown parish, which suggests the possibility that it was she who persuaded him to write the hymn. It was not included in any of his published works but has been found on the only known copy of the printed program of the service, now owned by the Huntington Library, San Marino, Pasadena, California. It probably was used only on the occasion for which it was written.

4. The ages one great minster seem,

Taken from a poem “Godminster Chimes” which was “Written in aid of a chime of bells for Christ Church, Cambridge,” and published in “Under the Willows,” 1868. From this poem of 7 stas. 8 l., enough lines have been selected and arranged, with a few verbal alterations, to make a hymn on the theme of the Church Universal, in 4 stas. of 4 l.

5. What means this glory round our feet?

A Christmas carol written in 1866 “For the children of the Church of the Disciples”, Boston, (Unitarian), of which Rev. James Freeman Clarke, q.v., was minister. Of the original 7 stas., five have come into considerable use.

Of the above listed hymns all except no. 3 are in current use in various hymn books. Nos. 2 and 5 are in The Pilgrim Hymnal, 1935; nos. 1, 2, 4 and 5 in the New Hymn and Tune Book, 189 1914, and in Hymns of the Spirit, 1864.

J. 698 H.W.F.

Lunt, Rev. William Parsons, D.D., Newburyport, Mass., April 21, 1805—March 31, 1857, Akabah, Arabia. He graduated from Harvard College in 1823, and from the Harvard Divinity School in 1828. On June 19, 1828 he was ordained as the first settled minister of the Second Unitarian Congregational Society in New York, where he served for five years. On June 3, 1835, he was installed as associate minister of the First Church in Quincy, Mass., where he became the sole minister in 1843 and served until his death while on a journey to Palestine. After his death his hymns and occasional poems were printed in a small volume entitled Gleanings, but none of them have been included in later books. His contribution to American hymnody was made by the publication of his collection entitled The Christian Psalter, 1841, for his congregation at Quincy, but its fine quality brought it into much wider use. It is chiefly remembered today because it included 5 hymns and the metrical version of 17 psalms by his distinguished parishioner, John Quincy Adams, q.v.

J. 703 H.W.F.

190

Mann, Rev. Newton, Cazenovia, New York, January 16, 1856—July 25, 1926, Chicago, Illinois. He graduated from Cazenovia Academy, and during the Civil War served as head of the Western Sanitary Commission. He then entered the Unitarian ministry and was ordained as pastor of the church in Kenosha, Wisconsin, which he organized and served for three years. He later served churches in Troy, New York, 1868-70; Rochester, New York, 1870-1888; and Omaha, Nebraska, 1888-1908, after which he retired to Chicago. His only connection with hymnody was his versification of an English translation of the Jewish creedal statement known as the Yigdal. His verse, which has not survived, was later recast by Rev. W. C. Gannett, q.v., to form the great hymn

Praise to the living God! All praiséd be his name!

concerning which detailed information will be found under Dr. Gannett’s name. In its present form the hymn is probably mostly the work of Gannett, but Mann should be credited with having drafted its earlier form. See also Foote, Three Centuries of American Hymnody, 339-340.

H.W.F.

191

Marean, Mrs. Emma (Endicott), Boston, Massachusetts, January 20, 1854—October 17, 1936, Cambridge, Massachusetts. She married Joseph Mason Marean January 20, 1876. Two hymns by her were included in The Isles of Shoals Hymn Book (Unitarian), 1908,

1. Grateful for another day, (An Island Morning)

2. Set from the restless world apart (An Island Hymn)

Neither has been included in later hymn books but both are in her small volume of poems, Now and Then, Cambridge, 1928.

H.W.F.

192

Mason, Mrs. Caroline Atherton (Briggs), Marblehead, Massachusetts, July 27, 1823—June 13, 1890, Fitchburg, Massachusetts. In 1853 she married Charles Mason, a lawyer living in Fitchburg. She published in 1852 a volume of poems entitled Utterance: or Private Voices to the Public Heart, and after her death another collection was published, her Lost Ring and Other Poems, 1891.

Three of her hymns have had considerable use.