{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_56479/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_56479","id":"gutenberg_56479","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/56479","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Music","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Hymns, English -- History and criticism"],"text":"Produced by Stephen Hutcheson and the Online Distributed\nProofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n                          HYMN STORIES OF THE\n                           TWENTIETH CENTURY\n\n\n                                  _by_\n                      WILLIAM J. HART, M.A., D.D.\n           _Member of the Hymn Society of America, author of\n                \"Unfamiliar Stories of Familiar Hymns\"_\n\n                          _With a Foreword by_\n                   BISHOP W. EARL LEDDEN, D.D., LL.D.\n\n    [Illustration: Publisher Logo]\n\n            _Publishers_    W. A. WILDE COMPANY    _Boston_\n\n                           _Copyright, 1948_\n                         By W. A. Wilde Company\n                         _All rights reserved_\n                  Made in the United States of America\n\n\n                               _Dedicated\n                                  to_\n                  The Churches I Have Served as Pastor\n\n\n\n\n                                FOREWORD\n\n\nThe most important musical feature of any service of worship is the\nsinging of hymns by the congregation. When voices are united in\nChristian song, hearts may readily be joined in common worship. Then it\nbecomes much more than a musical feature. It becomes an act of worship.\nAnd all who thus sing are builders of a Temple of Tone wherein their own\nhearts become the altar, high and lifted up.\n\nBefore this great thing can come to pass, there must be a familiarity\nwith the hymns--an appreciation of these \"crown jewels of the church.\"\nAnyone, then, who directs attention to Christian hymns and stimulates\ninterest in them is adding to our resources for private and public\nworship.\n\nThe author of this volume is continuing and extending his Christian\nministry by calling attention to the use of hymns and gospel songs on\nvarious occasions and exhorting us all to sing. He is a retired member\nof the Northern New York Conference of The Methodist Church, honored for\nhis long and fruitful ministry, and beloved for his unfailing devotion\nto the spreading of the gospel through the still wider use of Christian\nhymns.\n\n                                                         W. Earl Ledden.\n\n_Syracuse, New York_\n\n\n\n\n                           TABLE OF CONTENTS\n\n\n  Introduction                                                          9\n  _Chapter I._ Let's Sing                                              13\n      1. They Sang with the Marine Band\n      2. Song of the Chaplain's Wife\n      3. Our Popular Processional Hymn\n      4. Heard Lauder's Song and Wesley's Hymn\n      5. The Hymn with Exclamation Points\n  _Chapter II._ Morning Melodies                                       25\n      1. The Morning Call\n      2. Morning Hymn on an Ocean Voyage\n      3. Morning Songs Fill the Day with Music\n      4. Hymn Suggested by a \"Blaze of Leafage\"\n  _Chapter III._ Sunset Songs                                          32\n      1. Nature Gave the Perfect Touch\n      2. The Bells of Trinity\n      3. Singing Soldiers\n      4. Hymn Discussion at Oyster Bay\n  _Chapter IV._ Serenading the Soul With Song                          39\n      1. That Was Yesterday!\n      2. Song of the Hidden Singer\n      3. Americans Sang with the Japanese Lady\n      4. Northfield's Festival of Sacred Music\n  _Chapter V._ Hymns of Comfort                                        47\n      1. God's Angels in Charge\n      2. Singing Welshmen at Oxford\n      3. Singing Amid Suffering\n      4. Songs of a Sorrowing Nation\n  _Chapter VI._ Occasions To Remember                                  58\n      1. \"Abide With Me\" in a Submarine\n      2. Wheel Chair Singers\n      3. Sang the Hymn from Memory\n      4. Hymn Expressed the Hearer's Feelings\n      5. Hymn of the Homesick American\n      6. His Ordination Hymn\n      7. Soldiers Sang at Their General's Funeral\n  _Chapter VII._ Hymns That Changed Lives                              71\n      1. When Catherine Booth Made the Great Decision\n      2. His Song and Experience in a Coal Mine\n      3. Decision of the \"Incorrigible\"\n      4. The Hymn That Wrought a Miracle\n  _Chapter VIII._ Songs of Childhood and Youth                         80\n      1. Song of the Child in the Shelter\n      2. What the Scouts Sang\n      3. \"Jesus Bids Us Shine\"\n      4. Men Loved the Kiddies' Hymn\n  _Chapter IX._ Sang in Their Own Tongues                              87\n      1. Chinese and Americans Sang a Negro Spiritual\n      2. Christmas Carols in Two Tongues\n      3. \"Everybody Knows 'Holy Night'\"\n      4. Unifying Influence Of Song at Eastertide\n  _Chapter X._ Patriotic Music in War and Peace                        93\n      1. Surprise for American Soldiers\n      2. \"America the Beautiful\" Heard at Arlington\n      3. An American Home on Invasion Day\n      4. \"Our God is Marching On!\"\n      5. \"The Star-Spangled Banner\" at War's End\n      6. Kipling's \"Recessional\"\n  _Chapter XI._ Thanksgiving in Song                                  105\n      1. Two Statesmen Sang \"America\"\n      2. Gunner Led the Song Of Praise\n      3. Minister Thrilled by Singing of Philadelphia Laymen\n      4. \"We Love the Place\"\n      5. Memorable Rendering of the Doxology\n  _Chapter XII._ Carols at Christmastide                              115\n      1. Christmas Carols on Deck of Battleship\n      2. Christmastide Song of Blind Singers\n      3. Not Too Late to Hear the Christmas Music\n      4. Carol the Children Wanted\n  _Chapter XIII._ The Cross and the Church                            121\n      1. Building Gone, but Hymn Remains\n      2. An Army with Banners\n      3. Church Cross Inspired Grocer's Song\n      4. Visiting Singer Familiar with the Hymn\n  _Chapter XIV._ Easter With the Hymnal                               127\n      1. Easter Song of a Centenarian\n      2. Easter in New Guinea\n      3. Eastertide Hymn at an Easter Funeral\n      4. Mother's Hymn at Eventide\n  Bibliography                                                        135\n  Index of Hymns                                                      137\n\n\n\n\n                              INTRODUCTION\n\n\n\"That was heavenly,\" said a Welshman at the close of a service of sacred\nsong at which he had listened to the narration of incidents with\napparent delight and had joyously joined in the singing. Hymns are a\nsource of joy to persons of all ages; and youth and age alike enjoy\nsinging them. The hymnal stands next to the Bible in the devotional\nreading of many people. Workers among young people find hymn stories to\nbe an important feature of their work; and preachers know that an\nillustration relating to a hymn not only makes an effective appeal but\nis also long remembered. Short hymn stories give comforting satisfaction\nto sick people in their quiet chambers, especially when they can\nsometimes sing or hum them.\n\nGreat hymns belong to the ages. They are timeless, and always new\nstories are being associated with them. But this collection of stories\ndoes not range over the centuries; it comes from our own century almost\nentirely. The hymns are mostly old; but the stories are new. Two\nquotations indicate what a hymn is and its effects.\n\nThe following was adopted by The Hymn Society of America as its\ndefinition of a Christian hymn:\n\n\"A Christian hymn is a lyric poem, reverently and devotionally\nconceived, which is designed to be sung and which expresses the\nworshipper's attitude toward God, or God's purposes in human life. It\nshould be simple and metrical in form, genuinely emotional, poetic and\nliterary in style, spiritual in quality, and in its ideas so direct and\nso immediately apparent as to unify a congregation while singing\nit.\"--Carl F. Price.\n\n\"Some kinds of music are like mental and spiritual food. They console us\nwhen we have lost someone dear to us. They inspire us to higher forms of\nliving, which give us greater inner satisfaction. They stimulate us to\nmake greater effort to overcome the immense difficulties in the future.\nThis kind of music is beyond question of great value to every\nindividual, community, and nation. This kind of music was bequeathed to\nus from many lands and is the birthright of everyone.\"--Leopold\nStokowski in \"The New York Times Magazine.\"\n\nHymn stories are related to a definite moment and to an unusual\nexperience, such as the one which tells of the men in the submarine (p.\n60); or that which relates how the visiting Scotsman thrilled the\nPresbyterian ministers in Philadelphia, and their kindled emotions found\nexpression in a hymn (p. 109). Many of them came spontaneously from the\nheart, and thus they make a lasting impression.\n\nSuch incidents as these, coming from several lands, the author has\ngleaned from many sources, both American and British, and now he shares\nthem with his readers. The sources from whence they came have been\nindicated, and his gratitude for the privilege of passing them on to\nothers is very great.\n\nThe index will enable the reader to find the hymns included. The hymns\nthemselves come from standard hymnals of the churches. A short\nbibliography is included. Among the books mentioned, that of Dr. Moffatt\nis especially useful, because it partakes, somewhat, of the nature of a\nshort dictionary of hymnology. Professor Smith's work is unique in its\narrangements and will be particularly helpful to those preparing\nprograms for special occasions. A copy of the handbook to the hymnal\nwhich the reader uses will prove to be very valuable.\n\nThe author gratefully acknowledges the helpful service rendered by the\nRev. Herbert Harrison.\n\nReaders will peruse with deep interest the Foreword written by Bishop W.\nEarl Ledden. His life has been intimately related to church music.\nDuring his student days in both college and theological seminary, he was\nactively associated with musical leadership. Since his election to the\nepiscopacy, he has sometimes given addresses to group meetings of\nministers and church lay leaders on the importance of appropriate music\nin church services. His words, therefore, come from the pen of one who\nhas had ripe experience in the field of hymnology.\n\n                                                        William J. Hart.\n\n_Lacona, New York_\n\n\n\n\n                               CHAPTER I\n                               LET'S SING\n\n\n  \"So will we sing and praise thy power\"\n                                                       --(_Psa. 21:13_).\n\n  \"Lend a voice to swell the chorus,\n    Chant the songs that time endears;\n  They were sung by those before us,\n    They will chime along the years.\"\n                                --_Arthur Guiterman in \"The Classmate.\"_\n\n  \"We have no surer link with our fathers of generations past, and with\n  our fellow-Christians of to-day, than is provided by the psalms and\n  hymns and spiritual songs which are our spiritual heritage.\"\n              --Preface to _The Hymnary of the United Church of Canada_.\n\n  \"The echoes of your music die;\n    Some say, 'The song is ended'--but\n  They do not know.\n    It lives on--in my soul;\n  And I stay nearer God\n    Because of it.\"\n                             --_Bessie C. Hicks in \"The Church School._\"\n\n  Congregational singing, as we know it, we really owe to Luther and to\n  Calvin.\n                                             --_Dr. Arthur John Gossip._\n\n\n                     They Sang with the Marine Band\n\nThe community Christmas Tree at Washington in 1946 afforded a pleasant\noccasion when it was illuminated. The scene was outlined for, probably,\nmillions of listeners in all parts of the country. The nation was\nenjoying an unusually happy season, for though World War II had ended\nmore than a year before, many of the nation's sons and daughters who had\ntaken a part in the terrific struggle had only recently returned to\ntheir homes. Wartime restrictions had made a tree impossible for a few\nyears; and so this lighting of the tree at the capital was an enjoyable\nfeature, and Washington, apparently, made the most of it. The evening\nwas fair. The crowds were in attendance, and President Truman delivered\nan address.\n\nThe United States Marine Band played, of course, and the school\nchildren, in festive mood, sang, as well as others. The tree was ablaze\nwith lights.\n\nThe ceremonies were announced to close with the playing of \"The\nStar-Spangled Banner\" by the band, and the musicians began to play. Soon\nthere came over the radio the humming of many voices, then the people\nbegan to sing as the band played. Gradually the volume of voices\nincreased. And before the music ceased it sounded as though a mighty\nchorus expressed their pent-up feelings in the happy strains:\n\n  \"Oh, say! does that star-spangled banner still wave\n  O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?\"\n\nThe joy of freedom was in their hearts and voices at that happy and\nmemorable moment. Band and voices made mighty and glorious music for the\nmany who sat in their homes and listened to the convenient radio.\n\n\n                      Song of the Chaplain's Wife\n\nShe was lonesome as she sat in the small parsonage. Her preacher husband\nhad entered the army as a chaplain in World War II, and this little\nwoman, like many others of that period, had several problems to solve. A\nfamily of small children had to be looked after. Furthermore, being a\nlay preacher, she had been asked to care for her husband's church during\nthe period of his service with the armed forces of the United States.\nHousehold help was almost impossible to secure; but, with the aid of a\nhigh school girl, mostly, she cared for the home, with its three small\nchildren, and also the church.\n\nThis little woman (for she was really small physically) was a trained\nmusician. She could both play and sing, if need be, as well as preach.\nNatural was it, therefore, that she should turn to her hymnal as well as\nher Bible for needed strength of soul. She found it in a comparatively\nnew hymn. Its prayerful spirit expressed the yearning desire of her\nsoul:\n\n  \"Come! Peace of God, and dwell again on earth,\n  Come, with the calm that hailed Thy Prince's birth,\n  Come, with the healing of Thy gentle touch,\n  Come, Peace of God, that this world needs so much.\"\n\nShe asked to have it sung when I led a devotional service. Then I later\nwrote her, asking: \"What particular association has this hymn with your\nlife?\" Her answer was as follows: \"It is a favorite hymn with me, partly\nbecause of the unusual and beautiful harmony to be found in the music,\nand partly because the words are my own prayer for the world, and also\nfor myself, now that my husband is serving as a chaplain.\"\n\nSeeking information concerning the hymn itself, I turned to the\ninforming work of Dr. McCutchen. There I learned that it \"was written\nabout 1928, when there was much talk about the peace of the world and a\ngreat desire for it amid the unrest of the nations.\" The author, Miss\nMay Rowland, submitted it in manuscript to the commission preparing the\nnew hymnal of The Methodist Church, \"and its inclusion in this book\n(1935) marked its first publication.\"\n\nThe author of the hymn, and also the composer of the tune (\"Pax\"), are\nboth residents of England, and each is a prize-winner. When The Hymn\nSociety of America issued an appeal for a \"Hymn for Airmen,\" though\nthere were more than twelve hundred competitors from all parts of the\nworld, Miss Rowland won. Musicians were then invited to furnish a\nmusical setting for the same. This contest was also world-wide, and Miss\nLily Rendle was the winner. This was in 1928; and both women were\ngreatly surprised to learn that they each lived in Bournemouth within a\nmile of each other, though they were born in different parts of the\ncountry. \"Since that time their artistic association has been close.\"\nOne of their beautiful joint productions is this:\n\n  \"The day is slowly wending\n  Toward its silent ending,\n  But 'mid its light declining\n  The evening star is shining:\n    O Father, while we sleep,\n      Thy children keep!\"\n\nWorld War II ended suddenly and dramatically. Soldiers were returning\nhome in large numbers by the latter part of 1945. \"Will Daddy be home\nfor Christmas?\" the chaplain's children began to ask. \"We hope so,\" was\nthe cheery reply of the anticipating woman. \"Perhaps he'll even return\nfor Thanksgiving,\" she added.\n\nOne day early in November Chaplain Donald M. Cobb, of the United States\nArmy, appeared at the parsonage in the little railroad center at\nRichland, New York. What an unspeakably happy moment for him, his wife,\nand the three growing children! Thanksgiving and Christmas would both be\nspent at home. Now a manly voice could blend with the voices of his wife\nand the growing girls, as that night the family circle gathered around\nthe piano and sang:\n\n  \"Come! Blessed Peace, as when, in hush of eve,\n  God's benediction falls on souls who grieve;\n  As shines a star when weary day departs,\n  Come! Peace of God, and rule within our hearts.\"\n\n\n                     Our Popular Processional Hymn\n\nThe annual picnic in many of our American Sunday Schools has some\nfeatures in common with the annual tea treat in the program of the\nvillage Sunday Schools in England. The latter, however, has some more\nspectacular features, such as the procession through the village streets\nheaded, most likely, by a band as well as the minister and the\nsuperintendent. Whit-Monday is a favored time in many sections of the\ncountry for this eagerly anticipated event.\n\nFor such a day as this a young curate in Horbury, a Yorkshire village,\nwas asked to select a hymn to be sung for the Whit-Monday occasion. He\nthought of a good marching tune, but he did not like the words. So he\nsat up late one night, composed his own song, and it was sung the next\nday for the first time. That was in 1864; and it was published in _The\nChurch Times_ (October 15) that same year as a \"Hymn for Procession with\nCross and Banners\":\n\n  \"Onward, Christian soldiers!\n    Marching as to war,\n  With the cross of Jesus\n    Going on before.\n  Christ, the royal Master,\n    Leads against the foe;\n  Forward into battle,\n    See His banners go!\"\n\nThis hymn rates high both in the United States and in England. St.\nGertrude is ideally associated with the song. This tune came from Sir\nArthur Sullivan; but someone has sagely remarked, \"It took Baring-Gould\nto inspire Sir Arthur.\" \"As a hymn of inspiration it has no superior,\"\nsaid Dr. E. S. Lorenz. More than half a century ago Dr. Charles S.\nRobinson made this illuminating comment: \"It meets an American ideal,\nmechanically speaking, in that it is simple, rhythmical, lyric, and has\na refrain at the end of each stanza.\"\n\nThe little folks like to sing this song whenever they have the\nopportunity, and this is one of the hymns they often learn before they\ncan read. \"It is fundamentally a Sunday School song; but it has grown up\nand is now sung many more times in the congregation than in the Sunday\nschool.\"\n\nGloriously inspiring is it to hear a great company of people of all ages\nsing:\n\n  \"Crown and thrones may perish,\n    Kingdoms rise and wane,\n  But the Church of Jesus\n    Constant will remain.\"\n\nSabine Baring-Gould, the author (1834-1924) a graduate of Cambridge\nUniversity, was a man of unusual versatility. Some of his experiences\nwere exceptional. He had means at his disposal, and spent considerable\ntime in his youth in France and Germany. Writing extensively, \"it is\nsaid that he has more book titles listed in the literary catalogue of\nthe British Museum than any other writer of his times.\" Various parishes\nwere served by him until 1881. He then exercised his rights \"as squire\nof the estate in Lew Trenchard, Devon,\" which he inherited from his\nfather, and appointed himself as rector.\n\nThis historic incident has been preserved for us by Dr. E. S. Lorenz:\n\"It had been carefully arranged by the Executive Committee of the\nWorld's Sunday School Convention, held at Washington, D. C., in 1910,\nthat the hymn 'Onward, Christian Soldiers,' should be sung in Sunday\nSchools in every part of the world on Sunday, May 22, of that year. For\nthis purpose the hymn was translated and printed in more than one\nhundred languages and dialects. What a magnificent illustration of the\nsolidarity of the Christian Church in a progressive, aggressive\nattitude!\"\n\n\n                 Heard Lauder's Song and Wesley's Hymn\n\n\"Before going to our watch-night services many of us heard Sir Harry\nLauder singing his old favorite, 'Keep right on to the end of the road,'\nfrom 'Though the way be long, let your heart be strong,'\" wrote a woman\nat the beginning of 1947. She was thus reminded that though we take a\nlong look backward at the close of a year, we are also disposed to take\na forward look when the New Year dawns.\n\nThen the woman went to the watch-night service at the church. Soon she\nfound herself singing with the others the hymn written for this occasion\nby Charles Wesley:\n\n  \"Come, let us anew our journey pursue,\n    Roll round with the year,\n  And never stand still till the Master appear.\n  His adorable will let us gladly fulfill,\n    And our talents improve,\n  By the patience of hope, and the labor of love.\"\n\nReturning home, she confessed that she found herself with the feeling\nthat the Scotch minstrel and the English hymn writer each had an\nappropriate message for the human spirit.\n\n\n                    The Hymn with Exclamation Points\n\nAfter Dr. Charles Kendall Gilbert was elected to succeed Bishop William\nT. Manning as head of the Protestant Episcopal diocese of New York in\nthe latter part of January, 1947, _The New York Times_ said in an\neditorial: \"It will now be his responsibility to build his church on\never stronger foundations in a world beset by doubt, bewilderment and\nconfusion. But it is also an inspiring task. The hymn sung before his\nelection was dedicatory:\n\n  \"'Rise up, O men of God!\n    Have done with lesser things.'\"\n\n\"That hymn will be sung when everything else about you is forgotten,\"\nthe great pulpit orator of Brooklyn, Dr. S. Parkes Cadman, once remarked\nto the author of the vigorous hymn which both clergymen and laymen sang\ntogether on that responsible day.\n\n\"Every stanza has at least one exclamation point,\" remarked Dr. Charles\nA. Boyd, when he called attention to this peculiar feature of the hymn\nwritten by Dr. William Pierson Merrill. In fact, out of the four stanzas\nin the copy now in front of the writer, two of these have two\nexclamation points each. The vivid style of this hymn, therefore, is an\nemphatic call for speedy action. The hymn was written to incite men to\n\"do something,\" and to do it without delay. Hence the call:\n\n  \"Give heart and mind and soul and strength\n    To serve the King of kings.\"\n\nThis hymn was written for a definite purpose and a particular occasion.\nIt came to us early in the twentieth century when the Brotherhood\nmovement was one of large proportions in some of the great denominations\nin the United States; and the large conventions which were held in vital\ncenters of the country were scenes of tremendous enthusiasm. During that\nperiod Nolan R. Best, then editor of _The Continent_, remarked to Dr.\nMerrill that there was need of a Brotherhood hymn. The suggestion\nlingered in the mind of the latter. About the same time (1911) Dr.\nMerrill read an article by Gerald Stanley Lee on \"The Church of Strong\nMen.\" \"I was on one of the Lake Michigan steamers,\" Dr. R. G. McCutchen\nquotes him as saying, \"going back to Chicago for a Sunday at my own\nchurch, when suddenly this hymn came up, almost without conscious\nthought or effort.\"\n\nQuickly the hymn made an appeal to various denominations, which included\nit in their revised hymnals. Other countries, also, approvingly placed\nthis hymn in their new books. Thus it is found in _The Hymnary_ of the\nUnited Church of Canada, and _The Methodist Hymn Book_, London. Dr.\nMerrill once said, \"It has given me very deep satisfaction to have the\nhymn obtain such general use. Several times each year I am asked for\npermission to include it in some new collection of hymns.\" But, as Dr.\nC. M. Washburn has remarked, \"Any hymnal is enriched because of the\ninclusion of these challenging lines.\"\n\nA newspaper reporter (Ernest J. Bowden) in an upstate city of New York\nhas an assignment each Sunday to attend a selected church, and then\nwrite his impressions. He is peculiarly sensitive to the music rendered,\nand often makes illuminating comments on the same. He was peculiarly\ngratified when, on a December Sunday, he was assigned to a Presbyterian\nchurch to report a visiting minister. Thirty years earlier he had heard\na new hymn sung in a city in California, and he had remembered the name\nof the writer. Now came the opportunity to hear him. After the service\nhe met the author, and the two talked about Dr. Merrill's choice hymn.\nThe author told the newspaper man that while on a trip to Oriental\nmissions he had heard this hymn sung in both Japanese and Chinese. Also,\nit was sung at a meeting in India which he addressed. At the close of\nthe gathering Dr. Merrill said to the leader of the music, \"It was very\nthoughtful of you to sing my hymn.\"\n\n\"We didn't know that you wrote it; we sang it because we like it,\" was\nthe reply.\n\n\"Better still,\" continued Dr. Merrill. \"That's the finest tribute it\ncould have received.\"\n\nThis sketch was then given by the reporter of Dr. Merrill, in 1944, \"He\nis a genial soul, free and friendly as the gospel he preached in Brick\nChurch, New York. He retired in 1938, and is now climbing toward eighty.\nBut you would never think it to see him. His voice rang clear as a bell\nthrough every pew.\" Then, speaking as a layman, he remarked: \"When a\ngroup of men have been sitting for hours, or days, in conference,\nthreshing over the routine of church or community, what more fitting\nclimax could there be than the call to sing in parting:\n\n  \"'Rise up, O men of God!\n    Have done with lesser things;\n  Give heart and mind and soul and strength\n    To serve the King of kings.'\"\n\nThe wide service rendered by this hymn to the Christian Church is\nindicated by the fact that when the Bishop of Ripon congratulated Dr.\nMerrill on having written such a choice and practical hymn, he said: \"I\nuse it at every communion service in my diocese where young people are\nreceived into the church.\" Thus did the Episcopalian leader pay tribute\nto the appeal of the hymn written by the eminent Presbyterian author.\nDoubtless this hymn is destined to play a valiant part in helping to\n\n  \"Bring in the day of Brotherhood\n    And end the night of wrong.\"\n\nI cherish a program sent me by a friend who lives in a Cornish town\nbeyond the wide Atlantic. It outlined a great service of thanksgiving\nfor the return of peace held in one of the largest churches in the\ncounty, when the several churches of the community participated. The\nrector of the parish and the several ministers of the town united in\nconducting a carefully prepared service of hymns, responsive readings,\nprayers and addresses. Thus they that day remembered those who had\nfallen in World War II. Then, in closing, those men, women and youth,\nwhich packed the great building, led by a worthy choir, stood and sang\nthe hymn of our American author:\n\n  \"Rise up, O men of God!\n    The Church for you doth wait,\n  Her strength unequal to her task;\n    Rise up, and make her great!\"\n\nThen came the closing stanza, with also two exclamation points:\n\n  \"Lift high the cross of Christ!\n    Tread where His feet have trod;\n  As brothers of the Son of Man,\n    Rise up, O men of God!\"\n\n\n\n\n                               CHAPTER II\n                            MORNING MELODIES\n\n\n  \"But I sing of thy strength,\n    a morning song to thy love.\"\n                                                (_Psa. 59:16, Moffatt_).\n\n  \"For lovely morning songs we have:\n\n  (1)\n  'Come, my soul, thou must be waking;\n    Now is breaking\n  O'er the earth another day.'\n\n  (2)\n  'When morning gilds the skies,\n  My heart awaking cries,\n    May Jesus Christ be praised!'\n\n  (3)\n    'Fairest Lord Jesus,\n    Ruler of all nature,\n  O Thou of God and man the Son,\n    Thee will I cherish\n    Thee will I honor,\n  Thee, my soul's Glory, Joy, and Crown.'\n\n  The third of these is something which seems to me a perfect\n  hymn.\"--From an address by Dean Howard Chandler Robbins at the\n  Northfield General Conference, 1938.\n\n\n                            The Morning Call\n\nHer father was a lay preacher, and she, a school teacher, followed in\nhis steps. She was in the pulpit on that Sunday morning when an American\ncitizen visited the country of his birth, in the summer of 1946 to\nobserve post-war conditions. He was now amid familiar scenes in the far\nsouth of England. The morning was full of glorious sunshine, and he went\nto church as he had done when a boy. Then he wrote an account of the\nservice, and sent it to his home folks.\n\nWhat, he wondered, would be the hymn which this \"spiritually and\nmentally disciplined woman\" might select for the opening of the service.\nThat question was answered when this preacher-daughter of a\npreacher-father announced the charming lines of Geoffrey A. Studdert\nKennedy:\n\n  \"Awake, awake to love and work,\n    The lark is in the sky,\n  The fields are wet with diamond dew,\n    The worlds awake to cry\n  Their blessings on the Lord of Life,\n    As He goes meekly by.\"\n\nThere the visitor blended his voice with some of those he had known in\nhis boyhood days as they together worshipped in the village church. The\npreacher stood in the pulpit with the ease of one born to it, and\n\"joined in the singing with the full-voiced enthusiasm of a thrush or\nmockingbird on a spring morning.\"\n\nThis song is placed among the morning hymns in _The Hymnal_ of the\nProtestant Episcopal Church (1940). Imaginative and impressive is the\nlanguage used in the second verse:\n\n  \"Come, let thy voice be one with theirs,\n    Shout with their shout of praise;\n  See how the giant sun roars up,\n    Great Lord of years and days!\n  So let the love of Jesus come\n    And set thy soul ablaze.\"\n\n\"Woodbine Willie\" was the name, for some reason, given to the author\nwhen he became a chaplain in World War I. His was a charmed name in the\narmy, and his experiences there \"made him an enthusiast for peace.\" He\nbecame a rector in London, and in 1924 he made a visit to the United\nStates and added many persons to the long list of friends already his.\nDeath came to him in Liverpool in 1929. Someone characterized him as\n\"the wholly lovable prophet of social righteousness.\" Through coming\nyears he will continue to speak to the hearts of many who joyfully sing\nhis inspiring morning hymn with its lilting tune.\n\n\n                    Morning Hymn on an Ocean Voyage\n\nTime for reflection is found on an ocean voyage, and, as the writer and\nmany others can testify, lasting impressions are often made. Such an\nexperience came to one who was making a trip around the world in the\ndays between two world wars. \"The sea,\" said he, \"was not a friend of\nmine as we rode the mountainous waves for nearly three weeks without a\nport of call.\" Much of the time, indeed, he lay in his cabin simply\nwatching the rising and the falling of the waves through the porthole.\n\nA Sunday morning, however, dawned fair and bright; and he found himself\n\"able to make his way to the top deck for divine worship.\" Never, he\nconfessed, was he more deeply touched by a hymn than when the company of\npassengers, and some members of the crew, united in singing as their\nopening hymn:\n\n  \"New every morning is the love\n  Our wakening and uprising prove;\n  Through sleep and darkness safely brought,\n  Restored to life and power and thought.\"\n\nThe memory of that hymn proved to be cheering and invigorating. He later\nwrote: \"How beautiful this sunny Sunday morning with no land, or fish,\nor bird in sight. Just the sun, the sky, and the sea. How sacred the\nupper deck seemed that morning! Can you not believe that I never hear\nthis hymn sung without again feeling the waves lifting me, the scene\ncrowding my brain with its poignancy--sea, sky, sun, and God's care\nthrough another night on the ocean waves.\"\n\nA brilliant scholar was John Keble, author of \"The Christian Year,\" from\nwhich this hymn comes. It is regarded as one \"of the greatest religious\nclassics in the English language.\" This tribute has been paid to this\nwork by Nutter and Tillett: \"What the Prayer Book is in prose for public\nworship, 'The Christian Year' is in poetry for private devotion.\"\nMentally suggestive are the lines which have such a direct relation to\ndaily living:\n\n  \"New mercies, each returning day,\n  Hover around us while we pray;\n  New perils past, new sins forgiven,\n  New thoughts of God, new hopes of heaven.\"\n\n\n                 Morning Songs Fill the Day with Music\n\nSkilled in both the art and science of making lovely gardens, Silas\nKenton loved to sing while working. The story of this interesting\nEnglish gardener was related by the Rev. S. Horton in \"Say It with\nSong.\"\n\n\"Good morning, Kenton,\" was the cheery greeting of Lady Lawder, by whom\nhe was employed, one day. Then she added: \"You were singing early this\nmorning, Silas. I could hear you as I lay in bed.\"\n\n\"I hope I didn't disturb your ladyship,\" he answered. \"I had forgotten\nthe green-houses were so near your room. It was thoughtless of me and I\nam sorry indeed.\"\n\n\"Well, it did wake me up, but I didn't mind. What was it you were\nsinging? The tune was familiar to me.\"\n\n\"It was an old favorite of mine,\" replied Silas:\n\n  \"'Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty!\n    Early in the morning our song shall rise to Thee.'\"\n\nThe musical gardener then made this observation: \"You see, ma'am, when\nthe world gets busy, there are doubtless thousands upon thousands of\nsingers whose songs are rising like sweet music to the skies. I like to\nthink that most mornings I'm one of the earliest of the Lord's servants\noffering my tribute of praise. Besides I always think a few songs before\nbreakfast fill the heart with music all the day.\"\n\n\n                 Hymn Suggested by a \"Blaze of Leafage\"\n\nFor eight months an English Episcopalian bishop confined to a Japanese\nprison saw no sunlight. But this prisoner of war did witness what he\ndescribed as \"a blaze of leafage on some trees.\" This sight recalled to\nthe mind of the bishop a hymn from the heart and pen of Charles Wesley:\n\n  \"Christ, whose glory fills the skies,\n    Christ, the true, the only Light,\n  Sun of righteousness, arise,\n    Triumph o'er the shades of night;\n  Day-Spring from on high, be near;\n  Day-Star, in my heart appear.\"\n\nThis experience which came to Dr. J. L. Wilson, Bishop of Singapore, who\nwas representing the Church of England, stood out above all others, and\nrepresented the value of a mind stored with memories of hymns. Three\nthousand people listened most attentively for forty-five minutes in the\nCity Hall, Sheffield, England, in September, 1946, as the speaker\nnarrated experiences which can come only in war time.\n\nA reporter was among those who heard with amazement the words of the\nbishop as he explained how, charged with being a \"spy,\" he was\n\"imprisoned, tortured, and flogged with ropes almost beyond endurance\"\nby the Japanese. Four thousand persons were crowded into a prison\ndesigned to accommodate seven hundred. They were a courageous company,\nhowever. \"When men and women came downstairs bleeding from torture, they\nmight not speak; but they smiled, and the others smiled back.\" Bishop\nWilson was the only \"European among Malayans, Indians and Chinese.\" But\nhis fellow-prisoners, observing his firmness and forgiving spirit, asked\nhim to teach them to pray.\n\nBread and wine were lacking, but Bishop Wilson used tea or water in the\ncelebration of the Holy Communion on Sundays. \"It might be irregular,\"\nthe speaker remarked with a smile; but he could not be convinced that it\nwas not valid. A Christian girl, he learned, was there for helping the\nBritish, and the elements were passed through the prison bars to her.\n\nThe hymn which lifted the soul of the imprisoned bishop above his\nimmediate surroundings came from the singing spirit of Charles Wesley,\nand appeared in 1740 in his \"Hymns and Sacred Poems.\" The hymnology of\nboth British and American Methodism is enriched by the inclusion of this\nsong of worship; and it is also found in the _Hymnal_ of the Protestant\nEpiscopal Church, _The Hymnal_ (Presbyterian), _The Hymnary_ (of the\nUnited Church of Canada), _The Inter-Church Hymnal_, etc. The three\nverses will be found \"full of the sunshine of which they sing,\" observed\nDr. Charles S. Robinson. Lovers of literature will be especially\ninterested in a comment made by Dr. James Moffatt, where he says,\n\"George Eliot uses this hymn in _Adam Bede_ describing how Seth Bede,\nthe young Methodist, on leaving his brother one Sunday morning in\nFebruary, 'walked leisurely homeward, mentally repeating one of his\nfavorite hymns.' _It was this one._\"\n\nEasy is it, therefore, for us to imagine Bishop Wilson, the\nliberty-loving Englishman, confined to a sunless prison in a foreign\ncountry, catching a glimpse of \"a blaze of leafage on some trees,\" then\nrefreshing his singing spirit by mentally repeating the lines which he\nhad often joined with others in publicly singing when a youth in his\nhomeland:\n\n  \"Dark and cheerless is the morn\n    Unaccompanied by Thee;\n  Joyless is the day's return\n    Till Thy mercy's beams I see;\n  Till they inward light impart,\n  Cheer my eyes and warm my heart.\"\n\n\"Stone walls do not a prison make\" when one has a song in his soul. And\nhe who knows his hymnal well has one for every occasion.\n\n\n\n\n                              CHAPTER III\n                              SUNSET SONGS\n\n\n  \"In the night I sang of him.\"\n                                                (_Psa. 42:10, Moffatt_).\n\n  \"One of the most successful numbers sung in the series of Sunday\n  evening concerts, which for several years it was my privilege and\n  pleasure to sponsor, was that old English hymn, 'Now the Day is Over.'\n  That hymn marked the close of each Sunday night concert, and the\n  thousands of letters I received from listeners throughout the country\n  gave sure evidence that this old religious song struck a responsive\n  chord in the heart of listeners everywhere.\"\n     --_A. Atwater Kent in a broadcast on \"Radio's Influence on Music.\"_\n\nA group of young men from an English theological college, the \"Cliff\nCollege Trekkers,\" went, during the summer of 1936, to Morecambe, and\nthere this band of energetic youth held Sunday services on the slipway.\n\nEvening prayer was also held by them at the slipway, and one who was\npresent expressed gratitude through the press for the privilege of\nsharing these moments of quiet devotion. Following prayers, the entire\ncompany united in singing:\n\n  \"All hail the power of Jesus' name.\"\n\nPeople who had listened to the inspirational hymn were doubtless singing\nin their hearts, as they walked to their seaside residences, the glowing\nwords:\n\n  \"And crown Him Lord of all.\"\n\n\n                     Nature Gave the Perfect Touch\n\nSome of the great moments of a lifetime were experienced by lovers of\nsacred music on an evening in late June, 1931, at the stadium of Cornell\nUniversity. The Westminster Choirs, arrayed in their resplendent robes,\nsang under the leadership of the distinguished conductor, Dr. J. Finley\nWilliamson. A representative of The Syracuse Post-Standard thus sketched\nthe event for his newspaper:\n\n  \"The scene:--Eleven harps were ranged on the velvet green in front of\n  the singers. The skies were hung with black clouds for a canopy. The\n  soft beauty of the marvellous scenery, as far as the eye could reach,\n  surrounded all. Lightning darted through the clouds, and the low\n  rumble of thunder was a background for the celestial music of the\n  harps as they played the hymn:\n\n  \"'Day is dying in the west;\n    Heaven is touching earth with rest:\n  Wait and worship while the night\n  Sets her evening lamps alight\n    Through all the sky.'\n\n  \"When the voices, in unison with the harps, hummed the melody, it was\n  something to be cherished in memory. Words fail to describe adequately\n  the impression. It was the perfect touch that only nature is able to\n  give to human effort.\"\n\nDuring such sublime moments the musicians passed to the close of the\nhymn:\n\n  \"Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of hosts!\n  Heaven and earth are full of Thee!\n  Heaven and earth are praising Thee,\n    O Lord most high!\"\n\nThe music combined with the display of nature to induce a mood which\nbrought God very close to his earthly children that June afternoon.\n\n\n                          The Bells of Trinity\n\nStartled as he wandered rather aimlessly amid lower New York, a\ndistinguished visitor listened to the Bells of Trinity Church as they\njoyously pealed forth the strains of:\n\n  \"Hark, hark, my soul! angelic songs are swelling\n    O'er earth's green fields and ocean's wave-beat shore;\n  How sweet the truth those bless\u00e8d strains are telling\n    Of that new life when sin shall be no more!\"\n\nThe music fell with soul-stirring effect on the ears of Dr. John A.\nHutton, long-time editor of _The British Weekly_, who was in the United\nStates, as he frequently was in summer-time, to fulfill engagements in\npreaching and lecturing.\n\nThe location of Trinity Church, whence came the eventide music, deepened\nthe interest in the hymn. Said Dr. Hutton: \"I was hearing the Lord's\nsong just where the Lord's song stands in most need of being heard, and\njust where the Lord's song sounds most sweetly. I was hearing the Lord's\nsong in a strange land.\" Down opposite Wall street, \"Where Mammon holds\nthe throne, dwarfed and almost overshadowed by immense business and\nfinancial houses, rises the spire of Trinity.\" Hence, \"where men were\nengrossed in the things of time and sense, there fell upon the ear a\nsong that spoke of heaven.\"\n\nThe most popular setting in America for this hymn is \"Pilgrims\" by Henry\nSmart, with what H. Augustine Smith calls its \"plaintive wistfulness.\"\nThis hymn therefore, according to Boyd, \"appeals to both the poetic\nsense and the musical ear.\"\n\nPersonally I have seen congregations deeply moved as they have joined in\nsinging, at an evening service of worship:\n\n  \"Angels, sing on! your faithful watches keeping;\n    Sing us sweet fragments of the songs above;\n  Till morning's joy shall end the night of weeping,\n    And life's long shadows break in cloudless love.\"\n\n\n                            Singing Soldiers\n\nFifteen soldiers were gathered together on a Thursday evening in a\nlittle French village behind the line during the First World War.\nForming themselves into a semicircle around the chaplain, Thomas\nTiplady, who has described the scene in \"The Cross at the Front,\" they\nmade choice of the hymn they would like sung to open their devotional\nmeeting. Then they joined in singing:\n\n  \"At even, ere the sun was set,\n    The sick, O Lord, around Thee lay;\n  O in what divers pains they met!\n    O with what joy they went away!\n\n  \"Once more 'tis eventide, and we,\n    Oppressed with various ills, draw near;\n  What if Thy form we cannot see?\n    We know and feel that Thou art here.\"\n\nThe evening was still, and the voices of the men playing football not\nfar away were heard, as well as the sound of guns. Yet as the men sang\nthe birds were also singing in some neighboring trees. Chaplain Tiplady\nmakes this observation: \"To him who has only sung this hymn in a church\nmuch of its beauty must of necessity be hidden. It is revealed only in\nthe light of the setting sun. The men were facing the Golden West. The\npomp of the dying day lay upon the rustling leaves of the trees and upon\nthe grass at our feet. It lit up with beauty the faces of the men as\nthey sang. Soon it would be gone, and the shadows would wrap us round as\nwith a mantle.\" But those Englishmen in France sang their faith and\nprayer:\n\n  \"Thy touch has still its ancient prayer,\n    No word from Thee can fruitless fall;\n  Hear in this solemn evening hour,\n    And in Thy mercy heal us all.\"\n\n\n                     Hymn Discussion at Oyster Bay\n\nCaptain Archibald W. Butt, personal aide to President Theodore\nRoosevelt, spending a week-end at the Roosevelt residence in Oyster Bay,\nN. Y., accompanied the family to a morning service of worship on July\n27, 1908, at the Episcopal Church. Mrs. Roosevelt was a member of this\nchurch. Mr. Roosevelt was a member of the Dutch Reformed Church, but\nwhen in Oyster Bay he used to worship with the family; and so, on this\noccasion, he took Captain Butt, also an Episcopalian, with him. Later in\nthe day Captain Butt referred to the hymns sung in the service, and,\nbeing from the South, made this observation: \"I think the South likes\nstrong, sentimental hymns, while every one which was sung at Oyster Bay\nhad some poetic value.\"\n\nTheodore Roosevelt sang hymns with zest, and enjoyed variety. On this\nday, however, he declared that his favorite hymn was:\n\n  \"Christ is made the sure Foundation,\n    Christ the head and corner-stone,\n  Chosen of the Lord, and precious,\n    Binding all the Church in one;\n  Holy Sion's help for ever,\n    And her confidence alone.\"\n\nThis is a translation from an old Latin hymn by Dr. John Mason Neale.\nInformation concerning this hymn by Dr. Charles S. Robinson is as\nfollows: \"It is more popular in England than it is on this side of the\nwater, except, perhaps, among Episcopalians, who, as a denomination,\nseem very fond of it. It is used for corner-stone services, and for\ndedications and the like, with much acceptance.\"\n\n  \"Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty!\"\n\nwas given by Mr. Roosevelt as his next choice. But he also expressed\nadmiration for \"Jerusalem the Golden,\" and very naturally for a man of\nhis type:\n\n  \"The Son of God goes forth to war.\"\n\nMrs. Roosevelt, on the other hand, named as her choice:\n\n  \"Nearer, my God, to Thee;\"\n\nand also:\n\n  \"Art thou weary, art thou laden,\n    Art thou sore distrest?\n  'Come to Me,' saith One, 'and coming,\n    Be at rest.'\"\n\n\"For the first time I realized that I had no favorite hymn,\" said\nCaptain Butt in a letter which he wrote to his mother that very night;\nand which, fortunately, has been preserved in \"The Letters of Archie\nButt.\" He added: \"I have thought of it during the day, and I believe\nthat I shall take 'Nearer, my God, to Thee,' as my favorite. It appeals\nto the sentimental side of me at least.\"\n\n\"I think I should like to have sung at my funeral, 'Nearer, My God, to\nThee,'\" said Butt in this letter. Singularly enough, this was the last\nmusic which he heard played before he died. He was drowned when the\n_Titanic_ sank; and the ship's band, which had been playing popular\nmusic during the fateful period after the great ship had struck an\niceberg on a Sunday night, rendered as its last selection, when the boat\nwas going down and carrying hundreds of the passengers and crew to a\nswift death in the Atlantic:\n\n  \"Nearer, my God, to Thee.\"\n\nThe following interesting observation, which I have not elsewhere seen,\nis made by Lawrence F. Abbott, who edited \"The Letters of Archie Butt\":\n\"It is said by survivors of the _Titanic_ that as the ship was going\ndown Captain Butt ordered the band to play the music of this hymn.\"\n\nMost fruitful was the discussion of hymns held at Oyster Bay on that\nJuly Sunday afternoon and evening. As a result we know the first choice\nof Theodore Roosevelt of the many hymns he loved; the hymns which most\nappealed to Mrs. Roosevelt; and on that eventful day Archibald Butt made\nhis decision in favor of the hymn which went with him to his death in\nthe Atlantic Ocean.\n\n\n\n\n                               CHAPTER IV\n                     SERENADING THE SOUL WITH SONG\n\n\n  \"In London Town there are always queer, unexpected things to be seen\n  and heard. The other day my wife and I went out to lunch, and we were\n  waiting in a queue. Suddenly above the noise of the busy street we\n  heard a tin whistle being played. The tune was '_O Jesus, I have\n  promised_'--and it was played very well, too. This was followed by ...\n  '_Jerusalem the golden_.' I looked, but couldn't see the musician.\n\n  \"The queue moved up, and I was afraid I wasn't going to see the tin\n  whistle expert at all. But just as we got level with the door I did\n  see him. He was now giving a spirited rendering of '_The Church's one\n  foundation_'--and he was a grey-headed old Negro. He wore what had\n  been a very smartly cut officer's tunic. The tune finished, the old\n  fellow sat down on a doorstep.\n\n  \"Where, I wondered, had he learned these hymn-tunes? And where had\n  that Lascar seaman in the street in West Hartlepool learnt '_There's a\n  Friend for Little Children_?'--for he was humming it as he passed me\n  by.\"\n                       --_F. H. E. in \"The Methodist Recorder,\" London._\n\n  Nothing is more beautiful than the sight of a company of Christians\n  singing their hymns of praise.\n                                                       --_Roy L. Smith._\n\n\n                          That Was Yesterday!\n\n\"Why, Samuel!\" exclaimed the surprised wife of the beloved Bishop Samuel\nFallows, one morning.\n\nThe story as related by Dr. Roy L. Smith referred to a night when the\nageing bishop returned from a rather stormy meeting. Harsh things had\nbeen said, and he appeared thoroughly discouraged. Entering the home,\nhis wife, with womanly instinct, sensed the situation. The bishop even\nwent to bed without partaking of his usual cup of hot milk.\n\nFull of understanding sympathy, his wife expected him to remain in bed a\nlittle later than usual, and possibly have breakfast taken to him. But\nwhen she quietly entered his room, he was pulling the \"weights of his\nancient exercise machine.\" Meanwhile he was singing:\n\n  \"Come, Thou Fount of every blessing;\n    Tune my heart to sing Thy grace,\n  Streams of mercy, never ceasing,\n    Call for songs of loudest praise.\"\n\nAll this was so unexpected that the good and anxious woman, in her\nastonishment, could only say, \"Why, Samuel!\"\n\n\"Why what?\" questioned the bishop, without missing a beat in the rhythm\nof his morning exercise.\n\n\"Why that board meeting last night. I thought you would stay in bed this\nmorning, and try to get a bit of rest.\"\n\n\"That board meeting, what about it?\" he asked, as he came to a halt.\n\n\"Why it must have been terrible. You came home utterly spent and\ndiscouraged,\" was the reply.\n\nResuming his exercise, the bishop quietly remarked, \"O that was\nyesterday.\"\n\nThe gentle man would not permit what happened yesterday to take from him\nhis praiseful song.\n\nTherefore as he continued to pull his exercise machine he resumed the\nsinging of his hymn:\n\n  \"Here I raise mine Ebenezer;\n    Hither by Thy help I'm come;\n  And I hope by Thy good pleasure,\n    Safely to arrive at home.\"\n\n\n                       Song of the Hidden Singer\n\nA woman of culture was standing in a large London store waiting to be\nserved. The customers were many, and some of them became impatient.\nTired and irritated, occasionally someone would make an unpleasant\nremark.\n\nSomewhere up toward the roof, a workman, invisible to the one who\nnarrated the incident, was busy making structural alterations. Said Mrs.\nG. Elsie Harrison: \"As he worked above us, like some ham-strung lark, he\ncarolled.\" The notes that fluttered down to her were:\n\n  \"Tell me the old, old story\n    Of unseen things above,\n  Of Jesus and His glory,\n    Of Jesus and His love.\"\n\nOld memories were revived by the song. Mrs. Harrison thus indicated her\nown experience: \"In one moment the arrogant shoppers had vanished. I was\nat home again, and saw my mother at the piano, and heard the music which\nonly she could make to sound so reverent. Her generation really meant it\nwhen they sang:\n\n  \"'Tell me the story softly,\n    With earnest tones and grave;\n  Remember, I'm the sinner\n    Whom Jesus came to save.'\"\n\nTo them it was a real sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving, and the\nmusic matched the mood.\n\nPopular with older people, this hymn of Miss Katherine Hankey, an\nEnglish lady, has also been a favorite with children. The tune to which\nit is mostly sung was composed by William H. Doane, an American\nmusician.\n\nThe London singer was hidden, and singing just for himself. But the song\nbrought back beautiful memories to at least one woman amid the crowd of\nshoppers.\n\n\n                 Americans Sang with the Japanese Lady\n\nA lady from Japan, Madame Yoshika Sait\u00f3, Tokyo, was one of the\ndistinguished visitors to the historic Uniting Conference of The\nMethodist Church in Kansas City, May, 1939. She was introduced by Dr.\nJames R. Houghton, Boston University, who had charge of the music; and\nDr. Houghton announced that the visitor would sing \"Alleluia\" by Mozart.\n\nDr. Robert Bond, a former president of the Methodist Conference,\nEngland, was so impressed by the Japanese lady that he wrote back to one\nof the periodicals of his native England saying: \"Madame Sait\u00f3, both by\nher personal charm and her exquisite voice, captured the Conference.\n\nMadame Sait\u00f3, responsive to the purpose and the spiritual atmosphere of\nthe Uniting Conference, then followed with the verse of a hymn, which\nshe sang both in her native tongue and also in English:\n\n  \"I need Thee every hour,\n    Most gracious Lord;\n  No tender voice like Thine\n    Can peace afford.\"\n\nBishop Charles L. Mead, the presiding officer, suggested that the\nUniting Conference would probably like to sing the verse and the chorus\nwith the visitor. Soon the Japanese lady, the nine hundred delegates,\nand thousands of visitors were singing together:\n\n  \"I need Thee, O I need Thee,\n    Every hour I need Thee;\n  O bless me now, my Saviour,\n    I come to Thee!\"\n\n\"It was one of those rare moments,\" said Dr. Bond to his English\nreaders, \"when a great tide of emotions sweeps over a big assembly and\ncarries it out of itself.\"\n\n\n                 Northfield's Festival of Sacred Music\n\nThe Northfield Festival of Sacred Music when introduced into the program\nof the Northfield General Conference in the decade preceding World War\nII proved to be a thrilling moving event. Coming on the closing Sunday\nof the many summer programs, it brought immense crowds to the annual\ngathering at East Northfield which D. L. Moody made so popular by the\nlist of distinguished speakers that he enlisted from British and\nAmerican pulpits and educational institutions.\n\nThe fact that the Westminster Choir Summer School was holding its\nsessions at Mount Hermon, just a short distance across the river, with\nDr. John Finley Williamson at its head, made possible Northfield's\nfestival of sacred music. Choirs from neighboring communities united\nwith the group at the summer school, and for six weeks five hundred\nsingers prepared for the memorable occasion.\n\nTwice the writer was in attendance. Much alike each year, yet particular\ninterest attached itself to 1937. This was the season of the D. L. Moody\nCentenary Celebration, and the fifty-eighth session of the Northfield\nGeneral Conference. The Festival Choir was divided into a few different\ngroups for various purposes. Yet when the hymns were sung these all\nparticipated, and the audience was invited to join them.\n\nWithin five minutes after the entrances were opened the great auditorium\nwas filled. People also stood in a solid line near the walls. Newspapers\nreported that about two thousand additional people also stood outside in\nthe hot sun during the rendering of the program, a part of which was\nbroadcast.\n\nThe audience, inside and outside the building, had its first opportunity\nto sing when they united in Luther's soul-stirring hymn:\n\n  \"A mighty fortress is our God,\n    A bulwark never failing.\"\n\nThe singing company made the most of it. \"The very walls shook,\" said my\nfriend in the next seat.\n\nThe next hymn selection was that which came from Toplady. This the\naudience knew well, and sang with affectionate enthusiasm:\n\n  \"Rock of Ages, cleft for me,\n    Let me hide myself in Thee.\"\n\nHappy was the surprise which came with the next hymn. Mrs. W. R. Moody,\ndaughter-in-law of D. L. Moody, seated herself at the keyboard of a\nsmall instrument which, before it was opened up, looked like a big\npacking case. Really it was the small organ which accompanied Moody and\nSankey during their nation-wide evangelistic campaigns; for the latter\nalways wanted, if possible, to have his own instrument with him. Hence\nthe little organ was made for this purpose. The instrument had been on\ndisplay in the Moody exhibit at Moody's boyhood home during the special\ndays of the Moody Centennial. Visitors could there sit in the spacious\nchair used by Moody himself, sign their names; and, by permission, play\non Sankey's organ. Musicians loved to do so. The Westminster singers now\nrendered the beloved gospel song:\n\n  \"There were ninety and nine that safely lay\n    In the shelter of the fold,\n  But one was out on the hills away,\n    Far off from the gates of gold--\n  Away on the mountains wild and bare\n  Away from the tender Shepherd's care.\"\n\nJoy beamed on the countenance of Mrs. Moody as she led the singers on\nthe historic little organ; and the song continued through the lines:\n\n  \"But all through the mountains, thunder-riven,\n    And up from the rocky steep,\n  There arose a glad cry to the gate of heaven.\"\n\nThe conductor at this point gave a signal to the enraptured audience,\nand everybody joined the special singers in the triumphant lines:\n\n  \"'Rejoice! I have found my sheep!'\n  And the angels echoed around the throne,\n  Rejoice, for the Lord brings back His own.\"\n\nThis musical climax was dramatic. The great company had evidently\ncoveted the privilege of singing with Sankey's organ, and particularly\nin joining in this song. Now it came, and they made the most of it.\n\"Singing such as that I never expect to hear again this side of heaven,\"\nsaid a woman whose soul had caught a vision of the lost sheep which had,\nat last, been found.\n\nJust one more hymn remained to be sung before the Choral Benediction of\nPeter Lutkin was rendered by the great chorus. This was the familiar\nhymn of Isaac Watts, which we sang to the tune of Hamburg:\n\n  \"When I survey the wondrous cross,\n    On which the Prince of Glory died,\n  My richest gain I count but loss,\n    And pour contempt on all my pride.\"\n\n\"Both hymn and tune are universal favorites,\" affirmed Dr. Charles A.\nBoyd after he examined sixteen hymnals and found the hymn in each of\nthem. In all but two it was set to Hamburg.\n\nThree verses of the hymn were sung, as requested, very softly. Then the\nlast verse was sung louder, until, in mighty volume, the long-remembered\nservice closed with the lines of personal consecration:\n\n  \"Love so amazing, so divine,\n    Demands my soul, my life, my all.\"\n\n\n\n\n                               CHAPTER V\n                            HYMNS OF COMFORT\n\n\nWhen I received word of the death of my son, in a distant land, I turned\nto your book of hymn stories, and was comforted.--From the personal\nletter of a friend.\n\nIn the darkest hours of the war Mr. Winston Churchill (then prime\nminister) would steal away an hour or two to hear the songs he\nloves.--_The British Weekly._\n\n\"When I cannot sleep at night I silently repeat hymns,\" once said Mrs.\nMargaret E. Sangster to a caller. First in the list, she intimated, was\nthe cherished hymn of John Newton, who \"loved much because he was\nforgiven much\":\n\n  \"How sweet the name of Jesus sounds\n    In a believer's ear!\n  It soothes his sorrows, heals his wounds,\n    And drives away his fear.\n\n  \"It makes the wounded spirit whole,\n    And calms the troubled breast;\n  'Tis manna to the hungry soul,\n    And to the weary, rest.\"\n\n\n                         God's Angels in Charge\n\nA characteristic of Alice Freeman Palmer, who at the age of twenty-six\nbecame the President of Wellesley College, was her calmness. What would\nterrify another would leave her undisturbed. From her early girlhood she\nhad learned the lesson of Christian trustfulness. Her husband, Dr.\nGeorge Herbert Palmer, who wrote the story of her life, records the fact\nthat one day, while at her summer home at Boxford, she was ill in bed. A\nthunderstorm came swiftly out of the southwest and struck the house, and\nthe room next to her own was destroyed. \"She seemed at the time much\ninterested in the novel event, as if it were something contrived for her\nentertainment.\" After her death, however, he found among her papers a\nhymn with that date attached. This was sung at the memorial service held\nin Harvard Chapel; and Doctor Palmer printed it under the title of \"The\nTempest.\" Suggestions from the Psalms find expression in this poem, and\nthe opening lines conform closely to Psalm 91:11, which reads:\n\n  \"For he will give his angels charge over thee,\n    To keep thee in all thy ways.\"\n\nThe hymn of Mrs. Palmer reveals a spirit of confidence in the power and\nlove of God, and she felt comforted by the fact that she could nestle\ninto the strong arms of God. These are her words:\n\n  \"He shall give His angels charge\n    Over thee in all thy ways.\n  Though the thunders roam at large,\n    Though the lightning round me plays,\n  Like a child I lay my head\n  In sweet sleep upon my bed.\n\n  \"Though the terror come so close,\n    It shall have no power to smite;\n  It shall deepen my repose,\n    Turn the darkness into light.\n  Touch of angels' hands is sweet;\n  Not a stone shall hurt my feet.\n\n  \"All Thy waves and billows go\n    Over me to press me down\n  Into arms so strong I know\n    They will never let me drown.\n  Ah, my God, how good Thy will!\n  I will nestle and be still.\"\n\n\n                       Singing Welshmen at Oxford\n\nA scene which greatly impressed him was related by Frederick M.\nDavenport, a former member of congress, when he returned from a trip to\nEngland late in the summer of 1937. Mentioning the distressed area of\nthe coal district of South Wales, he said:\n\n  \"As we were leaving Oxford one morning there appeared on the station\n  platform about a hundred young Welshmen between eighteen and twenty\n  years of age. They were dressed in the garb of manual laborers, and\n  held rough baggage in their hands. Their home was in South Wales, but\n  they had been in Oxford working on a government project and were\n  leaving for a holiday.\n\n  \"Nearly all Welsh are singers, and these young men were no exception.\n  After a few jolly songs directed at their leaders, as their train was\n  nearly due to leave they massed themselves together and sang\n  magnificently:\n\n  \"'Guide me, O Thou great Jehovah,\n    Pilgrim through this barren land;\n  I am weak, but Thou art mighty;\n    Hold me with Thy powerful hand;\n      Bread of heaven,\n    Feed me till I want no more.'\n\n  \"For the time being they were unemployed at home,... but they were\n  full of confidence and good will.\"\n\nThis hymn, \"a genuine heart song,\" comes from Welsh sources; and one of\nthe tunes to which it is sung, \"Cwm Rhondda,\" composed by a Welshman, is\na favorite among Welsh people.\n\nThe group of young Welshmen who sang in Oxford that day, while some\nAmericans were among the listeners, showed a courageous spirit, a love\nof hymns, and a devotional attitude. Doubtless their song was a prayer\nof the heart:\n\n  \"Guide me, O Thou Great Jehovah.\"\n\n\n                         Singing Amid Suffering\n\n\"She truly learned in suffering what she taught in song,\" someone\nremarked concerning the author of the hymn:\n\n  \"There is no sorrow, Lord, too light\n    To bring in prayer to Thee;\n  There is no anxious care too slight\n    To wake Thy sympathy.\"\n\nThe Rev. J. H. Jowett, D.D., the great expository preacher who left his\nBirmingham pastorate in England to serve the Fifth Avenue pastorate in\nNew York City during the second decade of the twentieth century, made\nthis his favorite hymn. Few knew hymns, especially of a devotional\nnature, better than he.\n\nThis hymn came from the pen and heart of Jane Fox Crewdson. Cornwall was\nher birthplace, 1809; but after her marriage to a merchant of Manchester\nat the age of 27, she lived her life in that city until her death in\n1863. Many years of her life were spent in the sick room. Gifted with\npoetic talent, she wrote many poems and hymns. Most of these were\n\"composed amid paroxysms of pain.\"\n\nMost appropriately did a Presbyterian minister in an American city,\nwhere he had served for 24 years, select this hymn for Memorial Day\nSunday in 1947. At the entrance to the building a member of the church\nhad placed a basket of lovely flowers before the bronze tablet which\nrecorded the names of men who had served in the World Wars. Comforting\nmust have been the words of Mrs. Crewdson's hymn to those who had\nsuffered the loss of those dear to them in the war period:\n\n  \"Thou, who hast trod the thorny road,\n    Wilt share each small distress;\n  The love which bore the greater load,\n    Will not refuse the less.\"\n\nNot simply in the land where the author lived and wrote are her hymns\nfound, but this one also appears in _The Hymnal_ (Presbyterian) in the\nUnited States and _The Hymnary_ of The United Church of Canada. Dr.\nJames Moffatt quotes from an unnamed author this testimony relating to\nthe writer: \"As a constant sufferer, the spiritual life deepening, and\nthe intellectual life retaining all its power, she became well prepared\nto testify to the all-sufficiency of her Saviour's love.\" Hence we can\nappreciate what has been said concerning the third verse, namely, \"There\nis infinite pathos packed into these lines:\n\n  \"'There is no secret sigh we breathe,\n    But meets Thine ear divine;\n  And every cross grows light beneath\n    The shadow, Lord, of Thine.'\"\n\n\n                      Songs of a Sorrowing Nation\n\n\"You can tell the kind of a man he was from the hymns he loved. Our\norganist and our choir know. He felt those hymns inwardly.\" These words\nwere spoken by the 78-year-old rector, the Rev. George W. Anthony, at\nthe morning service of worship conducted by him on Sunday, April 15,\n1945, in St. James Episcopal Church at Hyde Park, N. Y., within a few\nminutes after President Franklin D. Roosevelt was laid to rest in the\n\"rose garden\" on his own estate.\n\nProbably never before did the people of the United States hear so many\nof the hymns of the Christian Church played so frequently as during\nthose days of sorrowing for the President of the nation who died\nsuddenly on April 12. They began to be heard soon after the first\nannouncement was made to a stunned people, and continued until Sunday,\nthe 15th, when the beloved leader was buried amid the scenes he loved.\nCommercial programs were cancelled, and the radio devoted itself to news\nconcerning the passing of the president and events thereto related. \"The\nStar-Spangled Banner\" and familiar hymns, mostly the favorites of\nPresident Roosevelt, were frequently heard.\n\nHymns were intimately associated with each movement of the body as it\nmade its journey from Warm Springs, Georgia, where the president died,\nuntil it reached its final resting-place. When on Friday the folks of\nthe community assembled to witness the departure of the train which\nwould carry him to Washington Chief Petty Officer Graham Jackson, a\nNegro, who was a favorite with Mr. Roosevelt, stepped from the circle of\nmourners. He had with him his accordion which Mr. Roosevelt loved to\nhear him play. Now, as a last tribute, he \"played the haunting strains\nof 'Going Home' from the New World Symphony. Then he played, 'Nearer, My\nGod, to Thee.'\"\n\nGreat crowds gathered to witness the passing of the train which bore the\nbody toward Washington. They were reverent and tearful. A rather\nstriking incident occurred at Charlotte, N. C., where the train moved\nslowly through the station without stopping. Street intersections were\nthronged for blocks with mourners. The silence was broken as the train\npassed by a troop of assembled Boy Scouts who started to sing, \"Onward,\nChristian Soldiers,\" and \"the crowd took up the hymn in a ringing\nchorus.\"\n\nWhen the caisson which bore the body from the railroad station at\nWashington halted \"before the main white-columned portico the casket was\nborne into the White House by uniformed members of the armed services.\"\nThe Navy Band played \"The Star-Spangled Banner.\" Then, outside on the\nlawn, \"a service band played an old tune, 'Abide with Me.'\"\n\nThe U. S. Marine Band which was present when the train arrived at\nWashington followed the national anthem with \"The Old Rugged Cross\" as\nthe casket was placed on the black-draped military caisson.\n\nBecause the hymns used at the funeral service in the White House on the\nafternoon of Saturday, April 14, were familiar, The Right Rev. Angus\nDun, Episcopal Bishop of Washington, who was in charge, with other\nclergymen assisting, mentioned the fact that these hymns were favorites\nof Mr. Roosevelt, and invited the assembled company to join in the\nsinging. The Navy Hymn, \"Eternal Father, Strong to Save,\" and \"Faith of\nOur Fathers\" were sung at this time.\n\nNext day the body of President Roosevelt was back in Hyde Park. The\ngreat chieftain had reached journey's end. \"Between the manor house and\nthe new library is the rose garden where the grave has been dug,\" said\n_The New York Times_. And there at ten o'clock on Sunday morning was\nbrought the body of the man who loved to visit this garden when the\nflowers, especially the roses, were sending forth their beauty and their\nfragrance. Probably it was because of this fact that many radio programs\nand church services placed in their musical programs the familiar sacred\nsong:\n\n  \"I come to the garden alone,\n  While the dew is still on the roses\n    And the voice I hear,\n    Falling on my ear,\n  The Son of God discloses.\"\n\nAt the head of the procession in Hyde Park, as the body was taken from\nthe train to its resting-place, was the Army band from West Point, with\n\"its members in uniforms composed of dark blue tunic, lighter blue\ntrousers with white stripes. Their silver instruments gleamed.\" First\nthere were the sounds of muffled drums. Then the band took up Chopin's\n\"Funeral March.\" Six hundred West Pointers \"formed a solid phalanx\nfacing the grave from the west. The brief rites were conducted by the\nRev. George W. Anthony, the venerable rector. It was brief and simple.\nAs the body was lowered into the grave he intoned the opening lines of\nthe widely used hymn of John Ellerton:\n\n  \"Now the laborer's task is o'er;\n    Now the battle day is past;\n  Now upon the farther shore\n    Lands the voyager at last.\n  Father, in Thy gracious keeping\n  Leave we now Thy servant sleeping.\"\n\n\"Hymns had been the life-long study and delight\" of Ellerton (1826-93),\nan English Clergyman of the Episcopal Church.\n\nA file of West Pointers fired three volleys. \"As the last volley\nsounded, as if it were one shot, muffled drums beat again. At the head\nof the grave a bugler sounded taps.\" Then, as Stevenson wrote, \"Here he\nlies where he longed to be.\"\n\nThe hour of morning worship in St. James' Church was near, and so many\nof the people went to the little church for the 11 o'clock service. The\nbuilding was crowded. But \"the Roosevelt pew was empty. Here Franklin\nRoosevelt sat, boy and man, for almost sixty years.\" An American flag\nmarked the pew on this day. Congregation and choir sang, \"How Firm a\nFoundation.\" When he announced \"O Master, Let Me Walk With Thee,\" the\nclergyman stated, as he glanced toward the Roosevelt pew, that the hymns\nselected were loved by Mr. Roosevelt. \"He is now at rest in the\ncommunity which he loved,\" said the speaker.\n\nThe next hymn sung is not widely known in this country outside the\nEpiscopal Church, though it is found in _The Church Hymnary_, Scotland.\nIts author was Arthur Campbell Ainger (1841-1919), who after his\ngraduation from Cambridge University spent most of his life in teaching\nat Eton. He was \"one of the most distinguished of Eton masters, a man of\nclear head, controlling character, wide accomplishments,\" and he also\nwrote several hymns. The hymn begins:\n\n  \"God is working His purpose out\n    As year succeeds to year.\"\n\nThe minister related the fact that Mr. Roosevelt loved growing things,\nespecially; and called attention to the extraordinary coincidence that\nthe church envelopes for that day carried a \"Garden Prayer\": \"Help us, O\nLord, to grasp the meaning of happy, growing things, that we may weave\nit into the tissue of our faith in life eternal.... We thank Thee, O\nLord, for gardens and their message.\"\n\nA soloist now sang, \"O Rest in the Lord.\"\n\nHoward Graves moved to the corner beside the altar and bore a large\nAmerican flag forward in the chancel. The ushers took their places\nbeside him. The choir, the organ and the congregation merged in fervent\nchorus with \"The Star-Spangled Banner.\" A prayer, and the service\nclosed.\n\n\"He was a good friend. He was a good neighbor,\" said a parishioner as\nshe left the sanctuary with tear-dimmed eyes.\n\nHymns were sung by an all-high-school chorus at City Hall Park, New York\nCity, on Saturday afternoon, following the one minute of silence, and\nthese included \"O God, Our Help in Ages Past.\" Fifty thousand people\nwere present and many joined in the singing. A memorial service was held\nin the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, and seven thousand people were\ngathered an hour before the service began on Saturday afternoon at four\no'clock. The hymns there sung were \"Nearer, My God, to Thee\"; \"Rock of\nAges,\" and \"O God, Our Help in Ages Past.\" Communities all over the\nnation also held services at the hour when the funeral was held in the\nWhite House and in thousands of churches, public squares and parks,\nafter the moment of silence in which traffic was hushed, and men and\nwomen stood with bowed heads, some of the hymns already mentioned were\nsung. \"Jesus, Lover of My Soul\" was sometimes included. Many of these\nprograms also included \"America the Beautiful,\" and, of course, our\nbeloved national hymn, \"My Country, 'Tis of Thee.\"\n\nThose who could not leave their homes were still enabled to listen to\nthese services (and perhaps join in the singing of the hymns). \"The\nnetworks,\" said an editor, \"gave an impressive picture of the tribute\nbeing paid to a departed leader from one end of the country to another.\nOne joined the solemn throng in front of the City Hall in New York, or\nsat in a great cathedral in Boston. Swiftly from the Eastern seaboard to\nthe Far West, the radio gave us glimpses of memorial services in\nChicago, in Kansas City, in Dallas and in Seattle.\"\n\nAn appreciative letter to an editor by a woman said of those days from\nthe death to the burial of Mr. Roosevelt, \"Along with our grief and\ntears we were given an uplift such as the broadcasting companies have\nnever given us before for a period of time like that.\"\n\n\n\n\n                               CHAPTER VI\n                         OCCASIONS TO REMEMBER\n\n\n  \"Once I remember taking a service while the shells screamed over us\n  into Ypres. And as the men were singing:\n\n  \"'Cover my defenseless head\n    With the shadow of Thy wing,'\n\n  one that fell short came hurtling, landing not two yards away--a\n  dud.\"--_Dr. A. J. Gossip in \"The British Weekly.\"_\n\n\"What was the greatest moment of all?\" That was the question put to\nGeneral Evangeline Booth of the Salvation Army when she was 81\n(Christmas Day, 1946), by Dorothy Walworth, who narrated the interview\nin The Christian Herald.\n\nRetired, yet in good health and still working hard, this magnetic\nspeaker, whom I once heard as she thrilled a mighty audience with her\nfervent oratory, paused a moment. As daughter of the founder, and later\nhis honored successor in its leadership, there had been many high\nmoments. Then came her answer with conviction as she related that her\nfinest experience came on a day which she spent in the Leper Colony in\nPoethenkuruz, in southern India, where a chorus of little leper girls\nhad been trained to sing one of the hymns she wrote for the Army. They\nstood before her in their dainty white dresses. Faces and hands were\nbadly scarred, \"but their voices were clear and true. As they reached\nthe words in the hymn:\n\n  \"With all my heart, I'll do my part,\"\n\nThey put their tiny scarred hands over their hearts, and I was\novercome,\" said Miss Booth.\n\nPrincess Elizabeth (prospective Queen of England) was married to Prince\nPhilip on November 20, 1947. This was the centennial of the death of\nHenry F. Lyte. The Princess, therefore, arranged for the rendering of\nhis hymn:\n\n  \"Praise, my soul, the King of heaven,\n    To His feet thy tribute bring,\"\n\nwhen the bridal party entered Westminster Abbey. \"This same hymn,\" said\n_The Diapason_, \"was also sung at the wedding of King George and Queen\nElizabeth.\"\n\n\n                     \"Abide with Me\" in a Submarine\n\nFiction has rarely given us anything more arrestingly strange than the\nfollowing narration of a few minutes of life with their bewildering\nexperience. The story was related in _The Methodist Recorder_, London,\nin its issue of December 19, 1946, and is here reproduced in the exact\nwords of the writer, Campbell Marr of Kirkaldy:\n\n  \"In the early days of the war (World War II) a British submarine was\n  trapped at the bottom of the Heligoland Bight through an unlocated\n  defect in the machinery. In frantic despair the engineers endeavored\n  to find the fault, but without success.\n\n  \"When the oxygen supply was almost exhausted the lieutenant in charge\n  assembled the crew and told them that the situation was beyond all\n  hope. He gave each man an opiate so that death might be made easier.\n  Someone started to sing that very popular hymn:\n\n  \"'Abide with me,'\n\n  and they all joined in. Suddenly one man swooned, and fell into the\n  machinery and immediately the lights went on and the engine commenced\n  to buzz. The man in his fall had operated a lever which in the light\n  of the hand torches had been overlooked.\n\n  \"In a few minutes they had surfaced, and were thanking God for their\n  miraculous deliverance. Many of these men are now back in civilian\n  life, and not one of them is ever likely to forget that grand old\n  hymn.\"\n\n\n                          Wheel Chair Singers\n\nWe looked long at the unusual picture which stood out prominently on the\nfront page of our morning newspaper (an AP Wirephoto). The item carried\nthe heading which we are using. A group of twenty-five singers was\nshown, and they all sat in wheel chairs. They were all polio patients,\nand among them were several naval officers. A special article in _The\nNew York Times_ supplied additional details.\n\nThe courageous singers were seated in the little white chapel in Warm\nSprings, Georgia, where President F. D. Roosevelt last attended a\nservice of worship. Now, two years after his sudden passing, a memorial\nservice was being conducted for him. This was on April 12, 1947, and\nthree hundred polio victims and villagers were present--the patients\nalso occupied wheel chairs. An overflow company of two hundred were\noutside on the greensward in front of the chapel, and listened to the\nservice which was conveyed to them by loudspeakers.\n\nThe pew in which President Roosevelt always sat when he was at Warm\nSprings was reserved. Warm Springs was the place to which he often went\nwhen making his heroic fight with his affliction. The health-giving\nsources which he there found were greatly helpful. It was there that\ndeath came suddenly to him; there the Little White House stands; and\nthere State Guards have maintained constant vigil since his translation.\nThe American flag was on that day at half staff at the unpretentious\ncottage where he spent restful, though busy, days.\n\nThe leader of the Wheel Chair Choir, Mr. Fred Botts, also occupied a\nwheel chair as he directed his group of plucky singers--young people who\nwere there for treatment. For the Georgia Warm Springs Foundation is the\nlargest center in the world for the treatment of poliomyelitis. Thither\ngo patients from every state in the union.\n\nOne newspaper supplied the thing I wanted to know, for I wondered what\nhymns would be sung by such an exceptional choir--young people fighting\nwith determination for their health and their future. First came:\n\n  \"Faith of our fathers! living still.\"\n\nThe second hymn which the Wheel Chair Singers led the congregation in\nsinging on that pleasant April day was one which is peculiarly\nimpressive:\n\n  \"Be still, my soul: the Lord is on thy side;\n    Bear patiently the cross of grief or pain;\n  Leave to thy God to order and provide;\n    In every change He faithful will remain.\n  Be still, my soul; thy best, thy heavenly Friend\n    Through thorny ways leads to a joyful end.\"\n\nThis hymn by Katharina von Schlegel appeared in 1752, and very little is\nknown of the writer. It was \"adequately translated\" by Jane Laurie\nBothwick (1813-1897) of Edinburgh. While visiting Switzerland, a friend\nsuggested that she translate some German hymns in which she was\ninterested. Therefore she and her sister, Sarah Bothwick Findlater,\nworked together in translating _Hymns From the Land of Luther_.\n\nComforting and challenging must have been the appeal to the hearts of\nthe crippled patients as there came to their lips the words of the\nsecond verse:\n\n  \"Be still, my soul, thy God doth undertake\n    To guide the future as he has the past.\n  Thy hope, thy confidence let nothing shake;\n    All now mysterious shall be bright at last.\n  Be still, my soul: the winds and waves still know\n    His voice who ruled them while He dwelt below.\"\n\nTimes there are in life when not only the occupants of wheel chairs, but\nalso the rest of us, may serenade our souls by singing or quoting that\nbravely suggestive line:\n\n  \"Thy hope, thy confidence, let nothing shake.\"\n\n\n                       Sang the Hymn from Memory\n\nWhen Theodore Roosevelt was running for the presidency in 1912, he spent\na weekend with William Allen White in Emporia, Kansas. The plan was to\ntake him to the Congregational Church on Sunday morning for worship, but\nthe guest asked if there were not a German Lutheran Church in town.\n\n\"There was, and I took him there,\" said White.\n\nA feature that impressed the host is related in _The Autobiography of\nWilliam Allen White_. Both building and congregation were small.\nNaturally everybody stared at Roosevelt in amazement. But the preacher\nlined out the hymns, and White was delighted to note that Roosevelt\nstood with the congregation and sang three stanzas of\n\n  \"How firm a foundation, ye saints of the Lord,\n  Is laid for your faith in His excellent word!\"\n\nwithout taking up the hymnal. He showed no hesitation concerning the\nwords.\n\nPerhaps, however, White did not know that the hymn was one of\nRoosevelt's favorites. Both Andrew Jackson and Robert E. Lee were fond\nof it; and it was used at the funerals of both Lee and Roosevelt.\n\nIts frequent use in services of worship in the United States is\nindicated by the fact that it is placed second in the _Inter-Church\nHymnal_ by Morgan and Ward (1930).\n\nAn early memory of the writer is that of an old man at a large religious\ngathering. During the evening this hymn was sung. He stood erect and\nwith face aglow as he joined in the singing. He had seen much of life\nand doubtless realized from personal experience the reality of the words\nhe was singing. Possibly he was recalling some specific hours in life;\nfor when the third verse was reached, he lifted his face and continued\nto sing with others:\n\n  \"When through the deep waters I call thee to go,\n  The rivers of woe shall not thee overflow;\n  For I will be with thee, thy troubles to bless,\n  And sanctify to thee thy deepest distress.\"\n\nThe tears now began to flow down his cheeks; but he sang clear to the\nclosing lines as he continued to wipe away the tears:\n\n  \"The soul that on Jesus still leans for repose\n  I will not, I will not desert to his foes.\n  That soul, though all hell should endeavor to shake,\n  I'll never, no never, no never, forsake.\"\n\nThis is a good memory hymn, for its assurances are fitted to many\nsituations and emergencies of life.\n\n\n                  Hymn Expressed the Hearer's Feelings\n\n\"That hymn expresses exactly what I have felt for years. How often I\nhave wanted 'A little shrine of quietness, all sacred to myself.' How\noften have I wanted 'a little shelter from life's stress.'\"\n\nThat was what a hearer said to a New Jersey minister, the Rev. Daniel\nLyman Ridout, at the close of worship during which the clergyman read\nthe words of John Oxenham, while his daughter accompanied him on the\npiano \"with reverent insight\":\n\n  \"Mid all the traffic of the ways--\n    Turmoils without, within--\n  Make in my heart a quiet place,\n    And come and dwell therein.\"\n\nOxenham's hymn expresses the desire of the soul in life's supreme\nmoments. This hymn was written during World War I, when the \"sorrow of\nthe human race was most acute.\"\n\nWriting under the name of John Oxenham, the author's real name is\nWilliam Arthur Dunkerley. Following his education in Victoria\nUniversity, Manchester, he followed a business career. He spent some\ntime in the United States, and also traveled extensively in Europe and\nCanada. \"He began writing as a relief from business,\" we are told.\nFinding that he enjoyed writing more, he \"dropped business and stuck to\nwriting.\"\n\nA most unusual note is sounded in this hymn. The heart of the mystic\ncalls for:\n\n  \"A little shrine of quietness,\n    All sacred to Thyself,\n  Where Thou shalt all my soul possess,\n    And I may find myself.\"\n\nIn a little private chapel down in the south of England he found the\nlittle \"shrine of quietness\" which he coveted. Thence he would go to\n\"sit and think,\" and realize his desire for:\n\n  \"A little place of mystic grace,\n    Of self and sin swept bare,\n  Where I may look upon Thy face,\n    And talk with Thee in prayer.\"\n\n\n                     Hymn of the Homesick American\n\nLeading representatives of every department of English public life\nassembled to do honor to one \"who had labored, during the six years he\nhad been ambassador, to promote good-will between the sister nations.\"\nThis was on May 6, 1905, when Joseph Hodges Choate was entertained at a\nfarewell banquet in London. He had attained high distinction as a lawyer\nand achieved great prominence in public life in the United States when,\nin 1899, President McKinley appointed him ambassador to Great Britain.\nThere he became a \"messenger of good-will\" in a very marked degree.\n\nThe scholarly orator, arising to speak, confessed that he was resigning\nbecause he was homesick. Then he explained: \"My friends on this side of\nthe water are multiplying every day in numbers and increasing in the\nardor of their affection. I am sorry to say that the great host of my\nfriends on the other side are as rapidly diminishing and dwindling away:\n\n  \"'Part of his host have crossed the flood,\n    And part are crossing now;'\n\nand I have a great desire to be with the waning number.\"\n\nThis was an effective use of words from a great hymn which Mr. Choate, a\nHarvard graduate, evidently well knew. The incident has been preserved\nfor us by the Rev. John Telford. They came from the hymn of Charles\nWesley, which begins:\n\n  \"Come, let us join our friends above\n    Who have obtained the prize.\"\n\nThis was the hymn that John Wesley and his congregation in Staffordshire\nwere singing at the hour when Charles Wesley, its author, joined the\ncompany in heaven. Once, when in Dublin, John Wesley announced this\nhymn, and making some comments on the same affirmed that it was \"the\nsweetest hymn\" his brother ever wrote. That lover and critic of hymns,\nW. T. Stead, reports that the Bishop of Hereford wrote him that he\nthought that the fourth verse \"was one of the finest in the whole realm\nof hymnology.\" This runs:\n\n  \"One army of the living God,\n    To His command we bow:\n  Part of his host have crossed the flood,\n    And part are crossing now.\"\n\nStudents in the classes of the beloved Samuel F. Upham, professor in\nDrew Theological Seminary, will readily recall how he, in advancing age,\nwith characteristic fervor and deep emotion, occasionally quoted the\nthird and fourth lines of this cherished verse. Stevenson, in his\ninforming discussion of the Wesley hymns, has given us a great variety\nof incidents associated with this song, and refers to it as \"that great\nand impassioned hymn.\"\n\n\n                          His Ordination Hymn\n\nThe day of his ordination is a sacred one in the life of a minister. It\nmarks the time when he is definitely set apart for a very sacred task\nfor the balance of his life. Therefore the events of that day are deeply\nembedded in the life of the individual who is henceforth to proclaim the\ngospel.\n\nReference was made by Dr. William Pierson Merrill, then pastor of the\nBrick Presbyterian Church in New York City, on October 26, 1930, when\nthe fortieth anniversary of his own ordination was observed, to the\nspecial hymn which was sung on that occasion. Written by the scholarly\nDr. Timothy Dwight, it has held a secure place in the hymnology of the\nChristian Church. The words deeply impressed him as a young man when\nthey sang:\n\n  \"I love Thy kingdom, Lord,\n    The house of Thine abode,\n  The Church our blest Redeemer saved\n    With His own precious blood.\"\n\nSpeaking of what the hymn had meant to him through the years of his\npulpit and pastoral experience, he said: \"I believed then, I am far\nsurer now, that this is the attitude for every Christian, and everyone\nwho would do his best for the common good. You cannot afford to neglect\n_the church_.\" Then once more the hymn was sung.\n\nDeep in the affections of thousands of Christians there dwells this love\nfor the church of the living Christ. Therefore through the decades since\nthis hymn was written Christians have assembled in their various places\nof worship, and have meaningly and happily sung:\n\n  \"For her my tears shall fall;\n    For her my prayers ascend;\n  To her my cares and toils be given;\n    Till toils and cares shall end.\"\n\n\n                Soldiers Sang at Their General's Funeral\n\nThe great military leader who had a premonition that he would die in\nbattle came to his death as the result of an accident sustained soon\nafter the close of World War II. Generals and colonels were the pall\nbearers of General George S. Patton, Jr., when he was laid to rest on\nChristmas eve, 1945, in the American Military Cemetery near Luxembourg.\nSix hundred men who had served under General Patton in combat formed an\nhonor guard; and his grave \"was no different from six thousand others\nwhich marked the resting-place of soldiers from his own beloved Third\nArmy.\"\n\nFuneral services were held in Christ Church, Heidelberg, Germany, on\nDecember 23rd, and those were extensively reported for the Associated\nPress. Two army chaplains were in charge. Mrs. Patton, who sat in the\nfront of the church, \"turned her head to look at the choir loft when a\nsoldier choir of thirty-six voices\" began to sing the first hymn:\n\n  \"The strife is o'er, the battle done;\n  The victory of life is won;\n  The song of triumph has begun.\n    Alleluia!\"\n\n\"This is one of those Easter hymns which is included in almost every\nhymnal, but which is actually used much less than it deserves,\" remarks\nDr. Charles A. Boyd. Tersely he adds: \"It is a historic treasure, one of\nthose Latin hymns so old that nobody knows the exact age.\"\n\nWhen the choral group from the Seventh Army began to sing:\n\n  \"The Son of God goes forth to war,\n    A kingly crown to gain;\n  His blood-red banner streams afar:\n    Who follows in His train?\"\n\nthe khaki-clad officers and men who filled Christ Church, where the\nEpiscopal service was conducted, joined in singing the familiar hymn.\nOnward to its concluding lines they sang with mighty voice:\n\n  \"A glorious band, the chosen few\n    On whom the Spirit came,\n  Twelve valiant saints, their hope they knew,\n    And mocked the cross and flame;\n  They climbed the steep ascent of heaven\n    Through peril, toil, and pain:\n  O God, to us may grace be given\n    To follow in their train!\"\n\nThe comment of Dr. Charles S. Robinson concerning this hymn merits\nconsideration: \"This is one of Bishop Reginald Heber's finest lyrics,\nranking in the estimation of many with that anthem-like composition,\n'Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty.'\"\n\nThe two hymns mentioned were sung at the request of Mrs. Patton, who\nstated that these were the two hymns which her husband most loved.\n\nThe soldiers lifted the flag from the casket, \"and held it a few inches\"\nabove the lid when the burial service occurred at Luxembourg. The 63rd\nPsalm (General Patton's favorite passage of Scripture) was intoned by\nChaplain Edwin R. Carter. The military men bared their heads, and the\nservice closed with the Lord's Prayer. \"With the ending of the prayer,\nthe soldiers folded the flag and handed it to Mrs. Patton.... A bugle\nsounded taps for the fallen leader.... The Russian, British and French\ngenerals, their great coats gleaming with medals, held themselves\nstrictly in salute until Mrs. Patton turned to leave.\" The body of the\nAmerican general was now resting beside that of an American private.\n\nDetails will gradually be forgotten by those who witnessed them, or\nfollowed the reports in the daily newspapers; but Americans will love to\nrecall the favorite hymns of a beloved military leader who participated\nin a most significant manner in the events of World War II.\n\n\n\n\n                              CHAPTER VII\n                        HYMNS THAT CHANGED LIVES\n\n\nTwice it has been my privilege to go to the Fiji Islands, the second\ntime just passing through on the ship. I never forgot the things told me\non my first visit. A hundred years ago all over the island of Tonga the\npeople were cannibals, but I saw Christian schools and colleges, in one\nof which I addressed 400 girls, from 13 to 19 years of age, who worked\nup to matriculation standard. When I had finished speaking they sang to\nme a Fijian farewell song. Then I saw these 400 big girls in their blue\ntunics scampering over the green, skin ebony black, teeth ivory white.\nTheir parents were all slaves; their grandparents cannibals, but these\ngirls burst into spontaneous singing and the words they sang were:\n\n  \"What a wonderful change in my life has been made,\n  Since Jesus came into my heart!\"\n\n                 --_Rev. Norman Dunning, at the Sudan Interior Mission._\n                                       --_The Christian Herald, London._\n\nPresiding at a great meeting in City Road Chapel, London, in 1933, when\nthe object was to inform the audience what was being done among the men\nof the army, the navy, and the air force by the churches, Mr. Joseph\nRank opened by giving his own experience. One Sunday evening he went to\nhear the famous and eloquent Hugh Price Hughes, who long conducted a\nsuccessful mission in London. Before he began to preach, the company\nsang:\n\n  \"'Tis the promise of God, full salvation to give\n  Unto him who on Jesus, His son, will believe.\n\n    \"Hallelujah, 'tis done! I believe on the Son;\n    I am saved by the blood of the crucified One.\"\n\n\"While singing it with the rest,\" said Mr. Rank, \"the question came to\nme, 'Can you truthfully say that?' By the time we came to the chorus\nagain, I had the peace that passeth understanding. I had the same warmed\nheart that John Wesley got, that Luther got, and that thousands of\nothers got in the same way, through believing in Jesus Christ.\"\n\n\n              When Catherine Booth Made the Great Decision\n\nA Salvation Army Band led the singing and a Salvation Army officer\ndelivered the address at one of the three meetings held in connection\nwith the 150th anniversary of Stockwell Green Congregational Church,\nLondon, during the summer of 1946. Very special reasons lay back of the\nrecognition of the Salvation Army on that occasion, for in that church\nthe wife of General William Booth made the \"great decision\"; and in\nfront of the speaker was the pew bearing the number 23 where Catherine\nMumford always sat with her family. She was also a teacher in its Sunday\nSchool. In that church on one June day she was converted, and on another\nJune day she was married to the Rev. William Booth, a young Methodist\nminister. The future years led these two young people, one a\nCongregationalist and the other a Methodist, in paths of Christian\nservice beyond their utmost dreams.\n\nCatherine had a gloriously happy memory in the hymn which led to her\nconversion, and rejoiced in its emphatic assurance, as expressed by\nCharles Wesley:\n\n    \"My God, I am Thine;\n    What a comfort divine,\n  What a blessing to know that my Jesus is mine!\n    In the heavenly lamb\n    Thrice happy I am,\n  And my heart it doth dance at the sound of His name.\"\n\nThis hymn has always been popular in British Methodism, and in the\nlatest edition of their hymn-book (1933) it is set to the tune of\n_Harwich_. Telford characterized it as \"a hymn with an extraordinary\nhistory of blessing ever since it was written.\" One can easily imagine,\ntherefore, with what delight the young convert could henceforth sing the\nsecond verse:\n\n    \"True pleasures abound\n    In the rapturous sound;\n  And whoever hath found it hath paradise found.\n    My Jesus to know,\n    And to feel His blood flow,\n  'Tis life everlasting, 'tis heaven below.\"\n\n\n                 His Song and Experience in a Coal Mine\n\n\"The greatest English poet of his age,\" said Dr. James Moffatt when\nspeaking of William Cowper. But this same writer gave us some of our\nmost cherished hymns. They are greatly beloved in our American churches\nas well as in his native land. Among those richly cherished and\nfrequently used in worship is the one which deals with Divine\nProvidence:\n\n  \"God moves in a mysterious way\n    His wonders to perform.\"\n\nThis hymn \"has helped multitudes to bear up under the blows of\napparently adverse fortune,\" we are told by W. T. Stead. Referring to\nthe verse which reads:\n\n  \"Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take;\n    The clouds ye so much dread\n  Are big with mercy, and shall break\n    In blessings on your head,\"\n\nwe are told that \"It has been much used in times of danger and\ndistress.\"\n\nIn confirmation of this statement, we have the experience of the Rev.\nEric Kinworthy, Rotherham, England. This personal incident won first\nprize among six hundred hymn stories submitted to _The Methodist\nRecorder_, London, in a \"Readers' Christmastide Symposium,\" December,\n1946. We give the story in the words of Mr. Kinworthy, who indicated the\neffect it had on his life:\n\n\"As a boy in my 'teens my work was that of a pony-driver in the local\ncoal-mine, and being a lover of horses, my work-mate and I were on good\nterms. Usually we were kept very busy, for two ponies and their drivers\nwere needed to keep the colliers supplied with empty tubs, and to take\naway the full tubs from the coal-face.\n\n\"One afternoon, since but few of the men were at work, Captain, my pony,\nwas well able to do the work by himself. The other pony was allowed to\nstay in the stables. As we went on our way to the end of the level with\na full load, I was singing a hymn.\n\n\"Suddenly, there was an awful crash. We were jerked to a standstill. It\nwas impossible to see anything until the dust cleared. In a little\nwhile, I found the roof had caved in, and resting on top of the first\ntwo tubs was a huge stone weighing about two hundredweights. Other big\nstones were lying around. I was badly frightened, but realized my life\nhad been wonderfully spared from death or certain injury. If the pony\nhad not increased his pace a moment or two before, nothing could have\nsaved us. I had been singing a moment before--\n\n  \"'God moves in a mysterious way.\n  His wonders to perform.'\n\nImmediately I knelt in the dust and dedicated my life to God. He had\nspared me for some high purpose. Today I am trying to fit in, in that\ngreat purpose, as a minister.\"\n\n\n                     Decision of the \"Incorrigible\"\n\nOne of the great hymns of the twentieth century, and one which attained\nimmediate popularity, the author tells us, was \"written for a\nConsecration Service at Boston University School of Religious Education\nin 1926.\" The opening lines begin with a striking question and a\nsignificant answer:\n\n  \"'Are ye able,' said the Master,\n    'To be crucified with me?--'\n  'Yea,' the sturdy dreamers answered,\n    'To the death we Follow Thee.'\"\n\nMany interesting stories have gathered around this hymn, written by\nProfessor Earl Marlatt, then of the Boston University School of\nTheology. Among these stories, which he treasures, was one given to me\nby Professor Marlatt, with full permission to use the same. Therefore I\ngive it in his own words: \"One of my former students, serving as a\nchaplain in Sherborn Prison for Women, wrote me a letter to say that she\nhad used this hymn in a Sunday vesper service at the prison. Two hours\nlater she was called to the cell of one of the so-called\n'incorrigibles.' The girl was very quiet now and soft-spoken.\n\n\"'I suppose you were surprised to have me call for you,' she said to the\nchaplain, 'and I don't wonder. I've never done much with religion. If I\nhad I wouldn't be here, probably. That song we sang tonight made me see\nwhat the things you believe can mean to people like me. Please tell your\nfriend, that he's never seen me, but he wrote that second verse for me.'\n\n\"She repeated the second verse from memory:\n\n  \"'Are ye able to remember,\n    When a thief lifts up his eyes,\n  That his pardoned soul is worthy\n    Of a place in Paradise?'\n\n\"Just thank him, please, and tell him I'll try to remember and be\ndifferent.\"\n\nFew hymns have so captured young people as this one, and they love to\nsing it. The refrain, especially, makes an appeal to them, and with\nglowing radiance on their faces they happily sing:\n\n  \"'Lord, we are able'\n    Our spirits are Thine,\n  Remold them, make us,\n    Like Thee, divine.\n  Thy guiding radiance\n    Above us shall be\n  A beacon to God,\n    To love and loyalty.\"\n\n\n                    The Hymn That Wrought a Miracle\n\nThe Wembley Stadium is known as a great sports center in England. With\nit, however, there is associated a very remarkable story of the effect\nof one of our choicest hymns. English periodicals have reported this\nincident under the headings of \"The Miracle at Wembley\" and \"The Song in\nthe Stadium.\" Naturally the story is associated with an individual, who\nin this case is Mr. T. P. Ratcliffe, \"the conductor in tennis flannels,\"\nand dates back to a \"memorable day at the Wembley Stadium, in April,\n1927, when the crowd numbered 96,000 people.\"\n\nRefusing to be discouraged by the statements of his friends, that\n\"singing at Wembley would not be a success,\" this leader of community\nsinging had his great audience begin with \"Pack Up Your Troubles,\" and\nfollowed with other popular songs of the day. The people liked it. Said\nhe: \"On my right, 48,000 waved their song-sheets and shouted 'Cheerio'\nto a similar number on my left.\"\n\nThis period of singing was about to close, when, greatly daring, the\nleader announced that they would, in conclusion, sing the \"grand old\nhymn, 'Abide With Me.'\" He was about to ask all to stand, when, glancing\nat the Royal box, he saw King George V rise and bare his head.\n\nThe hymn created a great depth of religious feeling. Said the leader, as\nquoted in _The British Weekly_: \"Wembley became for the moment a great\nopen air cathedral.\" One who knew the circumstances remarked: \"If ever\nany felt a possible incongruity in the singing of 'Abide With Me' by\nalmost 100,000 people on a football ground and in between two exciting\nparts of a game that awakened an immense sporting enthusiasm they should\nlisten to some of the stories of the influence of that hymn under those\nconditions.\" One of those related was particularly arresting.\n\nThis concerned a man who was in a muddled condition because of drink,\nbut the strange experience of \"singing a church hymn on a football stand\napparently sobered him.\" And an usher stated that he pulled off his cap\nfor the final stanza.\n\nTwo years later Mr. Ratcliffe, the leader, was singing in a mission hall\nin the north of England, and a lady who was present asked him to her\nhome to visit her husband. When he reached the house her husband, Bill,\nwith shining eyes, grasped the visitor's hand, and expressed his\nhappiness. He was the confused Wembley singer, and he thus related what\nhappened to him: \"When you sang 'Abide With Me' something snapped. I\ncould never explain, but I felt myself a new man. The singing of the\nfirst verse recalled my Christian parents, and a godly home, while the\nsecond brought before me my unhappy wife and children. I tried to join\nin the third verse which was a prayer just suited to me.\" This is the\nverse which begins:\n\n  \"I need Thy presence every passing hour:\n  What but Thy grace can foil the tempter's power?\"\n\nBill's wife then explained how she was affected as she took the visitor\nto the window, and told how she was waiting Bill's return. She expected\nthat when she saw him he would be \"in his usual state.\" But as he turned\nthe corner he was running and singing, and when he entered the house he\nkissed her, and, between sobs, told her what had happened.\n\nLater years have found him in the home three times, said this visitor in\nthe latter part of 1945. The three children were taught to call him\n\"Uncle Tom.\" Each time he visited the family the little girl got the\nlarge Bible and read one of the miracles of Jesus. Then the father would\nput an arm around the group of children and narrate the \"miracle\" that\nhappened to him at Wembley \"when the football crowd sang 'Abide With\nMe.'\" \"Uncle Tom\" would then sing the hymn that caused the miracle.\n\n\n\n\n                              CHAPTER VIII\n                      SONGS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH\n\n\n  \"One Sunday evening a farmer was teaching his little girl the hymn, 'A\n  charge to keep I have.' When they came to the verse:\n\n  \"'To serve the present age,\n    My calling to fulfill;\n  Oh, may it all my powers engage\n    To do my Master's will!'\n\n  the godly father told his daughter that the Creator had brought her\n  into the world that she might fulfill that verse. The child believed\n  it. And because that verse took possession of that little girl and\n  started her on a great career, Frances E. Willard stands in perpetual\n  marble in Statuary Hall in the Capitol at Washington, the one woman in\n  the nation's Hall of Fame.\"--_The Homiletic Review._\n\nA little lad, according to the story related by Bishop William Burt,\nloved to sing. He had a particular fondness for one hymn, and hence he\noften sang around the home the hymn which he had learned in Sunday\nSchool:\n\n  \"Jesus, Lover of my soul,\n    Let me to Thy bosom fly.\"\n\nThe parents, naturally, were delighted to have their growing boy\ndisplaying his gift of song; but he sometimes sang at what appeared to\nthem to be inopportune moments. For instance, one night the family were\ngoing to a party, and the little fellow was warned not to sing on that\noccasion.\n\nDuring the evening, however, the boy was in a corner of the room, and,\nbeing alone, began to sing his beloved hymn in a clear, sweet voice.\nThose present were delighted at the pleasing incident. When, however,\nthe boy observed his parents look at him, somewhat reprovingly, he said\nto them, \"I didn't mean to do it, but it sang itself.\"\n\n\n                    Song of the Child in the Shelter\n\n\"Mummie, do you think they would listen if I sang for them?\"\n\n\"Oh, no, of course not,\" was the mother's reply. \"You can't sing here,\"\nshe added.\n\nMother and her little girl were in an English air raid shelter and the\nwartime experience was a new one for the perplexed child. England was\nbeing terribly bombed in the spring of 1941, and on this occasion more\nthan a hundred people, highly nervous, were trying to meet their fears\nwith loud conversation, shouting, laughter, and some kind of singing.\nThe scene of commotion distressed the little girl, and she wished the\npeople were less noisy. A British writer told us what happened.\n\nThe conversation of mother and daughter was overheard by a woman who was\nsitting near by. Turning to the mother the woman said, \"And why should\nshe not sing?\" Immediately, therefore, she stood up, called for order,\nand invited the little girl to sing.\n\nThe child, very shyly, advanced to the middle of the shelter, and\nclasped her hands, as though in prayer. Lifting her sweet childish voice\nshe sang:\n\n  \"Jesus, tender Shepherd, hear me;\n    Bless Thy little lamb tonight;\n  Through the darkness be Thou near me;\n    Keep me safe till morning light.\n\n  \"All this day Thy hand has led me,\n    And I thank Thee for Thy care;\n  Thou hast clothed me, warmed and fed me;\n    Listen to my evening prayer.\n\n  \"Let my sins be all forgiven;\n    Bless the friends I love so well;\n  Take me when I die to heaven,\n    Happy there with Thee to dwell.\"\n\nSilence immediately prevailed. Hearts which were unmoved by the\nconfusion of the earlier noises were touched by the song of the child.\nTheir spirits became responsive, for a little child had led them in a\nsong which was both a prayer of thanksgiving and reverent petition. Mary\nLundie Duncan, who was the daughter of one minister and the wife of\nanother, wrote this hymn, as she did others, for her own children. \"In\nevery word it breathes the childlike spirit.\" Dr. James Moffatt,\nspeaking perhaps more for his native country than for America (though\nthe hymn is found in the section for children in some of our American\nhymnals), said that this is \"the first evening prayer that thousands of\nlittle children learn.\"\n\n\n                          What the Scouts Sang\n\nSea Scouts accompanied Boy Scouts to a morning service of worship on a\nFebruary Sunday, 1947, and thus \"gave modern color to the old-world\ndignity\" of a very beautiful Presbyterian Church in an American city. It\nwas also the first Sunday in his new pastorate of a man who had served\nduring World War II with anti-aircraft units in the Southwest Pacific.\nThus everything combined to make the occasion memorable. Said the\nminister to the Scouts: \"In my work as chaplain I found it was boys with\nScout background who stepped forward and offered to be of service. And a\nmarked proportion of distinguished service medals were awarded to former\nscouts.\"\n\nBut the \"sermon found its devotional climax,\" we were told, \"in the hymn\nof consecration\" selected to be sung. This was written by a great lover\nof youth, the Rev. Charles A. Dickinson, D.D. Born in Vermont, July 4,\n1849, he graduated from Harvard University. In the latter part of his\nlife he established his residence in California. The hymn sung was:\n\n  \"Blessed Master, I have promised,\n    Hear my solemn vow;\n  Take this pledge of mine and seal it\n    Here and now.\"\n\n\"The outstanding characteristic of this hymn is the absolute finality of\nthe solemn dedication to Christ. It is 'here and now' that the\nirrevocable decision is made,\" commented Covert and Laufer. But the hymn\ncloses with a prayer for strength to keep the pledge made:\n\n  \"Let no worldly cares or pleasures\n    Call my heart away;\n  Save me, Lord, and keep me faithful\n    Day by day.\"\n\n\"Hearts have been deeply stirred by the use of this hymn at the monthly\nconsecration service of Christian Endeavor societies, for which it was\nevidently designed,\" we are told. It was a good hymn for the Scouts to\nsing on that winter morning.\n\n\n                         \"Jesus Bids Us Shine\"\n\nThis large family lived about equi-distant from four towns on a quiet\ninaccessible rented farm along the river. It was while I was visiting\nthe country school that I first got acquainted with some of the\nchildren. They told me about their youngest sister, who had had\ninfantile paralysis. After getting rather minute directions from the\nolder brother, I finally found the isolated farm home.\n\nAlice was five years old and as bright and as ardent a little child as I\never knew. She was very easy to make friends with and I soon began to\nteach her the first verse of the children's song, \"Jesus Bids Us Shine.\"\nWhen I came to the line, \"You in your small corner, and I in mine,\" I\nwould point first at her and then at myself. She got a great \"kick\" out\nof this and set herself to learn the words and the tune. I visited with\nthe older folks a while, went out to the barn with the farmer to look at\nhis stock, ate dinner with the family, but in between times I kept\ntrying to teach little Alice the first verse of that song. Finally she\ncould sing it with the assistance of her older sister.\n\nAbout a year later I went out to the Anderson home but found that Alice\nhad been taken for treatment to the children's hospital at the\nUniversity. I went back a year later, and this time I found that an\nambulance had come after her that very morning. Perhaps six months\nlater, I was again slowly taking the deeply-rutted road. She came\nlimping toward me as fast as she could, which was not very fast.\nHobbling down the lane on her one good leg with the aid of a\nconsiderably improved other leg, she called out to me with ardent pride,\n\"I can sing that song. _I can sing that song!_\"\n\nAnd she could:\n\n  \"Jesus bids us shine, with a clear pure light,\n    Like a little candle burning in the night;\n  In this world of darkness, we must shine,\n    You in your small corner, and I in mine.\"\n\nAnd she didn't forget to point at me either!\n\n                                        --_Otis Moore in Zion's Herald._\n\n\n                      Men Loved the Kiddies' Hymn\n\n\"I have seen an officer in mid-years almost break down in tears because\nI casually quoted the ... hymn:\n\n  \"'Now the day is over,\n    Night is drawing nigh;\n  Shadows of the evening\n    Steal across the sky.'\"\n\nSuch was the testimony of Chaplain Thomas Tiplady, who was with the\nBritish forces in France during World War I. He gives the reason for\nthis when he says that the man's mother had for several years repeated\nthe hymn to him every evening.\n\nBut most of the soldiers liked this hymn. Particularly impressive is the\naccount given of the time when the men assembled for worship in a little\nchurch at Achicourt, about a mile out of Arras. There the men often\ngathered, even though the building had been badly shattered. A final\nservice was held, and the benediction had been pronounced. Then the\nchaplain said: \"Before we part and before we leave Achicourt which has\nmeant so much to us of joy and sorrow, let us sing a kiddies' hymn.\" It\nwas not in their books, but the leader read it verse by verse, and the\nmen sang. One may easily imagine their deep feelings as they united in\nthe words:\n\n  \"Grant to little children\n    Visions bright of Thee;\n  Guard the sailors tossing\n    On the deep blue sea.\"\n\nThe testimony of the chaplain to the effects produced by that hymn is as\nfollows: \"I have witnessed many moving sights in my time and heard much\ndeep and thrilling music but I have never been so deeply moved by\nanything as by the deep, rich voices of these gallant men and boys who,\nafter winning the Battle of Arras, had come into this ruined church and\nwere singing this beautiful kiddies' hymn as their last farewell.\"\n\n\n\n\n                               CHAPTER IX\n                       SANG IN THEIR OWN TONGUES\n\n\n  What seems to me important and inspiring is that in hours of deep\n  religious emotion Christian faith in different nations should find\n  expression in the same words.\n\n                                             --_The Christian Advocate._\n\n  Wondrous power of music!...\n\n  It touches the chords of memory, and brings back the happy scenes of\n  the past.\n\n  In the rude mining camp, cut off by the snows of winter, in the narrow\n  cabin of the ship ice-bound in the Arctic seas, in the bare, dark\n  rooms of the war-prison where the captive soldiers are trying to\n  beguile the heavy time in company, tears steal down the rough cheeks\n  when some one strikes up the familiar notes of \"Home, Sweet Home.\" ...\n\n  It borrows the comfort of hope.\n\n  It drops the threads of sorrow one by one, and catches the beams of\n  light reflected from the future, and weaves them in among its\n  harmonies, blending, brightening, softening the mystic web, until we\n  are enclosed, we know not how, in a garment of consolation, and the\n  cold, tired heart finds itself warmed, and rested, and filled with\n  courage.\n\n  Most gracious ministry of music!\n\n       --_\"Six Days in the Week,\" by Henry van Dyke_ (Charles Scribner's\n                                                                  Sons).\n\n\n              Chinese and Americans Sang a Negro Spiritual\n\nThe distinguished Negro musician who was the guest of honor of The Hymn\nSociety of America at its spring meeting, in 1944, was Dr. Harry T.\nBurleigh, who had then been associated for half a century with the music\nof St. George's Church, New York City. This prominent man began by\ntracing his love of music to his mother, and also his blind grandfather,\nwho taught him many, many of the old Negro melodies when a lad. Then,\nperseveringly, he won a scholarship at the National Conservatory of\nMusic in New York.\n\nAfter relating how much of his time had been devoted to the task of\narranging and composing Negro spirituals he sat at the piano and\nthrilled his audience as he sang these beautiful songs: \"Weeping Mary,\"\n\"Go Down in the Lonesome Valley to Meet Your Saviour There,\" \"I'm\nSeeking for a City, Hallelujah!\" \"Lord, I Want to be a Christian.\"\n\nHappily there was present that day the Rev. Timothy Tingfang Lew,\nprofessor at Yengching University, Chengtu, West China. He narrated how\nthere was produced in China a common hymnal for the leading evangelical\nchurches, and stated that \"the present Chinese hymnbook, 'Hymns of\nUniversal Praise,' was the result of effective team-work.\" Included in\nthis book was, he indicated, \"Lord, I Want to Be a Christian,\" and\nsuggested that they all sing it with Dr. Burleigh. Everybody liked the\nidea.\n\nTwo Chinese missionaries were accompanying Dr. and Mrs. Lew; so these\nfour sang it in the Chinese language, while the others sang in English.\nThus their voices blended in one of the beloved spirituals of the Negro\nrace, while they were accompanied by a Negro on the piano.\n\n  \"Lord, I want to be a Christian,\n    In-a my heart, in-a my heart\n  Lord, I want to be a Christian\n    In-a my heart.\"\n\nWriters of hymns, composers of tunes, church organists and choir leaders\nwere in that company of men and women who joyfully sang the verses of\nthat beloved spiritual, and their faces were radiant as they came to the\nwords:\n\n  \"Lord, I want to be like Jesus\n    In-a my heart, in-a my heart,\n  Lord, I want to be like Jesus\n    In-a my heart.\"\n\nThe entire company felt and affirmed that the effect was most touching.\n\nWhen the United States entered World War II five leaders of the\nSalvation Army, who knew what American youth liked to sing, and what is\nalso profitable for them, made a small selection of hymns for the use of\nthe armed forces in both their religious services and social gatherings.\nThat thin little book wisely contained the appealing spiritual:\n\n  \"Lord, I want to be a Christian.\"\n\nThus it went around the world with our American lads. The people of\nGreat Britain, the newspapers affirmed, became greatly attached to it,\nand particularly enjoyed hearing it sung by the colored soldiers.\n\n\n                    Christmas Carols in Two Tongues\n\n\"It required an attentive ear to notice that the singing was in two\nlanguages at once,\" said a reporter in _The New York Times_ when he gave\na vivid description of the Christmas service conducted in the First\nChinese Church in New York City on the Sunday following Christmas Day,\nin 1946. Children took a very prominent part, especially in the\nrendering of Christmas music.\n\nThe building was decorated in the traditional fashion. Both the United\nStates flag and that of the Chinese were displayed, and between them was\na white banner with \"red cut-out characters saying 'Merry Christmas' in\nChinese.\" Various Christmas exercises were rendered, and then a speaker\nemphasized the fact that Christmas belongs to everybody.\n\nTogether they sang, \"The First Noel\" and \"Hark! the Herald Angels Sing.\"\n\nBefore the service closed the \"two stars of the program, small\nbrothers,\" sang the lovely hymn attributed to Martin Luther:\n\n  \"Away in a manger, no crib for a bed,\n  The little Lord Jesus laid down His sweet head.\n  The stars in the sky looked down where He lay,\n  The little Lord Jesus, asleep on the hay.\"\n\n\"It was a big day for these Chinese children and their parents,\"\ncommented the reporter. For many visitors, also, it was a time of\nhappiness. The joyful strains of Christmas music make human hearts glad\nwherever the story of the Christ Child is told.\n\n\n                     \"Everybody Knows 'Holy Night'\"\n\n\"Can we not sing something together?\" This was the question asked in the\ndays of the First World War at a gathering in the Young Women's\nChristian Association in Boston.\n\n\"Why,\" someone exclaimed, \"how can we?\" Then she added, \"There is no\nlanguage which all of us speak.\"\n\nThe answer appeared to be discouragingly decisive until a French girl\nmade a happy suggestion. \"But tunes,\" said she, \"are the same, and there\nought to be a tune which we all know, even if we have to sing different\nwords.\"\n\n\"Everybody knows 'Holy Night,'\" remarked a young woman of large musical\nability, born in Russia. Her parentage was English and German, and she\nhad cousins in each of the three nations. She sat down at the piano and\nbegan to play the song.\n\nAn American concert singer with a rare voice, invited in for the\noccasion, stood by her and led. Those who spoke English began to sing:\n\n  \"Silent night, holy night,\n  All is calm, all is bright.\"\n\nOne after another others joined, and soon, French, Swiss, German,\nAustrian, Belgian, Pole, Russian and Italian were all singing together\nthe same message to the same music--but each in her own tongue.\n\n\"If we all start from Christ,\" said Henry Churchill King, who once\nrelated this incident, \"the nations can come into harmony, even though\neach sings in its own tongue.\"\n\n\n                Unifying Influence of Song at Eastertide\n\nThe spirit of Easter has an exhilarating effect on all peoples in\nChristian lands. The following from the news columns of _The New York\nTimes_ on Easter Monday (April 26, 1943) indicates that representatives\nof various nationalities entered into the joy of the festive season.\nAmong the many services described that day was the sunrise service at\nCentral Park, as follows:\n\nMore than 6,000 persons gathered for the annual service on the Mall in\nCentral Park at 7 A.M. A group of Waves and Spars and members of the\nMarine Corps Auxiliary served as ushers. The services were principally\nmusical, with the singing of Easter hymns by various foreign-language\ngroups, as well as hymns in English.\n\nThe services were opened with the singing of \"The Star-Spangled Banner\"\nby Miss Lucy Monroe, accompanied by the Maritime Band, and continued\nwith the singing of hymns by choirs from foreign-language churches in\nthe metropolitan area. Twelve Mohawk Indians in tribal regalia, the\nchoir of the Cuyler Presbyterian Church, Brooklyn, sang \"Up From the\nGrave He Rose,\" and a group of sixteen Chinese children sang the same\nhymn in their native tongue.\n\nThe choir of the Russian Evangelical Pentecostal Church sang the hymn,\n\"He Arose From the Dead,\" in Russian, and \"He Lives\" was sung by an\nItalian choir led by the Rev. D. Lisciandrello, pastor of Calvary\nChurch, Brooklyn.\n\nOther foreign language groups participating included the Syrian\nProtestant Church, Brooklyn; the Spanish Christian Church, and a Polish\nchoir.\n\nPeople of many lands, therefore, sang in their own tongue the glad story\nof the resurrection of Christ.\n\n\n\n\n                               CHAPTER X\n                    PATRIOTIC MUSIC IN WAR AND PEACE\n\n\nSoldier voices were heard singing in the crypt of St. Paul's Cathedral\non July 4, 1941. Strangely, as though protected by Divine Providence,\nthis historic building was still standing though surrounding London had\nbeen destructively bombed and was mostly in ruins. But on that memorable\nday there was unveiled a memorial tablet to Billy Fiske, the first\nAmerican to give his life in World War II. Fliers from his own squadron\nand some other American volunteers were the singers. \"Standing together\nin the candle-lit dusk,\" said Alexander Woolcott, \"this symbolic group\nof Anglo-American courage sang Billy Fiske to his rest with the words:\n\n  \"'Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.'\"\n\nA surprise awaited Mrs. F. D. Roosevelt on a September day, in 1943,\naccording to a report of the Associated Press, when she walked into a\nroom for youthful sufferers from infantile paralysis in the Melbourne\nChild's Hospital. Mrs. Roosevelt was in Australia at that time visiting\nthe American troops, but she was also interested in these youthful\npatients.\n\nThere she saw, as she entered, \"Thirteen-year-old Briar Dean holding a\nharmonica in his one usable hand, and playing America's national\nanthem.\" When he halted his music, Mrs. Roosevelt, attracted by the\nunusual scene, walked directly to the youngster and asked him to play\nfor her. So he started over, and played through a verse, and the chorus.\n\n\"Four generals, one admiral, and numerous other gold-braided men, stood\nat attention,\" according to the correspondent who narrated the memorable\nevent for his American readers.\n\n\n                     Surprise for American Soldiers\n\n\"It was the Fourth of July in this joint British and American Officers'\ntraining camp,\" said an Associated Press report from \"an officers'\ntraining camp\" in North Africa on July 5, 1943. No announcement,\nhowever, was posted concerning a Fourth of July celebration. \"The camp\nwas to follow its regular routine. There would be a route march at five\no'clock.\"\n\nThe hour of five came and the men fell in on the parade ground, and\nstarted up the trail. It was observed that the American general was\nmaking the march, but no British officers were seen. \"It's our holiday,\nand they get the day off. Can you beat it?\" Thus murmured the Americans.\n\n\"The trail led through a grove winding up and down the slopes of the\nmountain,\" said the correspondent. \"The sun was nearly down when they\nemerged into a clearing.\n\n\"Just ahead, in an open space among the trees, the British officers were\nlined up in two files. They were singing 'The Star-Spangled Banner.' An\nAmerican flag waved above their heads.\"\n\nSuch was the tersely vivid account of a dramatic moment in the lives of\nBritish and American soldiers in North Africa during an important period\nin the history of World War II.\n\n\n               \"America the Beautiful\" Heard at Arlington\n\n\"The Unknown Soldier and his legions of sleeping comrades were honored\nanew in this national cemetery today--with fresh flowers and a solemn\npromise,\" said an Associated Press report from the Arlington National\nCemetery on May 30, 1943. \"The Memorial Day crowd,\" it added, \"came from\nevery direction through the oak-shaded walks of the cemetery, sobered by\nthe sight of fresh graves among the sod-covered resting places of\nearlier veterans.\"\n\nTaps were sounded by a marine corps bugler, and all conversation ceased.\nPresident F. D. Roosevelt's wreath was laid on the tomb of the Unknown\nSoldier. Representatives of veterans' organizations and their\nauxiliaries, dressed in vivid uniforms, then deposited wreath after\nwreath at the base of the white monument.\n\nThe \"solemn promise\" mentioned was given by Lt.-Gen. Brehon B. Somervell\nwho made this declaration: \"To the nameless soldier here before us in\nthis marble tomb and through him to all his comrades, wherever they may\nlie, we make this promise:\n\n\"With them we enter into an earnest covenant that we will carry on the\nfight, against whatever odds and however long it takes, until justice\nand decency and human liberty are re-established throughout the earth.\"\n\n\"America the Beautiful\" was distinctly heard as the people moved quietly\ninto the classic marble amphitheater, as the carillon at Fort Myer,\nnearby, gave forth the music of the beloved patriotic song of Katharine\nLee Bates--\n\n  \"O beautiful for heroes proved\n    In liberating strife,\n  Who more than self their country loved,\n    And mercy more than life!\"\n\n\n                    An American Home on Invasion Day\n\nAs a nation we had looked upon the war as a gigantic business\nproposition which we could manage with our own resources: production,\ngovernment agencies, organization and training. Then came D-Day, and for\nthe first time we drew upon our reserve.\n\nThe first hour in the morning runs strictly to schedule in our household\nsince this is the only way to avoid confusion when the children are\ngetting ready for school as Dad leaves for the office. As soon as I go\ndownstairs, I turn the radio to the musical clock program in order to\ncheck our progress.\n\nEach morning a recording blares out, \"O, What a Beautiful Morning!\" But\non June 6 I heard an organ pealing forth \"Finlandia\"--\"Be still, my\nsoul: The Lord is on thy side.\" And then I knew before seeing the paper\non the front porch that the headline would be \"Invasion!\"\n\nEach minute of this day was so filled with destiny that it seemed of\nlittle importance to note their individual passing: so, without the\ncustomary pause for announcing the time, the melody changed to \"Onward,\nChristian Soldiers.\" Our boys were crossing the channel in the presence\nof that other Son who had suffered and died, that those he loved might\nlive fully.\n\nThe muted organ almost whispered \"Rock of Ages\" as parents knelt at home\nunder the sheltering arms of that other Father, whose heart had bled\nwith each thrust of the spear. \"Let me hide myself in Thee\" was the\nmessage. Those parents do not care that it is a beautiful morning. It\nmakes no difference that the hands on the clock say that it is\nseven-fifteen. \"Simply to Thy cross I cling\" was their solace.\n\nAnd then the organ led in prayer, the prayer that filled the hearts of\nthe sons approaching the beachheads, and the parents in their\nGethsemane:\n\n  \"O God, our help in ages past,\n  Our hope for years to come,\n  Be thou our guide while life shall last,\n  And our eternal home!\"\n\nFor the first time voices joined the melody of the organ. Strong,\nconfident, courageous voices ringing forth the affirmation, \"A Mighty\nFortress Is Our God.\" And then the triumphant, trumpet-like tones of the\norgan, sounding their notes of gratitude to the \"God of our Fathers,\"\nwhose strong arm is \"our ever sure defense ... from war's alarms, from\ndeadly pestilence.\"\n\nIn that moment, I murmured a prayer of gratitude that my parents had\ntaught me the words of these hymns so that my thoughts had been led by\nthe organ melodies to my personal unlimited reserves, that represent the\nrightful heritage of a child of God.\n\nFor my two children June 6, 1944, will soon have become another date to\nlearn from the pages of a history book. I cannot know when their H-Hour\nwill come. But I do know their reserves will make them more than\nvictorious because theirs is the greatest inheritance in the\nuniverse--the \"Faith of our Fathers.\"\n\n  --_Charlotte A. Young in \"The Christian Advocate,\" June 29, 1944. Used\n                                                         by permission._\n\n\n                       \"Our God is Marching On!\"\n\n\"The most solemn day in American history,\" was June 6, 1944, according\nto one editor. This was known as \"D day,\" and was the day of the\ninvasion of the coast of Normandy by the Allied nations engaged in a\nmighty and deadly struggle with Germany.\n\nThis day was anticipated for many weeks. It was known that the United\nStates and Great Britain would unite in striking the enemy at a season\nand a place when and where the blow would be considered to be most\neffective. Only a few statesmen and high-ranking military authorities,\nhowever, knew in advance just when that day would come. One outstanding\naim, of course, was to surprise the enemy. A mighty military machine had\nbeen built for the purpose; and, on the other hand, the enemy, in\nignorance of the secret of time and place, had done its utmost to mass\nits forces and arrange its protective material where it was hoped that\nthey would be most effective.\n\nChurches and communities arranged to ring their church bells and give\nother signals as soon as the news of the invasion was received, so that\nthe people might learn of the fateful hour and join in prayer. Churches\nalso arranged to open their buildings, and ministers planned for\ngatherings for prayer. These features were generally observed. Then at\nten o'clock at night, President F. D. Roosevelt, who the previous\nevening addressed the nation on the fall of Rome, led the nation in\nprayer. Probably never so many people in the United States listened to\nthe President at the same time as on that occasion. \"In this poignant\nhour, I ask you to join with me in prayer,\" said he to those, who, all\nover the nation, were listening. Then he began:\n\n\"Almighty God: Our sons, pride of our nation, this day have set upon a\nmighty endeavor, a struggle to preserve our republic, our religion and\nour civilization, and to set free a suffering humanity.\n\n\"Lead them straight and true; give strength to their arms, stoutness to\ntheir hearts, steadfastness in their faith.\"\n\nThe prayer was inclusive, and men and women mostly listened to it as\nthey sat in their own homes--homes from which their loved ones had gone\nforth to fight for freedom. Then came the closing words:\n\n\"Thy will be done, Almighty God. Amen.\"\n\nMillions of eyes were moistened by tears at that hushed moment. The\npause was brief. Then from the radio came voices reverently singing:\n\n  \"Onward, Christian soldiers,\n    Marching as to war,\n  With the cross of Jesus\n    Going on before!\"\n\nAnother selection was rendered, and then, most appropriately, came the\nsong of the beloved Julia Ward Howe:\n\n\"Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord,\" concerning\nwhich said one newspaper columnist the next day, \"more than any other\nsong of any time this strikes deeply home at this hour.\" How impressive\nwas that refrain toward the close of this historic day:\n\n  \"Glory, glory, Hallelujah! Glory, glory, Hallelujah!\n  Glory, glory, Hallelujah! His truth is marching on!\"\n\nThe second verse was rendered as a solo:\n\n  \"I have seen him in the watch-fires of a hundred circling camps;\n  They have builded Him an altar in the evening dews and damps;\n  I have read His righteous sentence by the dim and flaring lamps;\n    His truth is marching on.\"\n\nA male voice rendered one verse and a woman's voice another. The chorus\nrefrain was each time sung by the entire chorus. Also, they all united\nin the closing verse. How unforgettably impressive was this!\n\n  \"In the beauty of the lilies, Christ was born across the sea,\n  With a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me:\n  As He died to make men holy, let us die to make men free,\n    While God is marching on.\"\n\n\n                \"The Star-Spangled Banner\" at War's End\n\n\"It's going to be a long war, and it is going to be a tough war,\" said\nFranklin D. Roosevelt, when he appeared before Congress on December 8,\n1941, to ask for a declaration of war with Japan after that nation had\nattacked the United States. The President was speaking that day in a\nprophetic strain. He was right. The war was both \"long\" and \"tough.\" The\nwartime generation, of World War II, will long remember the anxiety and\nsacrifice of those days, as with grim determination our youth fought and\nour people labored unitedly to win a priceless victory. Not until\nSeptember, 1945, did peace return to our land.\n\n\"The Stars and Stripes were raised over ancient Tokio today as General\nMacArthur formally established authority over Japan's battered capital\nin the name of the United States,\" were the words which appeared on the\nfront page of some of our newspapers on September 8, 1945. This account\nof what happened was printed in _The New York Times_. It was written by\nFrank L. Kluckhorn: \"Standing alone before Lt.-Gen. Robert Eichelberger,\ncommander of the 8th army, which is garrisoning Tokio, MacArthur said:\n'Gen. Eichelberger, have our country's flag unfurled, and in Tokio's sun\nlet it wave in its full glory as a symbol of hope for the oppressed and\nas a harbinger of victory for the right.'\n\n\"Eichelberger saluted, repeated the order, and the band played the\nnational anthem. As the guard of honor and the others present saluted,\nthe flag was raised on the pole where it can be seen from much of Tokio.\nThe chaplain of the First Cavalry Division gave the benediction, and the\nceremony was over.\" But how thrilling and unforgettable must it have\nbeen to have listened to the strains of \"The Star-Spangled Banner\" in\nthat momentous hour!\n\nA news item observed that the American flag unfurled on this occasion\nwas the very flag that floated over the Capitol in Washington on\nDecember 7, 1941. This was the day when we were attacked by the\nJapanese.\n\nVauntingly the Japanese had declared, it was reported, that peace terms\nwould be signed in the White House in Washington. Far different,\nhowever, was the reality. The terms of the \"unconditional surrender\" of\nJapan were made known, and the ceremonies relating to the signing of the\nsame were observed on board the battleship Missouri in Tokio Bay. These\nwere reported in the morning papers of September 3, 1945, though\nmillions of citizens in the United States heard them over the radio the\nprevious night. We were told that the \"Missouri's band outdid itself\nproviding music, playing 'Anchors Aweigh' ... and 'The Stars and Stripes\nForever.' A bugler sounded 'Taps' in memory of the gallant band of men\nand women who had gone into the great conflict with mighty forces with\nthe hopeful feeling that\n\n  \"... conquer we must when our cause it is just,\n  And this be our motto, 'In God is our trust.'\"\n\nThus the national anthem was played at the hour of the formal surrender\nof Japan on the Missouri and also when General MacArthur set up power in\nTokio, \"and the same historic flag was flown on both occasions.\" _The\nStar-Spangled Banner_ always has a special appeal when it is rendered in\nthe presence of the Stars and Stripes. Our national anthem had gone with\nthe nation from peace to war and from war to peace.\n\n\n                        Kipling's \"Recessional\"\n\n\"Perhaps the greatest single production of Rudyard Kipling's pen,\"\nremarked Nutter and Tillett concerning \"The Recessional.\" It is a hymn\nof majestic greatness, and one can easily imagine the deep impression it\nmust have made when heard in Westminster Abbey on the day when the body\nof the brilliant author was placed in that historic shrine. The honor of\nbeing buried there, with the great of the nation, was well deserved.\n\n\"The Recessional\" was published in the _London Times_, July 17, 1897;\nand it was written in celebration of the Diamond Jubilee of Queen\nVictoria. The very next year it appeared in a hymnal published by the\nAmerican Baptist Publication Society. Since then it has appeared in many\nhymnals, and has frequently been sung on great patriotic occasions.\n\nFortunately the author has told us how the hymn came to be written. Said\nhe: \"That poem gave me more trouble than anything I ever wrote. I had\npromised the _Times_ a poem on the Jubilee; and when it became due, I\nhad written nothing that had satisfied me. The _Times_ began to want\nthat poem badly and sent letter after letter asking for it. I made many\nmore attempts but no further progress. Finally the _Times_ began sending\ntelegrams. So I shut myself in a room with the determination to stay\nthere until I had written a Jubilee poem. Sitting down with all my\nprevious attempts before me, I searched through those dozens of sketches\ntill at last I found one line I liked. That was 'Lest We Forget.' Round\nthese words 'the Recessional' was written.\"\n\nA majestic strain pervades the hymn. Its deep solemnity reminds one of\nsome of the language of the Old Testament prophet. One thrills when he\nhears the lines:\n\n  \"God of our fathers, known of old,\n    Lord of our far-flung battle line,\n  Beneath whose awful hand we hold\n    Dominion over palm and pine:\n  Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,\n    Lest we forget, lest we forget!\n\n  \"The tumult and the shouting dies;\n    The captains and the kings depart;\n  Still stands Thine ancient sacrifice,\n    A broken and a contrite heart:\n  Lord God of hosts, be with us yet,\n    Lest we forget, lest we forget.\"\n\nIt is interesting to read what Kipling's cousin, Miss Florence\nMacdonald, wrote for _The Methodist Recorder_, London, following\nKipling's death. She said that she had a letter that Kipling wrote to\nher father after \"The Recessional\" was published. He there said:\n\n\"Yes, when one has three generations of Methody (Methodist) ministers\nbehind one, the pulpit streak is bound to show. It's very funny to hear\nfolk wondering where I got it.\" Then Miss Macdonald made this\nobservation:\n\n\"It is not generally known, perhaps, that he (Kipling) was a grandson of\nthe manse on both sides, his maternal grandfather being the Rev. George\nB. Macdonald, and his paternal grandfather being the Rev. Joseph\nKipling, both Wesleyan ministers.\"\n\nThis side-light on Kipling's method of composition was also given by\nMiss Macdonald: \"When composing verse he would set it to a tune, often a\nhymn tune, and I have heard him walking up and down the room singing a\nverse over and over again to get the lilt and the swing of it.\"\n\nKipling, by the way, was awarded the Nobel prize for literature in 1907.\nAnd when the author was laid to rest in Westminster Abbey, June 23,\n1936, the choir sang his own \"Recessional,\" and through the venerable\ntemple there rang the words:\n\n  \"Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,\n  Lest we forget, lest we forget!\"\n\n\n\n\n                               CHAPTER XI\n                          THANKSGIVING IN SONG\n\n\nThe note of praise was sounded at the very beginning of the 75th annual\nconvention of the New York State Council of Religious Education, which\nwas held in Utica, N. Y., October, 1930. The assembled delegates, whose\ninterest centered in directing the religious life of the young people in\nthe churches and communities of the state, lifted up their voices in\nsinging what was once characterized by Dr. J. M. Buckley as the \"most\nperfect hymn in thanksgiving in the English language:\"\n\n  \"For the beauty of the earth,\n    For the glory of the skies,\n  For the love which from our birth\n    Over and around us lies:\n  Lord of all, to Thee we raise\n  This our hymn of grateful praise.\"\n\n  Each day in downtown Los Angeles, in the morning, at noonday, and\n  again at night, a mighty choir of bells invites the hearts of\n  merchants and bankers, tradesmen and newsboys, policemen and\n  seamstresses to pause and reflect, to be still a moment in their\n  hearts and receive the sacred benediction of the bells.\n\n  In the message of the bells there is joy and peace and love for all\n  our fellow men, the love one sometimes forgets in the hurly-burly of a\n  great city. Whenever I hear these bells I stop whatever I am doing,\n  and my heart looks up to the great tower atop a lofty building and\n  beyond to the vast blue sky.\n\n  My heart sings with the bells a prayer of gratitude for the gentle\n  reminder that commerce is not all.\n\n                                        --_Cy Lance in \"The Classmate.\"_\n\n\n            Two Statesmen Sang \"America\" in Washington's Pew\n\nThe American nation was called to supplication for Divine guidance on\nthe first day of 1942. The date was historic, for the nation was\nentering on a New Year with the dark shadows of war resting on the\npeople. One of the events of that day was recorded on the front page of\npractically all our newspapers.\n\nWinston Churchill, Prime Minister of Great Britain, was at that time\nvisiting the United States for the purpose of conferring with President\nF. D. Roosevelt. The latter took his guest with him to the quaint\nEpiscopal Church at Alexandria, Va., of which George Washington was, in\n1775, one of the founders. Together they occupied the white pew in which\nWashington used to worship.\n\nEach of the two statesmen loved to sing, hence both of them united with\nthe congregation when they sang:\n\n  \"My country, 'tis of thee,\n  Sweet land of liberty,\n    Of thee I sing.\"\n\nPerhaps each responsible statesman, burdened with anxiety, was thinking\nof his own country as he sang the prayerful words:\n\n  \"Our fathers' God, to Thee,\n  Author of liberty,\n    To Thee we sing;\n  Long may our land be bright\n  With freedom's holy light;\n  Protect us by Thy might,\n    Great God, our King.\"\n\nThus did two statesmen of the twentieth century render thanksgiving to\nGod and covet his leadership and guidance as they stood side by side and\nsang their faith in God and country.\n\n\n                     Gunner Led the Song of Praise\n\n\"Circumstances called for patient waiting,\" said one who had been\ninterned in the Allied-Prisoners-of-War Camp \"on the west coast of the\nisland of Honshu.... Over the mountains and two hundred miles to the\nsouth the first atom bomb had been dropped during those momentous days\nof August, 1945.... Then suddenly everything was quiet. The wailing\nair-raid sirens, the heavy drone of giant bombers, the explosions, the\nflames, the panic and confusion ceased.\"\n\n\"The ending of hostilities ... gave place to long silent and uneventful\ndays, completely cut off from news of the outside world.\" Thus ran the\nstory of one who signed himself with the initials \"R. E. W. H.\" as he\nnarrated some of his experiences in the Japanese prison camp during\nWorld War II. The prison community consisted of Australians, Americans,\nDutch and British. Three and a half years of alien bondage had been\nendured by some of them.\n\nOne of the first concerted acts of these former prisoners, when they\ndefinitely realized their freedom, was to hold a service of\nthanksgiving. The account of this appeared in _The British Weekly_,\nSeptember 9, 1946. They had \"no padre or religious leadership, but the\ndesire to give praise and thanks in a form of Divine service was\nspontaneous, and embraced all sects and racial creeds.\"\n\nThe first hymn used was a most appropriate selection:\n\n  \"Praise, my soul, the King of heaven,\n    To His feet thy tribute bring;\n  Ransomed, healed, restored, forgiven,\n    Evermore His praises sing;\n  Alleluia! Alleluia!\n    Praise the Everlasting King!\"\n\nThey did not get a good start. Perhaps they were overwhelmed by their\nemotions. Eventually they followed the lead \"of a confident and\nenthusiastic little gunner\"; and as the company gained control of itself\n\"the hymn swelled to strength, sung by Catholic, Anglican,\nNonconformist.\"\n\nThe service was methodical, having been planned with care. It was held\non the small parade ground in the center of the camp. The table was\ncovered by a worn but well-washed strip of cloth. The crucifix was made\nby a carpenter among the prisoners; and the Japanese, by request, had\nsupplied a small bowl of flowers. Benches were taken from the huts of\nthe prisoners, and served as seats. The men had dressed for the occasion\nas best they could. The writer who related the incident had been asked\nto address them; and he found the assembled men most attentive. The\npeace that came from the hymns and prayers \"was reflected in their eyes\nand attitude.\" Those who shared in worship will never forget that day.\nHow feelingly they must have sung that third verse!\n\n  \"Father-like, He tends and spares us;\n    Well our feeble frame He knows:\n  In His hands He gently bears us,\n    Rescues us from all our foes;\n  Alleluia! Alleluia!\n    Widely yet His mercy flows.\"\n\n\n          Minister Thrilled by Singing of Philadelphia Laymen\n\n\"John Reith was reared in a Scottish manse on a diet of porridge and\nprayer,\" but because of his useful service to his native land he\neventually became Sir John Reith. During the first World War he visited\nthe United States as an inspector of war munitions, and in the interest\nof national service. He had rendered service as Captain John C. Reith,\nand had been wounded.\n\nHe was a notable figure as he moved through the streets of Philadelphia,\nbeing 76 inches tall. The minister who relates the following story often\nsaw him as he walked down Chestnut Street, for his \"great height and\ncommanding figure attracted all eyes.\" The Rev. John T. Reeve, then a\npastor of a Presbyterian Church in the city, related the incident in\n1941. Many prominent laymen of the Presbyterian Churches of Philadelphia\nand vicinity constituted the Social Union, and had a dinner once a\nmonth. Occasionally ministers were invited.\n\nCaptain Reith was invited to address the Social Union during his visit,\nand Dr. Reeve was a guest at that meeting. The speaker indicated how\nmuch he missed the Bibles from the pews in our American churches, and\nalso made reference to the ministry of his father. \"His talk moved the\naudience deeply, and this young soldier made such a spiritual impression\non this company of several hundred business and professional men as had\nseldom been felt.\"\n\nWhen Captain Reith ceased speaking the whole body of men sprang to their\nfeet. A prominent organist from one of the churches went to the piano,\nand started to play. His selection was:\n\n  \"The heavens declare Thy glory, Lord,\n    In every star Thy wisdom shines;\n  But when our eyes behold Thy Word,\n    We read Thy Name in fairer lines.\"\n\nThis hymn of Isaac Watts was sung to the tune of Uxbridge.\n\n\"Such singing I never heard before or since,\" said Dr. Reeve, as he\nrecalled the event several years later. Then he explained: \"In not many\ncities could this have taken place. But in Philadelphia, where so many\nof these men had been brought up in Covenanter and United Presbyterian\nchurches, they knew the great hymn. The thrills ran up and down my back,\nand many times since in giving out the hymn I have mentioned the\nincident, and shall always remember Captain J. C. Reith with honor.\"\n\n\n                          \"We Love the Place\"\n\n\"WE RETURN HOME!\" was the announcement which appeared in some of the\nLondon papers in March, 1946. This was followed by the statement that on\nSaturday evening, March 9, at 6:30, there would be an act of\n\"thanksgiving in song.\" This was a call to the congregation of Central\nHall, Westminster, London, who had been dispossessed of the use of their\nbuilding for the use of the United Nations' Conference.\n\nThe spacious Hall, the center of extensive social and evangelistic work,\nwas the place considered to be most suitable for the gathering. Hence it\nwas a strange sight to see statesmen from many lands assemble day after\nday in the place where the people were accustomed to hear the minister,\nthe Rev. Dr. W. E. Sangster, proclaim the message of life everlasting to\nlarge congregations.\n\n\"We have been on a strange pilgrimage,\" remarked Dr. Sangster, as he\nfaced his re-united people in their own place of worship. During the\nprevious four months they had conducted their Sunday services in two\ndifferent theatres, and also the Carlton Hotel, all of which had\nextended hospitality. Naturally, extensive preparations were made for\nthe joyful occasion. The great Wiseman Choir, composed of singers from\nmany religious centers in London, and organized in memory of the beloved\nmusician and preacher, Dr. F. Luke Wiseman, sang; and Dr. George F.\nBrockless was the leader of the singing company.\n\n\"The choir obviously enjoyed themselves,\" said a reporter. Famous\nmusicians participated; and outstanding musical selections were\nrendered, including the majestic \"Hallelujah Chorus.\"\n\nEverybody wanted to sing on this happy occasion. The hymns needed to be\nselected with particular care. Beautifully appropriate, therefore, was\nthe first hymn of the program:\n\n  \"We love the place, O God,\n    Wherein Thine honor dwells;\n  The joy of Thine abode\n    All earthly joy excels.\n\n  \"It is the house of prayer,\n    Wherein Thy servants meet;\n  And Thou, O Lord, art there,\n    Thy chosen flock to greet.\"\n\nThis hymn, which appeared in \"Hymns Ancient and Modern,\" 1861, has found\nwide acceptance. It is found in _The Church Hymnary_ (Scotland); _The\nHymnary_ of the United Church of Canada; and likewise _The Hymnal_\n(1940) of the Protestant Episcopal Church of the United States.\n\nThe author was the Rev. William Bullock, D.D. (1798-1874), who was of\nEnglish birth. Thirty-two years he served as a minister for the Society\nof the Propagation of the Gospel. Dr. James Moffatt tells us that this\nhymn, based on Psalm 26:8, \"was composed in 1827 for the dedication of a\nchurch in Trinity Bay, Newfoundland, where he was rector.\" He also adds\nthat \"seventy years later, when a new building on the same site was\ndedicated, this hymn was once more sung.\"\n\n\"Enter into his gates with thanksgiving, and into his courts with\npraise,\" said the Psalmist. It was in this spirit that the congregation\nof the Central Hall, Westminster, \"spent a memorable evening of\nthanksgiving.\" The hearts of the people overflowed with joy as they\necstatically sang:\n\n  \"We love the place, O God.\"\n\nPrayerful were the lines which closed that hymn:\n\n  \"Lord Jesus, give us grace\n    On earth to love Thee more,\n  In heaven to see Thy face,\n    And with Thy saints adore.\"\n\n\n                  Memorable Rendering of the Doxology\n\n\"I believe the men will wish to sing and pray,\" said the Rev. Dr. Oscar\nR. Maurer of New Haven, Conn., when he secured consent from the military\nauthorities to have the doors of the cathedral of Verdun opened when the\nfiring should cease at the end of World War I. The dramatic story of the\nevent was written for _Association Men_ by one who had been at work in\nFrance with the Red Triangle. The scene was thus vividly described:\n\n\"Ten minutes of eleven, and still the guns roared on, unmindful of the\nfact that peace was imminent. Five minutes of eleven, and even the\ngeneral and his aides were showing signs of nervousness....\n\n\"Then, as suddenly as though God Himself had dropped a wet blanket over\nthe crackling flames of hell and at one blow had extinguished them all,\nthe firing and the rumbling ceased. There was an instant's pause in\nwhich it seemed as though the world had come to an end. Then from the\nforty bells high in the still untouched towers of that old cathedral at\nVerdun, which had witnessed the most heroic sacrifice of life and love\nsave that on Calvary alone, pealed forth as did the voices over the\nBethlehem hills, those silver tones that once again were saying, 'Peace\non earth.'\"\n\nThe men began to leap wildly and joyously. They shouted, sang and kissed\none another. The cathedral doors opened slowly, and about six hundred\nsoldiers from the armies of the Allies entered with a rush. Dr. Maurer\nwalked quietly to the altar rail, and there knelt in prayer. Officers\nand privates alike reached for the swinging ropes, and gave the bells\nanother pull. The possibility that the opportunity for a religious\nservice was lost oppressed the heart of Dr. Maurer with fear. The\nassembling company, however, soon observed the lonely figure kneeling at\nthe altar, and they began to move forward. He rose, and all was quiet.\n\"Boys,\" said he, \"I believe we all want to sing, and that we ought to\nsing the doxology.\" An English soldier, with a splendid tenor voice,\nstarted the familiar line:\n\n  \"Praise God, from whom all blessings flow.\"\n\nInstantly all who knew the words joined in the glorious doxology. Then\nthe Americans, the English and the French sang their respective national\nanthems before they reverently left the building.\n\nGeneral Valentine, who had given consent for the service to be held in\nthe cathedral, went forward, took Dr. Maurer's hands in his own, and\nsaid, \"I want to thank you for leading these men on this occasion to\noffer praise to God....\"\n\n\n\n\n                              CHAPTER XII\n                        CAROLS AT CHRISTMASTIDE\n\n\n  \"Christina Rossetti strikes her highest notes in her Christmas songs.\n  One is her delightful rhapsody:\n\n  \"'Love came down at Christmas,\n    Love all lovely, Love Divine;\n  Love was born at Christmas,\n    Star and angels gave the sign.'\n\n  \"The other is one written for her god-children:\n\n  \"'The shepherds had an angel,\n    The wise men had a star,\n  But what have I, a little child,\n    To guide me home from far?--'\n\n  delicate, humble, wondering, trustful.\"\n\n  \"I would like also to call attention to the new note contributed in\n  Mr. Laurence Housman's hymn:\n\n  \"'The Maker of the sun and moon,\n    The Maker of our earth,\n  Lo! late in time, a fairer boon,\n    Himself is brought to birth.'\n\n      . . . . .\n\n  \"'O Perfect Love, outpassing sight,\n    O Light beyond our ken,\n  Come down through all the world to-night,\n    And heal the hearts of men.'\"\n\n             --_Dr. F. Luke Wiseman in an address on \"Christmas Hymns.\"_\n\n\n                 Christmas Carols on Deck of Battleship\n\nThe battleship _Missouri_ will always hold a unique place in the history\nof the United States, for on her, at the close of World War II, the\nJapanese made their formal surrender. But about four months later\n(December 21, 1945) a very different scene was witnessed on her deck.\nThat night more than one hundred members of the Choral Group of the New\nYork Naval Shipyard in Brooklyn sang Christmas carols in sub-freezing\nweather. Naturally the listening members of the appreciative crew\nrecalled the experiences of the previous Christmas, when they were\nengaged in fighting World War II.\n\nBeneath a string of 500-watt bulbs the chorus sang into a microphone.\nPerhaps it was natural that they should begin with the familiar and\nbeloved carol written by Bishop Phillip Brooks:\n\n  \"O little town of Bethlehem,\n    How still we see thee lie!\"\n\nPossibly some who listened made the words their heart prayer as the\nsingers rendered the words:\n\n  \"O holy Child of Bethlehem!\n    Descend to us, we pray;\n  Cast out our sin, and enter in,\n    Be born in us today!\"\n\nOther carols were rendered, and then the singers concluded with:\n\n  \"Silent night, holy night.\"\n\nThe songs of the glorious holiday season in a year that began in war and\nended in peace reminded the men of home and family. One of the sailors\nremarked quietly to another: \"I shall be home this Christmas for the\nfirst time in four years.\"\n\n\n                  Christmastide Song of Blind Singers\n\nAt the Christmas season before the second World War a sale and\nentertainment were held in London under the auspices of the Greater\nLondon Fund for the Blind. Among the attractive features of the program\nduring the afternoon and the evening was the rendering of Christmas\ncarols by a company of blind singers. A London periodical, commenting on\nthis part of the program, said that it was \"especially impressive\" when\nthe chorus rendered the peculiarly appropriate hymn of Bishop Reginald\nHeber:\n\n  \"Brightest and best of the sons of the morning,\n    _Dawn on our darkness_ and lend us Thine aid;\n  Star of the East, the horizon adorning,\n    Guide where our infant Redeemer is laid.\"\n\nBlind though they were, the singers were conscious of the fact that\nChrist was the \"Light of the world.\"\n\nThis hymn was first published in 1811. Several other very popular hymns\nwere written by the same author. Following his training at Oxford\nUniversity, he became rector at Hodnet, and, later, Missionary Bishop of\nCalcutta, where this \"man of learning and piety\" lived only three years.\n\nDuring this short period, however, he had the great satisfaction of\nhearing this and another of his hymns (\"The Son of God Goes Forth to\nWar\") sung better than he \"had ever heard them sung in a church before.\"\nThis was on the occasion of the dedication of a church at Meerut, India,\nwhere in a remote situation, in sight of the Himalaya Mountains, he\nfound an excellent organ in what he described as \"one of the earliest,\nthe largest and handsomest churches in India.\"\n\nThe blind singers of London chose well when they decided to sing the\nhymn of this consecrated man.\n\n\n                Not Too Late to Hear the Christmas Music\n\nNewspapers all over the United States on Christmas Day, 1945, carried\npictures of returning troops from the scenes of war, as they arrived in\nthe harbor of Los Angeles. The men were shown crowding the rails of the\nboats, and on their faces there was a wistful look. Happiness and\ndisappointment were both registered. While they were privileged to see\ntheir native land on another Christmas Day, after their long and hard\nexperiences in conflict, yet they were too late to join the Christmas\ncircles in their homes.\n\nA group of singers, however, made the rounds of the various ships on a\ngreeter boat, and welcomed the warrior lads by the singing of Christmas\ncarols. Sweet was it to the men to hear the singers render the old\ncarol:\n\n  \"O come, all ye faithful, joyful and triumphant,\n  O come ye, O come ye to Bethlehem!\n  Come and behold Him, born the King of angels!\"\n\nWhen the chorus was reached many of the men on shipboard also sang or\nhummed the lines:\n\n  \"O come, let us adore Him, O come, let us adore Him\n  O come, let us adore Him, Christ, the Lord.\"\n\nThe origin of this great Christian hymn is obscure. This observation is\nmade by Dr. Charles A. Boyd: \"Here is another of the much loved hymns of\nthe church which we owe to the old Latin hymn-writers. They wrote not\nfor money or fame, but for the love of the writing, and for the praise\nof Christ.\" A somewhat extended discussion of both hymn and tune is\nfound in the work of Dr. James Moffatt, and at the close he says: \"The\nconclusion seems to be that the hymn and tune came into use together, in\nthe services of the Roman Church, during the first part of the\neighteenth century; that they were in circulation in manuscript for some\ntime before they appeared in print, but that nothing definite can as yet\nbe stated as to the author of either words or music.\"\n\nWhen a young high school student, whom I knew, attended the illumination\nof a community Christmas tree she heard a chorus of Welsh voices, at\nmidnight on Christmas Eve, sing this carol. Several times before, very\nnaturally, she had heard it in church and school. But this night she\nreturned home full of enthusiasm, and said to her parents, \"I never\nbefore heard anything so beautiful!\" Perhaps the returning troops had\njust this feeling when they listened to this and other carols rendered\nin the Christmas season of 1945, as they were welcomed back with joyful\nsong to the land for which they had victoriously fought.\n\n\n                       Carol the Children Wanted\n\nTwo little girls jumped from their bed to listen to the choir of an\nEnglish church as they were making their rounds at Christmastide singing\ncarols, according to a local custom. They were, of course, singing the\nold favorites, as they had been doing for a few successive evenings, and\nthey were tired. But this was their last call for the year.\n\nThe first selection was rendered when, according to the one who narrated\nthe incident in an English periodical (Mrs. Lyndon Hill), a bedroom\nwindow was lifted, and two little girls leaned out and asked them to\nsing the carol they most loved, \"Away in a Manger.\" Soon the Christmas\ncallers were singing:\n\n  \"Away in a manger, no crib for a bed,\n  The little Lord Jesus laid down His sweet head.\n  The stars in the sky looked down where He lay,\n  The little Lord Jesus, asleep on the hay.\"\n\n\"In all our singing it had never occurred to us to sing this seemingly\nchildish carol,\" said the one who related the story; \"but we did sing\nit, and the beauty and simplicity of the words and tune struck me as\nnever before, as the two little voices joined with us. They seemed to be\nthe expression of all the wonder of God's gift of the Christ child in\nthe humility of His manger bed, and our singing took on new life as we\ncaught a vision of the utter simplicity of the Christmas message.... And\nI never fail to receive inspiration from the mental picture of two\nlittle sleepy girls at a bedroom window singing 'Away in a Manger.'\"\n\nAnd what an especially appropriate prayer it must have been for the\nlittle girls when they closed the song with the words:\n\n  \"Be near me, Lord Jesus, I ask Thee to stay,\n  Close by me forever, and love me, I pray.\n  Bless all the dear children in Thy tender care,\n  And fit us for heaven to live with Thee there.\"\n\n\n\n\n                              CHAPTER XIII\n                        THE CROSS AND THE CHURCH\n\n\nA large group of Christian men gathered in Chicago early in 1938 for a\nconvention. Said one who was present: \"The mood and point of view were\nindicated by the opening hymn:\n\n  \"'Ask ye what great thing I know\n  That delights and stirs me so?\n  What the high regard I win?\n  Whose the name I glory in?\n  Jesus Christ, the crucified.'\"\n\nThe great and inspiring gathering closed with the same hymn, and thus\nbefore they separated these same men sang:\n\n  \"This is that great thing I know;\n  This delights and stirs me so:\n  Faith in Him who died to save,\n  Him who triumphed o'er the grave,\n  Jesus Christ the crucified.\"\n\n  \"But His lone cross and crown of thorns\n    Endure when crowns and empires fall.\n  The might of His undying love\n    In dying conquered all.\"\n\n                                                       --_John Oxenham._\n\n\n                    Building Gone, but Hymn Remains\n\n  \"Above the hills of time the cross is gleaming,\n    Fair as the sun when night has turned to day;\n  And from it love's pure light is richly streaming,\n    To cleanse the heart and banish sin away.\"\n\n\"The church where that hymn was first sung is utterly destroyed, but the\nhymn remains. In this thought I take comfort.\" Thus wrote the Rev.\nThomas Tiplady, superintendent of the Lambeth Mission, London, to The\nHymn Society of America a few weeks after the end of World War II. He\nexplained thus: \"Had not the Church of England friends granted the use\nof a tiny chapel and a wooden hut the congregation would have been\nentirely homeless, for the wrecking of the entire buildings of the\nMission was completed by a rocket bomb.\" The building was historic, and\ndated back to the ministry of the notable commentator, Dr. Adam Clark.\n\nThe author has written a fairly large collection of hymns, and they are\nrapidly finding places in new hymnals. But \"Above the Hills of Time\"\ncontinues to be the favorite. Congregations sing with enthusiasm:\n\n  \"To this dear cross the eyes of men are turning\n    Today as in the ages lost to sight;\n  And so for Thee, O Christ, men's hearts are yearning\n    As shipwrecked seamen yearn for morning light.\"\n\nVisits to the United States have been made by the author; and the writer\nwas privileged to hear him speak at Columbus, Ohio, to an immense\naudience. Hearers were profoundly moved as this chaplain in World War I\ntold the story which is found in his book, \"The Cross at the Front.\"\n\nThis beautiful tribute appeared in a review of one of his little\ncollections of hymns, where an English periodical made this comment:\n\"Hymns are rarely poetry, say the critics, but there is poetry of a high\norder here ... and frequent evidence that the poet has been inspired not\nby the muse alone, but also by the Holy Spirit.\" No one doubts this when\nhe hears a great congregation sing:\n\n  \"Like echoes to sweet temple bells replying,\n    Our hearts, O Lord, make answer to Thy love.\"\n\n\n                          An Army with Banners\n\nA monster rally of the Salvation Army for the raising of needed funds\nwas held in New York City in March, 1938, when something dramatic\noccurred which brought the vast audience to its feet. Among the speakers\nwere many noted people, including Walter Lippmann, the renowned\nphilosopher, and General Hugh S. Johnson, experienced soldier and\ndistinguished writer.\n\nThe speakers had been talking about the need of peace. Then, at one\npoint, the Salvation Army officer in charge, asked: \"Is there no\nsolution for the world's woes but bayonets in the hands of soldiers?\" He\npaused. Quickly the answer came as the band began to play:\n\n  \"The Church's one foundation\n    Is Jesus Christ her Lord;\n  She is His new creation\n    By water and the word;\n  From heaven He came and sought her\n    To be His holy bride;\n  With His own blood He bought her,\n    And for her life He died.\n\n  'Mid toil and tribulation,\n    And tumult of her war,\n  She waits the consummation\n    Of peace for evermore;\n  Till, with the vision glorious,\n    Her longing eyes are blest,\n  And the great Church victorious\n    Shall be the Church at rest.\"\n\nEmphasis was given to the song when a group of \"eager and exalted\" young\nsoldiers of the Salvation Army marched into the building carrying their\nown colors and the national emblem. These youthful soldiers, enlisted in\nthe cause of Christ, were militantly engaged in service for the Prince\nof Peace. And the parade of the singing soldiers \"touched everybody\ndeeply.\"\n\n\n                  Church Cross Inspired Grocer's Song\n\nA church which he served in his early ministry is thus described by Dr.\nWilliam L. Stidger, professor in Boston University: \"There was a little\nchurch on the top of a hill in the sand dunes of the Sunset District of\nSan Francisco, California. On the top of that beautiful little church,\ncovered with ivy vines, a white revolving cross flashed its light\nthrough the night across the dunes.\" I visited that church when I\nattended the great Exposition in the city mentioned, and heard Dr.\nStidger preach. In fact, I received great kindness at his hands during\nthe few days I was in the city. Through him I was privileged to attend a\nmeeting at which Edwin Markham spoke.\n\nIn one of his articles Professor Stidger related this story: \"At the\nfoot of that little hill there was a grocery store. The light of that\nrevolving cross, when it turned west, flashed through the front windows\nof that grocery store. The proprietor of the store, Robert Mobbs, as he\nwaited on his customers at evening time, could look up and see the flash\nof that white cross and it always gave him a comfortable feeling. He\nliked that cross, he liked to have it flash its message into his store\nwhen the twilight fell across the sand dunes looking toward the Golden\nGate.\n\n\"Robert Mobbs, tall, angular, had been born in Prince Edward Island, and\nhe had grown up in a church-going family. His mother had taught him to\nmemorize the great hymns of the church and he loved them. As he worked\nin the grocery store he liked to hum the hymns of the church over to\nhimself as he waited on his customers. The hymn he loved best of all was\n'In the Cross of Christ I Glory.' He would hum that hymn to himself as\nthe evening shadows gathered and the light of Calvary's Cross flashed in\nthrough the wide windows. One of his customers, hearing him, said, 'I go\nout with little songs singing in my heart. I like it.'\" He had heard the\ngrocer sing:\n\n  \"In the cross of Christ I glory,\n    Towering o'er the wrecks of time;\n  All the light of sacred story\n    Gather round its head sublime.\"\n\n\n                 Visiting Singer Familiar with the Hymn\n\nNelson Eddy, famed for his singing voice, was far from his American home\nwhen he gave a concert to the United States Army on a Saturday evening\nat Aden. But an interesting sidelight of this visit to the troops was\ngiven in _The British Weekly_ in February, 1944, and also referred to\nthe next morning, when he sang in the little Scots Kirk.\n\nThe explanation was made to the soloist to the effect that the place of\nworship was only a small building. But, accepting the invitation, he\nsaid that the size of the church made no difference, as it was his\npersonal wish to sing the Lord's Prayer in the Scottish Church. He,\ntherefore, slipped quietly into the building just as the congregation\nhad begun to sing the hymn, \"Crown Him With Many Crowns.\" \"Not only did\nhe join in,\" said the one who reported the incident, \"but he practically\nled the singing, and without a hymn book.\"\n\nAfter the scripture lesson, Mr. Eddy rendered his solo, a musical\nsetting of the Lord's Prayer, \"And it was magnificently sung as if it\nwere a prayer.\" The soloist remained while another hymn was sung, and\nthen he quietly left the sanctuary, as he had to leave Aden immediately.\n\nIt was interesting to learn that the visiting singer was so familiar\nwith the hymn, \"Crown Him With Many Crowns,\" and that he sang it so\nheartily. It is one of stirring hymns of the Christian Church, and with\nthe tune to which it is set, \"Diademata,\" it makes a jubilant song of\npraise. Hymn and tune form \"a perfect union.\" Said Covert and Laufer:\n\"The tune fully conveys the triumphant and ecstatic joy of the text, and\nyet its great dignity and solidity are preserved. It is a tune which\norganists like to play and which choirs and congregations enjoy\nsinging.\" Even in wartime, doubtless, all enjoyed singing:\n\n  \"Crown Him the Lord of peace,\n    Whose power a scepter sways\n  From pole to pole, that wars may cease,\n    And all be prayer and praise.\"\n\n\n\n\n                              CHAPTER XIV\n                         EASTER WITH THE HYMNAL\n\n\n  A portion of Abney Park Cemetery, Stoke Newington, is indicated as\n  being the favorite resting-place of Dr. Isaac Watts. A writer paid an\n  early morning visit to this location on a beautiful summer day.\n  Fastened to a tree there was found a piece of paper on which there was\n  written the following verse:\n\n  \"There is a land of pure delight\n    Where saints immortal dwell,\n  Infinite day excludes the night,\n    And pleasures banish pain.\"\n\n  Underneath were the words:\n\n  \"Dr. Watts now enjoys what he then wrote.\"\n\n                                                 --_The British Weekly._\n\n  A touching incident in connection with the death of Woodrow Wilson\n  concerns the manner in which the news of his passing came to his\n  friend and admirer Roland Hayes, the great American Negro singer, at\n  the time he was giving a series of concerts in Boston. In the midst of\n  his program Hayes raised his hand for silence and said, \"I have just\n  learned of the passing of a great soul and I'm going to sing something\n  for a memorial to him.\" And then he sang \"I Am Goin' Home\" with a\n  theme from the \"New World Symphony,\" in an arrangement by William A.\n  Fisher:\n\n  \"Goin' home, goin' home, I'm jes' goin' home;\n    It's not far, jes' close by, through an open door.\n  Work all done, care laid by,\n    Gwine to fear no more.\"\n\n                                                     --_Home Quarterly._\n\n\n                      Easter Song of a Centenarian\n\nLiving in two centuries and in two countries, the Rev. Timothy Edwards\nenjoyed some unusual experiences. He loved both to preach and to sing.\nBorn in England, he reached the United States before 1870, and was\nassigned to a circuit in Michigan, as a minister of the Methodist\nEpiscopal Church. But because of throat trouble, he was compelled to\nleave his ministerial work in 1876.\n\nHe then became editor of a small paper, and likewise a student of law.\nLater he was admitted to the bar. After a few years, however, he was\nable to re-enter the ministry, and served churches in northern Michigan\nuntil, in 1895, he was superannuated.\n\nWhen he observed his ninetieth birthday, he preached in the Methodist\nChurch at Washington, Michigan, and said: \"I will not speak in this\nchurch again until I am one hundred years old\"--and he did not. But on\nApril 1, 1934, celebrating his 100th birthday he once more preached in\nthe same church.\n\nMidway in the sermon his congregation was delighted when the aged\nChristian, one of God's singing saints, voiced his experience in sacred\nsong. It was one he long had loved:\n\n  \"My Jesus, I love Thee, I know Thou art mine,\n    For Thee all the follies of sin I resign;\n  My gracious Redeemer, my Saviour art Thou,\n    If ever I loved Thee, my Jesus, 'tis now.\"\n\nIt was Easter Sunday, and the centenarian could look forward to an\nageless life beyond the present. Hence he could sing:\n\n  \"In mansions of glory and endless delight,\n    I'll ever adore Thee in heaven so bright;\n  I'll sing with the glittering crown on my brow,\n    If ever I loved Thee, my Jesus, 'tis now.\"\n\nThe veteran preacher made that Easter Sunday memorable to his\ncongregation, and led them to see how happy a Christian can be when he\nreaches the age of one hundred.\n\n\n                          Easter in New Guinea\n\nSunrise in New Guinea in 1943 made Easter morning memorable for Lt. John\nMcDaniel Slocum, whose home was in Oswego, Oregon. Earlier he had\ndropped out of the freshman class at Oregon State College to enlist in\nthe service of his country. By Easter, 1943, he was a second lieutenant\nin the infantry, and was in charge of a reconnaissance party of twelve\nmen in New Guinea. These men had been away from their base for many\nweeks, and were living on powdered milk and canned stew. The letter\nwhich he wrote to his mother at Eastertide was a significant one. Said\nhe:\n\n\"All my men and myself were having a big gabfest last night, and the\nfact that Easter was today was mentioned. Not too much was said and the\nsubject was dropped.... But for some reason I woke up at 5:30 and I just\nhad an impulse to go out to our hill which overlooks the ocean, and hold\nmyself a little sunrise service.... Every man in camp was there!... We\nsang several hymns. Some natives (Christians) joined us, and we sang\nsome more.\n\n\"As the sky turned pink we all were quiet. As the sun came up someone\nstarted to sing 'The Star-Spangled Banner,' and as the sun rose over the\nmighty blue Pacific our voices, with a background of natives humming,\nreached out across that sea to tell all of you at home that all was\nwell....\n\n\"Then one of the boys took out a Bible and asked me to read something\nfrom it.... As I glanced at the opened page there was the Lord's Prayer.\nI read it through very quietly once, and then we all said it in unison.\n\n\"Then, with a glance at the rising sun, we all returned to camp.\"\n\nWhat an unforgettable Easter for those young Americans! Fighting for\ntheir native land on far-distant shores, yet \"at the dawn's early light\"\non Easter morning they could sing their song of patriotic hope:\n\n  \"And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave\n  O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.\"\n\n\n                  Eastertide Hymn at an Easter Funeral\n\nThey sang, they all sang, at the funeral of Mrs. Grace Beaven in\nRochester, N. Y., on Easter Monday, in 1938. She would have liked that,\nfor she was a lover of music. In her girlhood days she journeyed from\nher far-away home in Tacoma, Washington, to New York City that she might\npursue a course in music. Completing her course, she returned to her\nhome community, and became choir director in the First Baptist Church.\nSoon she became the bride of a young Baptist minister, served with him\nin the pastorate, and then shared his responsible life when he, the Rev.\nDr. Albert W. Beaven, became the president of the Colgate-Rochester\nDivinity School.\n\n\"She lived radiantly and gallantly to the end,\" testified her husband,\nwho confessed that he had asked for himself the privilege of conducting\nher funeral service. Clear and strong was his voice as, entering the\nLake Avenue Baptist, Rochester, he read the great words of affirmation\nfrom the Scripture, \"I am the resurrection and the life.\" The standing\ncongregation then sang the triumphant Easter song of Charles Wesley:\n\n  \"Christ the Lord is risen today,\n    Alleluia!\"\n\nThe bereaved family sang with the congregation. The song on the lips\ncame from their hearts, whatever tears may have been in their eyes. A\nthousand voices united with theirs in singing:\n\n  \"Soar we now where Christ has led,\n    Alleluia!\n  Following our exalted Head,\n    Alleluia!\n  Made like Him, like Him we rise,\n    Alleluia!\n  Ours the cross, the grave, the skies,\n    Alleluia.\"\n\n\"This hymn by Charles Wesley ... has long been accepted as the best\nEnglish Easter Hymn\" was the positive statement made by W. T. Stead.\nUnquestionably it is also sung more frequently than any other selection\nin our American churches on Easter Sunday. The author once went through\nthe published Easter Sunday morning programs of twenty-nine churches of\nvarious denominations of a city near his home at that time. This hymn\nappeared in all but three of the programs, and mostly it was the opening\nselection. Poetic language asks the question:\n\n  \"Where's thy victory, boasting grave?\"\n\nThen it gives the assuring reply:\n\n  \"Love's redeeming work is done\n    Alleluia!\n  Fought the fight, the battle won,\n    Alleluia!\"\n\nFriday, July 23, 1742, John Wesley was with his beloved mother. \"Her\nlook was calm and serene,\" said he, \"and her eyes fixed upward, while we\ncommended her soul to God. Soon the soul was set at liberty. There was\nno struggle. Those present then stood round the bed, and fulfilled her\nlast request, uttered a little while before she lost her speech,\n'Children, as soon as I am released, sing a psalm of praise to God.'\"\n\nThe passion-tide and an Easter message is summed up in the undying words\nof one of the singing sons of that honored mother which the family and\nfriends of Grace Beaven sang on that Easter Monday soon after, being\nreleased from suffering, she joined the great multitude of the singing\ncompany in the celestial city.\n\nWhat other hymn has such a triumphant climax?\n\n  \"Made like Him, like Him we rise,\n    Alleluia!\n  Ours the cross, the grave, the skies,\n    Alleluia!\"\n\n\n                       Mother's Hymn at Eventide\n\nA little girl would clutch her mother's hand and the two would go\nthrough the tall grass of an English meadow to a stile. There they both\nloved to stand to watch the sunset. Just when the last crimson streak\nwas dying in the west, the mother would sing, in her rich Welsh voice:\n\n  \"Forever with the Lord!\n    Amen, so let it be;\n  Life from the dead is in that word,\n    'Tis immortality.\"\n\nThe manner in which the woman greeted the passing of the day left a\nmemory with the young daughter which the latter carried with her through\nthe years, and brought with her when she came to America. \"Sing,\nkitten,\" the mother would sometimes exclaim. Then, with faces still set\nwestward, the daughter would chirp with her little voice, and the two\nwould sing:\n\n  \"Here in the body pent,\n    Absent from Him I roam,\n  Yet nightly pitch my moving tent\n    A day's march nearer home.\"\n\nThe girl was still young when her mother reached\n\n  \"The bright inheritance of saints,\n    Jerusalem above;\"\n\nbut she carried with her the memory of being led into a room where she\nsaw her father kneeling by the bed, with his face hidden in his hands.\nThe clergyman was there administering Holy Communion; also present was\nthe family physician. An older sister was sobbing.\n\nRushing to the bedside, the child gazed at the bright, beloved face of\nher mother. She was smiling. Her lips began to move. Beatrice Plumb, who\nonce told this story about her mother and herself, said that even before\nshe put her ear close to her mother, she knew that the latter was\nsinging their eventide hymn.\n\nOpening her eyes, the mother faintly whispered, \"Sing, Kitten!\" Once\nmore, the last time together, mother and little daughter were singing\ntheir old sunset song:\n\n  \"Forever with the Lord!\n    Amen so let it be;\n  Life from the dead is in that word,\n    'Tis immortality.\"\n\nCarved on the mother's tombstone, and cherished in the daughter's\nmemory, were the words:\n\n  \"Forever with the Lord!\"\n\n\n\n\n                              BIBLIOGRAPHY\n\n\nWhile the writer consulted many books, the following list includes those\nto which reference was most frequently made. The name of the author\nappears in the text, and the quotations may mostly be found by referring\nto the author's discussion of that particular hymn.\n\nAn extensive bibliography of the subject may be found in the work of\nMcCutchan.\n\nBoyd, Charles Arthur, _Stories of Hymns for Creative Living_, The Judson\nPress.\n\nCovert, William Chalmers, and Laufer, Calvin Weiss, _Handbook to the\nHymnal_, Presbyterian Board of Christian Education.\n\nGillman, Frederick John, _The Evolution of the English Hymn_, George\nAllen & Unwin, Ltd.\n\nLorenz, Edmund S., _Practical Hymn Studies_, Fleming H. Revell.\n\nMcCutchan, Robert Guy, _Our Hymnody_, The Methodist Book Concern.\n\nMoffatt, James, _Handbook to the Church Hymnary_, Oxford University\nPress.\n\nNutter, Charles S., _Hymn Studies_, Phillips & Hunt.\n\nNutter, Charles S., and Tillett, Wilbur F., _The Hymns and Hymn Writers\nof the Church_, The Methodist Book Concern.\n\nPratt, John Barnes, _Present Day Hymns and Why They Were Written_, A. S.\nBarnes and Company.\n\nRobinson, Charles Seymour, _Annotations Upon Popular Hymns_, Hunt and\nEaton.\n\nSankey, Ira D., _My Life and the Story of the Gospel Hymns_, Harper &\nBrothers.\n\nSheppard, W. J. L., _Great Hymns and Their Stories_, The Religious Tract\nSociety, London.\n\nSmith, H. Augustine, _Lyric Religion_, The Century Co.\n\nStead, W. T., _Hymns That Have Helped_, Doubleday and McClure Co.\n\nStevenson, G. J., _The Methodist Hymn Book Illustrated_, S. W. Partridge\n& Co., London.\n\nTelford, John, _The New Methodist Hymn Book Illustrated_, Epworth Press,\nLondon.\n\nWashburn, Charles C., _Hymn Interpretations_, Cokesbury Press.\n\nWiseman, F. Luke, _Charles Wesley_, The Abingdon Press.\n\n\n\n\n                             INDEX OF HYMNS\n\n\n                                   A\n  Abide with me: fast falls the eventide                      53, 60, 77\n  Above the hills of time the cross is gleaming                      122\n  A charge to keep I have                                             80\n  All hail the power of Jesus' name                                   32\n  At even, ere the sun was set                                        35\n  A mighty fortress is our God                                    44, 97\n  \"Are ye able,\" said the Master                                      75\n  Art thou weary, art thou laden                                      37\n  Ask ye what great thing I know                                     121\n  Awake, awake to love and work                                       26\n  Away in a manger, no crib for a bed                            90, 120\n\n\n                                      B\n  Be still, my soul: the Lord is on thy side                          62\n  Blessed Master, I have promised                                     83\n  Brightest and Best of the sons of the morning                      117\n\n\n                                      C\n  Christ is made the sure foundation                                  36\n  Christ the Lord is risen today                                     131\n  Christ, whose glory fills the skies                                 30\n  Come! Peace of God, and dwell again on earth                        15\n  Come, let us anew our journey pursue                                20\n  Come, let us join our friends above                                 66\n  Come Thou Fount of every blessing                                   40\n  Crown Him with many crowns                                         126\n\n\n                                      D\n  Day is dying in the west                                            33\n\n\n                                      E\n  Eternal Father, strong to save                                      53\n\n\n                                      F\n  Faith of our fathers! living still                              54, 62\n  For ever with the Lord                                             133\n  For the beauty of the earth                                        105\n\n\n                                      G\n  God of our fathers, known of old                                   102\n  God is working His purpose out                                      56\n  God moves in a mysterious way                                       73\n  Guide me, O Thou great Jehovah                                      49\n\n\n                                      H\n  Hark, hark, my soul! angelic songs are swelling                     34\n  He shall give His angels charge                                     48\n  Holy, holy, holy! Lord God Almighty                         29, 33, 37\n  How firm a foundation, ye saints of the Lord                    55, 63\n  How sweet the name of Jesus sounds                                  47\n\n\n                                      I\n  I come to the garden alone                                          54\n  I love Thy kingdom, Lord                                            68\n  I need Thee every hour                                              43\n  In the cross of Christ I glory                                     125\n\n\n                                      J\n  Jerusalem the golden                                                39\n  Jesus bids us shine                                                 85\n  Jesus, Lover of my soul                                     57, 58, 80\n  Jesus, tender Shepherd, hear me                                     81\n\n\n                                      L\n  Lord, I want to be a Christian                                      88\n  Love came down at Christmas                                        115\n  Low in the grave He lay                                             92\n\n\n                                      M\n  Mid all the traffic of the ways                                     64\n  Mine eyes have seen                                             93, 99\n  My country, 'tis of thee                                       57, 106\n  My God, I am Thine                                                  73\n  My Jesus, I love Thee                                              128\n\n\n                                      N\n  Nearer, my God, to Thee                                     38, 53, 56\n  New every morning is the love                                       28\n  Now the day is over                                             32, 85\n  Now the laborer's task is o'er                                      54\n\n\n                                      O\n  O beautiful for spacious skies                                  57, 95\n  O come, all ye faithful                                            118\n  O God, our help in ages past                                    56, 97\n  O Jesus, I have promised                                            39\n  O little town of Bethlehem                                         116\n  O Master, let me walk with Thee                                     55\n  On a hill far away stood an old rugged cross                        53\n  Onward, Christian soldiers                                  18, 53, 99\n  O say, can you see, by the dawn's early light 14, 56, 92, 93, 101, 129\n\n\n                                      P\n  Praise God, from whom all blessings flow                           113\n  Praise, my soul, the King of heaven                            59, 108\n\n\n                                      R\n  Rise up, O men of God                                               20\n  Rock of Ages, cleft for me                                      44, 96\n\n\n                                      S\n  Silent night, holy night                                       91, 116\n\n\n                                      T\n  Tell me the old, old story                                          41\n  The day is slowly wending                                           16\n  The Church's one foundation                                    39, 123\n  The heavens declare Thy glory, Lord                                110\n  The Maker of the sun and moon                                      115\n  The shepherds had an angel                                         115\n  The Son of God goes forth to war                                37, 69\n  The strife is o'er                                                  69\n  There is a land of pure delight                                    127\n  There is no sorrow, Lord, too light                                 50\n  There's a Friend for little children                                39\n  There were ninety and nine that safely lay                          45\n  'Tis the promise of God, full salvation to give                     72\n\n\n                                      W\n  We love the place, O God                                           111\n  What a wonderful change in my life has been wrought                 71\n  When I survey the wondrous cross                                    46\n  With all my heart, I'll do my part                                  59\n\n\n\n\n                          Transcriber's Notes\n\n\n--Retained copyright information from the printed edition: this eBook is\n  public-domain in the country of publication.\n\n--Silently corrected a few palpable typos.\n\n--In the text versions only, text in italics is delimited by\n  _underscores_.","title":"Hymn Stories of the Twentieth Century","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":31803}