A Hymn That Has Been Tested.
A HYMN is an experiment. It is sent abroad over the world for a trial on the hearts of the people? Does it move them? Does it convert them? Does it sanctify them? Then it is a good hymn, whether written by Papist, Protestant or infidel—in long metre, short metre, or in no metre at all. The question to be put to a hymn, as well as to a man is, "What have you done? Have you given consolation to the soul in anguish? Have you fired the dying eye with hope?" The real excellence of a hymn lies not in its paternity, nor its rhyme, nor its rhythm; but in its potency to bless the human heart, in its actual influence on the progress of the cause of the redeemed. It is, therefore, always rash to attempt to settle the destiny of a recent hymn. It may be formed upon the finest models; it may be lyrical; it may be faultless in its measure, smooth, harmonious, devotional; yet for want of some mysterious, indefinable quality, still be totally inadequate to touch the springs of sympathy in the soul. It takes a century at least, to test the real character of a hymn; and when we find one that has lived and shed its blessings through that period, cheering, comforting and refining; when we find a hymn which, in spite of the critic's eye, the people still persist in singing, and all the more when floods beat heavily, we may be certain that it has in the ring of genuine inspiration. Such a hymn is "Jesus lover of my soul," by Charles Wesley. It was probably suggested by the words in Wisdom 11:26, as the lines of St. Bernard, "Oh, amator and amplectende, Temet ipsum tunc ostende, In cruce salutifera," seem also to have been; though it is quite possible that the great storm which Mr. Wesley experienced at sea, after leaving Boston, in 1738, may have led to the composition of his admirable lyric. "I prayed," said he, in speaking of that terrific scene upon the deep, "for power to pray, continually repeating the name of Jesus, till I felt the virtue of it at last." This hymn first appeared in a volume entitled, "Hymns and Sacred Poems," published in 1740, where it has one stanza more than is generally found in our manuals of hymnology, thus:— "Wilt thou not regard my call?
Wilt thou not regard my prayer?
Lo! I sink, I faint, I fall;
Lo! on thee I cast my care.
Reach me out thy gracious hand!
While I of thy strength receive,
Hoping against hope, I stand,
Dying, and, behold, I live!" This Wesleyan hymn, so tender, so earnest, so evangelical, found its way from the Methodist into the Episcopal hymn book, and thence into all our best manuals of song. It has been translated into all the European tongues, and composers have vied with each other to prepare for it appropriate music. In England it is sung to "Hollingshire" and some other tunes; in America to a very simple tune called "Martyn," written in 1834, by the late Simeon Butler Marsh. A tune befitting it is yet to be composed. Perhaps no hymn was ever written which so well expresses man's need of a Saviour and his entire reliance on his mercy for salvation. It is a trust hymn. In our helplessness it opens the soul for Christ to come into it, and to fill it with himself. It sees him only, it clings to him only, it loves him only. Its words are like "apples of gold in pictures of silver." They are the sweet expression of the confiding heart in its entire reliance on its Lord and Master. The lines,
"Cover my defenceless head
With the shadow of thy wing,"
are as tenderly touching as anything ever sung. Millions have been moved toward Jesus by this charming lyric. It has resounded through the great congregation, comforting the desolate; it has warmed the hearts of the weary in the place of social worship; it has delighted and sweetened the devotions of the domestic circle; it has cheered the traveler on his lonely way; it has sustained the sick man in the hour of final conflict. Mary E Van. Lennep, the devoted missionary, repeated this hymn, "her face all radiant with smiles," on her dying bed. "Do you want anything ?" said a pastor to a girl thirteen years of age, in her last moments. "Yes, sir," she replied, "sing with me, 'Jesus, lover of my soul.'" So thousands in the last extremity have been solaced by these precious words. In a dreadful shipwreck, while the passengers were floating on whatever they could reach, a young man, clinging to a spar, sang in a clear, manly voice,
"Jesus, lover of my soul,
Let me to thy bosom fly,"
and as the last words sounded, sank beneath the wave, leaving a holy calmness in the hearts of those that gained the shore. "Blessed death song," says Dr. Cuyler; "if we could choose the manner of our departure, we would wish to die singing,
"Other refuge have I none,
Hangs my helpless soul on thee!" Wesley and Toplady, who wrote
"Rock of ages, cleft for me,"
were theological opponents, but they met together at the cross of Jesus, and their two great hymns now stand together in all our best manuals of sacred song, showing us that the love of Christ is mightier than denominational ramparts, and that while polemical discussions are soon forgotten, the grand heart-hymns, embalming Jesus as the only hope of glory, still ring on, consoling Christians of every creed, and advancing the Redeemer's kingdom. Whether Wesley's or Toplady's hymn is the better one I cannot say, unless I know the occassion for its use; but would rather ask, if Luther wrote the best judgment hymn; if Watts wrote the best heaven hymn; if Heber wrote the best mission hymn; if Toplady wrote the best Christ hymn, did not Wesley write the best death hymn? Does not its blessed ministry attest its excellence?