Ask ye what great thing I know. -KENNEDY. Rev. Benjamin Hall Kennedy, D. D., a canon of Ely Cathedral, and recently living in Cambridge, England, was born at Summer Hill, near Birmingham, England, November 6th, 1804; educated at King Edward's School, Birmingham, and afterward at Shrews bury School; and was graduated at St. John's College, Cambridge. He took many university honors, became a Fellow and Classical Lecturer in 1828, and in 1830 went to Harrow to assume an assistant mastership. Thence he departed in 1836, to become head-master of Shrewsbury School, and in 1865 was appointed rector of West Felton, Shropshire. Dr. Kennedy is somewhat celebrated as the author of classical works for schools, and as the editor of Hymnologia Christiana and The Psalter of English Verse. This Hymnologia Christiana must not be confounded with Hymnologia Christiana Latina, a series of renderings of well-known English hymns into Latin verse, by Rev. Richard Bingham, 1871, a book of laborious inutility, produced in consequence of that gentleman's wakefulness during certain hours of every night. Dr. Kennedy's volume consists of fifteen hundred hymns, given without authors' names, and published in 1863. For this omission, and for other reasons, it is quite a disappointing book. The compiler, in his preface, speaks regretfully of the absence of names and dates, and says that in a future edition he should arrange his work better. ASLEEP in Jesus, blessed sleep.-MACKAY. This hymn was contributed in 1832 to The Amethyst, an Edinburgh annual, by Margaret Mackay, daughter of Captain Robert Mackay, of Hedgefield, near Inverness, and wife, in 1820, of Lieutenant-Colonel William Mackay, of the Sixty-eighth Light Infantry. She has written in prose and verse with considerable success, and her Family at Heatherdale passed to a third edition in 1854. This hymn originated in a visit paid by the authoress to a burying-ground in the west of England. Dr. Belcher reprints the following account of its origin, from her own pen: ***SLEEPING IN JESUS.' "This simple inscription is carved on a tombstone in the retired rural burying-ground of Pennycross Chapel, in Devonshire. Distant only a few miles from a bustling and crowded seaport town, reached througl. a succession of those lovely green lanes for which Devonshire is so remark. able, the quiet aspect of Penny cross comes soothingly over the mind. 'Sleeping in Jesus' seems in keeping with all around. "Here was no elaborate ornament, no unsightly decay. The trim gravel walk led to the house of prayer, itself boasting of no architectural embellishment to distinguish it; and a few trees were planted irregularly to mark some favored spots." AT evening time let there be light.-ANON. 1838. Professor Bird states that this is from a small and ignoble selection, The Evergreen, no date"; but that his copy ["7th ed."] is not later than 1835 or thereabouts. It is there assigned to Montgomery by mistake, as it does not appear in that poet's hymns or poems. As it was copied by W. C. Wilson in his Book of General Psalmody, 1838, that year is chosen by Professor Bird as the earliest certain date. Ar the Lamb's high feast we sing.-R. CAMPBELL, tr. The Latin hymn, Ad regias Agni dapes, from which this is taken, is a later (sixth century) form of Ad cænam Agni providi, a hymn sometimes ascribed to Ambrose. The more recent text is that which appears in the Roman and Paris Breviaries. The other was known at Sarum, and among the early Anglo-Saxon churches generally; and is one of the hymns honored by the attention of the great scholar, Jacob Grimm. Mr. Campbell (who died in 1868) prepared this (in 1850), with other translations, to be used in a hymn-book for the diocese of St. Andrews, Scotland. Several of these were transferred anonymously to Hymns, Ancient and Modern, and the author has identified them at the request of Mr. Josiah Miller. He was an advocate in Edinburgh; was strongly inclined toward the Church of Rome, and entered its communion not long before his death, which took place in Edinburgh, December 29th, 1868. Another version of this Latin hymn is Dr. Neale's "The Lamb's high banquet called to share." For further knowledge upon the Latin hymnology, see "The Latin Hymn Writers and their Hymns." Ar thy command, our dearest Lord.-WATTS. Dr. Watts has this as his Hymn 19, Book III., with the title, Glory in the Cross, or not ashamed of Christ crucified." It has four stanzas in the original form, and is evidently a com. munion hymn. AUTHOR of good, to thee I turn. -MERRICK. This hymn is found in James Merrick's Sacred and Moral Poems, 1789. It is entitled "The Ignorance of Man," and commences, "Behold, yon new-born infant griev'd." There are eight stanzas, of which the present first line is from the fifth The concluding quatrain is the famous stanza · "Not to my wish, but to my want, Do thou thy gifts apply: Unask'd, what good thou knowest, grant; What ill, tho' ask'd, deny." The rare little book which contains this piece is possessed, along with a fine and full list of English hymnologies, by the Ridgway branch of the Philadelphia Library. AWAKE, and sing the song.-HAMMOND. Rev. William Hammond, in 1745, published a collection of original poems, entitled Psalms, Hymns and Spiritual Songs. From this the present hymn was taken. Some alterations appear in its later verses: one verse seems to have been added wholly by Madan, in 1760-the one next to the last. The author's title was, "Before Singing of Hymns, by way of Introduction.'' Scriptural allusion is made to Rev. 15: 3. AWAKE, awake, O Zion.-GOUGH. This, and the stirring hymn, "Uplift the blood-red banner," are found in Benjamin Gough's Lyra Sabbatica, 1865. It is entitled "The Coming Millennium.-ISA. 52: 1." AWAKE, my heart, arise, my tongue.-WATTS. We find this as Hymn 20, of Book I., and it is also printed after a sermon on Isa. 61: 10. It bears the title, "Spiritual Apparel, namely, the Robe of Righteousness, and Garments of Salvation," and is in six stanzas. AWAKE, my soul, and with the sun. -KEN. There are thirty-two editions of Bishop Ken's Manual from 1674 to 1799. The earliest to contain the three hymns for which he is most noted is that of 1695. The present writer has also seen the "Morning" and "Evening" hymns, in ten-syllable verses, in the famous Thumb Bible. This is a small copy of the Word of God prepared by Jeremy Taylor for the son of Princess Anne, who died in 1700. Its date is October 6th, 1693, and it bears the imprimatur of "J. Lancaster." It has been reprinted in facsimile by Longmans, London, 1851. The prefixed motto speaks more for the editor's piety than for his grammar : "With care and pains, out of the Sacred Book, This little abstract I for thee have took." In this Child's Bible, the "Morning Hymn" is given thus: Glory to thee, my God; who safe hast kept, Rev. Thomas Ken, D.D., the well-known bishop of Bath and Wells, was born in Hertfordshire, in 1637, and went to Winchester School in his boyhood. It was for this institution that in after years he prepared his Manual of Prayers, to which, in 1695, he appended the "Morning," " Midnight," and "Evening" hymns. The midnight hymn commenced with the line, "My God, now I from sleep awake," and it has been considered fully equal to the others. Bishop Ken used to sing the morning hymn to his own accompaniment on the lute. This excellent man was raised to the episcopal office in 1684, and ministered to Charles the Second in the king's last moments. Under James the Second he was imprisoned in the Tower of London for his refusal to sign the Declaration of Indulgence. He died in 1711, and his friends buried him at Frome, in the early morning. This had been his expressed desire, and he had wished to be laid in his last restingplace “under the east window of the chancel, just at sunrising.” There, in the midst of that solemn scene, and as the daylight brightened, they sang his own anthem of praise, "Awake, mv soul, and with the sun." So picturesque a subject could hardly escape the notice of the poets, and certainly no pen could have touched it more gracefully than that of Monckton Milnes (Lord Houghton): "Let other thoughts, where'er I roam, Ne'er from my memory cancel A basket-work where bars are bent, And shapes above that represent A mitre and a crosier. These signs of him that slumbers there The dignity betoken; These iron bars a heart declare Hard bent, but never broken; This calm and narrow dwelling. "There with the churchyard's common dust Was nothing rare or single ; Yet laid he to the sacred wall As close as he was able, The blessed crumbs might almost fall "Who was this father of the Church, In vain might antiquarians search But preciously tradition keeps The fame of holy men ; So there the Christian smiles or weeps "A name his country once forsook, And martyr in the Spirit's ! That dared with royal power to cope, In peaceful faith persisting, A braver Becket-who could hope To conquer unresisting." |