A settled rest: Isaac Watts remembered

Yesterday the Episcopal Church remembered Isaac Watts (July 17, 1674 – November 25, 1748), preacher, pastor and a prolific and popular hymn writer, often recognized as the “Father of English Hymnody” and credited with some 750 hymns. It is also worth noting that he was the first hymn-writer to give expression to the Reformation emphasis on a personal appropriation of the faith by using first person pronouns in hymnody.

Watts, unable to go to either Oxford or Cambridge on account of his non-conformity, went to the Dissenting Academy at Stoke Newington in 1690, and much of his life centered around that village, which is now part of Inner London.

London’s only public statue to Isaac Watts is in Abney Park, Stoke Newington.

He is honored with a memorial in Westminster Abbey.

Among his more enduring hymns are Jesus Shall Reign, Joy to the World, Oh God, Our Help in Ages Past, and I Sing the Mighty Power of God. One of my favorites has always been My Shepherd Will Supply My Need especially the last verse:

The sure provisions of my God
Attend me all my days;
O may Thy house be my abode,
And all my work be praise.
There would I find a settled rest,
While others go and come;
No more a stranger, nor a guest,
But like a child at home.

Marilynne Robinson (see yesterday’s post) quotes Watts in Gilead:

Time, like an ever-rolling stream,
Bears all its sons away;
They fly forgotten, as a dream
Dies at the opening day.

“Good old Watts,” she writes. “I’ve thought about that verse often. I have always wondered what relationship this present reality bears to an ultimate reality.”

A thousand ages in Thy sight
Are like an evening gone…

Truly they don’t write hymns like that anymore, do they?

Enjoy! (the choir of the Washington National Cathedral)

God of truth and grace, who didst give Isaac Watts singular gifts to present thy praise in verse, that he might write psalms, hymns and spiritual songs for thy Church: Give us grace joyfully to sing thy praises now and in the life to come; through Jesus Christ our Savior, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.