THE STORY OF THE HYMNS AND THEIR WRITERS 2OI
Weary of this war within,
Weary of this endless strife, Weary of ourselves and sin, Weary of a wretched life.
lln ver. I the original reads, All who groan to bear your load ; and in ver. 2, Cast on Thee our sin and care."
Hymn 280. Come, ye sinners, poor and wretched.
JOSEPH HART.
In his Hymns composed on Various Subjects, with, the Authors Experience, 1759. It had seven verses, and was headed Come, and welcome, to Jesus Christ. Dr. Conyers and Toplady made various changes in the text. In ver. 4, Bruised and broken is a happy revision. It is mangled in Hart s Hymns.
Joseph Hart (1712-68) was a teacher in London, who ran to dangerous lengths both of carnal and spiritual wickedness, and after much distress and pain was led to peace through a sermon on Rev. iii. 10, which he heard in the Moravian Chapel at Fetter Lane on the afternoon of Whit Sunday, 1757. He returned home, and there the great burden seemed suddenly lifted from his shoulders as he prayed. He felt himself melt ing away with a strange softness of expression. Tears ran in streams from my eyes, and I was so swallowed up in joy and thankfulness that I hardly knew where I was. During the next two years some of his best hymns were written. In 1759 he became minister of Jewin Street Independent Chapel, an old wooden structure put up in 1672 for William Jenkyn. Twenty thousand people are said to have attended his funeral in Bunhill Fields, where an obelisk was erected to his memory in 1875.
Dr. Johnson was evidently no admirer of Hart. He says, I went to church. I gave a shilling ; and seeing a poor girl at the sacrament in a bed-gown, I gave her privately half a crown, though I saw Hart s hymns in her hand.
Hymn 281. Jesus, Thou all-redeeming Lord.
CHARLES WESLEY (i).
Hymns and Sacred Poems, 1749; Works, v. 121. Before preach ing to the Colliers in Leicestershire." Eighteen verses.
Lover of souls! is a reminiscence of Jesu, Lover of my soul." In ver. 4, hardness is a happy substitute for the stony.
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