298 THE METHODIST HYMN-BOOK ILLUSTRATED
four lines, headed Light shining out of darkness. Montgomery says, It is a lyric of high tone and character, and rendered awfully interesting by the circumstances under which it was written in the twilight of departing reason. He evidently accepted the story that it was composed after Cowper s attempt to drown himself in the Ouse. The poor poet thought that it was the will of God that he should thus offer himself as a sacrifice. Dr. Julian thinks that the probable dates of its composition are October, 1773, or April, 1774, and that neither will agree with the popular account of its origin.
It has been described as the greatest hymn on divine Providence ever written. It was drawn from Cowper by much sorrow. He says, I have never met, either in books or conversation, with an experience at all similar to mine. More than a twelvemonth has passed since I began to hope that, having walked the whole breadth of the bottom of the Red Sea, I was beginning to climb the opposite shore, and I proposed to sing the song of Moses. But I have been disap pointed. Yet he can say to his Saviour, I love Thee, even now, more than many who see Thee daily.
The hymn has been a well of salvation for many sorrowing hearts. Dr. Archibald Alexander, writing from Princeton in 1841, to comfort Dr. Nicholas Murray in the death of his only son, says, Read Cowper s hymn, " God moves in a mysterious way." Christ seems to say, " What I do you know not now, but you shall know hereafter. All things work together for good to them that love God."
The Rev. Hugh Stowell said that during the Lancashire cotton famine in 1865, a mill-owner called his workers together, and told them he must close his mill. It meant ruin to him and them. Suddenly a Sunday-school teacher broke the silence by singing the verse, Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take. All joined in the words with deep emotion and new confidence in God.
The Rev. Richard Knill gave Charles H. Spurgeon sixpence to learn this hymn, when he visited Stambourne Parsonage in 1844, and made him promise that when he became a man, and preached in Rowland Hill s chapel, he would give it out. When Mr. Spurgeon came to London, Dr. Alexander Fletcher, who was to preach the sermon to children in Surrey Chapel, was taken ill, and the young Baptist minister was asked to fill his place. Yes, I will, was his reply, if you will allow the
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