Page:The Methodist Hymn-Book Illustrated.djvu/399

 THE STORY OF THE HYMNS AND THEIR WRITERS 387

so long as our most impressive annual service shall be solemnized

O God I how often hath Thine ear To me in willing mercy bowed ! * (Dr. Benjamin Gregory s Autobiographical Recollections, p. 14.)

Hymn 747. O happy day that fixed ray choice. PHILIP UODDRIDGE (95).

Published in 1755, headed Rejoicing in our Covenant Engagements to God.&quot; 2 Chron. xv. 15.

It was sung, by Queen Victoria s request, at the confirma tion of one of her children. James Montgomery says, Blessed is the man that can take the words of this hymn and make them his own from similar experience.

Dr. Bruce describes St. Matthew s farewell feast to the publicans as a kind of poem, saying for Matthew what Dod- dridge s familiar lines say for many another. The Training of the Twelve, p. 24.

Hymn 748. Lord, from this time wo cry to Theo. CHARLES LAWRENCE FORD, B.A.

\Vritten as a Confirmation hymn at the request of an old school fellow, Canon K. II. Baynes, and published in Canon Baynes s Jfotne Songs for Quiet Hours, 1874, and in Lyra Chris ti the same year. The hymn is a reply to the question in Jer. iii. 4, and requires a slight emphasis on we and our in the first two lines. The figures of the desert wandering of Israel and the temptation of Christ are used in the hymn.

Mr. Ford was born at Bath in 1830. His father, an artist, gave him his second name after Sir Thomas Lawrence, whom he had known. He joined the Methodist Society in 1846 ; became a schoolmaster in Colchester (1848-56), and in Cam- borne (1856-92), where Sir George Smith and Mr. H. A. Smith were his pupils. Since his retirement he has lived in Bath. He published Lyra, Christi, 1874; Horn No-vissima, 1898. Many of his hymns have appeared in various collec tions. This is My body which is given for you, was con tributed to the Congregational Hymn-book at the request of Dr. Henry Allon.

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