Page:The Methodist Hymn-Book Illustrated.djvu/445

 THE STORY OF THE HYMN S AND THEIR WRITERS 433

1872 lie became Rector of St. Mary Woolnoth, the living formerly held by John Newton, his father s friend; Bampton Lecturer, 1870; Prebendary of St. Paul s. He died in 1883. He began to write and translate hymns when a curate at St. Mary, New- ington, 1835-7, and many of these were printed on broad sheets. He published a Metrical Psalter, 1857.

Canon Ellerton says the translation by Dr. Irons is a truly wonderful achievement, for he has solved a difficulty which has baffled almost ever) one who has attempted it. He was present in Notre Dame when the funeral sermon was preached for the Archbishop of Paris, who was shot during the Revolution of 1848 whilst trying to persuade the insurgents to cease firing. The prelate s heart was shown in a glass case in the Choir, and the Dies Irae was sung by an immense body of priests. Dr. Irons was deeply moved, and on retiring from the church wrote out this translation, which is the finest rendering of this great Judgement hymn. It was first issued in the Introits and Hymns for Advent used at Margaret Street Chapel, London. It bears no date. In 1849 ^ r - Irons published it with historical notes and with the music he heard in Notre Dame, harmonized by Charles Child Spencer.

The last two lines, with a change of them to us, are from Isaac Williams s version, 1834. Dr. Irons s last lines ran

Lord, who didst our souls redeem, Grant a blessed Requiem.

Ver. 1 6 is omitted

\Vliile the wicked are confounded, Doomed to flames of woo unbounded, Call me, with Thy saints surrounded.

Dean Church gave orders that he should be buried in the graveyard of Whatlcy, in Somersetshire, where he had spent nineteen years of quiet happiness as rector, and that a stone like that placed over his son s grave at Hycres should be his memorial, with the same lines from the Dies Irae upon it

Rex tremcndac majestatis,

Qui salvandos salvas gratis,

Salva me, fons piclatis.

Quaerens me sedisti lassus, Kcdcmisti crucem passus, Tantus labor non sit cassus. He was buried in December, 1890.

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