Classic Hymn Writers and Their Books: Watts, Havergal, Crosby

Hymns Biography

Most Christians know the great hymn writers by a line or two: "When I survey the wondrous cross," "Amazing grace," "Take my life, and let it be," "Blessed assurance." Fewer know that the same people wrote books, or that their friends wrote their lives. TheWay Library has many of them. If you start with one, make it Isaac Watts' Hymns and Spiritual Songs, the collection that taught English churches to sing hymns at all. If you want a story, read Fanny Crosby's own account of her life.

The hymn writers were not mainly poets. They were pastors, missionaries' friends, a former slave-ship captain, a blind teacher, a traveling singer. What joins them is that they wanted the gospel in people's mouths. Watts gave congregations songs about Christ in place of only the Old Testament psalms. The Victorian writers, Havergal, Bonar and Matheson, wrote out of their own consecration and sorrow. And the American gospel singers, Crosby, Bliss and Sankey, wrote songs to be sung at revival meetings, where people came to Christ while they sang.

Speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord.
Ephesians 5:19

Here are the hymn writers with books in the library, in rough order of time, and the books to read.

Isaac Watts (1674–1748)

Watts is often called the father of English hymnody. Before him, most English churches sang only metrical psalms. He believed Christians should sing about Christ in words they could mean.

1. Hymns and Spiritual Songs

The 1707 collection, in three books. The first paraphrases Scripture, the second is Watts' own free hymns, and the third is hymns for the Lord's Supper. Here are "Alas! and did my Saviour bleed," "Come, we that love the Lord," "There is a land of pure delight" and, in book 3, the greatest of them all.

When I survey the wondrous cross On which the Prince of Glory dy'd, My richest gain I count but loss, And pour contempt on all my pride.
Hymns and Spiritual Songs, Book 3

Read Hymns and Spiritual Songs.

2. A Short Essay Toward the Improvement of Psalmody

Watts' argument for what he was doing. He studies the New Testament words for psalms, hymns and spiritual songs, answers those who said only inspired words may be sung, and argues that the Psalms must be sung as Christians. An hour's read that explains a revolution in worship.

Is not our Heart often warm'd with holy Delight in the Contemplation of the Son of God our dear Redeemer whose Love was stronger than Death?
A Short Essay Toward the Improvement of Psalmody

Read A Short Essay Toward the Improvement of Psalmody.

3. The Psalms of David

Watts' Psalms "imitated in the language of the New Testament." This is where "O God, our help in ages past" and "Joy to the world" came from, though the library's copy is incomplete, holding Psalms 1 and 2, 51 to 55 and 105 to 132. Read the preface, where he explains his method.

Where he speaks of the pardon of sin, through the mercies of God, I have added the merits of a Saviour.
The Psalms of David, Preface

Read The Psalms of David. For all his books, see Isaac Watts' books and Who Was Isaac Watts?

John Newton (1725–1807)

4. The Life of the Rev. John Newton

Newton wrote "Amazing Grace," and this is the story behind it, mostly in his own letters. He tells of his mother's early teaching, his slide into unbelief, his years in the African slave trade where he was sick and ill-treated, and the storm at sea in 1748 that turned him to God. Later chapters cover his ministry at Olney, where he and William Cowper wrote the Olney Hymns, and in London. The scan has some errors at the start of letters.

I could not utter the prayer of faith: I could not draw near to a reconciled God, and call him Father.
The Life of the Rev. John Newton, Letter VIII

Read The Life of John Newton. His letters of spiritual counsel, Cardiphonia, are in our guide to Christian books on suffering and comfort.

Horatius Bonar (1808–1889)

5. Follow the Lamb

Bonar, a Scottish minister, wrote hundreds of hymns, including "I heard the voice of Jesus say." Most of his books are prose. This short counsel to new converts ends with his hymn "Make use of me, my God." The text runs as one long section and has some misread capitals.

It is a great thing to be a Christian.
Follow the Lamb

Read Follow the Lamb. His other books are in Horatius Bonar's books.

Frances Ridley Havergal (1836–1879)

The English writer of "Take my life, and let it be," "Like a river glorious" and "I gave my life for thee." She wrote many small books, and her sister gathered her life and letters after she died at forty-two.

6. Kept for the Master's Use

Havergal's book on her own hymn. Twelve chapters follow "Take my life" line by line: moments, hands, feet, voice, lips, silver and gold, intellect, will, heart, love and self, each kept for Jesus. Her answer to those who sang the hymn and feared the gift wouldn't last is that the Lord who takes also keeps.

Whatever you did really trust Him to keep, He has kept, and the unkept things were never really entrusted.
Kept for the Master's Use, Our Lives kept for Jesus

Read Kept for the Master's Use.

7. Memorials of Frances Ridley Havergal, by Maria V. G. Havergal

Her sister's life of her, year by year, much of it in Frances's own words. Chapter VIII tells, in her own letter, how "Take my life" was written during a five-day visit, when she prayed that everyone in the house would be blessed.

Perhaps you will be interested to know the origin of the consecration hymn, "Take my life." I went for a little visit of five days.
Memorials of Frances Ridley Havergal, chapter VIII

Read Memorials of Frances Ridley Havergal.

8. Letters of Frances Ridley Havergal

Her letters to family and friends, about answered prayer, full consecration, and the writing of her books and hymns. Read the Letters. See all of Frances Ridley Havergal's books.

George Matheson (1842–1906)

9. Times of Retirement

Matheson, a blind Scottish minister, wrote "O Love that wilt not let me go." His books are short meditations, each turning one verse until it shows something new. This collection is a good start, and Moments on the Mount is his best known.

The Woman of Samaria has struck the marvel in the life of Jesus; He had nothing to draw with.
Times of Retirement, The Attractiveness of Christ

Read Times of Retirement. See George Matheson's books.

The gospel singers

10. Fanny Crosby's Life-Story and Memories of Eighty Years

Fanny Crosby lost her sight as a baby, grew up with much of the Bible by heart, studied and taught at the New York Institution for the Blind, and wrote thousands of hymns, among them "Blessed Assurance" and "To God Be the Glory." Fanny Crosby's Life-Story is the shorter. Memories of Eighty Years has more on hymn writing and the stories behind her songs.

"Safe in the Arms of Jesus" was composed and written in less than thirty minutes; but I have often spent three or four hours on half as many lines, and then cast them aside as worthless.
Memories of Eighty Years, Incidents of Hymns

11. Memoirs of Philip P. Bliss, by D. W. Whittle

Bliss wrote "Hallelujah! What a Saviour," "Wonderful Words of Life" and the tune for "It Is Well with My Soul." He sang at evangelistic meetings with his friend Whittle until he and his wife died in a train disaster in Ashtabula, Ohio, in 1876. Moody wrote the introduction. A large part of the book gives his hymns and the incidents behind them.

Many times he would stop in the middle of a song to lift up the cross, emphasize the love of Jesus, and urge every heart to immediate decision on the Lord's side.
Memoirs of Philip P. Bliss, God's Instruments

Read Memoirs of Philip P. Bliss.

12. My Life and Sacred Songs, by Ira D. Sankey

Moody's song leader tells how Moody heard him sing at a convention in 1870 and recruited him on the spot, then describes their great missions in Britain and America. The second half goes hymn by hymn through his Sacred Songs and Solos, with who wrote each one and what happened when it was sung.

I have known a hymn to do God's work in a soul when every other instrumentality has failed.
My Life and Sacred Songs, Preface

Read My Life and Sacred Songs. For Moody himself, see D. L. Moody's books.

More to explore

Ralph Erskine's Gospel Sonnets, Scottish verse on law and gospel, was loved for a century, but the library's scan is badly damaged. John Bunyan put a hymn into The Pilgrim's Progress, Valiant-for-Truth's "Who would true valour see"; see our Pilgrim's Progress summary. For more lives of Christians, including several of these writers, see the best Christian biographies.

Where to start

To sing and pray: Watts' Hymns and Spiritual Songs, then Havergal's Kept for the Master's Use.
A life story: Fanny Crosby's Life-Story, then Sankey.
The story behind "Amazing Grace": The Life of John Newton.