The “father of English hymnody” stuck to his form in 1719
when he wrote “How Shall the Young Secure Their Hearts”. Isaac Watts, the
45-year old pastor of a church in London, may have had a reputation as a
mold-breaker, but that was in fact his established pattern, his form. It was not
new to himself, as he took after his father. Having been mentored early in his
own life, this hymnist carried on what he had learned, so that his instructional
trademark for the young has resonance even today.
Watts was in the midst of his ministry and his hymn-writing
life when he penned his thoughts about young people’s education in 1719. He’d
been writing verses from his elementary school-age years, so his compositional
prose was well-practiced, even if its nonconformity had earned him a difficult
path at times. He’d been unable to attend either of the premier schools at Oxford
or Cambridge because of his views (nonconformists did not abide by the governance
of the church of England [Anglicans]), so he attended instead Dissenting
Academy in what is now London. He believed in singing from the Psalms, like
Anglicans, but he chose to interpret them in a Christian perspective. His 1719 production
Psalms of David showed his train of
thought at the time, revealing the window through which he was peering when he
composed “How Shall the Young…”. Its words read like Isaac was spending a lot
of time mulling over Psalm 119, even if it was not one of his ancestral
songwriter David’s compositions. Like the great psalm and longest book of the
Bible, Watts employed various synonyms of the word ‘commandment’ to call the
worshipper to God’s side. ‘Instruction’, ‘law’, ‘Word’, ‘precepts’, and ‘rule’,
are sprinkled through Watts’ verses, and the three verses of Watt’s composition
that we sing most often today read like paraphrases of verses 9, 105, and 142
of Psalm 119. His evident care for children, which comes through in so many of
his other hymns, is likewise obvious in this 1719 endeavor. Quizzically, the
only thing one might say is ‘Who were the children?’, since Watts apparently
had none of his own offspring.
Isaac Watts must have touched lots of children in the church
community in which he lived and worked in the early 18th Century. Watts
had moved to the estate of the late Thomas Abney and his wife Mary some seven
years earlier in 1712, due to poor health. The estate and its occupants proved
to be a tonic for Watts, who devoted himself more completely to hymn-writing.
Three of the widow Mary’s children were undoubtedly known and cared for by
Watts, including one daughter, Elizabeth, and Mary with whom Watts lived for
many years, including in 1719. To the Abneys' children Watts must have seemed
like a special, pedagogical uncle who was their mentor. Wouldn’t it be great to
have someone connected to the Holy One to be your intimate advisor? Hey, I
think I sense that this is already true! How about you?
See these sites for biography on composer: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Watts
http://www.wholesomewords.org/biography/bwatts9.html
http://www.wholesomewords.org/biography/bwatts7.html
See this site for explanation of Watts’ nonconformist background: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nonconformist
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