“I GAVE MY LIFE FOR THEE.”
This was written in her youth by Frances Ridley Havergal, and was suggested by the motto over the head of Christ in the great picture, “Ecce Homo,” in the Art Gallery of Dusseldorf, Prussia, where she was at school. The sight—as was the case with young Count Zinzendorf—seems to have had much to do with the gifted girl's early religious experience, and indeed exerted its influence on her whole life. The motto read “I did this for thee; what doest thou for me?” and the generative effect of the solemn picture and its question soon appeared in the hymn that flowed from Miss Havergal's heart and pen.
I gave my life for thee,
My precious blood I shed,
That thou might'st ransomed be
And quickened from the dead.
I gave my life for thee:
What hast thou given for me?
Miss Frances Ridley Havergal, sometimes called “The Theodosia of the 19th century,” was born at Astley, Worcestershire, Eng., Dec. 14, 1836. Her father, Rev. William Henry Havergal, a 189 / 155 clergyman of the Church of England, was himself a poet and a skilled musician, and much of the daughter's ability came to her by natural bequest as well as by education. Born a poet, she became a fine instrumentalist, a composer and an accomplished linguist. Her health was frail, but her life was a devoted one, and full of good works. Her consecrated words were destined to outlast her by many generations.
“Writing is praying with me,” she said. Death met her in 1879, when still in the prime of womanhood.
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