266. Blest be the everlasting God
Isaac Watts, 1674-1748
A paraphrase of I Peter 1:3-5.
The original by Watts was published in his Hymns and Spiritual Songs, 1707, from which it was taken over unchanged into the Scottish Paraphrases of 1745 and of 1751. In the final 1781 edition, the third stanza was omitted and the fourth altered from
There’s an inheritance divine
Reserved against that day;
’Tis incorrupted, undefiled,
And cannot waste away.
The improvements are attributed to William Cameron, 1751-1811, who, as a young licentiate, was entrusted with the final revision of the Scottish Paraphrases.
For comments on Isaac Watts see [Hymn 11].
MUSIC. ST. STEPHEN (ABRIDGE) is described by Archibald Jacob as a “beautifully fluent and graceful melody ... in the best 18th-century style of this class of tune.” It appeared originally in A Collection of Psalm Tunes in Three Parts ... by Isaac Smith, c. 1770, under the name ABRIDGE, by which it continues to be known in England. In Sacred Harmony for Use in St. George’s, Edinburgh, 1820, it appeared under the name ST. STEPHEN, with slight modification of the last line.
Isaac Smith, c. 1725-c. 1800, was a London linen-draper with a taste for music. He composed and published a number of Psalm-tunes which long remained popular, though ABRIDGE is almost the only one now left of his compositions. Smith named his tunes after localities in and about London. ABRIDGE was the name of a small village near Epping Forest, in Essex.