Having taken a survey of the hymns my father thus pointed out to me, and arranged them according to their degrees of approximation to the weakest of those in Mrs. Cromwell's collection, I judged that in all of them there was something she must appreciate, although the main drift of several would be entirely beyond her apprehension. Even these, however, it would be well to try upon her.
Accordingly, the next time she asked me to read from her collection, I made the request that she would listen to some which I believed she did not know, but would, I thought, like. She consented with eagerness, was astonished to find she knew none of them, expressed much approbation of some, and showed herself delighted with others.
That she must have had some literary faculty seems evident from the genuine pleasure she took in simple, quaint, sometimes even odd hymns of her own peculiar kind. But the very best of another sort she could not appreciate. For instance, the following, by John Mason, in my father's opinion one of the best hymn-writers, had no attraction for her:—
"Thou wast, O God, and thou was blest
Before the world begun;
Of thine eternity possest
Before time's glass did run.
Thou needest none thy praise to sing,
As if thy joy could fade:
Couldst thou have needed any thing,
Thou couldst have nothing made.
"Great and good God, it pleaseth thee
Thy Godhead to declare;
And what thy goodness did decree,
Thy greatness did prepare:
Thou spak'st, and heaven and earth appeared,
And answered to thy call;
As if their Maker's voice they Heard,
Which is the creature's All.
"Thou spak'st the word, most mighty Lord;
Thy word went forth with speed:
Thy will, O Lord, it was thy word;
Thy word it was thy deed.
Thou brought'st forth Adam from the ground,
And Eve out of his side:
Thy blessing made the earth abound
With these two multiplied.
"Those three great leaves, heaven, sea, and land,
Thy name in figures show;
Brutes feel the bounty of thy hand,
But I my Maker know.
Should not I here thy servant be,
Whose creatures serve me here?
My Lord, whom should I fear but thee,
Who am thy creatures' fear?
"To whom, Lord, should I sing but thee,
The Maker of my tongue?
Lo! other lords would seize on me,
But I to thee belong.
As waters haste unto their sea,
And earth unto its earth,
So let my soul return to thee,
From whom it had its birth.
"But, ah! I'm fallen in the night,
And cannot come to thee:
Yet speak the word, 'Let there be light;'
It shall enlighten me.
And let thy word, most mighty Lord,
Thy fallen creature raise:
Oh! make me o'er again, and I
Shall sing my Maker's praise."
This and others, I say, she could not relish; but my endeavors were crowned with success in so far that she accepted better specimens of the sort she liked than any she had; and I think they must have had a good influence upon her.