See where it shines in Jesus' face,
The brightest image of His grace!
God in the person of His Son
Has all His mightiest works outdone.
A rather finical question has occurred to some minds as to the theology of the word “works” in the last line, making the second person in the Godhead apparently a creature; and in a few hymn-books the previous line has been made to read—
God in the Gospel of His Son.
But the question is a rhetorical one, and the poet's free expression—here as in hundreds of other cases—has never disturbed the general confidence in his orthodoxy.
Montgomery called Watts “the inventor of hymns in our language,” and the credit stands practically undisputed, for Watts made a hymn style that no human master taught him, and his 58 / 34 model has been the ideal one for song worship ever since; and we can pardon the climax when Professor Charles M. Stuart speaks of him as “writer, scholar, thinker and saint,” for in addition to all the rest he was a very good man.
THE TUNE.
Old “Ames” was for many years the choir favorite, and the words of the hymn printed with it in the note-book made the association familiar. It was, and is, an appropriate selection, though in later manuals George Kingsley's “Ware” is evidently thought to be better suited to the high-toned verse. Good old tunes never “wear out,” but they do go out of fashion.