Glorious Things of Thee Are Spoken
John Newton, 1771
How often do we find, in human affairs, a brave and stubborn man bending his stiff neck and confessing, “I have been wrong, all my life I have been wrong!” Not often enough, I’d say, and that’s why I admire so deeply John Newton, one-time slave trader leading a godless and ruffianly life, then seized by God’s grace, we might even say throttled and flogged by it, turning his considerable energies to oppose what he had long contributed to, and to preach the word of God “in season and out of season,” to all who would hear.
Since I’d had some fun yesterday with delightful names of American towns, my thoughts turned to my home state of Pennsylvania, and a habit among the Moravians who settled in the eastern part of the state to turn to Biblical names for the villages they founded: Bethlehem is the largest of them; there’s also Nazareth and Mount Bethel in the same county, near where Debra’s father grew up, and Emmaus, where I went to school for a year and a half when I was a small boy, and Lebanon, and others. And I recalled, with some caution, Ronald Reagan’s citing of John Winthrop, to whom is commonly attributed a long and quite wise and judicious sermon called “A Model of Christian Charity.” Winthrop was one of the early governors of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, and in that sermon, delivered before their embarkation for the New World, he speaks of New England as “a city on a hill,” alluding to Jesus’ words in the Sermon on the Mount: “You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden.” But Winthrop did not mean to praise the greatness and the glory of New England, which was after all still in its infancy. Nor did he imply that New England was going to be a Jerusalem on earth. His point was that New England was going to be conspicuous:
“For we must consider that we shall be as a city upon a hill. The eyes of all people are upon us. So that if we shall deal falsely with our God in this work we have undertaken, and so cause him to withdraw his present help from us, we shall be made a story and a byword through the world. We shall open the mouths of enemies to speak evil of the ways of God, and all professors for God's sake.”
There are two temptations, as I see them, that beset the Christian in dealing with politics. One is to suppose that the faith is private, and that it should not touch public matters, so that you need not heed the gospels except on Sunday or except in dealing with your friends and your family, but not with your fellow workers or townsmen or employees or superiors. The other is to suppose that you can build the City of God on earth: which subtly slides into the view that there is no other City of God but that which might be so built. Each view, as it seems to me, turns human affairs into an idol, and the results are often monstrous. Charles Dickens is the man to go to if you want to see what a nation can become when the gospel is trammeled up into personal piety at best; and the twentieth century tells many a terrible tale of destruction and oppression when men begin to think that they can bring about their own Paradise. Of the latter, Whittaker Chambers, who knew whereof he spoke, said that the soul of communism was not the labor theory of value, or the dictatorship of the proletariat, but rather the second-oldest religion in the world: “Ye shall be as gods.”
And that’s why I find Newton’s hymn for today, “Glorious Things of Thee Are Spoken,” so wonderful and refreshing and filled with bright and energetic hope. Nobody could accuse John Newton of being disengaged from the poor and the oppressed! Perhaps the secret of true assistance to suffering mankind is to remember that we have souls as well as bodies, and that though the belly must be filled, the soul must be taught, disciplined, uplifted, directed to what transcends the soul, turned toward God; we want brave saints, not sluggish hedonists.
I also know that the most common melody for Newton’s hymn, “Austria,” composed by Franz Joseph Haydn (1797) to celebrate the birthday of Emperor Francis II, was adapted as an anthem for Germany — but you may be relieved to hear that that happened almost a century before the rise of that vicious failure of an artist and a human being — you know who I mean. Even the words “Deutschland, Deutschland, ueber alles,” didn’t mean that Germany was supposed to be the greatest nation in the world, or that people should think of Germany before anything else in heaven or on earth, but that there should be a German nation, rather than the current patchwork of principalities under the vague and general rule of the so-called Holy Roman Emperor. The same sort of movement was going on at that time in Italy — a movement for there to be an Italian nation, not a piece of this and a piece of that, ruled here by the French, there by the Spanish, and so forth. So much for that melody, but Debra has found for us a splendid rendition of the hymn by the choir at King’s College, to the melody “Abbots Leigh,” composed by Cyril Taylor in 1941. It is a melody of great breadth and power — and I think it fits the hymn splendidly.
Glorious things of thee are spoken, Zion, city of our God! He whose Word cannot be broken Formed thee for his own abode. On the Rock of Ages founded, What can shake thy sure repose? With salvation's walls surrounded, Thou mayst smile at all thy foes. See the streams of living waters, Springing from eternal love, Well supply thy sons and daughters And all fear of want remove. Who can faint while such a river Ever flows their thrist to assuage? Grace, which like the Lord, the Giver, Never fails from age to age. Round each habitation hovering, See the cloud and fire appear For a glory and a covering, Showing that the Lord is near. Thus deriving from their banner Light by night and shade by day, Safe they feed upon the manna Which He gives them on their way. Blest inhabitants of Zion, Washed in the Redeemer's blood! Jesus, whom their souls rely on, Makes them kings and priests to God. 'Tis his love his people raises Over self to reign as kings: And as priests, his solemn praises Each for a thank-offering brings. Savior, which of Zion's city I through grace a member am, Let the world deride or pity, I will glory in thy name! Fading is the worldling's pleasures, All his boasted pomp and show; Solid joys and lasting treasures None but Zion's children know.
Word & Song by Anthony Esolen is an online magazine devoted to reclaiming the good, the beautiful, and the true. We publish six essays each week, on words, classic hymns, poems, films, and popular songs, as well a weekly podcast for paid subscribers, Poetry Aloud or Anthony Esolen Speaks. We value all of our subscribers, and we thank you for reading Word and Song!
Whitaker Chambers was a masterfully talented translator. I read a few of Felix Salten's (author of "Bambi, A Life in the Woods") books that he translated from German into English, and he did such an excellent job. The translation wasn't word-for-word, but it retained everything the author wished to convey. There was emotion, nuance, rhythm, and pacing.
I will have to finally read Mr. Chamber's own book, "Witness" to figure out why the liberals hated him so much.
"There are two temptations, as I see them, that beset the Christian in dealing with politics. One is to suppose that the faith is private, and that it should not touch public matters..."
This reminds me of a certain nationally known politician, now deceased, who contradicted his professed faith on certain grave moral issues in both his public voting record and in private actions that became public knowledge. This led to the quip, and I wish I could cite the origin of it, that his religion was so private he wouldn't even impose it upon himself.
As to the second temptation, what an insight from Whitaker Chambers.