Isaac Watt: The Father of English Hymnody

For this Easter holiday, I thought we'd look at a hymn lyric from a very influential writer who is often overlooked in discussions of literature: Isaac Watt.  You can find the full text of the lyric in the transcript.

Additional Music: "When I Survey the Wondrous Cross" perf. The Choir of St. Margaret's, Westminster (1931) His Master's Voice (B 3746)

https://archive.org/details/78_when-i-survey-the-wondrous-cross_choir-of-st-margarets-westminster-miller-herber_gbia0438074b

Transcript

Happy Easter to everyone who celebrates!  On the ol’ ecclesiastical calendar it is the Feast of the Resurrection, so I thought this a splendid time to fill your basket with a little Easter treat.  So much better than those disappointing hollow chocolate bunnies – talk about empty calories!  And Peeps?  Sorry, man, never got the attraction.  Like biting a gritty sponge.  It’s so much better to feed your head with some literary confections, and what could be sweeter than a look at some of the lyrics from the Easter hymns of Isaac Watts?

Who?

Isaac Watts, the prolific hymnist, theologian, and logician, who rejoices in the sobriquet "Father of English Hymnody." He ponied up over 700 hymns, including such hits as "Joy to the World" and "When I Survey the Wondrous Cross." As a Nonconformist minister, Watts fundamentally altered the landscape of worship music by composing hymns that conveyed personal devotion and emotion, a departure from the strictly metrical psalms previously favored.

He was born in Southampton to a Puritan family in 1674 and very early exhibited exceptional intellect, mastering Latin, Greek, Hebrew, and French. He turned down the opportunity for a university education at Oxford or Cambridge in favor of a Dissenting Academy in London.  He served as the pastor of Mark Lane Independent Chapel in London; however, chronic, severe health challenges frequently precluded him from preaching. He spent many years residing with the Hartopp and Abney families, dedicating his time primarily to writing. Beyond his hymns, he authored influential scholarly textbooks on logic, geography, and astronomy, which were adopted by institutions such as Yale and Harvard universities.

Watts thought the quality of contemporary church music rather poor, so he published Hymns and Spiritual Songs in 1707, which introduced his new style of hymnody into congregational practice. He deployed a variety of metrical patterns and “Christianized” the Hebrew psalms by rendering them in a style reminiscent of the New Testament's language.  Musically, he wanted melodic tunes, easy to sing, over against the plodding death-march rhythm of traditional hymnody. Also, he didn’t forget the little’uns, publishing a volume of Divine Songs Attempted in Easy Language for the Use of Children.  I’m sure they were most grateful.  

Let’s take a quick peek at what is probably his most enduring and important hymn for Eastertide, 1707’s “When I Survey the Wondrous Cross.”

When I survey the wond'rous Cross

    On which the Prince of Glory dy'd,

    My richest Gain I count but Loss,

    And pour Contempt on all my Pride.

Forbid it, Lord, that I should boast,

    Save in the Death of Christ my God:

    All the vain Things that charm me most,

    I sacrifice them to his Blood.

See from his Head, his Hands, his Feet,

    Sorrow and Love flow mingled down!

    Did e'er such Love and Sorrow meet,

    Or Thorns compose so rich a Crown?

His dying Crimson, like a Robe,

    Spreads o'er his Body on the Tree;

    Then I am dead to all the Globe,

    And all the Globe is dead to me.

 Were the whole Realm of Nature mine,

    That were a Present far too small;

    Love so amazing, so divine,

    Demands my Soul, my Life, my All.

We’ve seen this structure before, yeah?  Octosyllabic quatrains – ABAB rhymes.  Bog standard lyric structure.  Flick on your radio.  Whatever song’s playing probably’s built like this.  Because it works – it's a popular structure because the populace can access it, and that’s what hymns and pop songs have in common – they’re for communal singing.  And the subject matter is pretty predictable: a believer considers the crucifixion and, overwhelmed by the compassion of such a sacrifice, renounces the temptations of the world for the love of Christ.

But don’t let that fool you, because that seeming simplicity hides some pretty sophisticated language tricks.  Here’s something kind of cool: anadiplosis (Linking Verses). The stanzas are linked together with related words into a single thought chain.  So, stanza 1 ends with “pride” and stanza 2 kicks off with “boast.”  The emotion followed by the action.  Stanza 2 ends with “blood” and in the next line we see that blood on the head, hands, and feet.  By the way, since we’re being all sexy with the literary terms, this is hypotyposis (a pompous way of saying “vivid imagery”): the third and fourth stanzas use hypotyposis to paint a graphic "word-picture" of the crucifixion, describing blood flowing from the head, hands, and feet.  Uh, and the rest of such links are “crown and robe” (stanzas 3 to 4), “me to mine” (stanzas 4 to 5), finally ending with “all,” the contrasting link to “mine.”  Cool, right?

Furthermore, the hymn uses contradictions to highlight theological mysteries.  For instance, "Wondrous Cross.”  I remember years ago, when I was a practicing Catholic, a friend asked me why I wore a crucifix around my neck.  I don’t recall exactly what I said, but it was probably something automatic from the catechism.  And she said: “But it’s horrible.  It’s a torture instrument.”  It had never really occurred to me how the crucifix might look to someone outside the tradition.  It’s like that here: the cross was an tool of torture, fear, and oppression, so calling it "wondrous" is immediately paradoxical.

The lyric’s third line – "Richest gain I count but loss" – paraphrases a line from St. Paul’s Letter to the Philippians, contrasts material wealth with spiritual value.  The last line of stanza 3 also gives us a seeming contradiction: "Thorns compose so rich a crown.” Some might call it an oxymoron, contrasting the pain of the thorns with the "richness" of Christ's royalty, but Christ is the only one feeling the thorns, whereas the richness is for all who believe in Him.

Here’s one of the coolest ones – like secret code kind of stuff.  The third stanza – the fulcrum, the crossroads, the turning point of the lyric - features a chiasmus, which is a reversal of grammatical structures or ideas.  You might know Knute Rockne’s “When the going gets tough, the tough get going” or Lil Wayne’s "I got my mind on my money, and my money on my mind."  See how the words flip in a mirror image.  Stanza three does that: "Sorrow and love flow mingled down / Did e’er such love and sorrow meet?”.  OK, elegant.  We could see Christ’s suffering and love as a mirror to our own.  Nice.  But check this out: the Greek letter for chiasmus is (Chi), also the first letter of "Christ" and a traditional symbol for the cross. By placing this device in the exact center of the hymn, Watts visually and structurally anchors the poem in the cross.  Boom.

As I indicated earlier, the whole use of first-person perspective was a bit innovative in the early 18th century.  Hymns were typically corporate paraphrases of Psalms. Watts shifted the focus to the individual’s emotional and internal response to the divine.  One of those cases in which the highly specific can appeal to the general, the more personal the more relatable.

What else could we talk about?  Oh!  Nice pun in stanza 4.  I guess folks often don’t sing this stanza, but there’s good wordplay: "dying" as in ceasing to metabolize, and "dyeing" as in coloring fabric. Christ’s blood is described as a "crimson robe" that spreads over his body, transforming an image of death into one of royal investiture.

The hymn reaches its peak with a powerful set of escalating terms: "Demands my soul, my life, my all." This intense progression moves sequentially from the innermost spirit to physical being, ultimately encompassing the totality of the human experience.  

So there you go, Litterbugs, a little Easter egg on a writer, Isaac Watt, who had a profound effect on English lyricism and literature, but is often overlooked.  Shine a little light on him today.  Thanks for listening and have a wonderful day.  If you’d care to support the show in some way, morally or financially, please do check the show notes for various options.  Thank you so much.  Talk to you soon.