Music Notes for Holy Cross — September 15, 2024 - St James' Anglican Church Vancouver

When I Survey the Wondrous Cross – Text: Isaac Watts (1674-1748) / Music: Melody Psalmody in Miniature 1790; adapt. Edward Miller (1731-1807)

This Sunday’s final hymn in church, When I Survey the Wondrous Cross, was written by the prolific English hymn writer Isaac Watts (1674-1748) after meditating on Galatians 6:14: “God forbid that I should boast of anything but the cross…” An English dissenter from a family of staunch English dissenters, Watts is nonetheless regarded as the pioneer of congregational hymnody in England. More than 600 hymns came from his pen. Matthew Arnold (1822-1888), the English poet and cultural critic declared When I Survey “the finest hymn in the English language”; and that from Arnold, for whom English dissent was far worse than an aberration, is the zenith of praise.

Rockingham is derived from a tune called Tunbridge in Psalmody in Miniature, edited by Aaron Williams c. 1790. This was adapted by Edward Miller (1731-1807) for his Psalms of David 1790. Its first association with Watts’ hymn occurred in The English Hymnal 1906 and since that time has been employed more often for these words than for any other text. Miller chose the name Rockingham in honour of the Marquis of Rockingham, patron and friend, and twice prime minister of Great Britain.

When I survey the wondrous Cross,
On which the Prince of glory died,
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.

Gerald Harder