THOMAS KEN, D.D., A SKETCH.
There is a soothing as well as a saving influence in religion; and when godliness finds appropriate utterance in poetry, no matter how modest and simple those utterances may be, doctrines find their way to the heart so readily, and sympathy and affection are so easily awakened and secured, it is not wonderful that so many devout persons should have embodied their religious hopes and fears, their opinions and sentiments, as well as their experience, in sacred song. We are to glance at a period somewhat remote from these hymn-loving times, in the remarks to be made on the author of that immortal and inestimable doxology—
"Praise God, from whom all blessings flow;"
but in doing so, we can almost hear the uninterrupted chorus of that grand old stanza, (the like to which for popularity is never likely again to be known,) through the whole of the three centuries now nearly passed, since it was first carolled in Winchester School. It enhances the value of the sacred words themselves when we know, that during a life of three-score years and four, the conduct of the author harmonized with the theological opinions which he expressed in his poetry.
Never did uninspired man write, in so few words, so much sound divinity, so much of deep feeling, so much of fervent praise, so much of earnest piety, combined with so much of gratitude, as is embodied in the four lines forming the Doxology written by Thomas Ken. Never was a stanza of human composition translated into so many languages, understood by so many nations, and sung by so many millions of mankind, as that Doxology. It suits all men, all climes, all time, all circumstances and conditions, and often expresses what the heart feels too deeply to be put in any other form of words. Thousands of Christ's followers have by it sung away their doubts and fears, relieved their sufferings, and comforted their hearts: tons of thousands of spirits released from the bondage of
