lead in a sweet duet with slur-flights, like an
obligato to the bass and tenor. The melody needs rich and cultured
voices, and is unsuited for congregational singing. So, perhaps, is the
hymn itself.

Peace, troubled soul, whose plaintive moan
Hath taught these rocks the notes of woe;
Cease thy complaint--suppress thy groan,
And let thy tears forget to flow;
Behold the precious balm is found,
To lull thy pain, to heal thy wound.

Come, freely come, by sin oppressed,
Unburden here thy weighty load;
Here find thy refuge and thy rest,
And trust the mercy of thy God.
Thy God's thy Saviour--glorious word!
For ever love and praise the Lord.

As now sung the word "scenes" is substituted for "rocks" in the second
line, eliminating the poetry. Rocks give an _echo_; and the vivid
thought in the author's mind is flattened to an unmeaning generality.

Count Joseph Mazzinghi, son of Tommasso Mazzinghi, a Corsican musician,
was born in London, 1765. He was a boy of precocious talent. When only
ten years of age he was appointed organist of the Portuguese Chapel, and
when nineteen years old was made musical director and composer at the
King's Theatre. For many years he held the honor of Music Master to the
Princess of Wales, afterwards Queen Caroline, and his compositions were
almost numberless. Some of his songs and glees that caught the popular
fancy are still remembered in England, as "The Turnpike Gate," "The
Exile," and the rustic duet, "When a Little Farm We Keep."

Of sacred music he composed only one mass and six hymn-tunes, of which
latter "Palestine" is one. Mazzinghi died in 1844, in his eightieth
year.

"BEGONE UNBELIEF, MY SAVIOUR IS NEAR."

The Rev. John Newton, author of this hymn, was born in London, July 24,
1725. The son of a sea-captain, he became a sailor, and for several
years led a reckless life. Converted, he took holy orders and was
settled as curate of Olney, Buckinghamshire, and afterwards Rector of
St. Mary of Woolnoth, London, where he died, Dec. 21, 1807. It was
while living at Olney that he and Cowper wrote and published the _Olney
Hymns_. His defiance to doubt in these lines is the blunt utterance of a
sailor rather than the song of a poet:

Begone, unbelief, my Saviour is near,
And for my relief will surely appear.
By prayer let me wrestle and He will perform;
With Christ in the vessel I smile at the storm.

_THE