Joy to those that serve the Lord

Author: Mrs. Barbauld

Barbauld, Anna Laetitia, née Aikin, daughter of the Rev. John Ailrin, D.D., a dissenting minister, was b. at Kibworth-Harcourt, Leicestershire, June 20, 1743. In 1753 Dr. Aikin became classical tutor at a dissenting academy at Warrington. During her residence there she contributed five hymns to Dr. W. Enfield's Hymns for Public Worship, &c, Warrington, 1772. In the following year these were included in her Poems, Lond., J. Johnson, 1773. In May, 1774, Miss Aikin was married to the Rev. Rochemont Barbauld, a descendant of a French Protestant family, and a dissenting minister. For some years Mr. Barbauld conducted, in addition to his pastoral work, a boarding school at Palgrave, Suffolk. From this he retired in 1785. In 1786 he undertook t… Go to person page >

Joy to the followers of the Lord . Anna L. Barbauld. [Joy .] Written about 1820, and pub. by her sister in The Works of Anna Laetitia Barbauld, with a Memoir, 1825, vol. i. p. 339, in 6 stanzas of 4 lines. In Dr. Martineau's Hymns, 1840, and again in 1873, it is given as "Joy to those that love the Lord." This is also in other collections. In Ellen Courtauld's Psalms & Hymns & Anthems, 1860, it begins with stanza iii., "'Tis a joy that, seated deep," altered to "Joy there is, that, seated deep."

--John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)