Come, let us join our cheerful songs. I. Watts. [Praise.] This is one of the most widely known and highly esteemed of Watts's compositions. It has no special history beyond the fact that it appeared in his Hymns & Sacred Songs, 1707, and the enlarged edition, 1709, Bk. i., No. 62, in 5 stanzas of 4 lines, and was headed “Christ Jesus the Lamb of God, worshipped by all the Creation, Rev. v. 11-13." The most popular form of the hymn is in 4 stanzas, the stanza "Let all that dwell above the sky (iv.) being omitted. This text was adopted by Whitefield, 1753: Madan, 1760; De Courcy, 1775; Toplady, 1776, and many others amongst the older compilers, and is retained by far the greater number of modern editors, both in Great Britain and America. The hymn, in whole, or in part, has been rendered into many languages, including one in Latin, "Venite, Sancti, nostra laeta carmina," in Bingham's Hymnologia Christiana Latina, 1871.
--John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)
Isaac Watts was the son of a schoolmaster, and was born in Southampton, July 17, 1674. He is said to have shown remarkable precocity in childhood, beginning the study of Latin, in his fourth year, and writing respectable verses at the age of seven. At the age of sixteen, he went to London to study in the Academy of the Rev. Thomas Rowe, an Independent minister. In 1698, he became assistant minister of the Independent Church, Berry St., London. In 1702, he became pastor. In 1712, he accepted an invitation to visit Sir Thomas Abney, at his residence of Abney Park, and at Sir Thomas' pressing request, made it his home for the remainder of his life. It was a residence most favourable for his health, and for the prosecution of his literary… Go to person page >
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