Isaac+Watts

=Isaac Watts (1674 - 1748)= Even as a small boy, Watts had a great interest in versifying. Once, during family prayers, he began to laugh. His father asked him why. He replied that he had heard a sound and opened his eyes to see a mouse climbing a rope in a corner, and had immediately thought, A little mouse for want of stairs Ran up a rope to say its prayers. His father thought this irreverent, and proceeded to administer corporal punishment, in the midst of which Isaac called out, Father, father, mercy take, And I will no more verses make. When he was older, he complained of the bad quality of writing in the metrical Psalters of his day. His father promptly challenged him to do better, and he undertook the effort. During his lifetime he wrote about 600 hymns altogether, but most of his best efforts were turned out between his graduation from school when he was 20 and his taking a job teaching when he was 22. During these two Golden Years, hymns poured from his pen with the impetus of true genius. Many of Watts's hymns are based on psalms, though some more loosely than others. On the other hand, some of his hymns are not straightforward verse translations of Psalms or other songs taken from the Scriptures, and for this Watts was criticized by those who thought it wrong to sing "uninspired hymns". He replied that, if we can pray to God in sentences that we have made up ourselves (instead of confining ourselves to the Our Father and other prayers taken directly from the Scriptures), then surely we can sing to God in sentences that we have made up ourselves. He added that the Psalms do not deal with specifically Christian themes except in hidden language, and that it is fitting that Christians should include in their worship open and clear proclamations of the acts of God in Christ || To hear works of Isaac Watts visit []. || === Sources ===
 * [[image:66586-004-0e9f03e5.jpg width="200" height="243" align="left"]] || In 1674, Isaac Watts was born in Southampton. Because his family were Dissenters or Non-Conformists (i.e. Protestants who did not think that the Church of England had departed sufficiently from the beliefs and practices of Rome, and who accordingly refused to conform to it), he did not attend Oxford or Cambridge, but instead was educated at the Dissenting Academy in Stoke Newington, London, until 1694. He then began a two-year period of writing, of which more later. In 1696 he became tutor and chaplain to the family of Sir John Hartopp of Leicestershire. In 1699 he became assistant minister at Mark Lane Independent (i.e. Congregational) Chapel in London, and full pastor in 1702. Then his health failed. In 1712 he was invited to spend a week at the home of the wealthy Dissenter Sir Thomas Abney in Hertfordshire. He ended up staying there for the rest of his life, devoting himself to writing. His works included, //Logic, Or the Right Use of Reason in the Enquiry// //After Truth,// a standard text at Oxford and elsewhere for several generations. His poems and songs for children were extremely popular, and became the object of parody in //Alice in Wonderland// (where "How doth the little busy bee improve each shining hour," became, "How doth the little crocodile improve his shining tail"). He died 25 November 1748.
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