"These are they which came out of great tribulation, and NEW YORK: ROBERT CARTER & BROTHERS, No. 530 BROADWAY. W28 Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1858, by In the Clerk's Office of the District Court for the Southern District of PREFACE THIS is simply a book of hymns for private ase. They are chosen from many sources; are of many countries; and were written, some of them, centuries ago. Perhaps I cannot better tell what the book really is, than by a title which I once thought of giving it-Hymns of and for the Church Militant. The pages will, I think, prove such description true. They are not fuller of trial than of consolation. I wished to bring together all the really fine hymns, and none others; but I found that I must admit a little class of general favourites, so long known and loved that they are beyond criticism-like the faces of old friends. Of many a hymn I wish I could know the history-so sure do I feel that some special circumstances called it forth; and every hint that I have found makes me wish to know more. Thus the hymn on page 218, was found treasured up in a chest in some poor cottage in England, -that on page 615 is a French hymn, written in Paris during the cholera summer of 1832; and who can read "The Battle Song of Gustavus Adolphus," (p. 253) and not feel stirred to know that it was sung by his army before every battle? While many auother is the war-cry of unknown combatants unseen strife. The old leaf whereon I found "The Saviour's Merit," (p. 351,) was so worn through with use, though the rest of the book was |