"be full surrender before there can be full blessedness. God admits you by the one into the other." It is this full surrender of herself to which she then attained that is recorded and expressed in the hymn.

The hymn was written while on a visit to Arely House, on February 4th, 1874. Miss Havergal afterward gave the following account of the circumstances: "Perhaps you will be interested to know the origin of the consecration hymn, Take my life.' I went for a little visit of five

my life, I let it be Consecrated, Lord, to Thee.

Jrances Ridley Havergal

AUTOGRAPH LINES OF THE HYMN

days. There were ten persons in the house, some unconverted and long prayed for, some converted but not rejoicing Christians. He gave me the prayer,' Lord, give me all in this house!' And He just did! Before I left the house every one had got a blessing. The last night of my visit I was too happy to sleep, and passed most of the night in praise and renewal of my own consecration, and these little couplets formed themselves and chimed in my heart one after another, till they finished with, Ever, ONLY, ALL for Thee!'"

Miss Havergal had her own characteristic way of

writing hymns; and here again it will be best to let her speak for herself: "Writing is praying with me, for I never seem to write even a verse by myself, and feel like a little child writing; you know a child would look up at every sentence and say, 'And what shall I say next?' That is just what I do; I ask that at every line He would give me not merely thoughts and power, but also every word, even the very rhymes. Very often I have a most distinct and happy consciousness of direct answers."

THE AUTHOR OF THE HYMN

It has been said of Miss Havergal that she was born in an atmosphere of hymns. Her father, the Rev. William Henry Havergal, certainly wrote many, but is now best remembered for his services to church music and by his tunes "Evan," "Zoan," " Patmos," and others. She was baptized by another hymn writer, the Rev. John Cawood, author of "Hark! What Mean those Holy Voices?" (The Hymnal, No. 169), and “Almighty God, Thy Word is Cast" (The Hymnal, No. 74).

Miss Havergal was born in the rectory of the little English village of Astley, December 14th, 1836. The family removed to the city of Worcester in 1845, when her father became rector of one of its churches. The story of her child life there, its joys and griefs, and the beginnings of her work for others in the Sunday-school and "The Flannel Petticoat Society," Miss Havergal herself has told in The Four Happy Days. She went away, first to an English school, under whose strong religious influences she began "to have conscious faith and hope in Christ," and afterward to a school in Germany.

With a real love of learning and an ambition to make the most of herself, she carried on her studies until she became a very accomplished woman. She was at home in Hebrew and Greek as well as in modern languages. In music she cultivated her special gift to such a degree that she was sought after as a solo singer in public concerts; and she became a brilliant performer on the piano. How she did it may be gathered from her poem "The Moonlight Sonata." Her own sense of power in her music and the delight of public applause enforced the advice from professional sources that she make music her career. She knew, too, that she held the pen of a ready writer and the promise of poetic achievement; and when there is added the influence upon her of marked social attentions evoked by the charm of her personality, and quickening her natural fondness for life and gayety, it will readily be understood that for a while the precise turn her life would take seemed somewhat problematical.

But it was never really in question. Love and service were the only ideals that could satisfy her nature, and to these she yielded herself so completely as to efface all other ambitions. Her gifts were thenceforward "Kept for the Master's use." She considered literal Singing for Jesus" her most direct mission from Him, and after 1873 sang nothing but sacred music, and that only for spiritual purposes. Her great work was that of personal spiritual influence upon others, and was carried forward to the extreme limit of her strength by writing many leaflets and books of prose and poetry, by personal interviews, addresses, teaching, society work, and correspondence.

Many of her hymns were written for a hymn book,

Songs of Grace and Glory, of which she was one of the editors. This was a large and carefully edited book, ardently evangelical in its point of view, but it took no permanent place in the Church of England. Many of Miss Havergal's poems were originally printed as leaflets. From time to time she collected them into volumes, of which Ministry of Song (1869), Under the Surface (1874), and Loyal Responses (1878), are the more important. After her death her complete poetical writings were gathered together and published by her sister. They made a bulky volume, and included, one would think, a great deal of verse which its author would not have considered worthy of appearing there. She also edited the Psalmody of her father, to whose memory she was devoted, and whose services to church music she lost no opportunity of magnifying.

Miss Havergal's ideals and methods in writing were not those of an artist. And, though her beautiful spirit is beyond criticism, it is only right to say that the cultivation of poetic art to the highest excellence (as in the case of Tennyson) may be pursued as conscientiously, and be as legitimate a consecration, as was the conscientious suppression of the art instinct in Miss Havergal's case. And while her hymns have been of great influence and won a wide use, it remains to be seen whether that influence shall be permanent, or was rather the personal influence of the devoted woman herself. For as the personal influence of a writer fades away, his or her work comes to be judged by what it is in itself. And one hardly feels that most of Miss Havergal's hymns are as good from the literary standpoint as she was capable of making them. Her "Golden Harps are