XXIII SHEPHERD OF TENDER YOUTH THE TEXT OF THE HYMN I Shepherd of tender youth, 2 Thou art our Holy Lord, Thou didst Thyself abase, 3 Thou art the Great High Priest, Of heavenly love: While in our mortal pain, None calls on Thee in vain: Help Thou dost not disdain, Help from above. 4 Ever be Thou our Guide, Lead us where Thou hast trod; 5 So now and till we die, Sound we Thy praises high, And joyful sing: Infants, and the glad throng Who to Thy Church belong, Unite to swell the song To Christ our King. Clement of Alexandria, who died about A. D. 220 THE STORY OF THE HYMN This hymn is the translation of a Greek poem, and this relation to an antique world gives it a special interest of its own. It forms a connecting link between the second century and the twentieth, showing that, while many things have been changed, the Christian heart then as now feels the same impulse to praise Christ, and can express that praise in like words. The Greek poem is often spoken of as the oldest Christian hymn, but that is saying too much. It is rather the oldest surviving Christian poem (after the Song of Mary and the other New Testament hymns) which can be traced to a particular author. And that is distinction enough. Among the great figures of the Church at the end of the second century was Clement of Alexandria. Of Clement himself, apart from his reputation and writings, we know little. He was a Greek, but when or where born is uncertain. He seems to have been of good birth and social position, and certainly was highly educated. He had been a heathen philosopher and when he became a Christian was a philosopher still, traveling about seeking for light from various teachers. He mentions six, under whom he studied "the true tradition of the blessed doctrine of the holy apostles." Alexandria was then the great centre of Christian scholarship. It was there that Clement found in the Word of God the solution of the riddles of his soul. And there his wanderings ended in rest in a living Christ. When his teacher, Pantænus, head of the Catechetical School there, left it to go forth as a missionary, Clement became the head of the school, and so remained until driven away by persecution in A. D. 202. Whither he went and how he spent his closing years we do not know. We hear of him at Jerusalem and once again at Antioch, and he is believed to have died a little before A. D. 220. Clement was a reformer, and wrote several books exposing the dreadful moral corruption of paganism and tutoring new converts in the life becoming the gospel of Christ. One of his books was called The Instructor (or Tutor), and is a treatise on Christian morals and manners. It sets forth Christ the Son of God as the true Instructor of men, and expounds His teachings with eloquence and the warmth of a real affection for Him. At the end of the book is appended the "Hymn to Christ the Saviour." It is a doxology, a burst of praise, an expression of thankfulness "to the Instructor who has not only enlightened us but called us into His Church and united us to Himself." Clement's poem has always been an object of interest to scholars as a relic of early Christianity, and has been frequently translated. From a poetic standpoint it partakes too much of the nature of an inventory of figures applied to Christ in the Scriptures, and too little of the spontaneity of a lyric of praise. There is at the same time a charm in its cumulative adorations and its loyalty to Christ. But it never at any period found a place in the hymn books of the Church. For that honor it waited sixteen centuries. In 1846 an American Congregational clergyman, the Rev. Henry Martyn Dexter, was preparing for his church at Manchester, New Hampshire, a sermon on "Some prominent characteristics of the early Christians," from the text, "Remember the days of old."-Deut. xxxii. 7. It occurred to him to make a hymn out of the old poem and to have it sung at the service. He says: “I first translated it literally into prose, and then transfused as much of its language and spirit as I could into the hymn." Dr. Dexter's hymn was first printed in The Congregationalist for December 21st, 1849. In 1853 Drs. Hedge and Huntington put it into their Hymns for the Church of Christ simply because, in their judgment, it was a good hymn, as they apparently knew nothing of its history or authorship. In 1866 it was included in the Hymnal of the Presbyterian Church, and is now widely used in this country and to some extent in England. Dr. Dexter's version has certainly won its way without any pushing on his part. As lately as 1869 Dr. Schaff (with all his wide acquaintance with religious verse) was obliged to include it in his delightful Christ in Song as "a transfusion by an unknown author." Ever lee near our side, By Thine enduring drove make our our futte strong. foutu felly yours. Berry Martyn Beyter? A VERSE IN THE AUTOGRAPH OF THE TRANSLATOR THE TRANSLATOR OF THE HYMN Henry Martyn Dexter, a son of the Rev. Elijah Dexter, was born at Plympton, Massachusetts, August 13th, 1821. He was graduated from Yale College in 1840 and from Andover Theological Seminary in 1844. That same year he was ordained, and became pastor of |