Dr. Frederic Hedge included the poem in his hymn-book but without any singing-supplement to the words.
It may not be our lot to wield The sickle in the harvest field.
If this stanza and the four following do not reveal all the strength of John G. Whittier's spirit, they convey its serious sweetness. The verses were loved and prized by both President Garfield and President McKinley. On the Sunday before the latter went from his Canton, O., home to his inauguration in Washington the poem was sung as a hymn at his request in the services at the Methodist church where he had been a constant worshipper.
The second stanza is the one most generally recognized and oftenest quoted:
Yet where our duty's task is wrought In unison with God's great thought, The near and future blend in one, And whatsoe'er is willed, is done.
John Greenleaf Whittier, the poet of the oppressed, was born in Haverhill, Mass., 1807, worked on a farm and on a shoe-bench, and studied at the local academy, until, becoming of age, he went to Hartford, Conn., and began a brief experience in editorial life. Soon after his return to Massachusetts he was elected to the Legislature, and after his duties ended there he left the state for Philadelphia to edit the _Pennsylvania Freeman_. A few years later he returned again, and established his home in Amesbury, the town with which his life and works are always associated.
He died in 1892 at Hampton Falls, N.H., where he had gone for his health.
"Abends," the smooth triple-time choral joined to Whittier's poem by the music editor of the new _Methodist Hymnal_, speaks its meaning so well that it is scarcely worth while to look for another. Sir Herbert Stanley Oakeley, the composer, was born at Ealing, Eng., July 22, 1830, and educated at Rugby and Oxford. He studied music in Germany, and became a superior organist, winning great applause by his recitals at Edinburgh University, where he was elected Musical Professor.
Archbishop Tait gave him the doctorate of music at Canterbury in 1871, and he was knighted by Queen Victoria in 1876.
Besides vocal duets, Scotch melodies and student songs, he composed many anthems and tunes for the church--notably "Edina" ("Saviour, blessed Saviour") and "Abends," originally written to Keble's "Sun of my Soul."