John Newton, the former slave-ship captain whose conversion during a storm at sea produced “Amazing Grace,” wrote nearly one new hymn every week to accompany his sermons. His diary records that he preached from this text at an evening service on Easter Sunday, April 16, 1775, and it was published in the 1779 Olney Hymns, the famous collection he produced with the poet William Cowper. Its jubilant tone stands apart in that collection, which was otherwise predominantly somber. The tune AUSTRIA was composed by Joseph Haydn around 1796, born of anxiety as French Revolutionary armies threatened Vienna—and it is still Germany’s national anthem. That association made it unsignable in Britain during the Second World War, so in 1941 Cyril Taylor of the BBC composed ABBOT’S LEIGH as a replacement, which became one of the most beloved British hymn tunes of the twentieth century.
Sung at Our Saviour
2026