George Herbert hymns twice on one Sunday – worship and “our utmost art”.

Two George Herbert poems set to music, on the one day! Sunday Morning worship in our church began with a George Herbert hymn. As we sang it I could almost see the small parish church of Bemerton, placed lovingly in the mind of Herbert against the backdrop of rural England, 17th Century national politics and Herbert's theological assumption that church and creation reflect the reign and love of God:

Let all the world in every corner sing, my God and King!
The heavens are not too high, his praise may thither fly,
the earth is not too low, his praises there may grow.
Let all the world in every corner sing, my God and King!

Let all the world in every corner sing, my God and King!
The church with psalms must shout, no door can keep them out;
but, above all, the heart must bear the longest part.
Let all the world in every corner sing, my God and King!


Then on Songs of Praise last night, the kind of hymn that is so old fashioned I thought it almost forgotten, not just out of favour but out of sync with current taste and preference. It recalls a spiritual atmosphere and intensity of devotion requiring more of us than our usual contemporary attempts at dumbed down intimacy and informal conversation with Holy Love that is both transcendent and immediate. But there it was, sung with that restrained politeness that in Anglican spirituality comes near to the spiritual quality of courtesy and quiet gratefulness, not spiritually greedy or emotionally ambitious, but showing that quality of balance that makes Herbert's poetry such a fine example of what he himself called "my utmost art".

King of glory, King of peace,

I will love thee;

and that love may never cease,

I will move thee.

Thou hast granted my request,

thou hast heard me;

thou didst note my working breast,

thou hast spared me.

Wherefore with my utmost art

I will sing thee,

and the cream of all my heart

I will bring thee.

Though my sins against me cried,

thou didst clear me;

and alone, when they replied,

thou didst hear me.

Seven whole days, not one in seven,

I will praise thee;

in my heart, though not in heaven,

I can raise thee.

Small it is, in this poor sort

to enroll thee:

e'en eternity's too short

to extol thee.