Ages, ages have departed

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Ages, ages have departed

Author: James Montgomery
Published in 3 hymnals

Representative Text

Ages, ages have departed,
Since the first dark vessel bore
Afric’s children, broken-hearted,
To this far-off western shore;
She, like Rachel,
Weeping, for they were no more.

Millions, millions have been slaughtered
In the fight and on the deep;
Millions, millions more have watered,
With such tears as captives weep,
Fields of labor
Where their wasted bodies sleep.

Mercy, mercy, vainly pleading,
Rends her garments, smites her breast,
Till a voice from heaven proceeding
Gladden all the waiting west:
“Come, ye weary!
Come, and I will give you rest!”

Tidings, tidings of salvation!
Brothers, rise with one accord,
Purge the plague-spot from our nation,
Till, unto their rights restored,
Slaves no longer,
All are freemen in the Lord!

Source: A Book of Hymns for Public and Private Devotion (15th ed.) #439

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Author: James Montgomery

James Montgomery (b. Irvine, Ayrshire, Scotland, 1771; d. Sheffield, Yorkshire, England, 1854), the son of Moravian parents who died on a West Indies mission field while he was in boarding school, Montgomery inherited a strong religious bent, a passion for missions, and an independent mind. He was editor of the Sheffield Iris (1796-1827), a newspaper that sometimes espoused radical causes. Montgomery was imprisoned briefly when he printed a song that celebrated the fall of the Bastille and again when he described a riot in Sheffield that reflected unfavorably on a military commander. He also protested against slavery, the lot of boy chimney sweeps, and lotteries. Associated with Christians of various persuasions, Montgomery supported missio… Go to person page >

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Text Information

Text Information

First Line:	Ages, ages have departed
Author:	James Montgomery
Copyright:	Public Domain

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Notes

Ages, ages have departed. J. Montgomery. [Anti-Slavery.] Published in his Poet’s Portfolio, &c, 1835, in 4 stanzas of 6 lines as No. 3 of his "Songs on the Abolition of Negro Slavery in the British Colonies, Aug. 1, 1834” and entitled "Slavery that was.”

--John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)

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