Happiness, thou lovely name. A. M. Toplady. [Happiness.] First printed in the Gospel Magazine, Oct., 1774, in 4 stanzas of 8 lines. It was not given by Toplady in his Psalms & Hymns, 1776; but appeared in 1793 in Hymns Compiled by Joseph Middleton, London, No. 27line In Bickersteth's Christian Psalmody, 1833, No. 147, stanzas i.-iii. were given as "Happiness! delightful name! " This form of the text is also in later collections. There are also "Man to happiness aspires," in Kennedy, 1863, and "Lord, it is not life to live;" but the most popular form of the hymn is stanzas ii., iii., as, "Object of my first desire." This is in extensive use in Great Britain and America. Full text in D. Sedgwick's reprint of Toplady's Hymns & Sacred Poems, &c, 1860, p. 158.
--John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)
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Happiness, thou lovely name, p. 483, ii. The cento "Saviour, Whom I fain would love" is in the Anglican Hymn Book, 1868; and the S.P.C.K. Church Hymns, 1871. A second cento is "Source and Giver of repose," in the American Sabbath Hymn Book, 1858. In H. M. Macgill's Songs of the Christian Creed and Life, 1876, No. 74. Sts. ii-iv. ("Object of &c") are translated as "Jesu! ter desiderate."
--John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology, Appendix, Part II (1907)
Toplady, Augustus Montague, the author of "Rock of Ages," was born at Farnham, Surrey, November 4, 1740. His father was an officer in the British army. His mother was a woman of remarkable piety. He prepared for the university at Westminster School, and subsequently was graduated at Trinity College, Dublin. While on a visit in Ireland in his sixteenth year he was awakened and converted at a service held in a barn in Codymain. The text was Ephesians ii. 13: "But now, in Christ Jesus, ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ." The preacher was an illiterate but warm-hearted layman named Morris. Concerning this experience Toplady wrote: "Strange that I, who had so long sat under the means of grace in England, should b… Go to person page >
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