Vital Sparks: Gentle patience smiles on pain

Singing from The Sacred Harp is somewhat countercultural. We sing these old songs, and compose new ones “in the style.” We sing these old hymn texts, as well. Anne Steele was an 18th century Dissenting Baptist. According to her biographer and collator, Samuel Duffield, who wrote in 1886, Steele “stands fourth or fifth in the list of contributors to English hymnody.” Yet even within Baptist circles, Steele’s lyrics are not often found in modern hymnals. But here is another way The Sacred Harp goes against the trend: The number of texts in the 2025 edition with words by Steele more than doubled from the 1991 edition There are now 15 songs with Steele’s words, up from six in the 1991 edition. She’s worth getting to know.

Steele was a birthright Particular Baptist; her father was the lay pastor of the local Baptist chapel; so was her uncle. She made a confession of faith at age 14. She was born in Broughton, Hampshire, England (1717); lived a single life with her family in Broughton; and died and was buried in Broughton (1778).

Unlike many women of her time, she received a good education. She was encouraged in her writing by her family, and her father considered her hymn texts good enough to be used for worship at the church. Throughout her life, she carried out a lively spiritual correspondence and wrote many poems and hymns. In her forties, she was encouraged to publish these, and two volumes were published, under the pen name “Theodosia,” meaning “gift of God.” She is considered to be the first widely published woman hymn writer. Forty-seven of her hymns, for example, were included in Rippon’s Selections.

Steele was often ill with “ague” (a chronic malaria) and apparently had a hip injury; her illnesses often influenced her writing. There are unfounded stories of her fiance drowning the night before their wedding, but it actually appears that she chose a single life to dedicate herself more fully to God. I have a sense that the difficulties in her life were not that uncommon for a person of her time and place, even though her life was relatively comfortable. She did live past sixty, after all.

I like this description of Steele’s writing:

In this essay, we will look at the theme of suffering in Steele’s poetry. Perhaps we can examine the notion of God’s ineffability, and Anne Steele’s poetic response, at another time. This essay is rather long as it is.

Consider the text we sing to 475 A THANKFUL HEART.

The words we sing are the concluding verses to a poem entitled, “Desiring Resignation and Thankfulness” in Sheppard’s collection. The first verse lays out her observation that life has both “thorns” and “flowers.”

Often I survey life’s varied scene, 
Amid the darkest hours, 
Sweet rays of comfort shine between, 
And thorns are mix’d with flowers. 

Observing this, she encourages herself:

And O, whate’er of earthly bliss 
Thy sovereign hand denies, 
Accepted at thy throne of grace, 
Let this petition rise:

And it is only then that makes her petition, which are the lyrics of our song.

Give me a calm, a thankful heart
From ev’ry murmur free;
The blessing of Thy grace impart,
And make me live to Thee.

Let the sweet hope that Thou art mine
My life and death attend;
Thy presence through my journey shine,
And crown my journey’s end.

Suffering is even more of a theme in the poem used for 32b DISTRESS. Its title is “To Amira on the death of her child.” Amira is the poetical pseudonym for Steele’s half sister, Mary. It’s devastating to realize the “lovely, blooming flower” that has faded is her dead niece. Here, I italicize the original words included in the 2025 edition:

So fades the lovely, blooming flower 
Frail, smiling solace of an hour!
So soon our transient comforts fly, 
And pleasure only blooms to die! 
To certain trouble we are born, 
Hope to rejoice, but sure to mourn. 
Ah wretched effort! sad relief, 
To plead necessity of grief! 
Is there no kind, no lenient art, 
To heal the anguish of the heart? 
To ease the heavy load of care, 
Which nature must, but cannot bear? 
Can reason’s dictates be obey'd? 
Too weak, alas, her strongest aid! 
O let religion then be nigh, 
Her comforts were not made to die; 
Her powerful aid supports the soul, 
And nature owns her kind control; 
While she unfolds the sacred page, 
Our fiercest griefs resign their rage. 
Then gentle patience smiles on pain, 
And dying hope revives again; 
Hope wipes the tear from sorrow’s eye, 
And faith points upward to the sky; 
The promise guides her ardent flight, 
And joys unknown to sense invite, 
Those blissful regions to explore, 
Where pleasure blooms to fade no more. 

I find it interestingly that the second half of verse two is changed from this poem: 

Spirit of grace, be ever nigh;
Thy comforts are not made to die.

Our book (and others) change the text slightly to make it a song of prayer. The original is a declaration that only religion, not reason, will provide the solace we need. We have a promise that the blooms of life will no longer fade, but that earthly sorrow replaced by the ardent, sensual joys of the “blissful regions” of heaven.

Several other songs in the 2025 edition take up the theme of sorrow, not just of death (323b KINGSWOOD, 507 WOODLANDS), but also of human fecklessness and error, as in 354t LEBANON:

How changed, alas, are truths divine,
For error, guilt, and shame!
What impious numbers, bold in sin,
Disgrace the holy Christian name!

Steele writes in hope, of course; her trust is in the powerful God of salvation, not fickle humans:

O turn us, turn us, mighty Lord,
By Thy resistless grace;
Then shall our hearts obey Thy word,
And humbly we shall seek Thy face.

But I want to note that, in the end, Anne Steele, having looked deeply at the pains and sorrows of life, remains content and trusting in God. No life is easy, and Steele surely did not protect herself from the pains and sorrows in the lives she held dear. She had a God, and a community, and she was content.

Note: A version of this article can be found as a Google document, containing more footnotes and references, which were lost when copying over to beehive.

Appendix

Epitaph

Here is a transcription of Anne Steele’s tombstone:

Anne Steele Daughter of M. William Steele
Dyed Nov^br , 11^th , 1778, Aged 61 Years and 6 Months.
Silent the Lyre, and dumb the tuneful Tongue,
That sung on Earth her Great Redeemer’s Praise,
But now in Heav’n, she joins th’ Angelic Song,
In more Harmonious more exalted Lays.

Anne Steele’s songs in The Sacred Harp

Bolded songs are new to the 2025 edition of The Sacred Harp.

32b DISTRESS
54 RUSSELL
138t ADORATION
258 INSPIRATION
301 GREENLAND (verse 2)
316 NEW HOPE
323b KINGSWOOD
354t LEBANON
409 EXETER
475 A THANKFUL HEART
488 RADIANCE
494 HARRISON
507 WOODLANDS
511 THE GREAT REDEEMER (lines 1 and 2)
569t EMMAUS