Addison, Joseph

Joseph Addison was born at Milston, near Amesbury, Wiltshire, on May 1, 1672. He was the son of the Rev. Lancelot Addison, who later became Dean of Lichfield and author of Devotional Poems (1699). Educated at the Charterhouse and Magdalen College, Oxford, where he graduated B.A. in 1691 and M.A. in 1693, Addison originally intended to enter the Church. However, he instead pursued law and politics, eventually securing prominent appointments as Commissioner of Appeals, Under Secretary of State, Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, and Chief Secretary for Ireland. In 1716, he married the Dowager Countess of Warwick. He died at Holland House, Kensington, on June 17, 1719. Addison achieved widespread fame through his contributions to The Spectator, The Tatler, The Guardian, and The Freeholder, as well as his highly esteemed tragedy, Cato.

Addison's primary contributions to hymnology consist of five sacred odes published in the Saturday editions of The Spectator in 1712. The series began on July 26, 1712 (No. 441), with his pastoral rendering of Psalm 23, "The Lord my pasture shall prepare," attached to an essay on Divine Providence. On August 9, 1712 (No. 453), he concluded an essay on gratitude with "When all Thy mercies, O my God." Following a short note on August 19 (No. 461) acknowledging a hymn contribution from Isaac Watts, Addison published "The spacious firmament on high" on August 23 (No. 465) to accompany an essay on confirming faith. On September 20 (No. 489), "How are Thy servants blest, O Lord" was published alongside an essay on the ocean, drawing on his personal experience surviving a severe Mediterranean storm near Marseilles in December 1700. The final hymn in the series, "When rising from the bed of death," appeared on October 18 (No. 513) at the conclusion of an essay on sickness.

Although claims regarding the authorship of these hymns were later raised on behalf of Andrew Marvell by Captain Edward Thompson in 1776, and on behalf of Richard Richmond in 1880, historical and internal evidence firmly establishes Addison as the author. The hymns were published in The Spectator under Addison's recognized signatures ("C." and "O."), linked directly to the prose of his essays, and explicitly declared in his introductory notes to be by the same hand. Furthermore, they were officially collected in Thomas Tickell's four-volume edition of The Works of the Right Honourable Joseph Addison in 1721. Addison's hymns entered widespread use across English-speaking countries throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, with several also translated into Latin.