Composed by Samuel Deacon in six stanzas of four lines, this hymn appeared as "A Serious Question" in his Barton Hymns (1797, No. 273) and was reprinted in John Deacon's New and Large Collection (1804). In John Rippon's Selection (27th ed., 1827), it was substantially rewritten and expanded into a nine-stanza version that retained only a few lines of Deacon's original text.