Isaac Watts. [Public Worship.] This celebrated hymn on the blessings of public worship was written by Isaac Watts and first published in his Hymns and Spiritual Songs (1709 edition, Book II, No. 123) under the title "The benefit of Public Ordinances." The original composition consists of 6 stanzas of 4 lines in Long Meter. It has been continuously republished in all subsequent authorized editions of Watts's Hymns and collected Works. In 1753, George Whitefield included a shortened four-stanza version comprising stanzas i, ii, iii, and vi in his Collection of Hymns for Social Worship. This condensed arrangement became a standard form adopted in numerous subsequent evangelical hymnals. In Edwin F. Hatfield's American Church Hymn Book (1872, No. 122), the full original text was restored, with a minor editorial substitution of "brings" for "bears down" in the third stanza. The hymn remains a timeless expression of setting aside earthly anxieties to seek God in the sanctuary.
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