Christopher Smart, b. 1722. English poet and song-writer, he was sometimes confined to the madhouse for praying in the streets and at other times arrested and thrown into jail for debt. Wouldn’t this poem make a great hymn?

Glorious the sun in mid career;
Glorious th’ assembled fires appear;
Glorious the comet’s train:
Glorious the trumpet and alarm;
Glorious th’ almighty stretch’d-out arm;
Glorious th’ enraptur’d main:

Glorious the northern lights a-stream;
Glorious the song, when God’s the theme;
Glorious the thunder’s roar:
Glorious hosanna from the den;
Glorious the catholic amen;
Glorious the martyr’s gore:

Glorious–more glorious is the crown
Of Him that brought salvation down
By meekness, call’d thy Son;
Thou that stupendous truth believ’d,
And now the matchless deed’s achiev’d,
Determin’d, dar’d, and done.
From Song to David by Christopher Smart

Dr. Samuel Johnson on Christopher Smart.

Karen Edmisten says you are what you read. I wonder what Christopher Smart was reading.

The Prattling Pastor’s Wife once thought poetry was a waste of time, until she discovered children’s poetry and later began to enjoy poetry with her own children. Now it’s Poetry Every Day.