Felicia Hemans (1793-1835) was an English poet. Her first poems, dedicated to the Prince of Wales, were published in Liverpool in 1808, when she was only fifteen. Her major collections, including The Forest Sanctuary and Other Poems (1825), Records of Woman With Other Poems (1828) and Songs of the Affections (1830) were immensely popular, especially with female readers. Her other works include: Poems (1808), The Domestic Affections and Other Poems (1812), On the Restoration of the Works of Art to Italy (1816), Wallaceas Invocation to Bruce (1819), The Sceptic (1820), Hymns on the Works of Nature: For the Use of Children (1827) and Early Blossoms (1836).

Understanding the culture of living with hymnbooks offers new insight into the histories of poetry, literacy, and religious devotion. It stands barely three inches high, a small brick of a book. The pages are skewed a bit, and evidence of a small handprint remains on the worn, cheap leather covers that don’t quite close. The book bears the marks of considerable use. But why—and for whom—was it made? Christopher N. Phillips’s The Hymnal is the first study to reconstruct the practices of reading and using hymnals, which were virtually everywhere in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Isaac Watts invented a small, words-only hymnal at the dawn of the eighteenth century. For the next two hundred years, such hymnals were their owners’ constant companions at home, school, church, and in between. They were children's first books, slaves’ treasured heirlooms, and sources of devotional reading for much of the English-speaking world. Hymnals helped many people learn to memorize poetry and to read; they provided space to record family memories, pass notes in church, and carry everything from railroad tickets to holy cards to business letters. In communities as diverse as African Methodists, Reform Jews, Presbyterians, Methodists, Roman Catholics, and Unitarians, hymnals were integral to religious and literate life. An extended historical treatment of the hymn as a read text and media form, rather than a source used solely for singing, this book traces the lives people lived with hymnals, from obscure schoolchildren to Emily Dickinson. Readers will discover a wealth of connections between reading, education, poetry, and religion in Phillips’s lively accounts of hymnals and their readers.

Rowthorn presents writings on preserving the Earth, celebrating diversity, and bridging cultural differences.

Hymns are a rich and beloved tradition, filled with praise, comfort, encouragement, and celebration. We sing them from the heart every Sunday as a key component of Lutheran worship. Knowing the words by heart is one thing, but knowing their symbols is another. The Illuminate Hymnal is a unique product, offering 42 illustrations to color following beloved Lutheran Service Book hymns. These illustrations engage you, helping you contemplate the meaning of the hymn, memorize stanzas, and connect it both theologically and scripturally to Biblical concepts.