Produced by Lewis Jones.
The Psalms of David
Imitated in the Language of
The New Testament
And Applied to
The Christian State and Worship
By I. Watts D.D.
Luke xxiv. 44All things must be fulfilled which were written in the Psalmsconcerning me.
HEB. xi. 32, 40.David, Samuel, and the prophets — that they without us shouldnot be made perfect.
Transcriber's Note.
There are significant differences in the numerous reprints of
Isaac Watts' "Psalms." The first generation of this Project
Gutenberg file was from an 1818 printing by C. Corrall of
38 Charing Cross, London.
The Index and the Table of First Lines have been omitted forthe following reasons:1. They refer to page numbers that are here expunged; and2. In this electronic version key words, etc., can be easilylocated via searches.
Separate numbers have been added to Psalms that have more thanone part or version, for example: Psalm 51:1; Psalm 51:2; etc.
The Life of Isaac Watts, D.D.
by
Dr. Johnson.
From his lives of the most eminent English Poets.
The Poems of Dr. Watts were by my recommendation inserted in thelate Collection; the readers of which are to impute to me whateverpleasure or weariness they may find in the perusal of Blackmore,Watts, Pomfret, and Yealden.
ISAAC WATTS was born July 17, 1674, at Southampton, where hisfather of the same name, kept a boarding-school for young gentlemen,though common report makes him a shoe-maker. He appears, from thenarrative of Dr. Gibbons, to have been neither indigent norilliterate.
Isaac, the eldest of nine children, was given to books from hisinfancy; and began, we are told, to learn Latin when he was fouryears old, I suppose at home. He was afterwards taught Latin,Greek, and Hebrew, by Mr. Pinhorne, a clergyman, master of thefreeschool at Southampton, to whom the gratitude of his scholarafterwards inscribed a Latin ode.
His proficiency at school was so conspicuous, that a subscriptionwas proposed for his support at the University; but he declaredhis resolution to take his lot with the Dissenters. Such he was,as every Christian Church would rejoice to have adopted.
He therefore repaired in 1690 to an academy taught by Mr. Rowe,where he had for his companions and fellow-students Mr. Hughesthe poet, and Dr. Horte, afterwards Archbishop of Tuam. Some Latinessays, supposed to have been written as exercises at this academy,shew a degree of knowledge, both philosophical and theological,such as very few attain by a much longer course of study.
He was, as he hints in his Miscellanies, a maker of verses fromfifteen to fifty, and in his youth he appears to have paid attentionto Latin poetry. His verses to his brother, in the glyconicmeasure, written when he was seventeen, are remarkably easy andelegant. Some of his other odes are deformed by the Pindaric follythen prevailing, and are written with such neglect of all metricalrules as is without example among the ancients; but his diction,though perhaps not always exactly pure, has such copiousness andsplendour, as shews that he was but at a very little distancefrom excellence.
His method of study was to impress the contents of his books uponhis memory by abridging them, and by in