Dum hos artus vita regit, Quando nox sepulcro legit; Mortuos quum stare jubes, Sedens Judex inter nubes;-- Jesus, pro me perforatus, Condar intra tuum latus! The wonderful hymn has suffered the mutations common to time and taste. When I soar thro' tracts unknown --becomes-- When I soar to worlds unknown, --getting rid of the unpoetic word, and bettering the elocution, but missing the writer's thought (of the unknown _path_,--instead of going to many "worlds"). The Unitarians have their version, with substitutes for the "atonement lines." But the Christian lyric maintains its life and inspiration through the vicissitudes of age and use, as all intrinsically superior things can and will,--and as in the twentieth line,-- When my eyestrings break in death; --modernized to-- When my eyelids close in death, --the hymn will ever adapt itself to the new exigencies of common speech, without losing its vitality and power. _THE TUNE._ A happy inspiration of Dr. Thomas Hastings made the hymn and music inevitably one. Almost anywhere to call for the tune of "Toplady" (namesake of the pious poet) is as unintelligible to the multitude as "Key" would be to designate the "Star-spangled Banner." The common people--thanks to Dr. Hastings--have learned "Rock of Ages" by _sound_. Thomas Hastings was born in Washington, Ct., 1784. For eight years he was editor of the _Western Recorder_, but he gave his life to church music, and besides being a talented tone-poet he wrote as many as six hundred hymns. In 1832, by invitation from twelve New York churches, he went to that city, and did the main work of his life there, dying, in 1872, at the good old age of eighty-nine. His musical collections number fifty-three. He wrote his famous tune in 1830. [Illustration: Thomas Hastings] "MY SOUL BE ON THY GUARD" Strangely enough, this hymn, a trumpet note of Christian warning and resolution, was written by one who himself fell into unworthy ways.[12] But the one strong and spiritual watch-song by which he is remembered appeals for him, and lets us know possibly, something of his own conflicts. We can be thankful for the struggle he once made, and for the hymn it inspired. It is a voice of caution to others. [Footnote 12: I have been unable to verify this statement found in Mr. Butterworth's "Story of the Hymns."--T.B.] George Heath, the author, was an English minister, born in 1781; died 1822. For a time he was pastor of a Presbyterian Church at Honiton, Devonshire, and was evidently a prolific writer, having composed a hundred and forty-four hymns, an edition of which was printed. _THE TUNE._ No other has been so familiarly linked with the words as Lowell Mason's "Laban" (1830). It has dash and animation enough to reenforce the hymn, and give it popular life, even if the hymn had less earnestness and vigor of its own.