them into poetic forms; and the greatest poetry is always that which
sets forth the facts of the religious life. "Without love to man and
love to God," says Dr. Strong, "the greatest poetry is impossible.
Mere human love to God is not enough to stir the deepest chords either
in the poet or in his readers. It is the connection of human love with
the divine love that gives it permanence and security."[A]

If, then, religion is the supreme experience of the human spirit, and
that experience finds its most perfect literary expression in poetry,
the present volume ought to contain a precious collection of the best
literature. And any one who wished to give to a friend a volume which
would convey to him the essential elements of religion would probably
be safe to choose this volume rather than any prose treatise upon
theology ever printed. He who reads this book through will get
a clearer and truer idea of what the religious life is than any
philosophical discussion could give him. For this poetry is an attempt
to express life, not to explain it. It offers pictures or reports
rather than analyses of religious experience. It gives utterance
to the real life of religion in the individual soul, and is not a
generalization of religious thoughts and feelings.

The sources from which this collection has been drawn are abundant
and varied. The psalmody and hymnology of the church furnish a vast
preserve, the exploration of which would be a large undertaking. It
must be confessed that the pious people who had in their hands some
of the ancient hymn-books were justified in feeling that religion and
poetry were not closely related, for many of the hymns they were
wont to sing were guiltless of any poetic character. It was too often
evident that the hymn-writer had been more intent on giving metrical
form to proper theological concepts than on giving utterance to his