English hymnody, reflecting the newly-awakened zeal for the
evangelization of the world which had gripped the English people. The
Baptist Missionary Society had been organized in 1792; Carey had gone to
India as its great apostle; and in 1799 the English Church Missionary
Society had been formed.

In the fervor aroused for foreign missions in England we may discern a
continuation of the impulses which went forth from the Pietistic movement
at Halle, Germany, nearly a century earlier, when Bartholomew Ziegenbalg
and Henry Pluetschau were sent from that cradle of the modern missionary
movement as the first missionaries to India. We may also see something of
the influences emanating from the great Moravian missionary center at
Herrnhut. John Wesley visited both these places before he began his great
revival in England, and became deeply imbued with zeal for missions.

Moravian contact with England had resulted in the formation of many
Moravian societies, and it was one of these that had sent Montgomery's
parents as missionaries to the West Indies. It was not without reason,
therefore, that Montgomery became the first English hymnist to sound the
missionary trumpet. He could never forget that his parents had given
their lives in bringing the gospel to the wretched blacks of the West
Indies. His father's grave was at Barbadoes and his mother was sleeping
on the island of Tobago. And for the same reason, Montgomery was a bitter
opponent of slavery.

The first missionary note is heard in Montgomery's great Advent hymn,
"Hail to the Lord's Anointed," written in 1821. One of the stanzas not
usually found in hymn-books reads:

Kings shall fall down before Him,
And gold and incense bring;
All nations shall adore Him,
His praise all people sing;
For He shall have dominion
O'er river, sea, and shore,
Far as the eagle's pinion
Or dove's light wing can soar.

Two other missionary hymns are "Lift up your heads, ye gates of brass"
and "Hark! the song of jubilee." The latter sweeps along in triumphant
measures:

He shall reign from pole to pole,
With illimitable sway;
He shall reign, when like a scroll
Yonder heavens have passed away;
Then the end: beneath His rod
Man's last enemy shall fall:
Hallelujah! Christ in God,
God in Christ, is all in all!

Although "Jerusalem, my happy home!" ranks highest among the hymns of
Montgomery, judged by the