Words: , 1891.

Music: .

Mr. Cornelius was brought up on a farm in my own coun­ty in Penn­syl­van­ia. He left farm­ing when he came of age, and learned the trade of a brick-ma­son. Lat­er he be­came a con­tract­or in Pitts­burg. In erect­ing a house in that ci­ty his leg was brok­en. The phy­si­cians de­cid­ed that it would have to be am­pu­tat­ed…He stood the op­er­a­tion well and came out safe­ly, but was maimed for life. He now de­cid­ed to go to col­lege and get an ed­u­ca­tion. Af­ter pass­ing through col­lege with hon­or he con­clud­ed to be­come a min­is­ter of the gos­pel. His first charge was at Al­too­na, Penn­syl­van­ia, but on ac­count of his wife’s health he soon re­moved to Cal­i­for­nia, lo­cat­ing at Pa­sa­de­na, where he built the larg­est Pres­by­ter­i­an church in that place. Ma­ny who had sub­scribed to help to pay for the build­ing failed in bu­si­ness, and he was left to meet the ob­li­ga­tions as best he could. But in a few years he had the church cleared from all debt. Short­ly af­ter­ward his wife died. He preached the fun­er­al ser­mon him­self. At the con­clu­sion he quot­ed the words of this hymn, which he had com­posed short­ly be­fore. Both the words of the hymn and the ser­mon were print­ed in a West­ern news­pa­per, where found them. Im­pressed by their beau­ty, he cut them out and car­ried them in his Bi­ble for three months be­fore he wrote the chor­us…Soon af­ter he hand­ed the words to his friend, James Mc­Gran­a­han, who com­posed the tune to which the hymn is now sung.