Born: March 17, 1801, Plymouth, England.
Died: June 23, 1847, Liverpool, England.
Son of artist A. B. Johns, John was educated at the local grammar school by I. Worsley, a Unitarian minister in Plymouth, and afterward during two years spent at Edinburgh.
In 1820, he became minister of the old Presbyterian chapel at Crediton, where he stayed until 1836, when he moved to Liverpool to serve as Minister to the Poor.
Johns wrote over 35 hymns, and was a frequent contributor to the Monthly Repository, Christian Reformer, and Christian Teacher.
His other works include:
Floating down the current of time to the tomb,
We hallow too much the flowers on its side,
As the Indian does the frail fair bloom
Of the lotus that drinks of his sacred tide.
But thus should we part with the pearl of Heaven,
To treasure on earth its rifled shell?
Or is aught so precious by this life given,
That we bid to the other a glad farewell?
Oh think, amid all thy flowers, how soon,
Son of Earth, the adder may cross thy way—
How quickly, amid the blaze of noon,
The cloud of the grave may eclipse thy day!
Go, taste of the banquet of this world’s joys,
And drink of the nectar of earthly love;
But remember betimes to lift thine eyes,
In the midst of them all, to the things above.
Thus sweeter by far shall thy life bloom on,
Than theirs who forget that they e’er must fall,
And over the future the past’s light thrown
Shall sign with a rainbow its cloudy pall.
And thus to thy God, without fear or crime,
Thy spirit, whenever ’tis called, will flee;
And the hand that scatters the wreath of time,
Will weave one of paradise-flowers for thee.
John Johns
The Dews of Castalie, 1828
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