Robinson’s wi­dowed mo­ther sent him at age 14 to Lon­don, to learn the trade of bar­ber and hair dress­er. How­ev­er, his mas­ter found he en­joyed read­ing more than work. Con­vert­ed to Christ at age 17, Ro­bin­son be­came a Meth­od­ist min­is­ter. He lat­er moved to the Bapt­ist church and pas­tored in Cam­bridge, Eng­land. He wrote a num­ber of hymns, as well as on the sub­ject of the­ol­o­gy. His lat­er life was ev­i­dent­ly not an ea­sy one, judg­ing from a well known sto­ry about his hymn Come, Thou Fount of Ev­ery Bless­ing. One day, he en­count­ered a wo­man who was stu­dy­ing a hymn­al, and she asked how he liked the hymn she was hum­ming. In tears, he re­plied, Madam, I am the poor un­hap­py man who wrote that hymn ma­ny years ago, and I would give a thou­sand worlds, if I had them, to en­joy the feel­ings I had then.

• Brown, p. 284
• Hustad, p. 309
• Julian, p. 970
• Morgan, p. 64
• McCutchan, p. 46
• Osbeck, pp. 52-3
• Reynolds, p. 393
• Reynolds, p. 414
• Sheppard, pp. 159-60
• Taylor, p. 401
• Telford, pp. 244-5
• Wells, pp. 321-3
• Young, p. 820

1. Come, Thou Fount of Ev­ery Bless­ing
2. Mighty God, While An­gels Bless Thee