In a day and age in which the only hymns we know are Christmas songs warbled by contemporary singers, perhaps with electric guitars and drums in accompaniment, we can forget that there was a time in which hymns were a staple of the cultural patrimony, known and shared by all and a source of comfort during difficult and trying times. This is particularly true of St. John Henry Newman’s “Lead, Kindly Light,” which he wrote in a season of trials before his conversion to Catholicism. The hymn itself is beautiful, the lyrics powerful—but its historical legacy is breathtaking.

Newman wrote the verses of this hymn, initially titled “The Pillar in the Cloud,” in 1833. He had been detained in Italy because of illness, though his greatest wish was to return to England where he felt called to do his great work for God. After three additional weeks in Palermo, he was finally able to sail to Marseilles, and it was aboard that vessel that he penned the lines of his famous hymn:

Lead, Kindly Light, amid the encircling gloom,
Lead Thou me on;
The night is dark, and I am far from home,
Lead Thou me on.
Keep Thou my feet;
I do not ask to see the distant scene;
one step enough for me.

I was not ever thus, nor prayed that
Thou shouldst lead me on;
I loved to choose and see my path; but now
Lead Thou me on.
I loved the garish day, and, spite of fears, pride ruled my will;
remember not past years. 

So long Thy power hath blessed me, sure it still
Will lead me on.
O'er moor and fen, o'er crag and torrent, till
The night is gone;
And with the morn those angel faces smile,
Which I have loved long since, and lost awhile.

The imagery in these verses is striking: Newman is able to express the execution of blind faith in God without affectation or excessive flourish; his writing is simple, direct, clear, but beautiful. This poem is, essentially, the summary of the Christian life; it is the pilgrimage of a soul that had lost its way returning back to its Creator amidst the darkness and trials of the world. For, as Newman writes,

I was not ever thus, nor prayed that
Thou shouldst lead me on;
I loved to choose and see my path; but now
Lead Thou me on.

He asks that the Lord “remember not past years” of self-assurance and pride, the years ruled by arrogance and willfulness that kept him along his own path rather than the path set for him by God. But now, “I do not ask to see the distant scene; / one step enough for me” expresses the maturation of a soul who, ill-satisfied with leading itself, now takes up the blindfold willingly and takes each step forward under the guidance of His Lord.  

The repetition of the line “Lead Thou me on” throughout suggests that the choice to submit one’s will to God is not the matter of an instant, but must be repeated, consciously, again and again, throughout the Christian life. For trials will come, and one must choose to trust that He will never leave, but will lead you on “O'er moor and fen, o'er crag and torrent, till / The night is gone[.]”

To some, admittedly, such lines might seem like platitudes, except for the fact that these verses have been uttered with complete sincerity by men and women in the darkest of times. They were sung by the twenty-six survivors of the 1909 Durham coalfield mining accident that took the lives of over 160 men and boys. Sitting in wait in complete darkness, one solitary voice began humming Newman’s hymn, and soon after, the other men began to sing along. These words, it seems, sustained them through the fourteen hours they waited, not knowing if or when help would come.

The verses were also sung by Betsie ten Boom, sister of Corrie ten Boom, and her female companions as they were taken to the Ravensbeück concentration camp during the Holocaust. They were sung on the Titanic in 1912, just before it struck that fateful iceberg, and again on a lifeboat the next morning when the Carpathia, arriving to rescue survivors, was sighted from afar. And again, in February 1915, they were sung by a group of British soldiers on the Western Front in prayer at a church service the day before they went into the trenches. 

It is a noble legacy that these words, written by St. John Henry Newman at a low point in his life, carry. For these men and women, experiencing true darkness, it was words of trust in God’s Providence that provided comfort. They can provide comfort for us, too. We are over a hundred years removed from these men and women, but we have our own crosses still. The verses penned by this young Englishman are as fresh and new and powerful for us now as they were back then. Learn them, and if you should ever find yourself—God forbid—in such darkness, perhaps they will spring to your lips and bring you comfort, fortifying your trust in God, Who leads you on always.