In the early 1970s the Hymn Society of America sponsored a search for new hymns on the stewardship of the environment. This hymn by Fred Pratt Green (1903-; see Biographies) was selected and printed in a booklet of 16 hymns on this subject in 1973. It was also included in Ecumenical Praise, to the tune ECOLOGY by Austin Lovelace, and later in Hymns of the Saints, the hymnbook of the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

A fifth stanza omitted is: Casual despoilers, or high-priests of Mammon, Selling the future for present rewards Careless of life and contemptuous of beauty: Bid them remember: the Earth is the Lord’s.

Sir Henry Walford Davies was a versatile musician, composer, munity singing. Born September 6, 1869, at Oswestry, Shropshire, En- choirmaster, adjudicator, teacher, editor, broadcaster, and pioneer of com- gland, he became a chorister at St. George’s Chapel at Windsor Castle and later assistant to the organist. Earning in 1898 the D. Mus. at Cambridge University, he was appointed organist at Temple Church, London, where he stayed for 25 years. Going to the University of Wales, Aberystwyth, in 1919, he was professor of music for several years and was knighted by King George Vin 1922. It was there that he wrote this tune WALLOG, while conducting experiments in cooperative hymn writing with his students. The tune was first published in his A Student’s Hymnal, 1928. It has not been used by other British hymnals but appears in the 1937 edition of the Christian Science Hymnal.

Davies’ final post was at St. George’s Chapel, where he began as a chorister; he succeeded Sir Edward Elgar as Master of the king’s music in 1934. He assisted in editing several hymnbooks; he wrote The Pursuit of Music, 1935, and with Harvey Grace wrote Music and Christian Worship, 1928. His compositions include hymn tunes; an oratorio, The Temple; and several cantatas. But his most notable contribution was, no doubt, his broadcasts on the BBC, in which he excelled at music education on radio. His series Melodies in Christendom helped the listeners to a new appreciation of the beauty of hymnody. He died March 11, 1941.

Davies’ other tune in SDAH is GOD BE IN MY HEAD, No. 678.

📖 Reference: Companion to the Seventh-day Adventist Hymnal by Wayne Hooper and Edward E. White. Review and Herald Publishing Association, 1988.