MARY WHEATON LYON

N the issue of the "The Outlook" for

IN

May 4, 1901, a hymn was published entitled "An Hour With Thee," and was credited to Mary Wheaton Lyon. Being greatly moved by the depth of feeling the hymn contains I wrote to Professor Ernest Neal Lyon, of Jersey City Heights, New Jersey, son of the author, and elicited some interesting facts concerning her life and character. Mrs. Lyon was born at Fabius, New York, in 1844. She was graduated from Cazenovia Seminary in 1865, and as the valedictorian of her class she received the prize for the best literary composition, a poem called, "The Eloquence of Silence." In 1868 Miss Wheaton was married to the Rev. A. Judson Lyon, a Baptist minister at Delaware, Ohio. When Mrs. Lyon sang

"Life's toil will soon be past, and then,

From all its sorrows free"

she was nearer to the door of eternity than she perhaps thought, for she passed away suddenly in 1892. I quote the full text of the hymn:

My heart is tired, so tired to-night;

How endless seems the strife.
Day after day the restlessness
Of all this weary life!

I come to lay the burden down
That so oppresseth me,

And, shutting all the world without,
To spend an hour with Thee,
Dear Lord,

To spend an hour with Thee.

I would forget a little while

The bitterness of tears,

The anxious thought that crowds my life,
The buried hopes of years;

Forget that woman's weary toil
My patient care must be.
A tired child I come to-night

To spend an hour with Thee,
Dear Lord,

One little hour with Thee.

A foolish, wayward child, I know,
So often wandering;

A weak complaining child — but, oh!
Forgive my murmuring,

And fold me to thy loving breast,
Thou who hast died for me,

And let me feel 't is peace to rest
A little hour with Thee,
Dear Lord!

One little hour with Thee !

The busy world goes on and on,
I cannot heed it now,
Thy sacred hand is laid upon

My aching, throbbing brow.
Life's toil will soon be past, and then,
From all its sorrow free,

How sweet to think that I shall spend
Eternity with Thee,
Dear Lord,

Eternity with Thee!

Professor Lyon says he does not know what occasion prompted the hymn, except that it was some heart-impulse to worship. That the lines appeal to many hearts is shown from the fact that the Professor is continually receiving words of appreciation of them from all parts of the country. Mrs. Lyon frequently wrote in poetry, and occasionally published articles in the "Philadelphia Ledger" and other prominent journals. An exquisite hymn of hers, entitled

"God Knoweth Best," appeared in “The Independent" in 1897, which I append :

The gates of life swing either way
On noiseless hinges night and day.
One enters through the open door,
One leaves us to return no more.
And which is happier, which more blest-
God knoweth best.

We greet with smiles the one who comes
Like sunshine to our hearts and homes.
And reach out longing hands with tears
To him, who in his ripened years
Goes gladly to his heavenly rest :
God knoweth best.

He guards the gates; we need not dread
The path these little feet must tread,

Nor fear for him who from our sight
Passed through them to the realms of light.
Both in His loving care we rest :
God knoweth best.

Mrs. Lyon was active in missionary and temperance endeavor, and often wrote of these themes. Her son writes me that she was one of those "rare and beautiful souls that are, like the wood-violet, too modest and sensitive to covet the glare of the sun."

Her life, indeed, may be summed in her own words in the lovely little poem called "Realities":

All the worth of living

Is loving, hoping, giving,
Love survives the breath ;

Hope grows bright in death--
Gifts that God returns to Thee,
With increase, through Eternity!