Be True To Thyself
Thou must be true thyself
If thou the truth wouldst teach;
Thy soul must overflow if thou
Another’s soul wouldst reach.
It needs the overflow of heart
To give the lips full speech.
Think truly, and thy thoughts
Shall the world’s famine feed;
Speak truly, and each word of thine
Shall be a fruitful seed;
Live truly, and thy life shall be
A great and noble creed.
~ Horatius Bonar
“Overflowing soul” .. “fruitful seed”
.. so very powerful for me today. Thank you Evan!
An interesting fact is that Horatius Bonar wrote five of the hymns in our hymnal. Mrs. Eddy quotes his poem above twice in Miscellaneous Writings (pp. 98 and 338), so it has a very important message for us. Thank you, Evan, for the reminder.
We have to dive deeply into the well. Thank you Evan.
Thank you Evan and Friend-in-Texas for this poem and facts about writer and his hymns in our hymnal. Was he CS?
His name is referred to 35 times in jsh online.
No, he was a minister in the Church of Scotland.
Words to live by! Thank you for sharing. Didn’t realize he was in our hymnal I will look look those hymns up. Thank you Even for the inspiration and all the lovely comments. SpiritView is such an incredible blessing.❤️❤️
Thanks, Evan, and commenters. This hymn speaks to me about having an unselfed love which helps the world. (S&H 1:4 & 192:30)
Think truly and your thoughts will feed the world’s famine!
Wow that stopped me in my tracks. Not only food famines but spiritual famine!
Thank you Evan, for this special SpiritView. It’s a joy to join the SV-Fans in commenting. And thank you Friend in Texas for your so interesting Infos about the author Horatius Bonar, who wrote this poem, and I found four songs in our CS Hymnal which are very good with such a nice melody.
To be “true to myself”. Yes am praying and working on this . If we pray to know our true spiritual self, asking our Father-Mother God for help if we are not sure whether we are really true to ourself, surely God will answer and help us! That is the best way for me to find out, whether I am truely true to myself.
We can always go to God for a clearer
spiritual understanding.
Am grateful for your comments!
AH very interesting! I thought this was by Mary Baker Eddy and have often read the second verse as the benediction at the end of Sunday services!
Very good to know this though and thanks for the research too “Friend in Texas”!
The words are so beautiful
Beautiful. Let your light shine!