Lord of all being, throned afar

I wonder how Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. , would feel about where the Unitarian ‘church’ has ended up theologically today?

This hymn was composed by Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1809, and graduated at Harvard university. A physician by profession, he was known as a practitioner chiefly in literature, being a brilliant writer and long the leading political wit of America. He was, however a man of deep religious feeling, and a devout attendant at King’s Chapel, Unitarian, in Boston where he spent his life. He held a Harvard Professorship of Anatomy and Physiology for more than 50 years, but his enduring work is in his poems, and his volume, “The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table. ” He died January 22, 1898

Oliver Wendell Holmes [father of the great U.S. Supreme Court Justice] went to Harvard University to study law but ended up studying medicine. His fame, however, came from his literary efforts. After writing "Old Ironsides" at the age of 21 and launching "The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table" series at 22, he quickly gained fame as a writer.

In December 1859, the last of his papers making up "The Professor at the Breakfast-Table" appeared. He concluded with these words: "And so my year's record is finished. ... Peace to all such as may have been vexed in spirit by any utterance the pages have repeated. They will doubtless forget for the moment the difference in the lines ... and join in singing this hymn to the source of the light we all need to lead us."

Then he printed this hymn, which has been called "the finest sentiment of God's omnipresence in the English language." - Great Songs of Faith by Brown & Norton