If thou but suffer God to guide thee

If thou but suffer God to guide thee. Georg Neumark* (1621-1681), translated by Catherine Winkworth* (1827-1878). The German text, ‘Wer nur den lieben Gott läßt walten’* was written by Neumark in 1641 or 1642 as a hymn of consolation and thanksgiving after he had been appointed tutor to the children of a judge in Kiel, following a period of poverty and depression. It was published in Neumark’s Fortgepflanzter Musikalisch-poetischer Lustwald (‘A musical and poetic pleasant spreading wood’, Jena, 1657), with a title ‘A Hymn of Consolation. That God will care for and preserve his own in his own time’ and a quotation from Psalm 55: 22: ‘Cast thy burden upon the Lord, and he shall sustain...