In the rifted rock I'm resting

In the rifted rock I’m resting. Mary Dagworthy James* (1810-1883). This is one of several hymns by James that were derived from earlier texts. In this case the obvious predecessor was Augustus Montague Toplady*’s ‘Rock of Ages, cleft for me’*. It may be compared with another Gospel hymn, ‘O safe to the rock that is higher than I’* by William Orcutt Cushing* (all three hymns, of course, could claim to have been inspired by a Biblical verse, such as The Song of Solomon 2: 14, or 1 Corinthians 4: 10). James’s version was slighter and less impassioned than that of Cushing, and it lacks his pulsating rhetoric. The earliest version found in Hymnary.org is that from The Chautauqua Collection: a...