While a col­lege stu­dent, Bar­low fought in the Bat­tle of Long Is­land (New York, 1776). He grad­u­at­ed from Yale Un­i­ver­si­ty in 1778, and was a well known au­thor and pol­i­ti­cian dur­ing and af­ter the Amer­i­can Re­vo­lu­tion. U.S. Pres­i­dent James Mon­roe ap­point­ed him as Amer­i­can am­bass­a­dor to France.

Bar­low’s pub­li­ca­tions in­clude Hasty Pud­ding, Co­lum­bia, and the ep­ic poem “The Vi­sion of Co­lum­bus.” In 1785, at the re­quest of the (Con­gre­ga­tion­al) Gen­er­al As­so­ci­a­tion of Con­nec­ti­cut, he cor­rect­ed and en­larged Watts’ Psalms of Da­vid, sup­ply­ing those omit­ted by Watts, and adapt­ing it to Amer­i­can tastes. The work, pub­lished in 1786, went through var­i­ous edi­tions for ma­ny years. Its cur­i­ous title is: Psalms Care­fully Suit­ed to the Christ­ian Wor­ship in the Unit­ed States of Amer­i­ca, Be­ing Dr. Watts’ Im­i­ta­tion of the Psalms of Da­vid, as Im­proved by Mr. Bar­low.

Sources

Lyrics

1. Along the Banks Where Babel’s Current Flows
2. Awake, My Soul! to Sound His Praise
3. Judge Me, O God, and Plead My Cause
4. Lord, Thou Hast Scourged Our Guilty Land
5. Our Land, O Lord, with Songs of Praise
6. In Thee, Great God, with Songs of Praise