Amazing Grace: The Amazing Life of John Newton

It was an amazing grace indeed that led Englishman John Newton--a self-indulgent wastrel and former slave trader--to write what is probably Christendom's most popular hymn, Faith's Review and Expectation, back in the 1760's. You may know this hymn by its more familiar title, Amazing Grace.

Newton led a most adventurous albeit dissolute life as a libertine, brawler, and all around. . .as the hymn says. . .wretch. At one point in his younger days in a perverse though ironic twist, a superior punished him for his uncouth and debauched behavior by making him the servant of plantation slaves in West Africa. (He notes this episode in his self-written epitaph quoted near the end of the essay.)

Eventually he became a ship's officer and eventually earned his captain's papers. His mother had read to him from the Bible and instructed him in Christianity, and he rediscovered his childhood faith after he felt providence saved his ship from a powerful storm.

He recorded in his journal that when all seemed lost and the ship would surely sink, he exclaimed, "Lord, have mercy upon us." Relecting later on what he had said and what happened, he felt that God had answered his prayer. With all humility, he observed the anniversary of May 10, 1748 as the day of his true conversion to Christianity, in which he came to understand the working of a higher power in his life.

Though he was becoming more and more sickened by the slave trade, he continued transporting slaves from West Africa to England and the United States for a few years after his conversion though he took pains to make sure that the ones under his command were treated humanely--while on board his ship at least.

Finally, this slave trader turned against the horrors of slavery and became a minister, song writer and one of the most important influences on the 18th century abolitionist movement, testifying before parliament from his own experiences and conscience about the horrors of this inhumanity imposed on other human beings. In 1750 he married his childhood sweetheart, Mary Catlett. Due to a severe illness he had to give up the sea, and worked from 1755 to 1760 as "surveyor of tides" in Liverpool.

Newton had educated himself during his time at sea, and had taught himself Latin among other subjects. Eventually, he embraced Methodist evangelism (which had not totally split off from the Church of England at that time) and became an admirer of John Wesley. During this period Newton continued his self-education, learning Greek and Hebrew and also studying theology.

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