G W Bethune on Anne Steele listing some of her work

In an anthology of British female poets Bethune writes

Daughter of a dissenting preacher at Broughton, in Hampshire, ranks with Toplady, Charles Wesley, Cowper and Newton, in that very difficult branch of composition, the devotional lyric. She also made an excellent version of the Psalms, which for literalness, smoothness, and evangelical power, may almost compare with that of Dr. Watts. None but those who have attempted a similar task, can appreciate the talent which she has displayed. Her compositions were, with few exceptions, all strictly devotional. She died about 1779, and her poems were collected shortly after and published in two volumes.

We give the first lines of her most popular hymns, that the pious may know to whom they are indebted for the language so often employed by them in their offerings of praise, as some or all of them are to be found in the Hymn-books of most Christian denominations:

"Lord, when my raptured thought surveys;"

"The Saviour! O what endless charms!"

"Ye wretched, hungry, starving poor;"

"Great God! to thee my ev'ning song;"

"Come, weary souls with sins distrest;"

"Jesus, the spring of joys divine;"

"Thou only sov'reign of my heart;"

"Father of mercies, in thy word;"

"Dear Lord, and shall thy Spirit rest;"

"Deep are the wounds which sin hath made;"

"He lives, the great Redeemer lives!"

"And will the Lord thus condescend?"

"Awake, awake the sacred song;"

"Should famine in the mourning field;"

"Ye humble souls, approach your God;"

"When blooming youth is snatched away;"

"O Thou whose tender mercy hears!"

"Ah! wretched, vile, ungrateful heart!"

"And is the Gospel peace and love!"

"Dear refuge of my weary soul!"

"When death appears before my sight;"

"The Saviour calls, let ev'ry ear;"

"Thou only source of true delight;"

"Jesus, in thy transporting name;"

"And did the holy and the just?"

"To Jesus our exalted Lord;"

"Jesus, what shall I do to •how?"

"Where is my God? does he retire!"

"Come ye that love the Saviour's name;"

"How helpless guilty nature lies!"

"Ye glittering toys of earth, adieu!" &c.

Many of these, though miserably mutilated by presumptuous hands, which had the impertinence to alter what they never could have written, will serve to make good our assertion of Mrs. Steele's merits as one of Israel's sweetest singers. We add one at length, which will compare favourably with the hymn in the Spectator (generally ascribed to Addison, but which, as the editor believes, has been shown in the preface to Andrew Marvell's works to be his): "When all thy mercies, O my God."