'Praise to the holiest in the height': hymns and church music

About the book: This book provides a new and important expansion of the first four volumes. It contains both specially written essays and a related compilation of primary sources drawn from the writings of the day. It explores the wider context of religion in Victorian Britain, in relation to its social and cultural environment at home, and in relation to the development of the Empire and its consequences. The introduction provides an overview of scholarship on Victorian religion in the years since the first four volumes were published in 1988, and subsequent essays examine relationships between religion and gender, trace the development of hymns and church music, and survey the history of Christian overseas missions in the Victorian era. The book also includes two innovative biographical studies, of Bishop John William Colenso and of Friedrich Max Muller, which serve to illustrate wider themes. In the final chapter is a pioneering study of the presence of Islam in Victorian Britain