[1] Though Watts's hymns are now better known than these poems, Divine Songs was a ubiquitous children's book for nearly two hundred years, serving as a standard textbook in schools.

[3] "Praise for Creation and Providence" (better known as "I sing the mighty power of God") is now a hymn sung by all ages.

Walter de la Mare wrote that "a childhood without the busy bee and the sluggard would resemble a hymnal without ‘O God, our help in ages past’.

"[5] Charles Dickens's novels occasionally quote "Against Idleness and Mischief";[6] for instance, in his 1850 novel David Copperfield, the school master Dr. Strong quotes lines 11-12: "Satan finds some mischief still, for idle hands to do.

"[7] In his 1865 fantasy Alice in Wonderland, Lewis Carroll parodies both "Against Idleness and Mischief" as "How Doth the Little Crocodile"[8] and "The Sluggard" as "'Tis the voice of the Lobster".