_Gottes Zeit ist die allerbeste Zeit_ (‘God’s time is the best of all’) is usually called the _Actus Tragicus_, and occasionally the ‘Mourning Cantata,’ as it was evidently written to commemorate the death of some aged man. This work, too, was composed at Weimar in Bach’s younger days. The introduction is quiet and tender, introducing some themes used later in the body of the cantata. The opening chorus (‘God’s own time is the best of all. In Him we live, move, and have our being, as long as He wills. And in Him we die at His good time’) is at first slow and solemn, but changes to a quick fugue and ends in a strain of mournful beauty, befitting the last part of the text. Next comes a tenor solo, ‘O Lord, incline us to consider that our days are numbered,’ the text being continued in a mournful aria for bass, ‘Set in order thine house, for thou shalt die and not live.’ The choir then sings ‘It is the old decree, Man, thou art mortal,’ the lower voices forming a double fugue, while the soprano repeats the words ‘Yea, come, Lord Jesus,’ and the orchestra intones the melody of an old hymn, ‘I have cast all my care on God.’ The words spoken on the cross, ‘Into Thy hands my spirit I commend,’ are rendered by the alto, the bass answering ‘Thou shalt be with Me to-day in Paradise.’ A chorale sung by the alto mingles with the last of the bass arioso. The work closes with a chorus, using the so-called Fifth Gloria, ‘All glory, praise, and majesty To Father, Son, and Spirit be, The holy, blessed Trinity,’ etc.