The Hymn-Book of the Modern Church: Brief studies of hymns and hymn-writersGregory, Arthur E. (Arthur Edwin)
Religion
The Hymn-Book of the Modern Church: Brief studies of hymns and hymn-writers
Gregory, Arthur E. (Arthur Edwin)
Hymn writers; Hymns, English -- History and criticism
Unto which joys for to attain,
God grant us all His grace,
And send us, after worldly pain,
In heaven to have a place:
Where we may still enjoy that light,
Which never shall decay:
Lord, for Thy mercy lend us might
To see that joyful day.[65]
Thomas Campion (1567-1619), a doctor of medicine, wrote some lovely
hymns, ‘admirable for their union of melodious simplicity, beauty, and
strong common sense.’[66] Josiah Conder included one in the section
for Private Worship of the Congregational hymn-book, 1836.[67]
Never weather-beaten sail more willing bent to shore,
Never tired pilgrim’s limbs affected slumber more,
Than my wearied sprite now longs to fly out of my troubled breast.
O come quickly, sweetest Lord, and take my soul to rest!
Ever blooming are the joys of heaven’s high Paradise,
Cold age deafs not there our ears nor vapour dims our eyes:
Glory there the sun outshines, whose beams the Blessed only see.
O come quickly, glorious Lord, and raise my sprite to Thee!
Here is another of Campion’s hymns.
View me, Lord, a work of Thine!
Shall I then lie drowned in night?
Might Thy grace in me but shine,
I should seem made all of light.
Cleanse me, Lord, that I may kneel
At Thine altar, pure and white:
They that once Thy mercies feel,
Gaze no more on earth’s delight.
Worldly joys, like shadows, fade,
When the heavenly light appears:
But the covenants Thou hast made,
Endless, know nor days nor years.
In Thy Word, Lord, is my trust,
To Thy mercies fast I fly;
Though I am but clay and dust,
Yet Thy grace can lift me high.
Campion is not mentioned in the _Dictionary of Hymnology_, but he
deserves a place there.
One other hymn must be mentioned, ‘Jerusalem, my happy home.’ It is
found in a MS. preserved in the British Museum, with the title ‘A Song
Mad, by F. B. P. To the tune of Diana.’ Who the author was no one
knows, but internal evidence indicates that he was a devout Roman
Catholic. In the _Arundel Hymns_ it is attributed to Father Laurence
Anderton, _alias_ John Beverley, S.J. The MS. has twenty-six verses,
of which nineteen were printed in London in 1601. The hymn is probably
based upon a passage in the _Meditations of St. Augustine_. The
popular modern hymn, ‘Jerusalem, my happy home,’ which is now believed
to have been written by Joseph Bromehead, Vicar of Eckington, near
Sheffield, was no doubt suggested by this hymn, or one of the various
versions of it, but has little verbal agreement except in the first
and last verses. I give a portion of the original poem.
Hierusalem, my happie home,
When shall I come to thee,
When shall my sorrowes haue an end,
Thy ioyes when shall I see.
O happie harbour of the saints,
O sweete and pleasant soyle,
In thee noe sorrow may be founde,
Noe greefe, noe care, noe toyle.
Hierusalem, Hierusalem,
God grant I once may see
Thy endless ioyes, and of the same
Partaker aye to bee.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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