Hymn 126. The King of Saints

Come, ye that love the Savior’s name,

And joy to make it known:

The sovereign of your hearts proclaim,

And bow before his throne.

Behold your King, your Savior crown’d                                               

With glories all divine;

And tell the wondering nations round

How bright those glories shine.

While majesty’s effulgent blaze

Surrounds his awful brow;                                                        

E’en angels tremble as they gaze,

And veil’d adoring bow.

But love attempers every ray,

Love, how divinely sweet!

That stoops to view the sons of clay,

And calls them to his feet!

Infinite power and boundless grace,

In him unite their rays:

You that have e’er beheld his face,

Can you forbear his praise?                                                                   

When in his earthly courts we view

The glories of our King;

We long to love as angels do,

And wish like them to sing.

And shall we long and wish in vain?

Lord teach our songs to rise!

Thy love can animate the strain,

And bid it reach the skies.

O happy period! glorious day!

When Heaven and earth shall raise,                                                    

With all their powers the raptur’d lay,

To celebrate thy praise.

Text: Timothy Whelan, gen. ed., Nonconformist Women Writers, 8 vols. (London: Pickering & Chatto, 2011), vol. 2, pp. 88-89; Collection of Hymns Adapted to Public Worship, no. 126 (all stanzas); Poems, 1780, vol. 3, pp. 136-37; no MS copy, Angus Library, Regents Park College,  Oxford.