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HYMN CCXLV.

C. M.

Ascending to Christ in Heaven.

I.

"TIS
IS pure delight without alloy

JESUS, to hear thy name,

My spirit leaps with inward joy,
I feel the sacred flame.

II.

My passions hold a pleasing reign
While love inspires my breast,
Love the divinest of the train,
The sovereign of the rest.

III.

This is the grace must live and sing
When faith and fear shall cease,
Must sound from every joyful string
Thro' the sweet groves of bliss.

IV.

Let life immortal seize my clay:
Let love refine my blood;
Her flames can bear my soul away,
Can bring me near my God.

V.

Swift I ascend the heavenly place,
And hasten to my home,

I leap to meet thy kind embrace,
I come, O LORD, I come.

VI.

Sink down, ye separating hills,
Let guilt and death remove,

'Tis love that drives my chariot-wheels, And death must yield to love.

HYMN CCXLVI.

C. M.

God glorious and Sinners saved.

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1.

ATHER, how wide thy glory shines!
How high thy wonders rise!

Known thro' the earth by thousand signs,

By thousand thro' the skies.

II.

Those mighty orbs proclaim thy pow'r,
Their motions speak thy skill;
And on the wings of every hour,
We read thy patience still.

III.

Part of thy name divinely stands
On all thy creatures writ,
They show the labour of thine hands,
Or impress of thy feet.

IV.

But when we view thy strange design
To save rebellious worms,

Where vengeance and compassion join
In their divinest forms;

V

Our thoughts are lost in reverend awe;
We love and we adore;
The first arch-angel never saw

So much of God before.

VI.

Here the whole Deity is known,

Nor dares a creature guess
Which of the glories brightest shone,
The justice or the grace,

II.

I saw one hanging on a tree,
In agonies and blood,

Who fix'd his languid eyes on me,
As near his cross I stood.

III.

Sure never 'till my latest breath,
Can I forget that look:

It seem'd to charge me with his death
Tho' not a word he spoke.

IV.

My conscience felt, and own'd the guilt,
And plung'd me in despair;

I saw my sins his blood had spilt,
And help'd to nail him there.

y.

Alas! I knew not what I did;
But now my tears are vain;
Where shall my trembling soul be hid?
For I the LORD have slain.

VI.

A second look he gave, which said,
"I freely all forgive;

This blood is for thy ransom paid,
I die, that thou may'st live.”

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Thus, while his death my sin displays,

In all its blackest hue,

(Such is the mystery of grace), It seals my pardon too.

Curse on you, sins that griev'd him so,
Ye sins, that forc'd him to remove.

IV.

Break, break my heart, complain, my tongue, Hither, my friends, your sorrows bring: Angels, assist my doleful song,

If you have e'er a mourning string.

V.

But ah! your joys are ever high,
Ever his lovely face you see,
While my poor spirits pant and die,

And groan for thee, my GoD, for thee.

VI.

Yet let my hope look thro' my tears
And spy afar his rolling throne;
His chariot thro' the cleaving spheres
Shall bring the bright beloved down.

VII.

Swift as a roe flies o'er the hills

My soul springs out to meet him high, Then the dear conqueror turns his wheels, And climbs the mansions of the sky.

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There smiling joy for ever reigns,
No more the turtle leaves the dove;
Farewell to jealousies, and pains,
And all the ills of absent love.

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HYMN CCXLVIII.

L. M.

God exalted above all Praise.

TERNAL power! whose high abode
Becomes the grandeur of a GOD;

Infinite lengths beyond the bounds
Where stars revolve their little rounds.

11.

The lowest step about thy seat
Rises too high for Gabriel's feet,
In vain the tall arch-angel tries

To reach thine height with wond'ring eyes.

111.

Thy dazzling beauties whilst he sings.
He hides his face behind his wings;
And ranks of shining thrones around
Fall worshipping, and spread the ground.

IV.

LORD, what shall earth and ashes do?
We would adore our maker too;
From sin and dust to thee we cry
The great, the Holy and the high.

V.

Earth from afar has heard thy fame,
And worms have learnt to lisp thy name;
But, O, the glories of thy mind
Leave all our soaring thoughts behind.

VI.

GOD in heaven, and men below;

Be short, our tunes; our words, be few;
A sacred reverence checks our songs,
And praise sets silence on our tongues.

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