And all the glad life-music
Now heard no longer here,
Shall come again to greet us
As we are drawing near.

Jerusalem the Golden;

I toil on day by day;

Heart-sore each night, with longing
I stretch my hands and pray
That midst thy leaves of healing

My soul may find her nest,

Where the Wicked cease from troubling,-
The Weary are at rest.

JERUSALEM, THY GLORIOUS WALLS.

JOHN MATTHEW MEYFART. A translation in the original metre.

John Matthew Meyfart, the author of this hymn, was a Lutheran theologian of the first part of the seventeenth century. He was born at Wallwinkel in Thuringia, November 9, 1590. Meyfart pursued his studies at Jena and Wittenberg. He wrote many able works, especially on doctrinal and polemical theology, and held various offices of the highest importance. The closing years of his life were spent as "Professor of the Augsburg Confession," and Pastor and Senior of the Ministerium at Erfurt, where he died, January 26, 1642.

JE

ERUSALEM, high tower, thy glorious walls,
Would God I were in thee!

My heart hath gone where thy fair beauty calls,
And dwells no more in me;

Far over the hill and mountain,

Far over the plain and dell, On wings of rapture soaring,

It bids this world farewell!

O day of joy, and hour of pure delight—
How long wilt thou delay?

When peacefully my soul may take its flight,
And leave this load of clay,
In perfect trust reposing
On God's Almighty hand,
Who faithfully shall bring it

Home to its Fatherland.

Lo! from the tomb, up to the clouds of heaven, It instantly shall soar,

When, hushed in death, its last farewell is given

To earth, now seen no more;

Elijah's fiery chariot

In triumph it shall ride, Upborne by angel armies,

That fly on every side.

The gates of pearl now open wide to me,

Thou City of the blest;

To me who oft have longed and prayed for thee,

And thy refreshing rest,

Ere sighs, and tears, and sorrow,

Ere pain, and grief, and woe, Were changed to this rejoicing, That all thy children know.

What shining host is this that comes to me,
Drawn up in bright array?

His chosen ones, with palms of victory,
His joy and crown are they.
These Jesus sends to meet me,

To calm my doubts and fears;
From far they smile and greet me,

In this dark vale of tears.

And now behold these Prophets, Priests, and Kings, And Martyrs noble band,

Who bore the Cross, and dared the torturings

Of tyrants to withstand;

See then in glory floating,

In freedom every where,
And swift as glittering sunbeams,
Move radiant through the air.

In Paradise, among the saints above,
New pleasures I shall know,
With joy divine shall my triumphant love
In songs of praise o'erflow;

Shall join the full hosannas
That echo all around,

And mighty hallelujahs

That ever there resound.

Clear trumpet tones, and harps with golden strings,
Those countless choirs employ,

So loud and sweet, heaven's living temple rings,
And trembles with the joy :-

Ten thousand times ten thousand,
A sea that has no shore,

Whose praise in thundering billows
Rolls on forever more.

O MOTHER DEAR, JERUSALEM!

We transfer the following judicious criticism upon this old masterpiece of hymnology, from the work of WILLIAM C. PRIME, entitled, O Mother dear, Jerusalem! "The authorship of the hymn in English has been commonly attributed to David Dickson, a Scotch clergyman of the Seventeenth Century. A careful examination of the authorities, as well as those cited by Dr. Bonar, leads to the conviction that we are indebted to Dickson for the present form of the hymn, and probably for a considerable portion of the verses. But portions of the hymn had earlier existence in our language, and it is manifest that this song is of earlier origin than the time of Dickson, who was born about A. D. 1583, and died in A. D. 1662. It seems probable, on a critical examination of the hymn, that it has received contributions from various hands; additions, which are mostly translations from the Fathers or from mediaæval Latin hymns, having been made by one and another author. So entirely diverse is the style of different stanzas that this theory alone can explain it, and it is possible that David Dickson only put into shape and polished a little the work of his devout predecessors. This, however, is certain, that to the noble Church of Scotland we owe this hymn in its present state."

MOTHER dear, Jerusalem!

When shall I come to thee?

When shall my sorrows have an end—
Thy joys when shall I see?

O happy harbor of God's saints!

O sweet and pleasant soil!
In thee no sorrows can be found,
No grief, no care, no toil.

In thee no sickness is at all,

No hurt nor any sore;

There is no death nor ugly sight,
But life for evermore.

No dimmish clouds o'ershadow thee,
No cloud nor darksome night;
But every soul shines as the sun,
For God himself gives light.

There lust or lucre cannot dwell,
There envy bears no sway;
There is no hunger, thirst, or heat,
But pleasure every way.

Jerusalem! Jerusalem!

Would God I were in thee!

Oh that my sorrows had an end,
Thy joys that I might see!

No pains, no pangs, no grieving grief, No woful wight is there;

No sigh, no sob, no cry is heard—

No well-away, no fear.

Jerusalem the city is

Of God our King alone;

The Lamb of God the light thereof

Sits there upon His throne.

Ah God! that I Jerusalem

With speed may go behold!

For why? the pleasures there abound

With tongue cannot be told.