First Fruits

Top Text Author Text Info Timeline Page Scans Instances

Behold, the grain of wheat that dies

Author: George Richards
Published in 2 hymnals

Representative Text

1 Behold! the grain of wheat that dies
Yet lives in nature's womb;
Matur'd by death, to life arise,
A type of things to come.

2 This Isr'el saw in ancient days,
When dedicate to heav'n,
The first ripe sheaf, with songs of praise,
To God, their God was given:

3 Here dwelt their opes for time to come,
That he who blest that fruit,
Would bring the future harvest home,
A harvest like the root.

4 Hail! first begotten from the dead!
The church first born are thine—
Thine at thy coming. Then the head,
The head of man divine.

5 (Lord of a harvest yet to come)
The rest of earth shall reap;
And gath'ring his unnumber'd home,
One feast forever keep.

Source: Psalms, Hymns and Spiritual Songs: selected and original, designed for the use of the Church Universal in public and private devotion #XXXV

All representative texts • Compare texts ^ top

Author: George Richards

Richards, George, born near Newport, Rhode Island, circa 1755. For some years he was Purser and Chaplain in the United States Navy, and also taught a school in Boston. In 1789 he became an Universalist preacher, ministered at Portsmouth, New Haven, 1793-1809, and from 1809 in Philadelphia, where, his mind having given way under trouble, he died by his own hand, March 16, 1816. With S. Lane he edited the Universalist Hymn Book, published at Boston, 1792. This was one of the earliest collections of that body. It contained 49 of Richards's hymns. In 1801 he published A Collection of Hymns, Dover, New Hampshire, which contained 6 additional hymns by himself, and in 1806, also at Dover, a second edition of the same, greatly enlarged, with anothe… Go to person page >

^ top