1 Thus hath the Son of Jesse said,
When Israel’s God had raised his head
To high imperial sway:
Struck with his last poetic fire,
Then Zion’s psalmist tuned his lyre
To this harmonious lay.
2 Thus dictates Israel’s sacred Rock:
Thus hath the God of Jacob spoke
By my responsive tongue:
Behold the just one over men
Commencing his religious reign!
Great subject of my song.
3 So gently shines with genial ray
Th’unclouded lamp of rising day,
And cheers the tender flowers,
When midnight’s soft diffusive rain
Hath blessed the gardens and the plain
With kind refreshing showers.
4 Shall not my house this honor boast?
My soul th’eternal covenant trust,
Well ordered still and sure?
There all my hopes and wishes meet;
In death I call its blessings sweet,
And feel its bond secure.
5 The sons of Belial shall not spring,
Who spurn at Heav’n’s appointed king,
And scorn his high command:
Tho’ wide the briars infest the ground,
And all the sharpest thorns around
Defy a tender hand.
6 A dreadful warrior shall appear
With iron arms, and massy spear,
And tear them from their place:
Touched with the lightning of his ire,
At once they kindle into fire,
And vanish in the blaze.
Source: The Cyber Hymnal #9157
Philip Doddridge (b. London, England, 1702; d. Lisbon, Portugal, 1751) belonged to the Non-conformist Church (not associated with the Church of England). Its members were frequently the focus of discrimination. Offered an education by a rich patron to prepare him for ordination in the Church of England, Doddridge chose instead to remain in the Non-conformist Church. For twenty years he pastored a poor parish in Northampton, where he opened an academy for training Non-conformist ministers and taught most of the subjects himself. Doddridge suffered from tuberculosis, and when Lady Huntington, one of his patrons, offered to finance a trip to Lisbon for his health, he is reputed to have said, "I can as well go to heaven from Lisbon as from Nort… Go to person page >
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