Above:  The Flag of England

Image in the Public Domain

Elizabeth Rundle Charles (1828-1876), a member of The Church of England, was a poet, painter, musician, translator, hymn writer, historian, and novelist.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Dost Thou in a Manger Lie:

https://gatheredprayers.wordpress.com/2020/05/11/dost-thou-in-a-manger-lie/

Never Further Than Thy Cross:

https://gatheredprayers.wordpress.com/2020/05/11/never-further-than-thy-cross/

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Above:  Jesus in a Manger

Image in the Public Domain

Original Latin Text by Jean Mauburn (1450-1503), 1494

English Translation (1858) by Elizabeth Rundle Charles (1828-1876)

Hymn Source = The Hymnal 1940 (1943), The Episcopal Church

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Dost thou in a manger lie,

Who hast all created,

Stretching infant hands on high,

Saviour, long awaited?

If a monarch, where thy state?

Where thy court on thee to wait?

Royal purple, where?

Here no regal pomp we see;

Naught but need and penury:

Why thus cradled here?

+++++

“Pitying love for fallen man

Brought me down thus low;

For a race deep lost in sin,

Came I into woe.

By this lowly birth of mine,

Sinner, riches shall be thine,

Matchless gifts and free;

Willingly this yoke I take,

And this sacrifice I make,

Heaping joys for thee.”

+++++

Fervent praise would I to thee

Evermore be raising;

For thy wondrous love to me

Thee be ever praising.

Glory, glory be for ever

Unto that most bounteous Giver,

And that loving Lord!

Better witness to thy worth,

Purer praise than ours on earth,

Angels’ songs afford.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Above:  The Crucifixion

Image in the Public Domain

Text (published in 1867), by Elizabeth Rundle Charles (1828-1876)

Hymn Source #1 = The Methodist Hymnal (1935), the Methodist Episcopal Church; the Methodist Episcopal Church, South; and the Methodist Protestant Church

Hymn Source #2 = Robert Guy McCutchan, Our Hymnody:  A Manual of The Methodist Hymnal, 2nd. ed. (1937)

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Never further than Thy cross,

Never higher than Thy feet;

Here earth’s precious things seem dross,

Here earth’s bitter things grow sweet.

+++++

Gazing thus our sin we see,

Learn Thy love while gazing thus;

Sin, which laid the cross on Thee,

Love, which bore the cross for us.

+++++

Here we learn to serve and give,

And, rejoicing, self deny;

Here we gather love to live,

Here we gather faith to die.

+++++

Symbols of our liberty

And our service here unite;

Captives, by Thy cross set free,

Soldiers of Thy cross, we fight.

+++++

Pressing onward as we can,

Still to this our hearts must tend;

Where our earliest hopes began,

There our last aspirings end;

+++++

Till amid the hosts of light,

We in Thee redeemed, complete,

Through Thy cross made pure and white,

Cast our crowns before Thy feet.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++