70 THE METHODIST HYMN-BOOK ILLUSTRATED
Hymn 34. Hail ! holy, holy, holy Lord !
CHARLES WESLEY (i).
Hymns on the Trinity, 1767 ; Works, vii. 280. Isa. vi. 3 ; Rev. iv. 8. After ver. 3, four lines are omitted
Thine incommunicable right,
Almighty God, receive, Which angel-choirs and saints in light
And saints embodied give.
The hymn in the original has three verses of eight lines.
Hymn 35. Jehovah, God the Father, bless.
CHARLES WESLEY (i).
Hymns on the Trinity, 1767 ; Works, vii. 276. Based on the priestly benediction, Num. vi. 24-26. The last verse is omitted.
Hymn 36. O God, of good the unfathomed sea!
JOHANN SCHEFFLER (1624-77) ; translated by JOHN WESLEY.
Du unvergleichlich s Gut, Heilige Seelenlust, 2nd edition, 1668, Book v., headed She (the soul) contrasts the majesty of God with her nothingness.
John Wesley s translation appeared in Hymns and Sacred Poems, 1739 ; Poetical Works, i. 141.
In ver. 5 the old reading is restored, which had been weakened into
Yes! self-sufficient as Thou art. Ver. 4 is founded on the Apocrypha (Wisd. of Sol. xi. 20).
Scheffler was the son of a Polish noble who had been forced to leave his native country on account of his Lutheranism. He was born at Breslau, and graduated at Leyden as Ph.D. and M.D. In 1649 he was appointed court physician to Duke Sylvius Nimrod, of Wiirttemberg-Ols. Scheffler had become acquainted in Holland with the writings of Jacob Bohme, and the rigid Lutheranism of the court was uncongenial. He with drew from public worship, confession, and holy communion. Freitag, the court preacher, who ruled in ecclesiastical matters, refused permission to print his poems because of their mysticism.
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