Stand and adore! How glorious he

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General information

This is a poem by Isaac Watts, published in Horae Lyricae, 1706, entitled God Only Known to Himself.

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Text and translations

English.png English text

1. Stand and adore! how glorious he
That dwells in bright eternity!
We gaze, and we confound our sight,
Plunged in the abyss of dazzling light!

2. Thou sacred one, almighty three,
Great everlasting mystery,
What lofty numbers shall we frame
Equal to thy tremendous name!

 

3. Seraphs, the nearest to the throne,
Begin, and speak the great unknown:
Attempt the song, wind up your strings
To notes untried, and boundless things.

4. You, whose capacious powers survey
Largely beyond our eyes of clay:
Yet what a narrow portion too
Is seen, or known, or thought, by you?

 

5. How flat your highest praises fall
Below the immense original!
Weak creatures we, that strive in vain
To reach an uncreated strain!

6. Great God, forgive our feeble lays,
Sound out thine own eternal praise :
A song so vast, a theme so high,
Calls for the voice that tuned the sky.

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