The 1849 poem in five stanzas by Edmund Sears was set to music a year later, although it seems every hymnal drops one verse or the other from the center.
It came upon the midnight
clear,
that glorious song of
old,
from angels bending near
the earth
to touch their harps of
gold:
"Peace on the earth,
good will to men,
from heaven's
all-gracious King."
The world in solemn
stillness lay,
to hear the angels sing.
Still through the cloven
skies they come
with peaceful wings
unfurled,
and still their heavenly
music floats
o'er all the weary world;
above its sad and lowly
plains,
they bend on hovering
wing,
and ever o'er its Babel
sounds
the blessed angels sing.
And ye, beneath life's
crushing load,
whose forms are bending
low,
who toil along the
climbing way
with painful steps and
slow,
look now! for glad and
golden hours
come swiftly on the wing.
O rest beside the weary
road,
and hear the angels sing!
And ye, beneath
life's crushing load,
Whose forms are
bending low
Who toil along the
climbing way
With painful steps
and slow,
Look now! for glad
and golden hours
come swiftly on the
wing.
O rest beside the
weary road,
And hear the angels
sing!
For lo! the days are
hastening on,
by prophet seen of old,
when with the
ever-circling years
shall come the time
foretold
when peace shall over all
the earth
its ancient splendors
fling,
and the whole world send
back the song
which now the angels
sing.
I just love singing this one.
And, set to the "other" version, more popular in England, set to the folk medley known as Noel:
and... just because of the ending:
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