The Hymnal and Order of Service ‎#620

620. There Is a Land of Pure Delight

1 There is a land of pure delight,
Where saints immortal reign;
Eternal day excludes the night,
And pleasures banish pain.

2 There everlasting spring abides,
And never with'ring flow'rs:
Death, like a narrow sea, divides
This heav'nly land from ours.

3 Sweet fields, beyond the swelling flood,
Stand dressed in living green:
So to the Jews old Canaan stood,
While Jordan rolled between.

4 But timorous mortals start and shrink
To cross this narrow sea,
And linger, shivering on the brink,
And fear to launch away.

5 O could we make our doubts remove,
Those gloomy thoughts that rise,
And see the Canaan that we love
With unbeclouded eyes!

6 Could we but climb where Moses stood,
And view the landscape o’er,
Not Jordan’s stream, nor death’s cold flood,
Should fright us from the shore.

Amen.

Text Information

• First Line: There is a land of pure delight
• Title: There Is a Land of Pure Delight
• Author: Isaac Watts (1707)
• Meter: C. M.
• Language: English
• Publication Date: 1937
• Topic: Last Things: Heaven

Tune Information

• Name: ST. PETER
• Composer: Alexander Robert Reinagle (1826)
• Meter: C. M.
• Key: E♭ Major