1 Blest is the man, forever blest,
Whose guilt is pardoned by his God,
Whose sins with sorrow are confessed
And covered with his Savior's blood.
2 Blest is the man to whom the Lord
Imputes not his iniquities;
He pleads no merit of reward
And not on works but grace relies.
3 From guile his heart and lips are free;
His humble joy, his holy fear,
With deep repentance well agree
And join to prove his faith sincere.
4 How glorious is that righteousness
That hides and cancels all his sins,
While bright the evidence of grace
Thro' all his life appears and shines!
First Line: | Blest is the man, for ever blest |
Title: | Repentance and Free Pardon |
Author: | Isaac Watts |
Meter: | 8.8.8.8 |
Language: | English |
Copyright: | Public Domain |
Blest is the man, for ever bless'd. I. Watts. [Ps. xxxii.] His L.M. rendering of Ps. xxxii., published in his Psalms of David, &c, 1719, in 4 stanzas of 4 lines. Dr. Watts's note thereupon explains the liberty taken with the Psalm as follows:—
"These two first verses of this Psalm being cited by the Apostle in the 4th chapter of Romans, to shew the freedom of our pardon and justification by grace without works, I have, in this version of it, enlarged the sense, by mention of the Blood of Christ, and faith and Repentance; and because the Psalmist adds. A spirit in which is no guile, I have inserted that sincere obedience, which is scriptural evidence of our faith and justification."
As a hymn in common use in Great Britain it has almost died out; but in America it still survives in a few collections.
-- John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)