Seek Ye First the Kingdom of God

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Now let a true ambition rise

Author: Philip Doddridge
Tune: BENTON (Pound)
Published in 70 hymnals

Representative Text

1 Now let a true ambition rise,
And ardour fire our breasts,
To reign in worlds above the skies,
In heav'nly glories drest.

2 Behold Jehovah's royal hand
A radiant crown display,
Whose gems with vivid lustre shine,
While sun and stars decay.

3 No more I seek for transient good,
Nor longer call it mine:
I spring to seize superior joys,
Immortal and divine.

4 Ye hearts, with youthful vigour warm,
The glorious prize pursue;
Nor shall ye want the goods of earth,
While heav'n is kept in view.

Source: A Collection of Hymns and A Liturgy: for the use of Evangelical Lutheran Churches; to which are added prayers for families and individuals #517

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Author: Philip Doddridge

Philip Doddridge (b. London, England, 1702; d. Lisbon, Portugal, 1751) belonged to the Non-conformist Church (not associated with the Church of England). Its members were frequently the focus of discrimination. Offered an education by a rich patron to prepare him for ordination in the Church of England, Doddridge chose instead to remain in the Non-conformist Church. For twenty years he pastored a poor parish in Northampton, where he opened an academy for training Non-conformist ministers and taught most of the subjects himself. Doddridge suffered from tuberculosis, and when Lady Huntington, one of his patrons, offered to finance a trip to Lisbon for his health, he is reputed to have said, "I can as well go to heaven from Lisbon as from Nort… Go to person page >

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First Line:	Now let a true ambition rise
Title:	Seek Ye First the Kingdom of God
Author:	Philip Doddridge
Meter:	8.6.8.6
Language:	English
Copyright:	Public Domain

Matthew 6:33
(hymns)

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Notes

Now let a true ambition rise. P. Doddridge. [Seek first the Kingdom of God.] Written January 1, 1738/9 [D. MSS.], and published by Job Orton in his posthumous edition of Doddridge's Hymns, 1755, No. 178, in 4 stanzas of 4 lines, and headed, "Seeking first the Kingdom of God.” It was also given in J. D. Humphreys's edition of the same, 1839, No. 199.

--John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)

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