O Sinner, Lift the Eye of Faith

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O sinner, lift the eye of faith

Translator: J. M. Neale
Tune: ALLEIN GOTT IN DER HÖH
Published in 16 hymnals

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	Father, Son and Holy Spirit

Representative Text

1. O sinner, lift the eye of faith,
To true repentance turning;
Bethink thee of the curse of sin,
Its awful guilt discerning;
Upon the Crucified One look,
And thou shalt read, as in a book,
What well is worthy thy learning.

2. Look on His head, that bleeding head,
With crown of thorns surrounded;
Look on His sacred hands and feet
Which piercing nails have wounded;
See every limb with scourges rent:
On Him, the Just, the Innocent,
What malice hath abounded!

3. ’Tis not alone those limbs are racked,
But friends, too, are forsaking;
And, more than all, for thankless man
That tender heart is aching;
Oh, fearful was the pain and scorn,
By Jesus, Son of Mary, borne,
Their peace for sinners making.

4. None ever knew such pain before,
Such infinite affliction,
None ever felt a grief like His
In that dread crucifixion;
For us He bare those bitter throes,
For us those agonizing woes,
In oft renewed infliction.

5. O sinner, mark, and ponder well
Sin’s awful condemnation;
Think what a sacrifice it cost
To purchase Thy salvation;
Had Jesus never bled and died,
Then what could thee and all betide
But uttermost damnation?

6. Lord, give us grace to flee from sin,
And Satan’s wiles ensnaring,
And from those everlasting flames
For evil ones preparing.
Jesu, we thank Thee, and entreat
To rest forever at Thy feet,
Thy heavenly glory sharing.

Source: The Cyber Hymnal #5328

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Translator: J. M. Neale

John M. Neale's life is a study in contrasts: born into an evangelical home, he had sympathies toward Rome; in perpetual ill health, he was incredibly productive; of scholarly temperament, he devoted much time to improving social conditions in his area; often ignored or despised by his contemporaries, he is lauded today for his contributions to the church and hymnody. Neale's gifts came to expression early–he won the Seatonian prize for religious poetry eleven times while a student at Trinity College, Cambridge, England. He was ordained in the Church of England in 1842, but ill health and his strong support of the Oxford Movement kept him from ordinary parish ministry. So Neale spent the years between 1846 and 1866 as a warden of Sackvi… Go to person page >

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First Line:	O sinner, lift the eye of faith
Title:	O Sinner, Lift the Eye of Faith
Latin Title:	Attolle paulum lumina
Translator:	J. M. Neale
Language:	English
Copyright:	Public Domain

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Notes

Attolle paullum lumina. [Passiontide.] The text of this hymn is in Daniel ii. p. 345; Simrock, p. 110; the Corolla Hymnorum, Cologne, 1806, p. 17, and is of unknown authorship and date. Bäumker, i. p. 495, cites it as in the Sirenes Symphoniacae, 1678. Dr. Neale dates it, in common with “Exite, Sion filiae, Videte, &c," as being:—

"Clearly of the very latest date: certainly not earlier than the sixteenth, it may be the beginning of the seventeenth, century. Their intensely subjective character would be a sufficient proof of this: and their rhyme equally shows it. Feminine double rhymes, in almost all mediaeval hymns, are reserved for trochaic measures;—their use, as here, in iambics, gives a certain impression of irreverence which it is hard to get over. Notwithstanding the wide difference between these arid mediaeval hymns, they possess, I think, considerable beauty, and perhaps will be more easily appreciated by modem readers." Mediaeval Hymns, 3rd ed., 1867, p. 214.
[Rev. W. A. Shoults, B.D.]

Translations in common use:—
1. Raise, raise thine eye a little way. By J. M. Neale, appeared in the first edition of his Mediaeval Hymns, 1851, p. 148, in 7 stanzas of 7 lines, being the first translation of this hymn into English. It is somewhat altered in the Hymnary, 1872, No. 248.
2. 0 Sinner, lift the eye of faith, is the above translation, in an altered form, made by the Compilers of Hymns Ancient and Modern, and included in that collection in 1861. Concerning the alterations, Dr. Neale says in his 2nd ed. of the Med. Hymns, 1863, that "the alteration of the two trochaic into iambic lines" is "an improvement on the original metre." Although thus commended by Dr. Neale, the use of this form is almost exclusively confined to Hymns Anceint and Modern.
3. 0 Sinners, lift your eyes and see. By F. Pott, in his Hymns, &c, 1861, No. 189, in 6 stanzas.

-- John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)

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Tune

ALLEIN GOTT IN DER HÖH

The tune name ALLEIN GOTT derives from the opening words of Decius's rhymed text in High German. The tune was first published in Schumann's Geistliche Lieder. Decius adapted the tune from a tenth-century Easter chant for the Gloria text, beginning at the part accompanying the words "et in terra pax.…

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[O sinner, lift the eye of faith]

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