The City that Hath Foundations

Representative Text

Jerusalem! thou glorious City-height,
Oh might I enter in!
My spirit wearieth for thy love and light,
Amidst this world of sin—
Far over the dark mountains,
The moorlands cold and grey,
She looketh with sad longing,
And fain would flee away.

O fair sweet day! and hour yet more fair
When wilt thou come to me?
My spirit, safe within my Saviour’s care
Made glad, and pure, and free—
And calmly, surely trusting
His faithful loving Hand,
Shall she be led in safety
To Heaven, her Fatherland.

One moment! Ere she is aware, she treads
The glorious shore that lies
Beyond the stars, beyond the midnight shades,
Beyond the stormy skies,—
The chariot of Elijah,
The shining angel throng
Shall bear her through the Heavens,
With triumph and with song.

O City beautiful! Thy light appears—
The gates by grace set wide—
The Home for which through long, long exile years,
My weary spirit sighed—
The false and empty shadows,
The life of sin, are past—
God gives me mine inheritance,
The land of life at last.

But who are they that come—the glorious ones,
As stars along the way—
A royal diadem of pleasant stones?
My Lord’s elect are they:
He sent them forth to meet me,
Where dark with mist of fears,
The land of gloom lay round me.
My distant land of tears.

The Patriarchs and Saints of olden days,
The Christians all unknown,
Who bore the heat of persecution blaze,
Or nameless Cross alone—
I see them crowned with glory,
And shining from afar;
To them the Lord their Saviour,
Has given the Morning-Star.

Oh when at last I reach that City fair,
That beauteous Paradise,
To sing unto the Love that led me there,
Eternal melodies,
Then only can I give Thee
The praises that are meet,
With Hallelujah thunder,
With psaltery clear and sweet.

Before the emerald encircled throne,
The thousand choirs fall;
Their song of praises echoing ever on
Through Heaven’s high palace hall.
The throng that none can number,
Of every race and tongue,
Join like the mighty waters
In that eternal Song.



Source: Hymns of Ter Steegen and Others (Second Series) #84

Author: Johannes Matthaeus Meyfart

Meyfart, Johann Matthäus, was born Nov. 9, 1590 at Jena, during a visit which his mother (wife of Pastor Meyfart of Wablwinkel, near Waltershausen, Gotha) was paying to her father. He studied at the Universities of Jena (M.A. 1611; D.D. 1624) and Wittenberg, and was thereafter for some time adjunct of the philosophical faculty at Jena. In 1616, he was appointed professor in the Gymnasium at Coburg and in 1623 director; and during his residence at Coburg was a great moral power. When his colleagues in the Gymnasium made a complaint to the government regarding a dissertation (De disciplina ecclesiastica) which he published in 1633, he accepted the offer of the professorship of theology in the revived University of Erfurt. He entered on his w… Go to person page >

Translator: Frances Bevan

Bevan, Emma Frances, née Shuttleworth, daughter of the Rev. Philip Nicholas Shuttleworth, Warden of New Coll., Oxford, afterwards Bishop of Chichester, was born at Oxford, Sept. 25, 1827, and was married to Mr. R. C. L. Bevan, of the Lombard Street banking firm, in 1856. Mrs. Bevan published in 1858 a series of translations from the German as Songs of Eternal Life (Lond., Hamilton, Adams, & Co.), in a volume which, from its unusual size and comparative costliness, has received less attention than it deserves, for the trs. are decidedly above the average in merit. A number have come into common use, but almost always without her name, the best known being those noted under “O Gott, O Geist, O Licht dea Lebens," and "Jedes Herz will etwas… Go to person page >

Text Information

First Line: Jerusalem! thou glorious City-height
Title: The City that Hath Foundations
Author: Johannes Matthaeus Meyfart (1642)
Translator: Frances Bevan (1899)
Language: English
Copyright: Public Domain

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Hymns of Ter Steegen and Others (Second Series) #84

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