Who can resist th' Almighty arm

Who can resist the Almighty arm

Author: John Logan
Tune: ST. GREGORY (Wainwright)
Published in 4 hymnals

Representative Text

1 Who can resist th’ Almighty arm
that made the starry sky?
or who elude the certain glance
of God’s all-seeing eye?
2 From him no cov’ring vails our crimes;
hell opens to his sight;
and all Destruction’s secret snares
lie full disclos'd in light.

3 Firm on the boundless void of space
he pois'd the steady pole,
and in the circle of his clouds
bade secret waters roll.
4 While nature’s universal frame
its Maker’s pow'r reveals,
his throne, remote from mortal eyes
an awful cloud conceals.

5 From where the rising day ascends,
to where it sets in night,
he compasses the floods with bounds,
and checks their threat’ning might.
6 The pillars that support the sky
tremble at his rebuke;
through all its caverns quakes the earth,
as though its centre shook.

7 He brings the waters from their beds,
although no tempest blows,
and smites the kingdom of the proud
without the hand of foes.
8 With bright inhabitants above
he fills the heav'nly land,
and all the crooked serpent’s breed
dismay'd before him stand.

9 Few of his works can we survey;
these few our skill transcend:
but the full thunder of his pow’r
what heart can comprehend?


Source: The Irish Presbyterian Hymbook #R9

Author: John Logan

Logan, John, son of a farmer, born at Fala, Midlothian, 1748, and educated at Edinburgh University, in due course entering the ministry of the Church of Scotland and becoming the minister of South Leith in 1770. During the time he held this charge he delivered a course of lectures on philosophy and history with much success. While he was thus engaged, the chair of Universal History in the University became vacant; but as a candidate he was unsuccessful. A tragedy, entitled Runnamede, followed. He offered it to the manager of Covent Garden Theatre, but it was interdicted by the Lord Chamberlain "upon suspicion of having a seditious tendency." It was subsequently acted in Edinburgh. In 1775 he formed one of the Committee by whom the Translati… Go to person page >

Text Information

First Line: Who can resist the Almighty arm
Title: Who can resist th' Almighty arm
Author: John Logan
Meter: 8.6.8.6
Copyright: Public Domain

Notes

Who can resist the Almighty arm? J. Logan. [God Omnipotent.] Published in the Scottish Translations and Paraphrases, 1781, as a paraphrase of Job xxvi. 6, &c, in 9 stanzas of 4 lines. It is rarely found outside of the Translations and Paraphrases. We have ascribed it to J. Logan on evidence.

--Excerpts from John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)

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The Irish Presbyterian Hymbook #R9

Include 3 pre-1979 instances
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