Suggested tune: WIE WOHL IST MIR
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Wie wohl ist mir, O Freund der Seelen. [The Love of Christ.] Founded on Canticles viii. 5. 1st published 1692, as above, p. 154, along with Meditation vi., which is entitled "The penitential forsaking and embracing." Included as No. 451 in Freylinghausen's Gesang-Buch, 1704, and recently as No. 438 in the Unverfälschter Liedersegen, 1851, in 6 stanzas of 10 lines. Lauxmann, in Koch, viii., 243, says of it:—
"This hymn dates from the period when Dessler as a youth was residing in his native town of Nürnberg in ill health. He had given up the occupation of goldsmith and set himself to study at Altdorf, but lack of money and of health compelled him to abandon this also. He then maintained himself as a proof reader in his native town, became the spiritual son and scholar in poesy of Erasmus Francisci, in whose powerful faith he found nourishment in his sorrows. Through his linguistic attainments, as well as through his hymns, he furthered the edification of the Christian populace; and what he here sung may have afforded stimulus to himself in the still greater troubles which he afterwards had to endure during his conrectorship, and finally in his last thirty-five weeks illness."
Fischer (ii. 391) calls it—
"One of the finest hymns of Pietism, that has produced many blessed effects, and has been the model and incitement to many hymns of like character."
It is translated as:—
1. How well am I, Thou my soul's lover, in full as No. 621 in pt. i. of the Moravian Hymn Book, 1754. Greatly altered, and omitting stanza ii., v., as No. 295 in the Moravian Hymn Book, 1789, beginning, "How blest am I, most gracious Saviour," and continued thus in later editions. In 1840 Dr. Martineau included a hymn in 4 stanzas of 4 lines, begin¬ning, " What comforts, Lord, to those are given," as No. 294 in his Hymns, &c. (edition 1873, No. 384). Of this stanzas i., ii. are based on stanza i., stanza iii. on stanza ii., and stanza iv. on stanza iii. of the 1789.
2. O Lord, how happy is the time, a somewhat free translation of stanzas i.-v., with stanza i., slightly varied, repeated as stanza vi., by Greville Matheson. Contributed to the Hymns & Sacred Songs, Manchester, 1855 (edition 1856, No. 226), repeated in the Sunday Magazine, 1872, p. 741, and in Dr. G. Macdonald's Threefold Cord, 1883, p. 38. In the Hymns for the Sick Room, N. Y., 1859 (1861, p. 70), and Hymns of the Ages, 3rd Series, Boston, U.S., 1864, p. 233, it is considerably altered. This text is given in Schaff's Christ in Song, 1869, p. 491, further altered, and beginning "O Friend of souls! how blest the time"; Miss Winkworth's translation of stanza v., altered, being substituted for Mr. Matheson's. In the Methodist Episcopal Hymnal, 1878, No. 613, is stanzas i., ii., v. of Schaff s text.
3. O Friend of Souls, how well is me, a good translation omitting stanza iii. by Miss Winkworth in her Lyra Germanica, 1st Series, 1855, p. 147 From this lines 1-4 of stanzas i., iii., v., altered, were taken as No. 513 in Hymns of the Spirit, Boston, U.S., 1864.
Another is: “Tis well with me, O Friend unfailing,” by Miss Burlingham in the British Herald, Dec. 1865, p. 185, repeated as No. 395 in Reid's Praise Book, 1872.
-- John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)
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