Christ's Transfiguration

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 >

When at this distance, Lord, we trace. P. Doddridge. [Transfiguration.] This hymn is No. 90 in the D. MSS., but is undated. It was included, without alteration, in J. Orton's posthumous edition of Doddridge's Hymns, &c, 1755, No. 183, in 6 stanzas of 4 lines; and again, but with alterations, in J. D. Humphreys's edition of the same, 1839, No. 204. The original text is that in common use.

--John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)