I sojourn in a vale of tears. J. Mason. [Hope.] First published in his Songs of Praise, &c, 1683, No. 30, in 9 stanzas of 8 lines, as the "Song of Praise for the Hope of Glory," and repeated in D. Sedgwick's reprint, 1859, p. 46. From it three centos are in common use:--
1. I sojourn in a vale of tears. In use in America specially.
2. And dost Thou come, 0 blessed Lord. In Bickersteth's Christian Psalmist, 1833, No. 535, and others.
3. My Saviour is gone up to heaven.
In Bickersteth, 1833, No. 536. and others. The text of all these centos is slightly altered from the original.
--John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)
Mason, John. The known facts of his life are scanty. He was the son of a Dissenting Minister, and the grandfather of John Mason, the author of A Treatise on Self-Knowledge. He was educated at Strixton School, Northants, and Clare Hall, Cambridge. After taking his M.A., he became Curate of Isham; and in 1668, Vicar of Stantonbury, Bucks. A little more than five years afterwards he was appointed Rector of Water-Stratford. Here he composed the volume containing The Songs of Praise, his paraphrase of The Song of Solomon, and the Poem on Dives and Lazarus, with which Shepherd's Penitential Cries was afterwards bound up. This volume passed through twenty editions. Besides the Songs of Praise, it contains six Penitential Cries by Mason, and it i… Go to person page >
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