Attolle paullum lumina. [Passiontide.] The text of this hymn is in Daniel ii. p. 345; Simrock, p. 110; the Corolla Hymnorum, Cologne, 1806, p. 17, and is of unknown authorship and date. Bäumker, i. p. 495, cites it as in the Sirenes Symphoniacae, 1678. Dr. Neale dates it, in common with “Exite, Sion filiae, Videte, &c," as being:—
"Clearly of the very latest date: certainly not earlier than the sixteenth, it may be the beginning of the seventeenth, century. Their intensely subjective character would be a sufficient proof of this: and their rhyme equally shows it. Feminine double rhymes, in almost all mediaeval hymns, are reserved for trochaic measures;—their use, as here, in iambics, gives a certain impression of irreverence which it is hard to get over. Notwithstanding the wide difference between these arid mediaeval hymns, they possess, I think, considerable beauty, and perhaps will be more easily appreciated by modem readers." Mediaeval Hymns, 3rd ed., 1867, p. 214.
[Rev. W. A. Shoults, B.D.]
Translations in common use:—
1. Raise, raise thine eye a little way. By J. M. Neale, appeared in the first edition of his Mediaeval Hymns, 1851, p. 148, in 7 stanzas of 7 lines, being the first translation of this hymn into English. It is somewhat altered in the Hymnary, 1872, No. 248.
2. 0 Sinner, lift the eye of faith, is the above translation, in an altered form, made by the Compilers of Hymns Ancient and Modern, and included in that collection in 1861. Concerning the alterations, Dr. Neale says in his 2nd ed. of the Med. Hymns, 1863, that "the alteration of the two trochaic into iambic lines" is "an improvement on the original metre." Although thus commended by Dr. Neale, the use of this form is almost exclusively confined to Hymns Anceint and Modern.
3. 0 Sinners, lift your eyes and see. By F. Pott, in his Hymns, &c, 1861, No. 189, in 6 stanzas.
-- John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)
John M. Neale's life is a study in contrasts: born into an evangelical home, he had sympathies toward Rome; in perpetual ill health, he was incredibly productive; of scholarly temperament, he devoted much time to improving social conditions in his area; often ignored or despised by his contemporaries, he is lauded today for his contributions to the church and hymnody. Neale's gifts came to expression early–he won the Seatonian prize for religious poetry eleven times while a student at Trinity College, Cambridge, England. He was ordained in the Church of England in 1842, but ill health and his strong support of the Oxford Movement kept him from ordinary parish ministry. So Neale spent the years between 1846 and 1866 as a warden of Sackvi… Go to person page >
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