Pain and toil are over now

Pain and toil are over now

Author: Cecil Frances Alexander
Published in 14 hymnals

Printable scores: PDF, Noteworthy Composer
Audio files: MIDI

Representative Text

1. Pain and toil are over now;
Bring the spice and being the myrrh;
Fold the limb and bind the brow
In the rich man's sepulchre;
Far within the garden gloom,
Leave him in his new-made tomb.

2. Sin has bruised the Victor's heel;
Roll the stone and guard it well;
Bring the Roman's dreaded seal;
Bring his staunchest sentinel;
Death and Hell shall hold their prey
Only till tomorrow's ray.

3. Doubt ye how corruption cold
Has not pow'r to chain its God,
How the chill grave cannot hold
Him beneath its silent sod,
Prest with heavy measured tread?
Thus you watch the buried dead.

4. We, till breaks the morning light,
With an earnest purpose come,
Watching all this solemn night
By our Savior’s lowly tomb,
Thinking we are buried too;
We must live with him anew.

5. In the fresh baptismal tide,
When our early walk was dim,
When our evil nature died,
We were buried deep with him;
We must live like souls new-born,
Eager for a brighter morn.

Source: Hymns and Devotions for Daily Worship #127c

Author: Cecil Frances Alexander

As a small girl, Cecil Frances Humphries (b. Redcross, County Wicklow, Ireland, 1818; Londonderry, Ireland, 1895) wrote poetry in her school's journal. In 1850 she married Rev. William Alexander, who later became the Anglican primate (chief bishop) of Ireland. She showed her concern for disadvantaged people by traveling many miles each day to visit the sick and the poor, providing food, warm clothes, and medical supplies. She and her sister also founded a school for the deaf. Alexander was strongly influenced by the Oxford Movement and by John Keble's Christian Year. Her first book of poetry, Verses for Seasons, was a "Christian Year" for children. She wrote hymns based on the Apostles' Creed, baptism, the Lord's Supper, the Ten Commandment… Go to person page >

Text Information

First Line: Pain and toil are over now
Author: Cecil Frances Alexander
Language: English
Copyright: Public Domain

Notes

Cecil F. Alexander, née Humphreys. [Easter Eve.] Published in her Verses for Holy Seasons, &c, 1846, p. 59, in 6 st. of 6 1., and headed " Easter Even. ‘And laid it in his own new tomb.' St. Matt, xxvii. 60." In common use it is commonly abbreviated, one form being that in the American Protestant Episcopal Church Hymnal, 1871, where st. i., ii. and iv., are altered, and the two closing lines of each stanza are omitted. These alterations and omissions have gone far towards utterly spoiling the hymn.

--John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)

Tune

PRUEN


REDHEAD NO. 76

REDHEAD 76 is named for its composer, who published it as number 76 in his influential Church Hymn Tunes, Ancient and Modern (1853) as a setting for the hymn text "Rock of Ages." It has been associated with Psalm 51 since the 1912 Psalter, where the tune was named AJALON. The tune is also known as P…

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POSEN


Timeline

Media

The Cyber Hymnal #9718
  • PDF (PDF)
  • Noteworthy Composer Score (NWC)

Instances

Instances (1 - 2 of 2)
Text

Hymns and Devotions for Daily Worship #127c

TextScoreAudio

The Cyber Hymnal #9718

Include 12 pre-1979 instances
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