Stedman and Hutchinson, comps. A Library of American Literature:
An Anthology in Eleven Volumes. 1891.
Vols. IX–XI: Literature of the Republic, Part IV., 1861–1889
Christmas Song
By Edmund Hamilton Sears (1810–1876)C
Come Heaven’s melodious strains,
Where wild Judea stretches far
Her silver-mantled plains;
Celestial choirs from courts above
Shed sacred glories there;
And angels with their sparkling lyres
Make music on the air.
Send back the glad reply,
And greet from all their holy heights
The day-spring from on high:
O’er the blue depths of Galilee
There comes a holier calm,
And Sharon waves, in solemn praise,
Her silent groves of palm.
The realm of ether fills:
How sweeps the song of solemn joy
O’er Judah’s sacred hills!
“Glory to God!” The sounding skies
Loud with their anthems ring:
“Peace on the earth; good-will to men,
From Heaven’s eternal king!”
The Saviour now is born:
More bright on Bethlehem’s joyous plains
Breaks the first Christmas morn;
And brighter on Moriah’s brow,
Crowned with her temple-spires,
Which first proclaim the new-born light,
Clothed with its Orient fires.
And Christian hearts be cold?
Oh, catch the anthem that from Heaven
O’er Judah’s mountains rolled!
When nightly burst from seraph-harps
The high and solemn lay,—
“Glory to God! on earth be peace;
Salvation comes to-day!”