Scripture Verse

Thy will be done. Matthew 26:42

Introduction

portrait
John G. Whittier 1807–1892

Words: John G. Whit­ti­er, 1861. Ap­peared in Whit­ti­er’s In War Time, and Oth­er Po­ems (Bos­ton, Mas­sa­chu­setts: Tick­nor & Fields, 1864), pag­es 9–11.

Music: Char­lottes­ville E. Maude Cline, in Po­pu­lar Hymns Num­ber 2, ed­it­ed by Chris­to­pher C. Cline (St. Lou­is, Mis­sou­ri: Chris­tian Pub­lish­ing, 1901), num­ber 40 (🔊 pdf nwc) (re­peats last line of each verse).

If you know where to get a good pho­to of Cline (head & shoul­ders, at least 200×300 pix­els),

Lyrics

We see not, know not; all our way
Is night—with Thee alone is day:
From out the tor­rent’s trou­bled drift,
Above the storm our pray­ers we lift,
Thy will be done!

The flesh may fail, the heart may faint,
But who are we to make com­plaint,
Or dare to plead, in times like these,
The weak­ness of our love of ease?
Thy will be done!

We take with so­lemn thank­ful­ness
Our bur­den up, nor ask it less,
And count it joy that ev­en we
May suf­fer, serve, or wait for Thee,
Whose will be done!

Though dim as yet in tint and line,
We trace Thy pic­ture’s wise de­sign,
And thank Thee that our age sup­plies
Its dark re­lief of sac­ri­fice.
Thy will be done!

And if, in our un­wor­thi­ness,
Thy sac­ri­fi­cial wine we press,
If from Thy or­deal’s heat­ed bars
Our feet are seamed with crim­son scars,
Thy will be done!

If, for the age to come, this hour
Of tri­al hath vi­ca­ri­ous pow­er,
And, blest by Thee, our pre­sent gain
Be Li­ber­ty’s eter­nal gain,
Thy will be done!

Strike, Thou the Mas­ter, we Thy keys,
The an­them of the des­ti­nies!
The mi­nor of Thy lof­ti­er strain,
Our hearts shall breathe the old re­frain,
Thy will be done!