Posted in CHRISTMASTIDE!, FATHERS of the Church, FEASTS and SOLEMNITIES, HYMNS, Our MORNING Offering, THE EPIPHANY of the LORD, The INCARNATION, The NATIVITY of JESUS

Our Morning Offering – 6 January – Bethlehem! of Noblest Cities

Our Morning Offering – 6 January – The Solemnity of the Epiphany of the Lord

Bethlehem! of Noblest Cities
By Prudentius, Aurelius Clemens (c 348-c 413)
Trans. Fr Edward Caswell c.Orat. (1814–1878)

Bethlehem! of noblest cities
None can once with thee compare;
Thou alone the Lord from Heaven
Didst for us Incarnate bear.

Fairer than the sun at morning
Was the Star that told His Birth;
To the lands their God announcing,
Hid beneath a form of earth.

By its lambent beauty guided,
See, the Eastern Kings appear;
See them bend, their gifts to offer,
Gifts of incense, gold and myrrh.

Offerings of mystic meaning;
Incense doth the God disclose;
Gold a Royal Child proclaimeth;
Myrrh a future Tomb foreshows.

Holy Jesus! in Thy brightness
to the gentile world displayed!
With the Father and the Spirit,
Endless praise to Thee be paid!
Amen! Amen!

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