Sunday Singing: Through All the World Below

“Through All the World Below” arranged by Alice Parker, performed by The Atlanta Singers

This traditional, anonymously written hymn is unfamiliar to me. Hymnary.org notes it is published in only a handful of hymnals, many of those being 200 years old. If those hymnals introduce this piece at all, they do so with a statement of its theme, that God is seen through his creation. The earth, the natural habits of the world, and all the tangibles of life are not merely matter and energy, devoid of spirit. Our world and ourselves are the handiwork of the Almighty.

1. Through all the world below,
God is seen all around;
Search hills and valleys through,
There he’s found.
The growing of the corn,
The lily and the thorn,
The pleasant and forlorn,
All declare God is there,
In the meadows drest in green,
There he’s seen.

2. See springs of water rise,
Fountains flow, rivers run;
The mist below the skies
Hides the sun;
Then down the rain doth pour
The ocean it doth roar,
And dash against the shore,
All to praise, in their lays,
That God that ne’er declines
His designs.

3.
The sun, to my surprise,
Speaks of God as he flies:
The comets in their blaze
Give him praise;
The shining of the stars
The moon as it appears,
His sacred name declares;
See them shine, all divine!
The shades in silence prove
God’s above.

4.
Then let my station be
Here on earth, as I see
The sacred One in Three
All agree;
Through all the world is made,
The forest and the glade;
Nor let me be afraid,
Though I dwell on the hill
Since nature’s works declare
God is there.

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