Lo! He Comes With Clouds Descending

For Advent, Second Advent

Words: Charles Wesley, "Hymns of Intercession for all Mankind," 1758

Music: Thomas Helmore and Thomas Morley, eds., Music of the Appendix to the Hymnal Noted. (Novello, Ewer & Co., No Date, ca. 1870), Tune #122
Meter: P.M. - 87 87 47

Source: Charles Rogers, Lyra Britannica: A Collection of British Hymns. Second Edition. (London: Longmans, Green & Co., 1868) p. 618.

"The Judgment Hymn"

Revelation 1:7.
 "Behold, he cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see him, and they also which pierced him: and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him. Even so, Amen." (KJV)

1. Lo! He comes with clouds descending,
    Once for favour'd sinners slain!
Thousand, thousand saints attending,
    Swell the triumph of His train:
                    Hallelujah!
    God appears on earth to reign!

2. Every eye shall now behold Him
    Robed in dreadful majesty;
Those who set at nought and sold Him,
    Pierced, and nailed Him to the tree,
                    Deeply wailing,
    Shall the true Messiah see.

3. The dear tokens of His passion
    Still His dazzling body bears,
Cause of endless exultation
    To His ransom'd worshippers;
                    With what rapture
    Gaze we on those glorious scars!

4. Yea, amen, let all adore Thee,
    High on Thine eternal throne!
Saviour, take the power and glory,
    Claim the kingdom for Thine own;
                    Jah, Jehovah!
    Everlasting God, come down.

Also found in John Mason Neale and Thomas Helmore, eds., The Hymnal Noted With Appendix, Revised and Greatly Enlarged, and Supplement. Tenth Edition. (London: J. Masters & Co., 1889), #122, p. 131, with the following differences:

• St. 1. L. 1. Lo! He comes, in clouds descending

• St. 1. L. 5. Alleluia!

• St. 1. L. 6. Alleluia! Amen.

• St. 2. L. 6. Shall the dread Messiah see.

• St. 3. L. 1. Those dear tokens of His Passion,

• Additional Verse 4:
  Now, redemption, long expected,
      See in solemn pomp appear!
  All His Saints, by man rejected,
      Rise to meet Him in the air:
                      Alleluia!
      Angels, Martyrs, all are there!

• St. 4. L. 4, 5, 6.
      Make Thy righteous sentence known!
                      O come quickly,
      Claim the kingdoms for Thine Own. Amen.

Sheet Music from Thomas Helmore and Thomas Morley, eds., Music of the Appendix to the Hymnal Noted. (Novello, Ewer & Co., No Date, ca. 1870), Tune #122.

Note from Rogers, Lyra Britannica, p. 675.

The Judgment Hymn of Charles Wesley, p. 618, is one of the most effective renderings of the celebrated Dies iræ, dies illa, by Thomas de Celano. It constituted Part Second of a hymn in three parts, entitled, "Thy Kingdom Come," published by Wesley in his "Hymns of Intercession for all Mankind," 1758.

Rev. Martin Madan did a compilation of this hymn and the version by John Cennick, Lo! He Cometh, Countless Trumpets. See: Lo He Comes With Clouds Descending.

About 1758, Thomas Olivers published a hymn on the Last Judgment, commencing—

"Come, immortal King of glory,
Now in majesty appear;
Bid the nations stand before Thee,
Each his final doom to hear;
Come to judgment.
Come, Lord Jesus, quickly come."

Olivers composed for his hymn the tune "Helmsley." To the twenty stanzas, of which it was originally composed, he afterwards added sixteen others. In its new form, the fourth stanza proceeded :—

"Lo! He comes with clouds descending:
Hark, the trump of God is blown."

The dates of Olivers' publications are not certain, but the additional 16 stanzas were published after Wesley's hymn.

Concerning the Olivers hymn, the entry in Julian's Dictionary of Hymnology (1892) explains:

Come, Immortal King of Glory. T. Olivers. [Advent—Judgment.] One form of this hymn, in 20 stanzas of 6 lines was published by [Oliver] as a pamphlet, and printed by Griffith Wright, at Leeds, but undated. A second form in 36 stanzas, with parallel Scripture references, was printed at Bristol, and dated 1763. The two forms were reprinted by D. Sedgwick in his reprint of Olivers's Hymn's, 1868.

Two centos lave been compiled from the second form of the hymn as follows:—

1. Come, Lord Jesus. O come quickly. This is No. 336 in Snepp's Songs of Grace & Glory, 1872, and is composed of stanzas 9, 20, 21, 29, 32, and 35.

2. Lo ! He Comes With Clouds Descending ! Hark ! the trump, &c. This was given in Lord Selborne's Book of Praise, 1862, and is composed of stanzas 4, 5, 7, 9, 20, 21, 23, 24, 27, 29, 32, 35.

These centos are usually dated 1757. This date is uncertain with regard to the first form of the hymn, and certainly wrong as applied to the second form, from which they are taken. [W. T. B.]

-- Julian, p. 247.

I have been unable to see a copy of Olivers' Hymns.

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