Honor to the Hills (Jeremiah Ingalls)

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(Posted 2017-04-04) CPDL #43874:

Editor: Barry Johnston (submitted 2017-04-04). Score information: Letter, 1 page, 76 kB Copyright: Public Domain

Edition notes: Oval-note version, as written in 1805. All nine stanzas included.

(Posted 2017-04-04) CPDL #43873:

Editor: Barry Johnston (submitted 2017-04-04). Score information: 7 x 10 inches (landscape), 1 page, 77 kB Copyright: Public Domain

Edition notes: Note shapes added (4-shape). All nine stanzas included.

General Information

Title: Honor to the Hills
First Line: Through all this world below
Composer: Jeremiah Ingalls
Lyricist: Anonymous

Number of voices: 3vv Voicing: STB
Genre: Sacred Meter: 66. 63. 66. 66. 63

Language: English
Instruments: A cappella

First published: 1805 in Ingalls' The Christian Harmony, pp. 47-48, for three voices: Treble-Tenor-Bass
Description: This is a folk hymn (Jackson 1953a, no. 142), based on a 17th-century ballad, Captain Kidd. Considerably revised by Alexander Johnson in 1818, rewritten in A minor for four voices; this revision forms the basis for the three-voice Captain Kidd in Southern Harmony, p. 50. Words by an unknown author, before 1800; nine stanzas in Ingalls 1805. Porter and Garst (1979) found more than twenty tunes in this unusual meter, including the present one.

References:

Jackson, George Pullen. 1953a. Spiritual Folk-Songs of Early America, Second Edition. Locust Valley, New York: J. J. Augustin. 254 pp.
Porter, Ellen Jane, and John F. Garst. 1979. More tunes in the Captain Kidd meter. The Hymn 30(3): 252-262.

External websites:

Original text and translations

English text

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

2. See springing waters rise,
Fountains flow, rivers run;
The mist beclouds the sky,
Hides the sun:
Then down the rain doth pour,
The ocean it doth roar,
And break upon the shore,
All to praise, in their lays,
A God that ne’er declines
His designs.

3. The sun with all his rays,
Speaks of God as he flies;
The comet in its blaze,
God it cries.
The shining of the stars,
The moon when she appears,
His dreadful name declares:
See them fly through the sky,
And join the silent sound
From the ground.

4. Then let my station be,
Here in life, where I see
The sacred trinity
All agree,
In all the works he’s made,
The forest and the glade.
Nor let me be afraid,
Though I dwell in the hill,
Where nature’s works declare
God is there.

5. God did to Moses show,
Glories more than Peru;
His face alone withdrew
From the view.
Mount Sinai was the place,
Where God did show his grace;
And Moses sang his praise,
See him rise near the skies:
And view old Canaan's ground
All around.

6. Elijah’s servant views
From the hill and declares,
A little cloud appears,
Dry your tears:
Our Lord transfigured is,
With those blest saints of his,
As faith the witnesses:
See them shine all divine.
While Olive’s Mount is blest
With the rest.

7. Not India hills of gold,
With wonders, we are told.
Nor seraphs strong and bold,
Can unfold
The mountain Calvary,
Where Christ our Lord did die;
Hark! hear the God-man cry,
Mountains quake, heavens shake,
When God, their Author’s ghost,
Leaves their coast.

8. And now from Calvary,
We may stand and espy,
Beyond this lower sky,
Far on high,
Mount Zion’s spicy hill,
Where saints and angels dwell;
Hark! hear them sing and tell
Of their Lord, with accord,
And join in Moses’ song,
Heart and tongue.

9. The hills are honored thus,
By our Lord in his course,
Let them not be by us
Called a curse;
Forbid it mighty King,
But rather let us sing.
While hills and valleys ring;
Echoes fly through the sky,
And heaven hears the sound
From the ground.