O Seize This Hour

Representative Text

1 Oh! seize this hour, for day by day,
Death lies in ambush for his prey;
Fill it with virtuous toils and cares—
He spreads around his thousand snares.

2 He lurks in summer’s sickly breath,
The winter winds are winged with death,
And autumn, in her mellow stores,
Disease amidst her riches showers.

3 But thou, in every season brave,
Walk calmly o’er that hidden grave,
For Christian duties, aims divine,
To thee make every season shine.

4 The summer’s sickly air may bring
Disease and suffering on its wing,
But holy patience waits on thee,
To sweetly soothe thy misery.

5 Should pestilence, in autumn’s shade,
Sudden thy blooming health invade,
Unshrinking thou that dart shalt bear,
For God Himself is with thee there.

6 And should the winter’s fiercer hour
The bursting tempest on thee shower,
Amidst that elemental strife,
Calm shalt thou view eternal life.

7 The Christian heart shall know not fear,
Though death in every shape appear;
Amid the waves’ most awful form,
It sees a Father in the storm!

Source: The Cyber Hymnal #13119

Author: Jane Elizabeth Roscoe Hornblower

Roscoe, Jane, a second daughter of William Roscoe, was born in 1797, married to Francis Hornblower in 1838, and died in 1853. Her Poems by one of the Authors of Poems for Youth by a Family Circle were published in 1820, and her Poems in 1843, Her hymns in common use are:— 1. How rich the blessings, O my God. Gratitude. In the Liverpool Kenshaw Street Collection 1818. 2. My Father, when around me spread. Peace in Affliction. Appeared in the Monthly Repository, Dec, 1828; and the Sacred Offering, 1832. 3. O God, to Thee, Who first hast given. Self-Consecration. In Poems for Youth, 1820. 4. Thy will be done, I will not fear. Resignation. [Rev. Valentine D. Davis, B.A.] --John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (190… Go to person page >

Text Information

First Line: O seize this hour, for day by day
Title: O Seize This Hour
Author: Jane Elizabeth Roscoe Hornblower
Meter: 8.8.8.8
Source: Poems (London: Simpkin, Marshall, 1843)
Language: English
Copyright: Public Domain

Tune

WARRINGTON

WARRINGTON was composed by Ralph Harrison (b. Chinley, Derbyshire, England, 1748; d. Manchester, Lancashire, England, 1810) and published in his collection of psalm tunes, Sacred Harmony (1784). The tune's rising inflections help to accent words such as erotic (probably the only time this word has b…

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The Cyber Hymnal #13119

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