The Sycamore Bough

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Upon an ancient sycamore A sturdy bough there grew

Author: Thomas MacKellar
Tune: [Upon an ancient sycamore]
Published in 3 hymnals

Audio files: MIDI

Representative Text

1 Upon an ancient sycamore
A sturdy bough there grew,
And foster’d myriads of leaves
That hid itself from view.
When winter came with angry breath,
The bough was brown and bare;
Gone were the summer-hearted leaves
That once were nurtured there.

2 Thus with vain man. In summer days
The world around him clings;
It guiles his heart and o’er his faults
A leafy mantle flings;
It blinds him, till the bitter day
Of pain and death comes on;
And leaves him, then, to bear his woes
Unaided and alone.

3 Not so the lowly man who walks
The path the Jesus trod,
Who daily learns to die; whose “life
Is hid with Christ in God.”
The world between his soul and God
Can never intervene;
In joy or sorrow, life or death,
His hope is ever green.

Source: The Helper in Sacred Song: for Sunday-schools, churches, and devotional services #25

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Author: Thomas MacKellar

Mackellar, Thomas, was born in New York, Aug. 12, 1812. At the age of 14 he entered the printing establishment of Harper Brothers. In 1833 he removed to Philadelphia and joined the type-foundry firm of Johnson & Smith, as proof reader. He subsequently became a foreman, and then a partner in that firm, which has been known from 1860 as Mackellar, Smiths, and Jordan, type-founders of Philadelphia. His publications include The American Printer, 1866, a prose work, and the following in verse:— (1) Droppings from the Heart, 1844; (2) Tam's Fortnight Ramble, 1847; (3) Lines for the Gentle and Loving, 1853; (4) Rhymes Atween Times, 1872. The last contains some of his hymns. (5) Hymns and a few Metrical Psalms, Phila. 1883 (71 hymns, 3 psalms… Go to person page >

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