With Godhead glory veiled in human flesh
We see Him in this world of sin and death,
Man among men, born of a virgin, found,
In infant weakness, drawing sustenance
Out of His mother’s breasts, yet all the hope
Of that meek lowly heart centred in God.
And here my soul would pause in wonderment
And holy contemplation, while the great,
In haughty pride, go heedless on their ways,
Nor stay to give a look within that stall,
Where, laid among the oxen, I behold
The lowly Babe, the poorest of earth’s poor,
Whose name was erst by angel lips pronounced—
“Jesus.” It is Jehovah come in grace
To rescue His poor people from their sins.
To that dear heavenly Stranger would I press
Nearer and closer, that mine eyes might dwell
In admiration great upon that scene
Of the Redeemer’s birth, Incarnate God!
The One through whom all creatures and all worlds
Being received, and now for the first time
Beheld by angels, who from radiant spheres
Hasting to contemplate with wonderment
The One who gave them being now revealed,
Awoke the midnight echoes with their song,
And flooded Bethlehem’s plains with heavenly light.