the spirit and tone of the one
seven-line stanza has steadily connected it with Ringwaldt's name.
Apparently it is the single survivor of a great lost hymn--edited and
altered out of recognition. But its power evidently inspired the added
verses, as we have them. Dr. Collyer found it, and, regretting that it
was too short to sing in public service, composed stanzas 2d, 3d and
4th. It is likely that Collyer first met with it in _Psalms and Hymns
for Public and Private Devotion_, Sheffield 1802, where it appeared
anonymously. So far as known this was its first publication in English.
Ringwaldt's stanza and two of Collyer's are here given:

Great God, what do I see and hear!
The end of things created!
The Judge of mankind doth appear
On clouds of glory seated.
The trumpet sounds, the graves restore
The dead which they contained before;
Prepare, my soul, to meet Him.

The dead in Christ shall first arise
At the last trumpet sounding,
Caught up to meet Him in the skies,
With joy their Lord surrounding.
No gloomy fears their souls dismay
His presence sheds eternal day
On those prepared to meet Him.

Far over space to distant spheres
The lightnings are prevailing
Th' ungodly rise, and all their tears
And sighs are unavailing.
The day of grace is past and gone;
They shake before the Judge's Throne
All unprepared to meet Him.

Bartholomew Ringwaldt, pastor of the Lutheran Church of Longfeld,
Prussia, was born in 1531, and died in 1599. His hymns appear in a
collection entitled _Hymns for the Sundays and Festivals of the Whole
Year_.

Rev. William Bengo Collyer D.D., was born at Blackheath near London,
April 14, 1782, educated at Homerton College and settled over a
Congregational Church in Peckham. In 1812 he published a book of hymns,
and in 1837 a _Service Book_ to which he contributed eighty-nine hymns.
He died Jan, 9, 1854.

_THE TUNE._

Probably it was the customary singing of Ringwaldt's hymn (in Germany)
to Luther's tune that gave it for some time the designation of "Luther's
Hymn," the title by which the music is still known--an air either
composed or adapted by Luther, and rendered perhaps unisonously or with
extempore chords. It was not until early in the last century that
Vincent Novello wrote to it the noble arrangement now in use. It is a
strong, even-time harmony with lofty tenor range, and very i