Words: Anon­y­mous, in Songs of Zi­on, 1864.

Music: Pres­ton (Mac­lean), , 1898.


And is it so? “A little while,”
And then the life undying,
The light of God’s unclouded smile,
The singing for the sighing?
“A little while!” O glorious word,
Sweet solace of our sorrow;
And then “forever with the Lord,”
The everlasting morrow.

Then be it ours to journey on
In paths that He decrees us,
Where His own feet before have gone,
Our strength, our hope, our Jesus;
In lowly fellowship with Him
The cross appointed bearing;
For O a crown no grief can dim
One day we shall be wearing.

O ’twill be passing sweet to gaze
On Him in all His glory;
And lost in love and glad amaze
To shout redemption’s story;
Till angels bend to catch the strain
Our human lips are swelling,
And “worthy is the Lamb once slain,”
Resounds through Heaven’s high dwelling.