Bible Songs — Scriptures, Law, Sabbath

Give Me the Bible

Give me the Bible, star of gladness gleaming,

No. 1300
Tune GIVE ME THE BIBLE.
Words Priscilla J. Owens.
Music E. S. Lorenz.
Key A-flat major
Singing key A♭ major
Time 4/4
4 stanzas

Words

Give me the Bible, star of gladness gleaming,To cheer the wand'rer lone and tempest-tossed;No storm can hide that peaceful radiance beaming,Since Jesus came to seek and save the lost.

Give me the Bible when my heart is broken,When sin and grief have filled my soul with fear;Give me the precious words by Jesus spoken,Hold up faith's lamp to show my Saviour near.

Give me the Bible, all my steps enlighten,Teach me the danger of these realms below;That lamp of safety, o'er the gloom shall brighten,That light alone the path of peace can show.

Give me the Bible, lamp of life immortal,Hold up that splendor by the open grave;Show me the light from heaven's shining portal,Show me the glory gilding Jordan's wave.

Chorus.

Give me the Bible,—holy message shining,Thy light shall guide me in the narrow way.

D. S.—Precept and promise, law and love combining,Till night shall vanish in eternal day.

About this hymn

As printed As printed: no running head on p. 511 (the page opens with the hymn); hymn number «1300» (large, left), title «Give Me the Bible.» centred (condensed capitals and small capitals: «G», «M», «B» full capitals); under it the epigraph in one line of roman, «"Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path."—Ps. 119 : 105.» (old-style figures); on the next line «PRISCILLA J. OWENS.» at the left (words) and «E. S, LORENZ.» at the right (music), both in capitals and small capitals (the mark after «S» looks like a comma — probably a damaged period; written «E. S. Lorenz.»). No meter, no tune name other than the title, no reference line. All four stanzas are interlinear, numbered «1.»–«4.», between the staves of systems 1–3 (up to «Fine.»); «CHORUS.» (bold capitals) stands over the end of system 3, and the chorus words are printed once, under systems 3–4 («Give me the Bi-ble,—» on the second lyric row of system 3). Under the bass staff of systems 2–3, in italics, the words sung after the «D. S.» (from the segno to «Fine.»): «D. S.—Pre - cept and prom - ise, law and love com - bin - ing, / Till night shall van - ish in e - ter - nal day.» Under the music, centred: «From "Holy Voices," by permission.». Each printed line of words carries one or two verse lines; they are given here one verse line per line. The words divided under the notes are joined here («Bi-ble», «glad-ness», «bro-ken», «en-light-en», «im-mor-tal», «wan-d'rer», «dan-ger», «splen-dor», «be-low», «o-pen», «pre-cious», «safe-ty», «peace-ful», «Je-sus», «spo-ken», «shin-ing», «por-tal», «a-lone», «glo-ry», «Sav-iour», «gild-ing», «Jor-dan's», «ho-ly», «mes-sage», «nar-row», «Pre-cept», «prom-ise», «com-bin-ing», «van-ish», «e-ter-nal») — the divisions are in `lyrics_syllables.txt`; «tempest-tossed» keeps its printed word hyphen. Systems 2 and 3 are blurred in this copy (ink set off over the first words of each line); every word was read at 2.2× (see `uncertainties.md`). The print sets a thin space before «;» («tossed ;», «fear ;», «low ;», «grave ;»); it is closed up here; the curly apostrophes are written straight («wan-d'rer», «o'er», «heaven's», «faith's», «Jordan's»). Spelling («Saviour», «splendor»), capitals and punctuation are the print's.