Bible Songs — Scriptures, Law, Sabbath

To Obey is Better than Sacrifice

To obey is better than sacrifice, the Lord hath said;

No. 1308
Tune TO OBEY IS BETTER THAN SACRIFICE.
Words F. E. B.
Music F. E. Belden.
Key B-flat major
Singing key B♭ major
Time 6/8
3 stanzas

Words

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To obey is better than sacrifice, the Lord hath said;To hearken when he commandeth, than an off'ring made.

All ye who say, "There is naught to do since Christ doth save,"Remember what he commands you in the Book he gave.

Remember only the doers of the word are blest;'Tis well to hear and believe it, but to do is best.

Chorus.

Turn to the Lord, and he will be gracious,Walk in the way of his commandments.To obey is better than sacrifice, the Lord hath said;To hearken when he commandeth, than an off'ring made.

About this hymn

As printed As printed: no running head on p. 519 (the page opens with the hymn); hymn number «1308» (large, left), title «To Obey is Better than Sacrifice.» centred (condensed capitals and small capitals: «T», «O», «B», «S» full capitals); under it the epigraph in two lines of roman, «"Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the voice of the Lord ? Behold, to obey / is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams."—1 Sam. 15 : 22.» (old-style figures); on the next line «F. E. B.» at the left (the words) and «F. E. BELDEN.» at the right (the music, capitals and small capitals). No meter, no tune name other than the title, no reference line. The three stanzas are interlinear, numbered «1.»–«3.», between the staves of system 1 and the first half of system 2 (to «made.» / «gave.» / «best.»); «CHORUS.» (bold capitals) stands over the second half of system 2, and the chorus words are printed once, under systems 2–4 («Turn to the Lord, and he will be gracious,» on the second lyric row of system 2). Under the music, centred: «Copyrighted 1886 by F. E. Belden.». In stanza 3 the words «do-ers» and «do» are printed in italic. Each printed line of words carries a verse line and the start of the next; the verse lines are given here one per line (each stanza is two long lines, rhyming «save,"/gave.» and «blest;/best.»); the words broken by the end of a system are joined («com- / mandeth» → «commandeth», «com- / mands» → «commands», «be- / lieve» → «believe»), and the words divided under the notes are joined too («o-bey», «sac-ri-fice», «heark-en», «of-f'ring», «Re-mem-ber», «on-ly», «do-ers», «com-mand-eth», «gra-cious») — the divisions are in `lyrics_syllables.txt`. The print sets a thin space before «;» and «?» («said ;», «blest ;», «Lord ?»); it is closed up here; the curly quotes and apostrophes are written straight («f'ring», «'Tis»). Spelling, capitals and punctuation are the print's.