Bible Songs — Reward of Saints

The Half has Never been Told

I'll sing you a song of a city

No. 1350
Tune THE HALF HAS NEVER BEEN TOLD.
Words F. E. B.
Music F. E. Belden.
Key A-flat major
Singing key A♭ major
Time 6/8
4 stanzas

Words

I'll sing you a song of a cityWhich mortals have never yet seen,I'll sing you a song of a countryWhose valleys forever are green;Whose murmuring streamlets and fountainsThe ransomed ones soon shall behold,The glorious light of whose mountainsNo tongue has ever yet told.

Chorus.

The half has never been told,The half has never been told;O, wonderful kingdom of glory!The half has never been told.

I'll sing of those beautiful mansionsThe Saviour has gone to prepare;I'll sing of the noontide of gloryThat lingers eternally there;I'll sing of life's tree and life's river,I'll sing of the streets of pure gold:Tho' thousands have sung of these glories,The half has never been told.

I'll sing you a song of the loved onesWe'll meet on those beautiful plains,Where sorrow and death cannot enter,Where friendship forevermore reigns;I'll sing of the life that's unending,Of songs that shall never grow old,Whose heavenly harmonies blending,Are robed in beauty untold.

But hark! there is something more preciousThan all of these pleasures so rare,—The hope of beholding my Saviour,—The promise of knowing him thereWho trod the rough pathway before usThose portals of bliss to unfold—Who suffered and died to restore us:His love can never be told.

About this hymn

As printed As printed on p. 560 (PDF 561): hymn number «1350» (large) at the left, title «THE HALF HAS NEVER BEEN TOLD.» centred (condensed capitals and small capitals); under it the epigraph in two lines of smaller roman (given below; the thin spaces around the colon of the reference closed up); «F. E. B.» (the words) at the left and «F. E. BELDEN.» (the music, capitals and small capitals) at the right; under them, in italics, «Andante with expression.» and «[Respectfully dedicated to Ira D. Sankey.]»; «Copyrighted 1886 by F. E. Belden.» centred under the music, folio «560» below it. The song runs over to p. 561 (PDF 562) under the heading «THE HALF HAS NEVER BEEN TOLD.—Concluded.»: the CHORUS, two systems at the top of the page, ending with a final bar, folio «561». No meter, no tune name other than the title, no reference line. The four stanzas are interlinear under the melody staff of the four systems of p. 560, numbered «1.»–«4.» in system 1; the CHORUS is printed once and is sung after every stanza. Each printed line of words carries two verse lines; they are given here one verse line per line, by the rhymes (seen/green, behold/told; prepare/there, gold/told; plains/reigns, old/untold; rare/there, unfold/told) and the capitals that open them. The print sets a thin space before «;», «:» and «!»; it is closed up here; apostrophes and quotation marks are written straight («I'll», «We'll», «life's», «that's», «Tho'»). Words divided under the notes are joined («cit - y», «beau - ti - ful», «Sav - iour», «pre - pare», «coun - try», «glo - ry», «lin - gers», «e - ter - nal-ly», «sor-row», «can - not», «en - ter», «for - ev - er», «for - ev-ermore», «be - hold - ing», «prom - ise», «mur - mur - ing», «fount-ains», «be - hold», «riv - er», «un - end - ing», «nev-er», «be - fore», «por - tals», «un - fold», «glo - ri - ous», «ev - er», «glo - ries», «heaven - ly», «har - mo - nies», «blend - ing», «beau - ty», «un - told», «suf-fered», «re - store»; chorus «nev - er», «won - der - ful», «king-dom», «glo - ry»); «noon-tide» and «path-way» are written «noontide» and «pathway» (see uncertainties.md). Spelling («Saviour»), capitals and punctuation are the print's: stanza 4, line 4 ends «there» with no stop, and the dashes of stanza 4 («rare,—», «Saviour,—», «unfold—») are the print's.