O’er hill and vale and tem­ple proud
When Je­sus died for man,
There hung in air a sa­ble shroud
To mark the bit­ter ban—
The ban of death on sin­ners laid,
The dread­ful debt Em­ma­nu­el paid!

Well might the sun of na­ture hide
Its match­less lamp of light,
And veil, while its cre­at­or died,
All ra­di­an­cy in night:
How could the small­est star il­lume
The depth of such in­fer­nal gloom!

Oh! dire­ful dark­ness—un­al­loyed,
Of hor­ror most pro­found—
Emblem of what the cross de­stroyed
And le­veled with the ground;
When, burst­ing through the reams of hell,
It beamed with light in­ef­fa­ble!

Lord! by that dark­ness, from this soul
All dark­ness roll away—
Nor let a shade of sin con­trol
My pro­gress t’wards the day:
That day, with an un­cloud­ed sky,
Of Heav’n—in full eter­ni­ty!