A song and a car­ol
For Christ­mas­tide
Of the Prince of the Gold­en Shore,
Whom ar­mies of light,
In their ves­ture bright,
Love, serve, and ad­ore ev­er­more.
Far, far be­low,
Where the sun­beams glow
On a realm of His wide do­main,
Sad ru­in and woe,
Hath come through His foe,
With trou­ble and sor­row and pain.

And sad is the sigh­ing
When death’s dark wings
Over pa­ra­dise dark­ly loom;
And dark the des­pair
Of the lost ones there,
Awaiting their last fa­tal doom.
When thus spake the Prince
To His Fa­ther dear—
Now life with a life I will buy,
Bring help from above
For the sons of My love,
For them I will suf­fer and die!

Away and away
To the far off land,
When the full­ness of time was come,
Now speed­eth the Lord
Of the Gold­en Strand
From His fair ev­er­last­ing home.
So down be­low,
And un­stained by sin,
In a man­ger born will He be;
Thereby a lost world
He did en­ter in,
To set the loved cap­tives free!

And bright was the car­ol,
And loud the song
Which burst from the sil­ver sky,
When en­ter­ing lowly
Earth’s sons among
He was seen by the hosts on high.
While song shall re­sound,
As the years go round,
Till the moon and the stars shall cease;
All glo­ry and praise
To the An­cient of Days,
And to men be good will and peace!