I To Your Savior Belong

This is more of a note than an essay. Bess and I sang 384 PANTING FOR HEAVEN (not painting for heaven, thank you very much, Google) as part of our morning devotions today and we got to wondering about the words:

Oh, when will the period appear,
When I shall unite in your song?
I’m weary of lingering here,
And I to your Savior belong.

I’m fettered and chained up in clay;
I struggle and pant to be free:
I long to be soaring away,
My God and my Savior to see.

Who is the your or “unite in your song” and “your Savior belong”?

It turns out to be the angels and saints in heaven, if we look at the original poem, first published in 1791. It is by Maria De Fleury, from her book, Divine Poems and Essays on Various Subjects. 

AN HYMN

Ye ANGELS, who stand round the throne,
And see my IMMANUEL's face,
In rapturous songs make him known,
Tune, tune your soft harps to his praise:
He form'd you the SPIRITS you are,
So noble, so happy, so good,
While others sunk down in despair,
Confirm'd by his power, you stood.

Ye SAINTS, who stand nearer than they,
And cast your bright crowns at his feet,
His GRACE and his GLORY display,
O tell of his love as is meet;
He sav'd you from HELL, and the GRAVE,
He ransom'd from DEATH and DESPAIR,
For you he was MIGHTY to SAVE,
Almighty to bring you safe there.

O when will the period appear
When I shall unite in your song!
I'm weary of lingering here,
And I to your SAVIOUR belong!
I'm fetter'd, and chain'd up in clay,
I struggle and pant to be free,
I long to be soaring away,
My GOD and my SAVIOUR to see.

I want to put on my attire,
Wash'd white in the BLOOD of the LAMB,
I want to be one of your choir,
And tune my sweet harp to his name:
I want—O I want to be there,
(Where SORROW and SIN bid adieu,)
Your Joy and your FRIENDSHIP to share,
To wonder and worship with you.

Notes

Saints, for a Baptist like De Fleury, wouldn’t necessarily mean a person of “heroic virtue,” but all believers; in this case, the believers in heaven.

If you haven’t listened to Jeni & Billy’s version of Longing of Heaven, you’re in for a treat.

Maria De Fleury, a Dissenting Baptist pamphleteer and poet, seems like an interesting woman. See the Wikipedia article (Maria De Fleury), or this biography at The New Historia: Maria De Fleury. She’s buried in the same graveyard as Isaac Watts.

De Fleury wrote a parody of “Flow Gently Sweet Afton,” called “Sweet Gliding Kedron.” Honestly, I don’t think it’s very good, but it did make it into The Southern Harmony.