We hate the sins that stain the past;
We would henceforth from them be free;
O grant us peaceful years, good Lord;
And we will spend them all to Thee.
We would that our good Father’s eye
Should look on us—but not in wrath;
And we, Thy children, year by year,
A purer song of praise pour forth. Amen.
When the hymn was selected for Hymns Ancient and Modern, the translation was altered into its present form. The last stanza is omitted in the Hymnary. The English and Latin are published in Hymns, Ancient and Modern, Historical Edition, London, Clowes, 1909.
MUSIC. TALLIS, also called “Tallis’ Ordinal,” is from The Whole Psalter translated into English Metre, which contayneth an hundreth and fifty Psalmes, a work by Matthew Parker, Archbishop of Canterbury, printed about 1561. At the end of the book are nine tunes in four parts by Thomas Tallis. This is the last of the nine and is set to the version of Veni Creator Spiritus, which appears in the English Prayer Book Ordinal. The tune was evidently derived by Tallis from a 15th-century English carol tune, “This endris Nyght”—for it is an adaptation to common time of the first two lines of this carol melody.