Through All the World Below

SATB/piano – also can be sung a cappella – words and soprano, bass by Jeremiah Ingalls, tenor traditional – alto and piano by Peter Amidon

Free download. You get a pdf of the piano/vocal score, and mp3 of the recording, rehearsal mp3s of each of the vocal parts, and an mp3 of piano-0nly.  In the Amidons’ book “Fifty-five Anthems for the Small Church Choir“. Sung by the Friends-of-the-Amidons-Singers. Words (by Vermont’s Jeremiah Ingalls) and music (soprano, tenor, bass) are straight from the Southern Harmony, first published in 1844, where it is titled “Captain Kidd” as the tune is from an old ballad about the pirate Captain Kidd.  Peter has added an alto line and an optional simple piano accompaniment. A wonderful hymn to the earth.

The Bread & Puppet Theater famously starts each of its Pageant performances with a singing of this song to Mother Earth.

LYRICS

Through All the World Below
Jeremiah Ingalls

Through all the world below, God is seen all around;
Search hills and valleys through, There he’s found.
The growing of the corn, The lily and the thorn,
The pleasant and forlorn, All declare God is there.
In the meadows dressed in green, There he’s seen.

See springs and water rise, Fountains flow, rivers run;
The mist below the skies hides the sun;
Then down the rain doth pour The ocean it doth roar,
And dash against the shore, All to praise, in their lays,
That God that ne’er declines His designs.

The sun, to my surprise _Speaks of God as he flies:
The comets in their blaze Give him praise;
The shining of the stars The moon as it appears,
His sacred name declares; See them shine, all divine!
The shades in silence prove God’s above.

Then let my station be Here on earth, as I see
The sacred One in Three All agree;
Through all the world is made, The forest and the glade;
Nor let me be afraid. Though I dwell on the hill
Since nature’s works declare God is there.