(concluded)

II. English Translations.

The four stanzas given by Wade have formed the basis of every English translation, from the earliest— which, according to Julian, is that beginning ‘Draw near, ye faithful Christians,’ in the Evening Office of the Church (1760)—to the present time. The rendering, however, upon which the version in most general use is based, and indeed which it mostly follows, is that made by the late Canon Oakeley in 1841 for Margaret Street Chapel (the forerunner of All Saints’, Margaret Street) of which he was then incumbent. According to Julian, ‘it was never published by the translator, but came into notice by being sung in his chapel.’ This began,‘Ye faithful, approach ye.’ The usual version, ‘O come, all ye faithful,’ appeared in Murray’s Hymnal (1852); Neale, in the Hymnal Noted (1854), has ‘Be present, ye faithful’—a much less singable rendering. (One sometimes wonders whether the quality of singableness appealed to Neale : it will be remembered that the first line of the hymn universally sung as ‘O come, O come, Emmanuel,’ was rendered by its translator ‘Draw nigh, draw nigh’ — almost impossible to sing with pleasure !) The general popularity of the Adeste undoubtedly dates from the publication of Hymns Ancient and Modern (1861); the second part of the Hymnal Noted in which it appeared was not as widely used as the earlier portion. A slightly altered version appeared in The Churck Psalter and Hymn Book (1854) by the Rev. W. Mercer, to whom the translation is sometimes attributed; this was at one time the most popular collection in Anglican use, and was in many respects a great advance on those—e.g. Bickersteth’s Christian Psalmody and Brady and Tate’s ‘new version’ of the Psalms appended to the Book of Common Prayer—which had previously held the field.