A Civil War song from 1862.
words by Julia Ward Howe
music by William Steffe
This patriotic song links the judgement of the wicked at the end of time with the Civil War. The Glory Hallelujah refrain came first. It started developing around 1800. Then in the 1850s a Methodist hymn “Say, Brothers, Will You Meet Us” included it. The five verses seen here were written for the Atlantic Monthly magazine in 1861. It was probably inspired by the military song John Brown’s Body which was being sung just before the war.
The sheet music:
Accompaniment by W. Tomaschewski:
Lyrics
- Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord
He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored
He hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword
His truth is marching on.
Chorus:
Glory, glory, glory hallelujah! Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Glory, glory, hallelujah! His truth is marching on
- I have seen Him in the watch-fires of a hundred circling camps
They have builded Him an altar in the evening dews and damps
I can read His righteous sentence by the dim and flaring lamps
His day is marching on - I have read a fiery gospel writ in burnished rows of steel
“As ye deal with my contemners, so with you my grace shall deal”
Let the Hero, born of woman, crush the serpent with his heel
Since God is marching on - He has sounded forth the trumpet that shall never call retreat
He is sifting out the hearts of men before His judgment-seat
Oh, be swift, my soul, to answer Him! Be jubilant, my feet!
Our God is marching on - In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea
With a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me
As He died to make men holy, let us die to make men free
While God is marching on
Sung here by Fred Feild: