'"
At least three English metrical renderings of _Benedicite_ exist, one
of the 18th and two of the 19th century, by J. Merrick, J.S. Blackie,
and Richard Wilton respectively. The first of these writers, who expands
freely, concludes with a stanza designed to put the Song unmistakeably
into the mouths of the Three:
Let us, who now impassive stand,
Plac'd by the Tyrant's stern Command
Amid the fiery Blaze,
(While thus we triumph in the Flame)
Rise, and our Maker's Love proclaim
In hymns of endless praise.
The objection that in using this hymn we pray to angels and heavens, to
ice and snow, etc., shews how hard it is to find reasonable cause of
complaint against its use. (_See_ p. 62).
The whole canticle was however actually omitted in the P.B. printed at
Oxford in 1796, an edition notorious for the liberties taken with the
book in many ways (A.J. Stephens' _P.B._, Lond. 1849).[28] The last
verse, "O Ananias," etc., which was omitted in the United States' P.B.
is, as well as the above, dealt with under 'Theology,' p.
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