Bethlehem of noblest cities

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Bethlehem, of noblest cities
None can once with thee compare:
Thou alone the Lord from heaven
Didst for us Incarnate bear.

Fairer than the sun at morning
Was the star that told his birth
To the lands their God announcing,
Hid beneath a form of earth.

By its lambent beauty guided,
See, the Eastern Kings appear
See them bend, their gifts to offer—
Gifts of incense, gold and myrrh.

Solemn things of mystick meaning—
Incense doth the God disclose:
Gold a Royal child proclaimeth:
Myrrh a future tomb foreshows,

Holy Jesu, in thy brightness
To the Gentile world display’d,
With the Father and the Spirit
Praise eterne to thee be paid. Amen.