Hark the glad sound! The Saviour comes

Hark the glad sound! The Saviour comes. Philip Doddridge* (1702-1751). Included in the Church of Scotland’s Translations and Paraphrases of Several Passages of Scripture (1754), it was also published as no. 203 in Hymns Founded on Various Texts in the Holy Scriptures (Salop, 1755), edited by Doddridge’s friend Job Orton, with the title ‘Christ’s message. Luke iv. 18, 19’. The manuscript is dated 28 December 1735. This is a hymn for Advent, but the text on which it is based concerns the preaching of Christ in the synagogue. The hymn follows the scriptural account closely, especially in verse 3 of the usual text: ‘he hath sent me to heal the broken-hearted, to preach deliverance to the...