Sol praeceps rapitur

Sol praeceps rapitur. Latin, author and date unknown. The date of this hymn is uncertain. In Ulysse Chevalier’s Repertorium Hymnologicum (Louvain, 1892-1912, Brussels, 1920-21) it is listed as appearing in a book of 1805, Traité abr. Ste Volonté de Dieu, and it is found in Officium Sanctissimae Voluntatis Dei: The Office of the most holy Will of God, translated by Frederick Charles Husenbeth* (Norwich, 1846). It must have come to the notice of Edward Caswall*, who freely translated it, quoting the first line, ‘Sol praeceps rapitur, proxima nox adest’, in The Masque of Mary (1858). Caswall expanded the four stanzas of the Latin text to seven, in a lovely translation, ‘The sun is sinking...