The heavenly Child in stature grows

The heavenly Child in stature grows. Jean-Baptiste de Santeuil* (1630-1697), translated by John Chandler* (1806-1876) and others. The Latin text, beginning ‘Divine crescebas puer’, was first published in de Santeuil’s Hymni Sacri et Novi (1689), in four stanzas. A doxology was added when it was published in the Paris Breviary of 1736: Qui natus es de virgine, Jesu, tibi sit Gloria Cum Patre cumque Spiritu In sempiterna saecula. It was the hymn for Lauds on Sundays from the Feast of the Circumcision to the Presentation in the Temple. Chandler’s translation, beginning ‘In stature grows the heavenly child’, was published in The Hymns of the Primitive Church (1837), where it began: In stature...