Two weeks ago, I transcribed "Savior, When in Dust to Thee," and I noticed something interesting about the rhyme scheme. The hymn is structured as perfectly rhyming couplets, with two exceptions. The lines "By the gloom that veiled the skies / O'er the dreadful sacrifice" have assonance (the long I sound) rather than a perfect rhyme, but the interesting exception to the perfectly rhyming couplets is in the lines "By the vault whose dark abode / Held in vain the rising God." "Abode" isn't even close to sounding like "God," and that difference is significant considering the lines they appear in. The "dark abode" of the grave doesn't have the power to hold Christ, and those imperfectly rhyming lines indicate that. The words themselves don't go together; it's "in vain" that the "dark abode" pairs with "God."
I referenced this hymn as it appears in Lutheran Worship too. Where The Lutheran Service Book has "Thee," Thy," and "Thine," Lutheran Worship has just "you" and "your," so the title is "Savior, When in Dust to You," but it too has this imperfect abode/God rhyme.
