"O Day of Rest and Gladness"

I think I've actually run out of things to write about in Lenten hymns (excepting those specifically for Holy Week), so here are some things I noticed about "O Day of Rest and Gladness" back in June.

Because I found so many little things, I'm going to go through the hymn in sections of two phrases each.  The tune is "Ellacombe."

The first two phrases:

In the fourth verse, the text here is "That light our hope sustaining / We walk the pilgrim way."  "Walk" is sung with a melisma (E F#), musically giving a sense of movement.  As a whole, the second phrase here is completely conjunct (it doesn't skip any notes in the scale), which gives a sense of walking step by step.

The second two phrases:

In the second verse, the text is "This day for our salvation / Christ rose from depths of earth."  The "rose" is sung with an ascending melisma (E F#), musically giving a sense of the word's meaning.

In the fourth verse, the text is "At length our rest attaining, / Our endless Sabbath day."  Here, "endless" is sung with a melisma (E F# G), for a musical sense of duration.

The third two phrases:

In the first verse, the text is "This day the high and lowly / Through ages joined to bless."  One of the notes to which "lowly" is sung (F#) is the lowest in the phrase, musically giving a sense of the word's meaning.  Incidentally, "high and lowly" is an instance of a merism.

The fourth two phrases:

In the first verse, the text is "Sing, 'Holy, holy, holy,' / The triune God confess," and in the second verse, the text is "And thus this day more glorious / A threefold light was giv'n."  "Triune" and "threefold" are both sung to three notes (E F# G), so there's a musical picture of that number.

In the fourth verse, the text is "The Church her voice upraises / To Thee, blest Three in One."  "Upraises" is sung to a (generally) ascending group of notes (G B C D), musically giving a sense of that "uprais[ing]."