https://contentdm.lib.BYU.edu/digital/c ... 46/id/9394A VOICE FROM THE PROPHET.
“COME TO ME”
BY W.W. PHELPS, ESQ.
—TUNE—“Indian Hunter”—
Come to me, will ye come to the saints that have died —
To the next better world, Where the righteous reside;
Where the angels and spirits in harmony be.
In the joys of a vast Paradise? Come to me.
Come to me where the truth and the virtues prevail;
Where the union is one, and the years never fail;
Where the heart can’t conceive, nor the natural eye see, What the Lord has prepar’d for the just: Come to me.
Come to me where there is no destruction or war;
Neither tyrants, nor mobbers, or nations ajar;
Where the system is perfect, and happiness free,
And the life is eternal with God: Come to me.
Come to me, will ye come to the mansions above
Where the bliss and the knowledge, the light, and the love, And the glory of God, do eternally be?
Death, the wages of sin, is not here: Come to me.
Come to me, here are Adam and Eve at the head
Of a multitude quicken’d and rais’d from the dead:
Here’s the knowledge that was, or that is, or will be—
In the gen’ral assembly of worlds: Come to me.
Come to me; here’s the myst’ry that man hath not seen; Here’s our Father in heaven, and Mother, the Queen,
Here are worlds that have been, and the worlds yet to be, Here’s eternity,—endless; amen: Come to me.
Come to me all ye faithful and blest of Nauvoo:
Come ye Twelve, and ye High Priests, and Seventies, too; Come ye Elders, and all of the great company;—
When you’ve finish’d your work on the earth: Come to me,
Come to me; here’s the future, the present and past:
Here is Alpha, Omega, the first and the last;
Here’s the fountain, the ‘river of life’, and the Tree;
Here’s your Prophet and Seer, JOSEPH SMITH: Come to me.
Michael Hicks provided some additional information about the hymn in a 1985 Dialogue article:
Michael Hicks, “Poetic Borrowing in Early Mormonism,” Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought 18/1 (Spring 1985): 140-141.A major new hymn by Phelps, also written for the dedication of the Seventies Hall, adapted yet another secular song, “The Indian Hunter.” The new song, entitled “A Voice from the Prophet: Come to Me,”was in fact a reworking of an earlier and now better-known poem by Phelps called “Vade Mecum” or “Go with Me” — a preface to a versification of Joseph’s account of the vision of degrees of glory. The song Phelps had in mind was a mock-Indian lament, sung (in the first person) to the oppressive white man. The Indian narrator describes the love of his family, the beauties of the “far distant west” and of his “fair forest home,” then pleads to be set free to go to them: each verse begins and ends with the words, “Let me go.” Phelps’s adaptation for the Seventies Hall dedication turns the song into a plea by Joseph to “come to me . . . to the next better world . . . [to] the joys of a vast Paradise.” Each verse begins and ends with the words “come to me.” “The Indian Hunter” no doubt appealed to the Saints’ sympathy for the red man. “Come to Me” capitalized on the song’s appeal and for a brief moment took its place in the Mormon sun — and on the poetry page of the Times and Seasons.
Merry Smithmas to all!
