Edmund Sears

Edmund Hamilton Sears (April 6, 1810 – January 14, 1876) was a Unitarian parish minister and author who wrote a number of theological works influencing 19th century liberal Protestants. Sears is known today primarily as the man who penned the words to "It Came Upon A Midnight Clear" in 1849.

"Peace on the earth, good will to man
From Heaven’s all gracious King."
The world in solemn stillness lay
To hear the angels sing.

Quotes

• Death is a stage in human progress, to be passed as we would pass from childhood to youth, or from youth to manhood, and with the same consciousness of an everlasting nature.
  • Reported in Josiah Hotchkiss Gilbert, Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), p. 177.

• Calm on the listening ear of night
  Come Heaven’s melodious strains,
  Where wild Judea stretches far
  Her silver-mantled plains.
  • Christmas Song, reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919).

• It came upon the midnight clear,
  That glorious song of old,
  From Angels bending near the earth
  To touch their harps of gold;
  "Peace on the earth, good will to man
  From Heaven’s all gracious King."
  The world in solemn stillness lay
  To hear the angels sing.
  • The Angels' Song ("It Came Upon A Midnight Clear", 1849).

• For lo! the days are hastening on,
  By prophet-bards foretold,
  When with the ever-circling years,
  Comes round the age of gold;
  When Peace shall over all the earth
  Its ancient splendors fling
  And the whole world send back the song
  Which now the angels sing.
  • The Angels' Song ("It Came Upon A Midnight Clear", 1849).