Come Down, O Love Divine
A prayer asking the Holy Spirit to come, fill the heart, and make it humble and loving.
The words are public domain. We print a hymn only after checking it word for word against a dated old printing, and this one hasn’t been checked yet. Hymnary has it now.
“Come Down, O Love Divine” at HymnaryAbout this hymn
This hymn is a prayer to the Holy Spirit. It asks the Spirit to come near, to burn away what is wrong in us, and to give a humble and loving heart.
It rests on Jesus' promise in John 14 that the Father would send the Spirit to live with his followers, and on the coming of the Spirit in Acts 2.
It is often sung on the Day of Pentecost. Bianco da Siena wrote the Italian original around 1400; Richard Littledale translated it into English in 1867.
For musicians and planners
| Words | Bianco da Siena | Public domain |
|---|---|---|
| Translation | Richard Frederick Littledale, 1867 | Public domain |
| Tune | DOWN AMPNEY · Ralph Vaughan Williams, 1906 | Public domain in the US |
Checked 2026-09-27 against hymnary.org text, tune and person pages (attribution and rights only). The words are not transcribed here yet.
Hymn numbers checked against Hymnary.org’s index of Evangelical Lutheran Worship. Full record: Hymnary.