LUMEN HILARE

The text of this hymn, one of several very similar hymns, is sometimes attributed to St. Francis Xavier, but is of uncertain date and authorship. The hymn has been appropriately styled the "love-sigh" of St. Francis Xavier who, it is fairly certain, composed the original Spanish sonnet "No me meuve, mi Dios, para quererte"—on which the various Latin hymn versions are based, about the year 1546. There is not, however, sufficient reason for crediting to him any Latin versions of the hymn.

 

The Scriptural basis might well be 2 Corinthians 5:14-15, or perhaps better still 1 John 4:19 — "Let us therefore love God, because God hath first loved us".

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The music is known as an eighteenth century traditional source, sometimes attributed as an arrangement, to Nicola Montani of the twentieth century.