[Page 101]

CHRIST the Friend of Sinners.

I.
1 WHERE shall my wond'ring Soul begin?
2 How shall I All to Heaven aspire?
3 A Slave redeem'd from Death and Sin,
4 A Brand pluck'd from Eternal Fire,
5 How shall I equal Triumphs raise,
6 And sing my great Deliverer's Praise!
II.
7 O how shall I the Goodness tell,
8 Father, which Thou to me hast show'd,
9 That I, a Child of Wrath, and Hell,
10 I should be call'd a Child of GOD!
11 Should know, should feel my Sins forgiven,
12 Blest with this Antepast of Heaven!
[Page 102]
III.
13 And shall I slight my Father's Love,
14 Or basely fear his Gifts to own?
15 Unmindful of his Favours prove?
16 Shall I the hallow'd Cross to shun
17 Refuse his Righteousness t'impart
18 By hiding it within my Heart?
IV.
19 No — tho' the Antient Dragon rage
20 And call forth all his Hosts to War,
21 Tho' Earth's self-righteous Sons engage;
22 Them, and their God alike I dare:
23 JESUS the Sinner's Friend proclaim,
24 JESUS, to Sinners still the same.
V.
25 Outcasts of Men, to You I call,
26 Harlots and Publicans, and Thieves!
27 He spreads his Arms t'embrace you all;
28 Sinners alone his Grace receives:
29 No Need of Him the Righteous have,
30 He came the Lost to seek and save!
VI.
31 Come all ye Magdalens in Lust,
32 Ye Ruffians fell in Murders old;
33 Repent, and live: despair and trust!
34 JESUS for you to Death was sold;
35 Tho' Hell protest, and Earth repine,
36 He died for Crimes like Yours — and Mine.
VII.
37 Come O my guilty Brethren come,
38 Groaning beneath your Load of Sin!
[Page 103]
39 His bleeding Heart shall make you room,
40 His open Side shall take you in.
41 He calls you Now, invites you home —
42 Come, O my guilty Brethren, come!
VIII.
43 For you the purple Current flow'd
44 In Pardons from his wounded Side:
45 Languish'd for you th' Eternal GOD,
46 For you the Prince of Glory dy'd.
47 Believe; and all your Guilt's forgiven,
48 Only Believe — and yours is Heaven.

Text

  • TEI/XML [chunk] (XML - 97K / ZIP - 10K) / ECPA schema (RNC - 357K / ZIP - 73K)
  • Plain text [excluding paratexts] (TXT - 1.8K / ZIP - 1.1K)

Facsimile (Source Edition)

(Page images digitized from a copy in the Bodleian Library [Vet. A4 f. 254].)

Images

PDF

All Images (PDF - 4.0M)

About this text

Title (in Source Edition): CHRIST the Friend of Sinners.
Author: Rev. Charles Wesley
Themes:
Genres: hymn

Text view / Document view

Source edition

Wesley, John, 1703-1791. Wesley, Charles, 1707-1788. Hymns and sacred poems: Published by John Wesley, ... and Charles Wesley, ... London: printed by William Strahan; and sold by James Hutton; and at Mr. Bray's, 1739, pp. 101-103. x,[6],223,[1]p.; 12⁰. (ESTC T31323; OTA K034809.000) (Page images digitized from a copy in the Bodleian Library [Vet. A4 f. 254].)

Editorial principles

The text has been typographically modernized, but without any silent modernization of spelling, capitalization, or punctuation. The source of the text is given and all editorial interventions have been recorded in textual notes. Based on the electronic text originally produced by the TCP project, this ECPA text has been edited to conform to the recommendations found in Level 5 of the Best Practices for TEI in Libraries version 4.0.0.

Other works by Rev. Charles Wesley