Wesley Corpus

Secure of the celestial prize, Thou waitest now in paradise Till we are all convey'd By angels to our endless rest, Of thine and Jesu's joy possest, In Jesu's bosom laid. O when shall I be taken home! O that my latest change were come For which I wait in pain! Weary of life thro' inbred sin! Speak Jesu, speak the sinner clean, Nor let my faith be vain. O bid me live in thee and die: Why Saviour, let me ask thee, why Dost thou so long delay? A blessing hast thou not for me? O bid me live, and die in thee; My Jesus, come away. Another and another goes Thro' the dark vale to his repose, And glad resigns his breath; But I alas! must still remain, I cannot break my fleshly chain, Or overtake my death. I live and suffer all my care, The bondage of corruption bear, Page 263 And groan beneath my load, Struggles my spirit to get free, And pants for immortality, And reaches after God. But O! my strivings all are vain, Inevitable is my pain, Incurable my wound, Till Jesus ends my inward strife, And speaks me into second life, And I in Christ am found. See then I all at last resign, Thy will, O Lord, be done not mine, I give my murmurings o'er: Do with me now as seems thee meet, But let me suffer at thy feet, And teach my God no more. Part II.11 O death, thou art on every side, Thy thousand gates stand open wide The weary to receive: Yet I can find no rest for me, I suffer all my misery, And still alas I live! Still my imprison'd spirit waits; In vain for me thy thousand gates 11Manuscript precursors of Part II appear in MS Richmond Tracts, 7-8; MS Shent, 155a-155b; and MS Thirty, 84-85. Page 264 Stand open day and night, And other souls their exit make, On every moment's wings they take Their everlasting flight. Envious I hear the passing-bell With sweetly-melancholy knell Their happy change declare: But I can see no end of strife, Th' intolerable load of life I still am forc'd to bear. Weary of life in pain I breathe, With blind desire I covet death, But cannot find it nigh; Unsav'd and unredeem'd from sin, Unchang'd, unholy, and unclean, Yet still I long to die.