Wesley Corpus

Last updated: December 5, 2009. 2This survives in the remnants of his personal library at Wesley's House, London. Nativity Hymns (1745)1 Baker list, 112 Editorial Introduction: Charles Wesley deeply appreciated the value of celebrating the major Christian festivals connected to the life of Christ. This is evident from the first volume containing his poetry, Hymns and Sacred Poems (1739), which included (on pp. 206-15) a series of hymns on Christmas Day, Epiphany, Easter Day, Ascension Day and Whitsunday (Pentecost) all clearly traced to Charles. Of all these festivals, regular celebration of Christmas held Charles's deepest interest. He apparently arranged for reprinting the Christmas hymn in HSP (1739) as a broadsheet for use on Christmas 1743 see Hymn for Christmas Day (1743). The following year he issued a collection of 3-4 hymns for this purpose see Hymns for Christmas Day (1744). Then, in preparation for Christmas 1745, he issued a collection of 18 new Hymns for the Nativity of our Lord. This collection contains some of Wesley's most creative work. There are 14 different metrical patterns represented, nearly a unique pattern for each hymn. Likewise, they contain some of his most compelling images about the paradoxical affirmation of the Divine becoming human. While it is little known among Methodists today, this collection was also a favorite of early Methodists. As the list of editions on the next page shows, it went through at least 25 printings in Britain before Charles's death. The textual history of this collection is more complex than most of Charles's pamphlets. The first edition was printed in London on December 17, 1745. An edition followed briefly after in Bristol which made a few small corrections and one large omission: the final hymn was not included. It is unclear if this was intentional, as Charles was in London at the time and would not have been supervising the process in Bristol. This defective Bristol copy served as the source for the reprint editions in Dublin in 1747, 1751 1760, as well as the 5th edn. (1756) and 6th edn. (1761) in Bristol. By contrast, the 4th edn. (1750) in Bristol restored the last hymn, perhaps at Charles's direction. John Wesley's input provoked some of the other textual changes in later editions of Nativity Hymns. In his personal copy of the 4th edn.