March 29, 1788

Charles Wesley (December 18, 1707 to March 29, 1788) with his brother John, is counted an early leader of Methodism. While John Wesley is more famous as a church father, we remember Charles Wesley as a voluminous writer of church hymns. This summary from the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, is preceded by a bit about the death of Charles Wesley, as we go back in time.

'In 1788 [Charles] Wesley's health deteriorated, and despite John's characteristic optimism that travel and folk-remedies would revive his brother, Charles died at home, aged eighty, of exhaustion on 29 March 1788. It is symptomatic of the brothers' ecclesiastical differences that John was buried behind his City Road Chapel, denying the notion of consecrated ground. Charles, however, was interred in the graveyard of his parish church, St Mary's, Marylebone,... his pall borne by eight clergymen of the Church of England... Charles's family had so little money at the time of his death that his funeral expenses were defrayed by his friends......

'Charles Wesley has long been regarded as the greatest of English hymn writers, yet in range and intention he was really a writer of 'sacred poems' as well. Of his 9000 poems, 'hymns' (depending on definition) form between one- and two-thirds of the total. It is only fairly recently that he has received recognition as a poet because hymns have commonly been regarded as too limited in content, metre, and purpose to be assessed as poetry. Charles habitually expressed his feelings and beliefs on a wide range of religiously orientated private and public concerns in verse...

'Charles's mind was pervasively furnished with material and images from the classics, the Book of Common Prayer, and English poetry, but above all from the Bible. All these materials were adapted to express Christian experience, above all the love of God. The boundary between sacred and secular here was easily crossed-some poems to his future wife were later adapted as hymns. What has been termed his 'physicality', even 'carnality', did undoubtedly cause uneasiness in later minds. However, to early Methodists Wesley showed that body as well as mind and feelings could express religion, a belief which informed some of the dancing metres and rhythms used in his writing. Like Isaac Watts he adapted literary culture to the needs of less educated readers, but with a much more remarkable range of metres and technical poetic skills. Ideas and images were transmuted and compressed into a few compelling words, simplicity being varied with dramatic use of Latinate words to express feelings or theological paradoxes: 'indissolubly joined', 'inextinguishable blaze',

'"Our God contracted to a span,
Incomprehensibly made man."

'Methodists unaware of Charles's subtle skills nevertheless unconsciously absorbed a measure of theology and culture as well as expressing their faith and feelings.'

They did not absorb some sentiments, such as "charming pieces for his children," because lines like these, on the family cat: 

"I sing Grimalkin brave and bold 
Who makes intruders fly ..."

were unpublished verse.