Charles Wesley

Charles Wesley wrote over 6,000 hymns. Like most hymnists, his work were frequently altered. In the preface to the 1779 Collection of Hymns for the Use of the People called Methodists, his brother John wrote:

I beg leave to mention a thought which has been long upon my mind, and which I should long ago have inserted in the public papers, had I not been unwilling to stir up a nest of hornets. Many gentlemen have done my brother and me (though without naming us) the honour to reprint many of our hymns. Now they are perfectly welcome to do so, provided they print them just as they are. But I desire they would not attempt to mend them, for they are really not able. None of them is able to mend either the sense or the verse. Therefore, I must beg of them these two favours: either to let them stand just as they are, to take things for better or worse, or to add the true reading in the margin, or at the bottom of the page, that we may no longer be accountable either for the nonsense or for the doggerel of other men.

In addition to hymn writing, Charles and his brother John founded the movement which became the Methodist denomination.

Lyrics:

A Charge to Keep I Have

And Can It Be That I Should Gain

Christ the Lord Is Risen Today

Come Thou Long Expected Jesus

Hark the Herald Angels Sing

Jesus Lover of My Soul

Love Divine All Loves Excelling

O For a Thousand Tongues to Sing

O Love Divine What Hast Thou Done

Soldiers of Christ Arise!