WRESTLING JACOB. Come, O thou Traveller unknown, And I am left alone with Thee; I need not tell Thee who I am, Thyself hast called me by my name; Look on Thy hands, and read it there! But Who, I ask Thee, Who art Thou? Tell me Thy Name, and tell me now. In vain Thou strugglest to get free, Wilt Thou not yet to me reveal 'Tis all in vain to hold Thy tongue, Or touch the hollow of my thigh; Out of my arms Thou shalt not fly: What though my shrinking flesh complain, And murmur to contend so long? I rise superior to my pain; When I am weak, then I am strong: My strength is gone; my nature dies; I fall, and yet by faith I stand: I stand, and will not let Thee go, Yield to me now, for I am weak, 'Tis Love! 'tis Love! Thou diedst for me! To me, to all, Thy bowels move; Thy Nature, and Thy Name, is Love! My prayer hath power with God; the grace Unspeakable I now receive; Through faith I see Thee face to face, I see Thee face to face, and live: In vain I have not wept and strove; Thy Nature, and Thy Name, is Love. I know Thee, Saviour, Who Thou art; Thy mercies never shall remove, The Sun of Righteousness on me Hath rose, with healing in His wings; Contented now upon my thigh I halt, till life's short journey end; All helplessness, all weakness, I On Thee alone for strength depend; Nor have I power from Thee to move; Thy Nature, and Thy Name, is Love. Lame as I am, I take the prey, Hell, earth, and sin, with ease o'ercome; I leap for joy, pursue my way, And as a bounding hart fly home! Through all eternity to prove, Thy Nature and Thy Name is Love! CATHOLIC LOVE. Weary of all this wordy strife, These notions, forms, and modes, and names, To Thee, the Way, the Truth, the Life, Whose love my simple heart inflames, Divinely taught, at last I fly, With Thee, and Thine to live, and die. Forth from the midst of Babel brought, Redeem'd by Thine almighty grace, I taste my glorious liberty, But cleave to those who cleave to Thee; But only in Thy saints delight, Who walk with God in purest white. One with the little flock I rest, The members sound who hold the Head; The chosen few, with pardon blest, And by the anointing Spirit led Into the mind that was in Thee, Into the depths of Deity. My brethren, friends, and kinsmen these, And all Thy counsels to fulfil, And love their God with all their heart. For these, howe'er in flesh disjoin'd, And constant as the life of God; Joined to the hidden church unknown And glory in the uniting grace, JOHN WESLEY. AN HYMN FOR SERIOUSNESS. Thou God of glorious majesty, An half-awakened child of man, Lo! on a narrow neck of land, A point of life, a moment's space O God, mine inmost soul convert, Give me to feel their solemn weight, Before me place in dread array To judge the nations at Thy bar: Said to have been suggested by a rocky isthmus at the Land's End in Comwall. |