Angels rejoice! a child is born

Verse 1
Angels rejoice, a child is born,
Into your happier world above!
Let poor short-sighted mortals mourn,
While on the wings of heavenly love,
An everlasting spirit flies,
To claim his kindred in the skies.

Verse 2
His few sad days of guiltless pain
Are all irrevocably gone,
Escap’d from earth without a stain,
My heart’s desire, my darling son
Hath first attain’d his endless rest,
Hath reach’d his heavenly Father’s breast.

Verse 3
And shall I for his bliss repine,
And shall I for his absence grieve?
Or rather bless the choice divine,
With awful joy and thanks receive
The period of my countless cares,
The answer of my thousand pray’rs!

Verse 4
My pray’rs are seal’d, my child is fled,
Is safe on that eternal shore:
No longer I his dangers dread,
The pois’nous world’s bewitching power,
The charms of sin, the tempter’s art,
The fondness of a parent’s heart.

Verse 5
No more my eyes with tears o’erflow,
No more in deep distress I pray
“Ah! Save my child from endless woe,
Ah! Take him from the evil day,
Nor let the man his God deny,
Nor let him live to sin, and die.”

Verse 6
Who fill’d me with those jealous fears,
Who arm’d my heart with sad mistrust,
The God of love hath seen my tears,
And never can the child be lost,
Whom God hath found, and claim’d for his,
And snatch’d to everlasting bliss.

Hymnal/Album: Originally titled: "On the Death of a Child, Part V." Introduced in Charles Wesley, Funeral Hymns [Second Series] (London: Strahan, 1759).Published in The Poetical Works of John and Charles Wesley, Collected and Arranged by G. Osborn, Vol. 6 (London: Wesleyan-Methodist Conference Office, 1870), page 258.
Publishing: Public Domain