By that prophetic impulse stirr’d
He did not to the robes advert,
But thro’ the Spirit of his Lord
Discern’d the false professor’s heart:
He warn’d him of th’ impending woe,
That those who fight with the Most-high,
And touch his people now, may know
They touch the apple of his eye.
By that prophetic impulse stirred
Hymnal/Album: Originally titled: “‘I wist not, brethren, that he was the high-priest.’—[Acts 23,] v. 5." This hymn appears in the 1764 manuscript “MS Acts.” This manuscript is part of the collection of the Methodist Archive and Research Centre in The John Rylands Library, The University of Manchester (accession number MA 1977/555, Charles Wesley Notebooks Box 1). Accessed through the website of The Center for Studies in the Wesleyan Tradition, Duke Divinity School. Published in The Poetical Works of John and Charles Wesley, Collected and Arranged by G. Osborn, Vol. 12 (London: Wesleyan-Methodist Conference Office, 1871), page 401.
Publishing: Public Domain