Contempt be justly might express

Verse 1
Contempt he justly might express
For his own heathen-deities,
His ear from idle questions turn,
And all their names and fables scorn;
But JESUS is th’ important Name
In which the world’s Salvation came,
The only Name to sinners given,
More worth than all in earth and heaven!

Verse 2
Yet curious man, whose reasoning eye
Would into all creation pry,
Hath no innate desire to know
The things of God Reveal’d below;
Averse from the inquiring pain,
He counts that only knowledge vain,
On which his present peace depends
And bliss supreme which never ends.

Hymnal/Album: Originally titled: “‘But if it be a question of names ... look ye to it &c.’—[Acts 18,] v. 15." 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 349.
Publishing: Public Domain