Learning secular, profane

Verse 1
Learning secular, prophane,
To use if God intends,
Pestilent no more, or vain,
It serves the noblest ends;
Wrests the weapons from their hands,
Who learnedly the truth oppose,
Puts to flight th’ Egyptian bands,
And quels the church’s foes.

Verse 2
Lord, the figure we look thro’,
The truth substantial see,
All the stores of wisdom true
Are treasur’d up in Thee:
Powerful all thy doctrines are,
Thy Spirit speaks in every word,
All thy works the hand declare
Of an Almighty Lord.

Hymnal/Album: Originally titled: “‘Moses was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and was mighty in words and in deeds.’—[Acts 7,] v. 22.” 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 207.
Publishing: Public Domain