Stay, thou triumphant spirit, stay

Verse 1
Stay, thou triumphant spirit, stay,
And bless me ere thou soar’st away,
Where pain can never come!
In vain my call: the soul is fled,
By Israel’s flaming steeds convey’d
To her eternal home.

Verse 2
Yet lo! I now the blessing find,
The legacy she left behind,
Fruit of her latest prayer:
The answer in my heart I feel,
This fresh supply of heavenly zeal,
To live, and die like her.

Verse 3
She liv’d to serve the God unknown,
And following in a land not sown,
A thorny wilderness,
Beneath the yoke of legal fear
She labour’d hard, with heart sincere,
To buy the Saviour’s peace.

Verse 4
Faithful she then in little was;
And zealous for religion’s cause,
To please the Lord most high
In serving man she humbly sought,
But blindly by her duties thought
Herself to justify.

Verse 5
Yet when she heard the gospel-sound,
That grace doth more than sin abound,
That pard’ning grace is free,
She cast her righteous rags aside,
She closed at once with Christ, and cry’d,
“He bought the peace for me!”

Verse 6
From hence the fight of faith begun,
From hence in Jesus’ steps she run,
Nor e’er disgrac’d the cause,
Meek follower of the patient Lamb,
She priz’d his honourable shame,
And gloried in his cross.

Verse 7
By all the rage of fiends and men,
(The vehement stream, the beating rain)
Assail’d on every side;
Nor men nor fiends her firmness shock,
The house was built upon a Rock,
And every storm defy’d.

Verse 8
What tongue her hidden worth can tell,
Her active faith and fervent zeal,
And works of righteousness,
Her thirst and reverence for the word,
Her love to those who lov’d her Lord,
Or but desired his grace!

Verse 9
She lov’d them both in word and deed,
O’rjoy’d an hungry Christ to feed,
To visit him in pain;
Him in his members she reliev’d,
And freely as she first receiv’d,
Gave him her all again.

Verse 10
How did her generous bounty deal
The widow’s scanty oil and meal,
A treasure for the poor?
A treasure spent without decrease,
As miracle reviv’d to bless
The consecrated store.

Verse 11
But who can paint the strong desire,
The holy heav’n-inkindled fire
That glow’d within her breast,
To insure the bliss of friends and foes,
To save the precious souls of those
She ever lov’d the best!

Verse 12
Witness ye children of her prayers,
Ye objects of her tenderest cares,
Into her bosom given,
Did not her yearning bowels move
With more than a maternal love
To train you up for heaven?

Verse 13
Can you her artless warmth forget,
Her eager haste to turn your feet
Into the narrow road,
Her counsels kind, her warning fears,
Her loud protests, or silent tears,
Whene’er ye stray’d from God!

Verse 14
She took your guardian angel’s part,
She watch’d the motions of your heart
To pride and pleasure prone;
For you she spent her latest breath,
And urg’d you both in life and death
To love the Lord alone.

Hymnal/Album: Originally titled: "On the Death of Mrs. Grace Bowen, Jan. 2, 1755 Part I." 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 239.
Publishing: Public Domain