Th’ inordinate, excessive love

Th’ inordinate, excessive love
Of life, and the vain things below
Damps the belief of joys above,
Of joys which few desire to know;
Regardless of that bliss unseen
Their portion here the worldlings chuse,
And for a moment’s pleasure mean
Consent th’ eternal life to lose.

Hymnal/Album: Originally titled: “‘He that loveth his life, shall lose it.’—[John 12,] v. 25." This hymn appears in the 1763-64 manuscript “MS John.” 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 1977/573, Charles Wesley Notebooks Box 3). Accessed through the website of The Center for Studies in the Wesleyan Tradition, Duke Divinity School. Published in S.T. Kimbrough Jr. and Oliver A. Beckerlegge, eds., The Unpublished Poetry of Charles Wesley, vol. 2 (Nashville: Kingswood Books, 1990), page 255.
Publishing: Public Domain