Well doth a summer leaf explain
The transient state of feeble man:
We flourish fair in youthful bloom,
Till age, and palled Autumn come:
He comes with sickness at his side,
He withers all our verdant pride,
And shook with the first stormy gust
We drop, and crumble into dust.
Well doth a summer leaf explain
Hymnal/Album: Originally titled: “‘We fade as a leaf.’—[Isa.] 64:6.” This hymn appears in the 1783 manuscript “MS Scriptural Hymns.” 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 1977/576, Charles Wesley Notebooks Box 3). 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. 9 (London: Wesleyan-Methodist Conference Office, 1870), page 460.
Publishing: Public Domain