What is it then which now constrains

Verse 1
What is it then which now constrains
My hardness to lament?
Why do I miss my former pains,
And wish I coud relent?
It is my Advocate above,
Who forces me to hope,
It is the voice of bleeding LOVE
“How shall I give thee up?[”]

Verse 2
Lord, if thy love doth still abound
Above my sin’s excess,
If still Thou art my Spokesman found
Before the throne of grace;
If one so doubly dead to God
Thou canst revive again,
Revive me now; restore my load,
And give me back my pain.

Verse 3
Giver of power to them that faint,
Thy power to me impart,
Thy whole omnipotence I want
To rouse my languid heart:
I want the voice that wakes the dead,
To bid my soul arise,
And follow where my Captain led,
And labour up the skies.

Verse 4
O for the strength of fervent zeal,
The faith in Jesus Name,
Which dares the floud, and scales the hill,
And rushes thro’ the flame;
Which wrestles on divinely bold
The secret name to know,
With violent faith on God lays hold,
And will not let him go!

Verse 5
Spirit of power and life, inspire
This faint and feeble breast
With even, infinite desire
Of my eternal rest:
Stir up my soul its strength t’ exert,
With never-slackning care,
And groan Thyself within my heart
Th’ unutterable prayer.

Verse 6
I woud be govern’d by thy will,
I woud be wholly thine:
Now, Lord, my gasping spirit fill
With energy divine;
And that my zeal no more may cool,
Come, heavenly Comforter,
Take full posession of my soul,
And dwell for ever here!

Hymnal/Album: Originally titled: “[For One grown slack.] Part IV.” This hymn appears in the ca. 1786 manuscript “MS Miscellaneous 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 1977/556, Charles Wesley Notebooks Box 2). 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 and Oliver A. Beckerlegge, eds., The Unpublished Poetry of Charles Wesley, vol. 3 (Nashville: Kingswood Books, 1992), pages 251-56.
Publishing: Public Domain