For Reviving Grace

Author: Charles Wesley

Charles Wesley, M.A. was the great hymn-writer of the Wesley family, perhaps, taking quantity and quality into consideration, the great hymn-writer of all ages. Charles Wesley was the youngest son and 18th child of Samuel and Susanna Wesley, and was born at Epworth Rectory, Dec. 18, 1707. In 1716 he went to Westminster School, being provided with a home and board by his elder brother Samuel, then usher at the school, until 1721, when he was elected King's Scholar, and as such received his board and education free. In 1726 Charles Wesley was elected to a Westminster studentship at Christ Church, Oxford, where he took his degree in 1729, and became a college tutor. In the early part of the same year his religious impressions were much deepene… Go to person page >

Light of life, seraphic Fire. C Wesley. [Holiness desired.] Appeared in Hymns and Sacred Poems, 1749, vol. ii., in 3 stanzas of 8 lines, as No. 18 of "Hymns for those that wait for full Redemption" (Poetical Works, 1868-72, vol. v. p. 309). In 1780 it was given in the Wesleyan Hymn Book, No. 387, with the omission of stanza iii. This form of the hymn has come into extensive use in Great Britain and America. It also sometimes appears as "Light of life, celestial Fire," as in Kennedy, 1863.

--John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)