And Can It Be That I Should Gain?

Lyrics

And can it be that I should gain
an interest in the Saviour's blood?
Died he for me, who caused his pain?
For me, who him to death pursued?
Amazing love! How can it be
that thou, my God, shouldst die for me?

'Tis mystery all : the Immortal dies!
Who can explore his strange design?
In vain the first-born seraph tries
to sound the depths of love divine.
'Tis mercy all! Let earth adore,
let angel minds enquire no more.

Long my imprisoned spirit lay
fast bound in sin and nature's night;
thine eye diffused a quickening ray -
I woke, the dungeon flamed with light,
My chains fell off, my heart was free,
I rose, went forth, and followed thee.

No condemnation now I dread;
Jesus, and all in him, is mine!
Alive in him, my living head,
and clothed in righteousness divine,
Bold I approach the eternal throne,
and claim the crown, through Christ, my own.

History

"And can it be that I should gain?" is one of the best-known hymns of Charles Wesley, born at Epworth, Lincolnshire, in 1707 and died in London in 1788. By one account it was first published in 1738 in John Wesley's Psalms and Hymns, in six stanzas, and reprinted in Hymns and Sacred Poems (1739) under the title "Free Grace". By another, it was written in 1738 and first published in 1739 in Hymns and Sacred Poems.

The hymn is dated to the weeks after Wesley's conversion. Wesley regarded his conversion as having taken place on 21 May 1738, the feast of Pentecost, and he sang the hymn with his brother John soon after John's Aldersgate experience. The 1780 Wesleyan Hymn Book omitted the original fifth stanza, and the revised form has been used since.

The text is dense with Scripture allusions. They include Philippians 2 (the Incarnation), Acts 12 and Acts 16 (the imprisonments of Peter and Paul, used as images of release from sin) and Romans 8:1; Hebrews 4:16 is also cited. One line is closely modelled on Alexander Pope's Eloisa to Abelard (1717).

In the twentieth century the text became associated almost exclusively with the tune SAGINA by Thomas Campbell (1800-1876), first published in 1825 in The Bouquet, a collection of tunes with botanical names; the earliest documented pairing of the two is in The Salvation Army Music (New York, 1900). In the nineteenth century the most common tune was FILLMORE, and it was also set earlier to SURREY, CRUCIFIXION and BIRMINGHAM.

Performance

The page's video, titled "And Can It Be? - Traditional Hymn | Charles Wesley. Performed by St. Martin's Voices", runs about 4 minutes 21 seconds and was published to the St Peter's YouTube channel on 14 November 2024; the title names St. Martin's Voices as performer.

Sources: hymnary.org · en.wikipedia.org · St Martin's Voices recording and Words book