Charles Wesley (18 December 1707 – 29 March 1788) was an English Anglican cleric and a principal leader of the Methodist movement.

Charles followed his father and brother into ministry in 1735, and he travelled with John to Georgia in America, returning a year later.

[4] At Oxford, Wesley formed a prayer group among his fellow students in 1727; his elder brother, John, joined in 1729, soon becoming its leader and moulding it in line with his own convictions.

Other students mocked them, saying they were the "Holy Club", "Sacramentarians", and "the Methodists", being methodical and exceptionally detailed in their Bible study, opinions and disciplined lifestyle.

On 14 October 1735, Wesley and his brother John sailed on The Simmonds from Gravesend, Kent, for Savannah in the Georgia colony of British America at the request of the governor, James Oglethorpe.

A City of London blue plaque at 13 Little Britain, near the church of St Botolph, Aldersgate, off St. Martin's Le Grand, marks the site of the former house of John Bray, reputed to be the scene of Wesley's evangelical conversion.

[7] Wesley commemorated the first anniversary of his religious experience by composing an 18-stanza poem, with its seventh verse, beginning "O for a thousand tongues to sing", now serving as the opening of a shorter hymn.

[6] Wesley felt renewed strength to spread the gospel to ordinary people and it was around then that he began to write the poetic hymns for which he would become known.

In January 1739, he was appointed as curate to serve at St Mary's Church, Islington, but was forced to resign when the churchwardens objected to his evangelical preaching.

[1] Later that same year, finding that they were unwelcome inside parish churches, the Wesley brothers took to preaching to crowds in open fields.

[9]: 91–92  They were opposed by many Anglican clergy, especially when their appointed lay preachers began to preach in parishes without seeking permission.

[1][4] Following a period of illness, after 1756 Wesley made no more journeys to distant parts of the country, mainly just moving between Bristol and London.

[10]: 45–46  Increasingly in his later years, Wesley became the mouthpiece of the so-called "Church Methodists"—he was strongly opposed to a separation of Methodism from its Anglican roots.

Charles junior spent most of his career as the personal organist of the Royal Family, and Samuel became one of the most accomplished musicians in the world and is often called "the English Mozart".

[4] His hymns are marked by their strong doctrinal content (notably the Arminian insistence on the universality of God's love),[18] a richness of scriptural and literary allusion, and the variety of his metrical and stanza forms.

From his published work Hymns and Prayers to the Trinity and in Hymn number 62 he writes "The Holy Ghost in part we know, For with us He resides, Our whole of good to Him we owe, Whom by His grace he guides, He doth our virtuous thoughts inspire, The evil he averts, And every seed of good desire, He planted in our hearts.

the Herald Angels Sing", and The Church Hymn Book (In New York and Chicago, US, 1872) where "Jesus, Lover of My Soul" is published.

Many of his hymns are translated into other languages, and form the foundation for Methodist hymnals, as well as the Swedish Metodist-Episkopal-Kyrkans Psalmbok printed in Stockholm in 1892.

[26] Of particular importance is Wesley's manuscript Psalms, held in the archives of the Pitts Theology Library at Emory University.

[28] Wesley is still remembered for his ministry while in St. Simon's Island, Georgia, by the South Georgia Conference of the United Methodist Church; in 1950, the conference opened a Christian retreat centre on the island by the banks of the Frederica River, designating it Epworth by the Sea in honour of his and John's birthplace.

In the 19th century, Charles Wesley's legacy was downplayed by Methodist historians, largely because of his opposition to separating from the Church of England.