Poems (1791) :: :: University of Virginia Library

Hanc Vos, Pierides festis cantate calendis,
Et testudineâ, Phœbe superbe, lyrâ
Hoc solenne sacrum multos celebretur in annos,
Dignior est vestro nulla puella choro.
TIBULLUS.

ARGUMENT.

Stanza I, II. Invocation of Men and Angels to join in the Praise of S. Cecilia. The Divine Origin of Musick. Stanza III. Art of Musick, or it's miraculous power over the brute and inanimate Creation exemplified in Waller, and Stanza IV, V, in Arion. Stanza VI. the Nature of Musick, or it's power over the Passions. Instances of this in it's exciting pity. Stanza VII. In promoting Courage and Military Virtue. Stanza VIII. Excellency of Church Musick. Air to the memory of Mr. Purcell.—Praise of the Organ and it's Inventress Saint Cecilia.

I.

From your lyre-enchanted tow'rs,
Ye musically mystic Pow'rs,
Ye, that inform the tuneful spheres,
Inaudible to mortal ears,
While each orb in Ether swims
Accordant to th'inspiring hymns;
Hither Paradise remove
Spirits of Harmony and Love!

Thou too, divine Urania, deign t'appear,
And with thy sweetly-solemn lute
To the grand argument the numbers suit;
Such as sublime and clear,
Replete with heavenly love,
Charm th'inraptur'd souls above.
Disdainful of fantastic play,
Mix on your ambrosial tongue
Weight of sense with sound of song.
And be angelically gay.

CHORUS.

Disdainful, &c. &c.

II.

And you, ye sons of Harmony below,
How little less than angels, when ye sing!
With emulation's kindling warmth shall glow,
And from your mellow-modulating throats
The tribute of your grateful notes
In Union of Piety shall bring.
Shall Echo from her vocal cave
Repay each note, the Shepherd gave,
And shall not we our mistress praise
And give her back the borrow'd lays?
But farther still our praises we pursue;
For ev'n Cecilia, mighty maid,
Confess'd she had superior aid—
She did—and other rites to greater pow'rs are due.

Higher swell the sound and higher:
Let the winged numbers climb:
To the heav'n of heav'ns aspire,
Solemn, sacred, and sublime:
From heav'n musick took it's rise,
Return it to it's native skies.

CHORUS.

Higher swell the sound, &c. &c.

III.

Musick's a celestial art;
Cease to wonder at it's pow'r,
Tho' lifeless rocks to motion start,
Tho' trees dance lightly from the bow'r,
Tho' rolling floods in sweet suspence
Are held, and listen into sense.
In Penhurst's plains when Waller, sick with love,
Has found some silent solitary grove,
Where the vague moon-beams pour a silver flood
Of trem'lous light athwart th'unshaven wood,
Within an hoary moss-grown cell,
He lays his careless limbs without reserve,
And strikes, impetuous strikes each quer'lous nerve
Of his resounding shell.
In all the woods, in all the plains
Around a lively stillness reigns;
The deer approach the secret scene,
And weave their way thro' labyrinths green;

While Philomela learns the lay,
And answers from the neighbouring bay.
But Medway, melancholy mute,
Gently on his urn reclines,
And all-attentive to the lute,
In uncomplaining anguish pines:
The crystal waters weep away,
And bear the tidings to the sea:
Neptune in the boisterous seas.
Spreads the placid bed of peace,
While each blast,
Or breathes it's last,
Or just does sigh a symphony and cease.

CHORUS.

Neptune, &c. &c.

IV.

Behold Arion—on the stern he stands
Pall'd in theatrical attire,
To the mute strings he moves th'enliv'ning hands,
Great in distress, and wakes the golden lyre:
While in a tender Orthian strain
He thus accosts the Mistress of the main:
By the bright beams of Cynthia's eyes
Thro' which your waves attracted rise,
And actuate the hoary deep;
By the secret coral cell,
Where love, and joy, and Neptune dwell
And peaceful floods in silence sleep;

By the sea-flow'rs, that immerge
Their heads around the grotto's verge,
Dependant from the stooping stem;
By each roof-suspended drop,
That lightly lingers on the top,
And hesitates into a gem;
By thy kindred wat'ry Gods,
The lakes, the riv'lets, founts and floods,
And all the pow'rs that live unseen
Underneath the liquid green;
Great Amphitrite (for thou can'st bind
The storm, and regulate the wind)
Hence waft me, fair Goddess, oh waft me away,
Secure from the men and the monsters of prey!

CHORUS.

Great Amphitrite , &c. &c.

V.

He sung—The winds are charm'd to sleep,
Soft stillness steals along the deep,
The Tritons and the Nereids sigh
In soul-reflecting sympathy,
And all the audience of waters weep.
But Amphitrite her Dolphin sends— the same,
Which erst to Neptune brought the nobly perjur'd dame—

Pleas'd to obey, the beauteous monster flies,
And on his scales as the gilt sun-beams play,
Ten thousand variegated dies
In copious streams of lustre rise,
Rise o'er the level main and signify his way—
And now the joyous Bard, in triumph bore,
Rides the voluminous wave, and makes the wish'd for shore.
Come, ye festive, social throng,
Who sweep the lyre, or pour the song,
Your noblest melody employ,
Such as becomes the mouth of joy,
Bring the sky-aspiring thought,
With bright expression richly wrought,
And hail the Muse ascending on her throne,
The main at length subdued, and all the world her own.

CHORUS.

Come, ye festive, &c. &c.

Fabulantur Græci hanc perpetuam Deis virginitatem vovisse: sed cum a Neptuno sollicitaretur ad Atlantem confugisse, ubi a Delphino persuasa Neptuno assensit. Lilius Gyraldus.

VI.

But o'er th'affections too she claims the sway,
Pierces the human heart, and steals the soul away;
And as attractive sounds move high or low,
Th'obedient ductile passions ebb and flow,
Has any Nymph her faithful lover lost,
And in the visions of the night,
And all the day-dreams of the light,
In sorrow's tempest turbulently tost—

From her cheeks the roses die,
The radiations vanish from her sun-bright eye,
And her breast, the throne of love,
Can hardly, hardly, hardly move,
To send th'ambrosial sigh.
But let the skillful bard appear,
And pour the sounds medicinal in her ear;
Sing some sad, some plaintive ditty,
Steept in tears, that endless flow,
Melancholy notes of pity,
Notes that mean a world of woe;
She too shall sympathize, she too shall moan,
And pitying others sorrows sigh away her own.

CHORUS.

Sing some sad, some &c. &c.

VII.

Wake, wake, the kettle-drum, prolong
The swelling trumpet's silver song,
And let the kindred accents pass
Thro' the horn's meandring brass.
Arise—The patriot muse invites to war,
And mounts Bellona's brazen car;
While Harmony, terrific maid!
Appears in martial pomp array'd:
The sword, the target, and the lance
She wields, and as she moves, exalts the Pyrrhic dance.

Trembles the earth, resound the skies—
Swift o'er the fleet, the camp she flies
With thunder in her voice and lightning in her eyes.
The gallant warriours engage
With inextinguishable rage,
And hearts unchil'd with fear;
Fame numbers all the chosen bands
Full in the front fair Vict'ry stands,
And Triumph crowns the rear.

CHORUS.

The Gallant warriours, &c. &c.

VIII.

But hark the Temple's hollow'd roof resounds,
And Purcell lives along the solemn sounds—
Mellifluous, yet manly too,
He pours his strains along,
As from the lion Sampson slew,
Comes sweetness from the strong.
Not like the soft Italian swains,
He trills the weak enervate strains,
Where sense and musick are at strife;
His vigorous notes with meaning teem,
With fire, with force explain the theme,
And sing the subject into life.
Attend—he sings Cecilia—matchless Dame!
'Tis She—'tis She—fond to extend her fame,

On the loud chords the notes conspire to stay,
And sweetly swell into a long delay,
And dwell delighted on her name.
Blow on, ye sacred Organs, blow,
In tones magnificently slow;
Such is the musick, such the lays,
Which suit your fair Inventress' praise:
While round religious silence reigns,
And loitering winds expect the strains.
Hail majestic mournful measure,
Source of many a pensive pleasure!
Blest pledge of love to mortals giv'n,
As pattern of the rest of heav'n!
And thou chief honor of the veil,
Hail, harmonious Virgin, hail!
When Death shall blot out every name,
And Time shall break the trump of Fame,
Angels may listen to thy lute;
Thy pow'r shall last, thy bays shall bloom,
When tongues shall cease, and worlds consume,
And all the tuneful spheres be mute.

GRAND CHORUS.

When Death shall blot out every name, &c.