Exulting, trembling, raging, fainting,
Possessed beyond the Muse's painting;
By turns they felt the glowing mind
Disturbed, delighted, raised, refined:
Till once, 'tis said, when all were fired,
Filled with fury, rapt, inspired,

From the supporting myrtles round
They snatched her instruments of sound;
And, as they oft had heard apart
Sweet lessons of her forceful art,
Each (for madness ruled the hour),
Would prove his own expressive power.

First Fear his hand, its skill to try,
Amid the chords bewildered laid,
And back recoiled, he knew not why,
Even at the sound himself had made.

Next Anger rushed; his eyes, on fire,

In lightnings owned his secret stings;

In one rude clash he struck the lyre,
And swept with hurried hand the strings.

With woful measures wan Despair
Low, sullen sounds his grief beguiled;

A solemn, strange, and mingled air;
'Twas sad by fits, by starts 'twas wild.

But thou, O Hope, with eyes so fair,
What was thy delightful measure?
Still it whispered promised pleasure,

And bade the lovely scenes at distance hail!
Still would her touch the strain prolong,

And from the rocks, the woods, the vale, She called on Echo still, through all the song; And, where her sweetest theme she chose,

A soft responsive voice was heard at every close,

And Hope enchanted smiled, and waved her golden hair.

And longer had she sung,-but, with a frown,
Revenge impatient rose;

He threw his blood-stained sword in thunder down
And, with a withering look,

The war-denouncing trumpet took,
And blew a blast so loud and dread,

Were ne'er prophetic sounds so full of woe.
And ever and anon he beat

The doubling drum with furious heat;

And though sometimes, each dreary pause between,
Dejected Pity, at his side,

Her soul-subduing voice applied,

Yet still he kept his wild unaltered mien,

While each strained ball of sight seemed bursting from his head.

Thy numbers, Jealousy, to naught were fixed,

Sad proof of thy distressful state;

Of differing themes the veering song was mixed,

And now it courted Love, now raving called on Hate.

With eyes upraised, as one inspired,

Pale Melancholy sate retired,

And from her wild sequestered seat,

In notes by distance made more sweet,

Poured through the mellow horn her pensive soul:
And, dashing soft from rocks around,

Bubbling runnels joined the sound;

Through glades and glooms the mingled measure stole;
Or, o'er some haunted stream, with fond delay,
Round an holy calm diffusing,

Love of Peace and lonely musing,

In hollow murmurs died away.

But oh, how altered was its sprightlier tone,
When Cheerfulness, a nymph of healthiest hue,
Her bow across her shoulder flung,

Her buskins gemmed with morning dew,
Blew an inspiring air, that dale and thicket rung,
The hunter's call to faun and dryad known!

The oak-crowned sisters, and their chaste-eyed queen, Satyrs, and sylvan boys, were seen, Peeping from forth their alleys green; Brown Exercise rejoiced to hear,

And Sport leapt up, and seized his beechen spear.

Last came Joy's ecstatic trial.

He, with viny crown advancing,

First to the lively pipe his hand addressed; But soon he saw the brisk awakening viol,

Whose sweet entrancing voice he loved the best. They would have thought, who heard the strain, They saw in Tempe's vale her native maids Amidst the vestal sounding shades,

To some unwearied minstrel dancing,

While, as his flying fingers kissed the strings,

Love framed with Mirth a gay fantastic round;
Loose were her tresses seen, her zone unbound,
And he, amidst his frolic play,

As if he would the charming air repay,
Shook thousand odors from his dewy wings.

O Music! sphere-descended maid,
Friend of Pleasure, Wisdom's aid!
Why, goddess, why, to us denied,
Lay'st thou thy ancient lyre aside?
As, in that loved Athenian bower,
You learned an all-commanding power,
Thy mimic soul, O Nymph endeared,
Can well recall what then it heard.
Where is thy native simple heart,
Devote to Virtue, Fancy, Art?
Arise, as in that elder time,
Warm, energic, chaste, sublime!
Thy wonders, in that godlike age,
Fill thy recording sister's page.-
'Tis said, and I believe the tale,
Thy humblest reed could more prevail,
Had more of strength, diviner rage,
Than all which charms this laggard age;

Even all at once together found,
Cecilia's mingled world of sound.
O bid our vain endeavors cease,
Revive the just designs of Greece:
Return in all thy simple state!
Confirm the tales her sons relate!

William Collins [1721-1759]

TO MUSIC, TO BECALM HIS FEVER

CHARM me asleep, and melt me so

With thy delicious numbers,
That, being ravished, hence I go
Away in easy slumbers.

Ease my sick head,

And make my bed,

Thou power that canst sever

From me this ill,

And quickly still,

Though thou not kill

My fever.

Thou sweetly canst convert the same

From a consuming fire

Into a gentle-licking flame,
And make it thus expire.

Then make me weep

My pains asleep;

And give me such reposes
That I, poor I,

May think thereby
I live and die

'Mongst roses.

Fall on me like a silent dew,

Or like those maiden showers
Which, by the peep of day, do strew
A baptism o'er the flowers.

Melt, melt my pains
With thy soft strains;

That, having ease me given,
With full delight

I leave this light,

And take my flight

For Heaven.

Robert Herrick [1591-1674]

A MUSICAL INSTRUMENT

WHAT was he doing, the great god Pan,
Down in the reeds by the river?
Spreading ruin and scattering ban,

Splashing and paddling with hoofs of a goat,
And breaking the golden lilies afloat
With the dragon-fly on the river.

He tore out a reed, the great god Pan,
From the deep cool bed of the river:
The limpid water turbidly ran,
And the broken lilies a-dying lay,
And the dragon-fly had fled away,

Ere he brought it out of the river.

High on the shore sat the great god Pan,
While turbidly flowed the river;

And hacked and hewed as a great god can,
With his hard bleak steel at the patient reed,
Till there was not a sign of a leaf indeed
To prove it fresh from the river.

He cut it short, did the great god Pan,
(How tall it stood in the river!)

Then drew the pith, like the heart of a man,

Steadily from the outside ring,

And notched the poor dry empty thing

In holes, as he sat by the river.

"This is the way," laughed the great god Pan,

(Laughed while he sat by the river,)

"The only way, since gods began