ODE ON ST. CECILIA'S DAY, AND OTHER PIECES FOR MUSIC. Written in the year 1708. I. DESCEND, ye Nine! descend and sing, The breathing instruments inspire; Let the warbling lute complain; The shrill echoes rebound; While in more lengthen'd notes and slow Now louder, and yet louder rise, And fill with spreading sounds the skies. Till by degrees, remote and small, The strains decay, And melt away In a dying, dying fall. II. By Music minds an equal temper know, 20 Intestine war no more our passions wage, 35 III. But when our country's cause provokes to arms, So when the first bold vessel dar'd the seas, While Argo saw her kindred trees 40 Descend from Pelion to the main : IV. But when thro' all th' infernal bounds, Which flaming Phlegethon surrounds, O'er all the dreary coasts! Dreadful gleams, Dismal screams, Fires that glow, Shrieks of woe, Sullen moans, Hollow groans, And cries of tortur'd ghosts! VOL. II. 45 50 55 60 But hark! he strikes the golden lyre, See shady forms advance! Thy stone, O Sisyphus! stands still, Ixion rests upon his wheel, 65 And the pale spectres dance; The Furies sink upon their iron beds, And snakes uncurl'd hang list'ning round their heads. V. By the streams that ever flow, In yellow meads of asphodel, Glitt'ring thro' the gloomy glades; 71 75 80 Restore, restore Eurydice to life; Oh, take the husband, or return the wife! He sung, and hell consented To hear the poet's pray'r; 85 Thus song could prevail O'er death and o'er hell, A conquest how hard and how glorious! 90 Tho' Fate had fast bound her, With Styx nine times round her, Yet music and love were victorious. VI. But soon, too soon, the lover turns his eyes; Now under hanging mountains, Beside the falls of fountains, Or where Hebrus wanders, Rolling in meanders, All alone, Unheard, unknown, And calls her ghost, 95 100 105 |