"TIS WHEN THE CUP IS SMILING. Was it for this that her shout Italian Air. 'Tis when the cup is smiling before us, And we pledge round to hearts that are true, boy, true, That the sky of this life opens o'er us, And Heaven gives a glimpse of its blue. Talk of Adam in Eden reclining, We are better, far better off thus, boy, thus; For him but two bright eyes were shining See what numbers are sparkling for us! When on one side the grape-juice is dancing, And on t'other a blue eye beams, boy, beams, 'Tis enough, 'twixt the wine and the glancing, To disturb even a saint from his dreams. Though this life like a river is flowing, I care not how fast it goes on, boy, Thrilled to the world's very core? Thus to live cowards and slaves, Do you not, e'en in your graves, NE'ER TALK OF WISDOM'S GLOOMY SCHOOLS. Mahratta Air. NE'ER talk of Wisdom's gloomy schools; And is gone again next minute. The grape's own rosy daughter! And none can prize her charms like him, Oh! none like him obtain her, Who thus can, like Leander, swim Through sparkling floods to gain her! A MELOLOGUE UPON NATIONAL MUSIC. ADVERTISEMENT. THESE Verses were written for a Benefit at the Dublin Theatre, and were spoken by Miss Smith, with a degree of success, which they owed solely to her admirable manner of reciting them. I wrote them in haste, and it very rarely happens that poetry, which has cost but little labour to the writer, is productive of any great pleasure to the reader. Under this impression, I should not have published them, if they had not found their way into some of the newspapers, with such an addition of errors to their own original stock, that I thought it but fair to limit their responsibility to those faults alone which really belong to them. 6 With respect to the title which I have invented for this Poem, I feel even more than the scruples of the Emperor Tiberius, when he humbly asked pardon of the Roman Senate for using the outlandish term Monopoly.' But the truth is, having written the Poem with the sole view of serving a Benefit, I thought that an unintelligible word of this kind would not be without its attraction for the multitude; with whom, 'If 'tis not sense, at least 'tis Greek.' To some of my readers, however, it may not be superfluous to say, that by 'Melologue' I mean that mixture of recitation and music, which is frequently adopted in the performance of Collins's Ode on the Passions, and of which the most striking example I can remember, is the prophetic speech of Joad, in the Athalie of Racine. T. M. INTRODUCTORY MUSIC-Haydn. There breathes the language, known and felt That language of the soul is felt and known. (Where oft, of old, on some high tower, Not worlds could keep her from his arms away1) A certain Spaniard, one night late, met an Indian woman in the streets of Cozco, and would have taken her to his home, but she cried "For God's sake, sir, let me go; for that pipe which you hear in yonder tower calls me with great passion, and I cannot refuse the summons; for love constrains me to go, that I may be his wife and he my husband."-Garcilasso de la Vega, in Sir Paul Rycaut's translation. To the bleak climes of polar night, The Lapland lover bids his reindeer fly, And sings along the lengthening waste of snow, Of vernal Phoebus burn'd upon his brow. Is still resistless, still the same! And faithful as the mighty sea To the pale star that o'er its realm presides, Of human passion rise and fall for thee! GREEK AIR. LIST! 'tis a Grecian maid that sings, She draws the cool lymph in her graceful urn; FLOURISH OF TRUMPET. HARK! 'tis the sound that charms Round her boy-soldier, when that call she hears, See! from his native hills afar, As if 'twere like his mountain rill, O Music! here, even here, Amid this thoughtless wild career, Thy soul-felt charm asserts its wondrous power. There is an air, which oft among the rocks Of his own loved land, at evening hour, Is heard when shepherds homeward pipe their flocks: With tenderest thoughts-would bring around his knees With speaking tears that ask him why He wander'd from his hut for scenes like these? And the stern eyes, that look'd for blood before, SWISS AIR. BUT wake the trumpet's blast again, Than the blest sound of fetters breaking, From Slavery's slumber, breathes to Liberty! SPANISH AIR. HARK! from Spain, indignant Spain, By Saragossa's ruin'd streets, By brave Gerona's deathful story, That while one Spaniard's life-blood beats, If neither valour's force nor wisdom's light Can break or melt that blood-cemented seal, What muse shall mourn the breathless brave, What harp shall sigh o'er Freedom's grave? O Erin! thine' IRISH AIR-Gramachree. THE LOVES OF THE ANGELS. 1823. PREFACE. THIS Poem, somewhat different in form, and much more limited in extent, was originally designed as an episode for a work about which I have been, at intervals, employed during the last two years. Some months since, however, I found that my friend Lord Byron had, by an accidental coincidence, chosen the same subject for a drama; and as 1 could not but feel the disadvantage of coming after so formidable a rival, I thought it best to publish my humble sketch immediately, with such alterations and additions as I had time to make, and thus, by an earlier appearance in the literary horizon, give myself the chance of what astronomers call an Heliacal rising, before the luminary, in whose light I was to be lost, should appear. As objections may be made, by persons whose opinions I respect, to the selection of a subject of this nature from the Scripture, I think it right to remark that, in point of fact, the subject is not scriptural-the notion upon which it is founded (that of the love of angels for women) having originated in an erroneous translation by the LXX. of that verse in the sixth chapter of Genesis, upon which the sole authority for the fable rests. The foundation of my story, therefore, has as little to do with Holy Writ as have the dreams of the latter Platonists, or the reveries of the Jewish divines; and, in appropriating the notion thus to the uses of poetry, I have done no more than establish it in that region of fiction, to which the opinions of the most rational Fathers, and of all other Christian theologians, have long ago consigned it. In addition to the fitness of the subject for poetry, it struck me also as The error of these interpreters (and, it is said, of the old Italic version also) was in making it oi Ayyeλol Tov Ocov, the Angels of God,' instead of the Sousa mistake which, assisted by the allegorizing comments of Philo, and the rhapsodical fictions of the Book of Enoch, was more than sufficient to affect the imaginations of such half-Pagan writers as Clemens Alexandrinus, Tertullian, and Lactantius, who, chiefly among the Fathers, have indulged themselves in fanciful reveries upon the subject. The greater number, however, have rejected the fiction with indignation. Chrysostom, in his twenty-second Homily upon Genesis, earnestly exposes its absurdity; and Cyril accounts such a supposition as eyyus pwpias, 'bordering on folly. According to these Fathers (and their opinion has been followed by all the theologians, down from St. Thomas to Caryl and Lightfoot), the term 'Sons of God' must be understood to mean the descendants of Seth, by Enos-a family peculiarly favoured by Heaven, because with them men first began to call upon the name of the Lord '--while, by the daughters of men' they suppose that the corrupt race of Cain is designated. The probability, however, is, that the words in question ought to have been translated the sons of the nobles or great men,' as we find them interpreted in the Targum of Onkelos (the most ancient and accurate of all the Chaldaic paraphrases), and as, it appears from Cyril, the version of Symmachus also rendered them. This translation of the passage removes all difficulty, and at once relieves the Sacred History of an extravagance, which, however it may suit the imagination of the poet, is inconsistent with all our notions, both philosophical and religious. |