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Lor. How sweet the moonlight sleeps upon this bank!
Here will we sit, and let the sounds of music
Creep in our ears; soft stillness and the night
Become the touches of sweet harmony.

Sit, Jessica. Look how the floor of heaven
Is thick inlaid with patines of bright gold :
There's not the smallest orb which thou behold'st,
But in his motion like an angel sings,

Still quiring to the young-eyed cherubim ;
Such harmony is in immortal souls;
But, while this muddy vesture of decay
Doth grossly close us in, we cannot hear it.

Enter Musicians.

Come, ho, and wake Diana with a hymn;
With sweetest touches pierce your mistress' ear,
And draw her home with music.

Jes. I am never merry when I hear sweet music.
Lor. The reason is, your spirits are attentive;
For do but note a wild and wanton herd,
Or race of youthful and unhandled colts,
Fetching mad bounds, bellowing, and neighing loud,
Which is the hot condition of their blood;

If they but hear, perchance, a trumpet sound,
Or any air of music touch their ears,

You shall perceive them make a mutual stand,
Their savage eyes turned to a modest gaze,

By the sweet power of music. Therefore the poet
Did feign that Orpheus drew trees, stones, and flood-
Since naught so stockish, hard, and full of rage,
But music for the time doth change his nature.

The man that hath no music in himself,
And is not moved with concord of sweet sounds,
Is fit for treasons, stratagems, and spoils;
The motions of his spirit are dull as night,
And his affections dark as Erebus :

Let no such man be trusted.-Mark the music.

Enter Portia and Nerissa at a distance.

Por. That light we see, is burning in my hall.
How far that little candle throws his beams!
So shines a good deed in a naughty world.

[Music.

Ner. When the moon shone, we did not see the candle.

Por. So doth the greater glory dim the less:
A substitute shines brightly as a king,

Until a king be by; and then his state
Empties itself, as does an inland brook
Into the main of waters. Music! hark!

Ner. It is your music, madam, of the house.
Por. Nothing is good, I see, without respect;
Methinks it sounds much sweeter than by day.

Ner. Silence bestows that virtue on it, madam.
Por. The crow doth sing as sweetly as the lark,
When neither is attended; and, I think,

The nightingale, if she should sing by day,
When every goose is cackling, would be thought
No better a musician than the wren.

How many things by season seasoned are
To their right praise, and true perfection!
Peace, hoa! the moon sleeps with Endymion,
And would not be awaked!

SHAKSPEARE.

LESSON LXIX.

THE FREED BIRD.

RETURN, return, my bird!

I have dressed thy cage with flowers, 'Tis lovely as a violet bank

In the heart of forest bowers.

"I am free, I am free; I return no more!
The weary time of the cage is o'er!
Through the rolling clouds I can soar on high,
The sky is around me, the blue, bright sky!

"The hills lie beneath me, spread far and clear,
With their glowing heath-flowers and bounding deer,
I see the waves flash on the sunny shore;

I am free, I am free; I return no more!"

Alas, alas, my bird!

Why seek'st thou to be free?

Wert thou not blest in thy little bower,

When thy song breathed naught but glee?

"Did my song of summer breathe naught but glee?
Did the voice of the captive seem sweet to thee?
Oh! hadst thou known its deep meaning well,
It had tales of a burning heart to tell.

"From a dream of the forest that music sprang,
Through its notes the peal of a torrent rang;
And its dying fall, when it soothed thee best,
Sighed for wild flowers and a leafy nest.”

Was it with thee thus, my bird?

Yet thine eye flashed clear and bright;
I have seen the glance of the sudden joy
In its quick and dewy light.

"It flashed with the fire of a tameless race,
With the soul of the wild wood, my native place;
With the spirit that panted through heaven to soar;
Woo me not back; I return no more!

"My home is high, amid rocking trees,
My kindred things are the star and breeze,
And the fount unchecked in its lonely play,
And the odors that wander afar away!"

Farewell, farewell, then, bird!

I have called on spirits gone,

And it may be they joyed like thee, to part,
Like thee, that wert all my own.

"If they were captives and pined like me,

Though love might guard them, they joyed to be free;
They sprung from the earth with a burst of power,
To the strength of their wings, to their triumph's hour

"Call them not back when the chain is riven,
When the way of the pinion is all through heaven.
Farewell! With my song through the clouds I soar,
I pierce the blue skies: I am earth's no more!"

MRS. HEMANS.

LESSON LXX.

BEAUTY, HEALTH, HAPPINESS.

Beauty.

A NATIVE grace

Sat fair-proportioned on her polished form,
Vailed in a simple robe, its best attire,
Beyond the pomp of dress; for loveliness
Needs not the foreign aid of ornament,
But is, when unadorned, adorned the most.
Thoughtless of beauty, she was beauty's self,
Recluse amid the close-embowering woods;
As in the hollow breast of Apennine,
Beneath the shelter of encircling hills,
A myrtle rises far from human eye,

And breathes its balmy fragrance o'er the wild;
So flourished, blooming, and unseen by all,
The sweet Lavinia.

Never yet hath bride or maid

In Araby's gay harems smiled,

Whose boasted brightness would not fade
Before Al Hassan's blooming child.
Light as the angel shapes that bless
An infant's dream, yet not the less
Rich in all woman's loveliness;
With eyes so pure, that from their ray
Dark vice would turn abashed away,
Blinded like serpents when they gaze
Upon the emerald's virgin blaze;
Yet filled with all youth's sweet desires,
Mingling the meek and vestal fires
Of other worlds, with all the bliss,
The fond, weak tenderness of this;
A soul, too, more than half divine,

THOMSON.

When, through some shades of earthly feeling,
Religion's softened glories shine,

Like light through summer foliage stealing,
Shedding a glow of such mild hue,
So warm, and yet so shadowy, too,
As makes the very darkness there
More beautiful than light elsewhere.

Health.

Ah! what avail the largest gifts of Heaven,
When drooping health and spirits go amiss?

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MOORE.

How tasteless then whatever can be given?
Health is the vital principle of bliss,
And exercise, of health.

Oh who can speak the vigorous joys of health?
Unclogged the body, unobscured the mind;
The morning rises gay; with pleasing stealth
The temperate evening falls serene and kind.
In health the wiser brutes true gladness find;
See how the younglings frisk along the meads,
As May comes on, and wakes the balmy wind;
Rampant with life, their joy all joy exceeds:

Yet what but high-strung health this dancing pleasure breeds?

Happiness.

With thee conversing, I forget all time,

THOMSON.

All seasons and their change; all please alike.
Sweet is the breath of morn; her rising sweet,
With charm of earliest birds; pleasant the sun,
When first on this delightful land he spreads
His orient beams, on herb, tree, fruit, and flower,
Glistening with dew; fragrant the fertile earth
After soft showers; and sweet the coming on
Of grateful evening mild, and silent night
With this her solemn bird, and this fair moon,
And these the gems of heaven, her starry train.

MILTON.

LESSON LXXI.

THE WISE AND AMIABLE WOMAN.

THE woman, whom I would exhibit to your view, possesses a sound understanding. She is virtuous, not from impulse, instinct, and a childish simplicity; for she knows that evil exists, as well as good; but she abhors the former, and resolutely chooses the latter. As she has carefully weighed the nature and consequences of her actions, her moral principles are fixed; and she has deliberately formed a plan of life, to which she conscientiously adheres. Her character is her own; her knowledge and virtues are original, and are not the faint copies of another character. Convinced that the duty of every human being, consists in performing well the

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