And the mute Silence hist along, Smoothing the rugged brow of night, Sweet bird, that shunn'st the noise of folly, Most musical, most melancholy !" 11 Thee, chauntress, oft the woods among I woo to hear thy even-song; And missing thee, I walk unseen Like one that hath been led astray 12 Through the heaven's wide pathless way; Where glowing embers through the room's Far from all resort of mirth, Save the cricket on the hearth, Or the bellman's drowsy charm, What worlds, or what vast regions, hold The immortal mind, that hath forsook Or what (though rare) of later age Of Camball, and of Algarsife, And who had Canace to wife, That own'd the virtuous ring and glass; Till civil-suited morn appear; Not trick'd and frounc'd as she was wont With the Attic boy to hunt, But kercheft in a comely cloud, While rocking winds are piping loud, Or usher'd with a shower still When the gust hath blown his fill, With minute-drops from off the eaves: Hide me from day's garish eye, While the bee with honied thigh, And the waters murmuring, With such consort as they keep, And let some strange mysterious dream Of lively portraiture display'd, Softly on my eyelids laid; And, as I wake, sweet music breathe Sent by some spirit to mortals good, In service high and anthems clear, As may with sweetness, through mine ear, And bring all heaven before mine eyes. And may at last my weary age To something like prophetic strain. These pleasures, Melancholy, give, In He puts the Penseroso last, as a climax; because he prefers the pensive mood to the mirthful. I do not know why he spells the word in this manner. I have never seen it without the i,-Pensieroso. Florio's Dictionary the ie varies into an o,-Pensoroso; whence apparently the abbreviated form,-Pensoso. "As thick as motes in the sunne beams."-Chaucer.—But see how by one word, people, a great poet improves what he borrows. 9 “ Prince Memnon's sister."—It does not appear, by the ancient authors, that Memnon had a sister; but Milton wished him to have one; so here she is. It has been idly objected to Spenser, who dealt much in this kind of creation, that he had no right to add to persons and circumstances in old mythology. As if the same poetry which saw what it did might not see more! 10 "The cherub Contemplation."-Learnedly called cherub, not seraph; because the cherubs were the angels of knowledge, the seraphs of love. In the celestial hierarchy, by a noble sentiment, the seraphs rank higher than the cherubs. 11 “Most musical, most melancholy.”—A question has been started of late years, whether the song of the nightingale is really melancholy; whether it ought not rather to be called merry, as, in fact, Chaucer does call it. But merry, in Chaucer's time, did not mean solely what it does now; but any kind of hasty or strenuous prevalence, as "merry men," meaning men in their heartiest and manliest condition. He speaks even of the "merry organ," meaning the church organ- the "merry organ of the mass." Coleridge, in some beautiful lines, thought fit to take the merry side, out of a notion, real or supposed, of the necessity of vindicating nature from sadness. But the question is surely very simple, one of pure association of ideas. The nightingale's song is not in itself melancholy, that is, no result of sadness on the part of the bird; but coming, as it does, in the night-time, and making us reflect, and reminding us by its very beauty of the mystery and fleetingness of all sweet things, it becomes melancholy in the finer |