Who hath not felt the magic of a voice,--
Its spirit haunt him in romantic hours?
Who hath not heard from Melody's own lips
Sounds that become a music to his mind?--
Music is heaven! and in the festive dome,
When throbs the lyre, as if instinct with life,
And some sweet mouth is full of song,--how soon
A rapture flows from eye to eye, from heart
To heart--while floating from the past, the forms
We love are recreated, and the smile
That lights the cheek is mirror'd on the heart!
So beautiful the influence of sound,
There is a sweetness in the homely chime
Of village bells: I love to hear them roll
Upon the breeze; like voices from the dead,
They seem to hail us from a viewless world.
[2] We know a reverend vicar who once took the trouble to count
all the quotations from Scripture, which occurred in a charity
sermon he had just printed: and his great satisfaction at the
conclusion was, that his was indeed "a scriptural sermon."
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