Whispers one tone to win me from that height.
All is of Heaven! Yet wherefore to mine eye
Gush the vain tears unbidden from their source,
Even while the waves of that strong harmony
Roll with my spirit on their sounding course?
Wherefore must rapture its full heart reveal
Thus by the burst of sorrow’s token shower!
—Oh! is it not, that humbly we may feel
Our nature’s limit in its proudest hour?
[The mention of Neukomm’s magnificent organ-playing brings to remembrance one great enjoyment of Mrs Hemans’s residence in Dublin—the exquisite “Music of St Patrick’s,” of which she has recorded her impressions in the little poem so entitled. Its effect is, indeed, such as, once heard, can never be forgotten. If ever earthly music can be satisfying, it must surely be such as this, bringing home to our bosoms the solemn beauty of our own holy liturgy, with all its precious and endeared associations, in tones that make the heart swell with ecstasy, and the eyes overflow with unbidden tears. There was one anthem, frequently heard within those ancient walls, which Mrs Hemans used to speak of with peculiar enthusiasm—that from the 3d Psalm—“Lord, how are they increased that trouble me!” The consummate skill exhibited in the adaptation of sound to sense in this noble composition is, in truth, most admirable. The symphony to the 5th verse—“I laid me down and slept”—with its soft, dreamy vibrations, gentle as the hovering of an angel’s wing—the utter abandon, the melting into slumber, implied by the half-whispered words that came breathing as from a world of spirits—almost “steep the senses in forgetfulness,” when a sudden outbreak, as it were, of life and light, bursts forth with the glad announcement, “I awaked, for the Lord sustained me;” then the old sombre arches ring with an almost overpowering peal of triumph, bearing to Heaven’s gate the exulting chorus of the 6th and 8th verses.—Memoir, p. 260-1.]