This cruel misfortune afflicted him at first profoundly; but when he was compelled to recognise that the evil was without a remedy, his manly soul got the upper hand, he resigned himself to his fate, and resolved to continue his oratorio performances.

"Samson," one of his favourite oratorios, was in the programme of the season. In spite of all his moral energy, the author could not listen untroubled to the pathetic air of the sightless Hercules of the Hebrews, in which he gave utterance to his immense grief. "Total eclipse. No sun—no moon!" Then it was that they saw the grand old man, who was seated at the organ, grow pale and tremble; and when they led him forward to the audience, which was applauding, many persons present were so forcibly affected that they were moved even to tears.

And we may still be sharers in that emotion, as when we recall the circumstances of that scene, and remember that the verses were composed by Milton, who, you recollect, was himself blind.

"Total eclipse! No sun!—no moon!
All dark amidst the blaze of noon!
Oh! glorious light! No cheering ray
To glad my eyes with welcome day.
Why thus deprived thy prime decree?
Sun, moon, and stars are dark to me."

On the 6th April, 1759, the "Messiah" was performed for the last time under the direction of the author.

After returning home from this performance, he went to bed, never to rise again. Seized with a mortal exhaustion, and feeling that his last hour was come, in the full plenitude of his reason, he gently rendered up his soul to die, on the Anniversary of the first performance of the "Messiah," Good Friday, 13th April, 1759, aged seventy-four years.

He was buried with all honour and respect in Westminster Abbey, the Pantheon of Great Britain. His remains were placed in what is called "the Poet's Corner," wherein lie buried Shakspere, Milton, Dryden, Thompson, Sheridan, Gray. And he is in his place there; for who was ever more of a poet than Handel?—who deserved better than he to enter the Pantheon. They might have written upon his tomb the words which Antony spoke when he beheld the body of Cæsar, "This was a man."

Yes: this was a man who had done honour to music as much by the nobility of his character as by the sublimity of his genius. He was one of the too few artists who uphold the dignity of art to the highest possible standard. He was the incarnation of honesty. The unswerving rigidity of his conduct captivates even those who do not take him for a model. He worked ceaselessly for the improvement of others without ever feeling weary. He was virtuous and pure, proud and intrepid. His love of good was as unconquerable as his will. He died at his post, working to the last hour of his life. He has left behind him a luminous track and a noble example.

A Handel, like a Homer or a Milton, a Shakspere or a Dante, is only once given to a nation. No man need ever expect to rival the genius of Handel, or approach his powers of expression; but all may emulate his love for his fellow-man—his sympathy for the distressed—his desire to promote the glory of his God. For these noble qualities I commend Handel to your consideration; and for these I hold him forth this evening as a man worthy of our imitation.

"Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And departing leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time.