"
This confession is so peculiar; shows, too, so exquisitely fine a
sensibility, that its repetition makes me regard it as Shakespeare's.
The most splendid lyric on music is given to Lorenzo in the "Merchant of
Venice," and it may be remarked in passing that Lorenzo is not a
character, but, like Claudio, a mere name and a mouthpiece of
Shakespeare's feeling. Shakespeare was almost as well content, it
appears, to play the lover as to play the Duke. I cannot help
transcribing the magical verses, though they must be familiar to every
lover of our English tongue:
"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 cherubims.
Such harmony is in immortal souls;
But, whilst this muddy vesture of decay
Doth grossly close it in, we cannot hear it.
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