A car of fire I see towards me soar

On pinions light, I feel my spirit high By a new road the ether to explore,

For unknown spheres a purer energy.

Thou late but worm, what worth of thine doth earn This lofty life, this ecstacy divine ;

Aye, only now resolve thy back to turn

Upon the sun that on thy earth doth shine. Those gates, whence others cowering hold aloof, Thou, armed in dauntlessness, in sunder tear; Here is the time thy deeds shall give the proof, Man's dignity shrinks not God's loftiness to share. Before that sable cavern not to quail,

Where Fancy her own torments doth invent; Uncowed that narrow entrance to assail,

Through whose close mouth all Hell in flames is

sent;

Serenely resolute the step to take,

Being or nothingness on the cast to stake.

Now come, thou goblet, down, of crystal clear,
From out thine ancient case. For many a year
I have not thought of thee, since when my sire
Held festive meetings, and 'twas thine to inspire
His guests with gladness, when in jovial round
They pledged each other, and when each was bound

Of all thy many pictured ornaments,*
Each one in festive couplets to explain,

Then at one draught to drain thy whole contents,
What days of youth dost thou recall again!
Now to no neighbours do I pass thee on,
No wit of mine will on thy art be shewn;
Here is a drink that quickly steals away
The senses; see how its brown flood fills up
The long by me prepared self-chosen cup.

Here my last draught with my whole soul I drain,
High festive greeting to the coming day.

[He sets the cup to his mouth

Peal of bells and chorus.

CHORUS OF ANGELS.

Christ has arisen from the tomb,

Let the hour all mortals bless,

Goblets, curiously stained, and many of great antiquity, abound in Germany. The Emperor and the seven electors, and some historical and scriptural paintings, are favourite subjects. It was customary in many great houses, upon the birth of an heir, to cause a glass of this sort to be blown, to become an heirloom, the size of the glass being frequently proportional to the rank of the family. As these were carefully preserved, they accumulated in great numbers, and the text alludes to a sort of game in which they were employed.

Whose hereditary doom,

Is to be girt with wickedness.

FAUST.

What a deep murmur on the night air swells,
What a clear tone draws irresistibly

The goblet from my mouth. Ye hollow bells,
Proclaim ye Easter's dawn is drawing nigh?
The words of hope in that sweet music ringing,
That once, when o'er his sepulchre did close
The shades of night, from angel lips arose,
Assurance of a covenant renewed to mortals bringing.

CHORUS OF WOMEN.

His body in death

With spices we dressed,
And unfailing in faith

We left him to rest;

With graveclothes we bound.
His limbs for the bier,

Alas, and we found

Christ no more here.

CHORUS OF ANGELS.

Glorious in resurrection,

Christ is arisen on high,

Ye tones of Heaven, with me that dwell in dust?
Seek elsewhere mortals flexible and weak.
I hear the message, but I cannot trust;
Faith's chosen child is the miraculous.

I dare not strive those distant spheres to gain,
From whence these holy tidings came to us;
And it seems that long remembered strain
In youth, recalls me back to life again.*

* There is in souls a sympathy with sounds,
And as the mind is pitched the ear is pleased
With melting airs, is martial, brisk, or grave;
Some chord in unison with what we hear,
Is touched within us, and the heart replies.
How soft the music of those village bells,
Falling at intervals upon the ear
In cadence sweet, now dying all away,
Now pealing loud again and louder still,
Clear and sonorous as the gale comes on;
With easy force it opens all the cells

Where memory slept. Whenever I have heard

The kiss of heavenly love upon me fell,

In the deep stillness of the Sabbath calm, The heart-felt fulness of the Sabbath bell,

A prayer to my glad soul sufficient balm, Beyond conception sweet, a holy longing,

Drove me to wander forth through wood and mead, And in the thousand tear-drops warmly thronging, I felt a world grow up, mine own indeed. The joyous sports of youth those tones revealing, Of the spring feast once more the joys unfolds, And recollection fraught with childish feeling,

Me from the last dread step of all withholds; Oh sound, sound on, thou sweet celestial strain, The tears well forth, the earth hath me again.

CHORUS OF DISCIPLES.

Has he that tombed did lie

Already gloriously

A kindred melody, the scene revives,

And with it all its pleasures, all its pains.-Cowper.

The Hindoos account for the mysterious influence which melody exercises over the tone of our minds, by saying, that it is the spirit language in which our souls conversed, before the task of animating bodies was imposed upon them, and that music, reviving a dim shadowy recollection of a better state, softens, elevates, and directs heavenward the mind, enfranchising it for the moment from the matter that encumbers it.