Stephen Duck

On Music

I.

MUSIC the coldest Heart can warm,
 The hardest melt, the fiercest charm;
 Disarm the Savage of his Rage,
 Dispel our Cares, and Pains assuage;
 With Joy it can our Souls inspire,
 And tune our Tempers to the Lyre;
 Our Passions, like the Notes, agree,
 And stand subdu'd by Harmony. 
This found the melancholy King,
 When DAVID tun'd the trembling String:
 Sweet MUSIC chas'd the sullen Spleen away,
 And made his clouded Soul serenely gay. 

II.

WHILE MUSIC breathes in Martial Airs,
 The Coward durst forget his Fears;
 Or, if the Notes to Pity sound,
 Revenge and Envy cease to wound:
 The Pow'r of MUSIC has been known
 To raise or tumble Cities down:
 Thus Theban Turrets, Authors say,
 Were rais'd by MUSIC's magic Lay;
 And ancient Jericho's Heav'n-hated Wall,
 To sacred MUSIC, ow'd its destin'd Fall. 

III.

NOR Mortals only MUSIC love;
 It chears celestial Saints above:
 Sweet Hallelujahs Angels sing
 Around their great Ethereal KING;
 Ceasless they sound the FATHER's Praise,
 The FATHER too approves their Lays;
 For HE (as all Things) MUSIC made,
 And SERAPHIMS before Him play'd:
 When over Horeb's Mount He came,
 Array'd in Majesty and Flame;
 After the sounding Trump, sublime, He rode;
 The sounding Trump proclaim'd th'approaching GOD. 

IV.

MUSIC had Being, long before
 The solemn Organ learnt to roar:
 When MICHAEL, o'er the heav'nly Plain,
 Advanc'd, to fight the rebel Train;
 Loud Trumpets did his Wrath declare,
 In MUSIC, terrible to hear:
 And when the Universe was made,
 On golden Harps the Angels play'd:
 And when it falls, (as fall it must)
 MUSIC shall penetrate the Dust;
 The Trump shall sound with the Archangel's Breath;
 And, sweetly dreadful! wake the Dead from Death.