III. Ad Eandem. Credula quid liquidam Sirena, Neapoli, jactas, Illic, Romulidum studiis ornata secundis, It seems to have been the fashion to address epigrams to Leonora. A volume entitled Applausi poetici alle glorie della Signora Leonora Baroni was published at Rome in 1639, containing Greek, Latin, Italian, French, and Spanish poems in praise of the singer.1 2 Giovanni Battista Doni, compares both her and her mother with the poetess Sappho. 3 Fulvio Testi wrote a sonnet in praise of her singing and her beauty. An interesting eulogy of Leonora is to be found in a Discours sur la Musique d'Italie by M. Mangars, Prior of S. Peter de Mac, Paris, 1672: "Leonora has fine parts, and a happy judgment in distinguishing good from bad music; she understands it perfectly well, and even composes, which makes her absolute mistress of what she sings, and gives her the most exact pronunciation and expression of the sense of the words... She sings with an air of confident and liberal modesty, and with a pleasing gravity. Her voice reaches a large compass of notes, is just, clear, and melodious; and she softens or raises it without constraint or grimace. Her raptures and sighs are not too tender; her looks have nothing impudent, nor do her 1 See Nicias Erythreus, Pinacotheca 2. 427, Lips. 1712. 2 Cf. p. 22. 8 De Praestantia Musicae Veteris, 1647, 2. 56. See Hawkins 4. 196. ▲ Poesie del Conte Fulvio Testi, Milano, 1658, p. 122. of gestures betray anything beyond the reserve of a modest girl. In passing from one song to another, she shows sometimes the divisions of the enharmonic and chromatic species with so much air and sweetness, that every hearer is ravished with that delicate and difficult mode of singing. She has no need any person to assist her with a theorbo or viol, one of which is required to make her singing complete; for she plays perfectly well herself on both those instruments. In short, I have been so fortunate as to hear her sing several times above thirty different airs, with second and third stanzas of her own composition. But I must not forget, that one day she did me the particular favor to sing with her mother and her sister; her mother played upon the lute, her sister upon the harp, and herself upon the theorbo. This concert, composed of three fine voices, and of three different instruments, so powerfully captivated my senses, and threw me into such raptures, that I forgot my mortality, et crus être déjà parmi des anges, jouissant des contentements des bienheureux." 1 The mention of the mother's lute (lyra) in Ep. 2. 6, shows that Milton himself probably heard a concert of the kind described above. The line is a reminiscence of Buchanan's "Aureaque Orpheae fila fuisse lyrae," El. 7, noted by Todd, and also of Ovid's "fila dedisse lyrae," Fast. 5. 105.2 1 See Bayle, Dict., s. v. Baroni, quoted by Warton and Hawkins 4. 197. Cf. also Warton's note of the eulogy of Pietro della Velle, and Masson, Life 1. 751-753. See p. 32, and s. v. lyra, G. APPENDIX IV AN ESSAY READ IN THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS On the Music of the Spheres. If there is any chance, fellow-students, for my slender abilities, after you have listened to so many and so great orators today, I also shall forthwith try to express, according to my small measure, my good will towards the solemn celebration of this day, and shall follow, at a distance, as it were, this day-long triumph of eloquence. While, therefore, I completely shun and dread those trite and commonplace subjects of discourse, the thought of this day and also of those who, as I rightly suspected, would speak worthily of the occasion, kindles and immediately arouses my mind to an arduous attempt with some other new material; and these two influences could indeed have stimulated even some sluggish person and have sharpened a mind otherwise obtuse. Therefore, it occurs to me to offer, with open hand, as they say, and abundance of oratory, at least a few prefatory words concerning that celestial concent about which there is soon to be a dispute with closed fist; but I shall keep track of the course of time, which at once urges and restrains me. Nevertheless, my hearers, I should wish you to accept these words as though they were said in sport. For what sane man would have thought that Pythagoras, that god among philosophers, to whose name all mortals of his age yielded the palm with the most sacred veneration-who, I say, would have thought that he would ever have produced publicly an opinion of so uncertain foundation? Surely, if ever he taught the harmony of the spheres, and the circling of the heavens to the charm of melody, he wished by this wisely to signify the most friendly relations of the orbs, and their uniform revolutions for ever according to the fixed law of fate. In this, to be sure, he has imitated both the poets and, what is almost the same, the divine oracles, by whom no sacred and hidden mystery is exhibited to the people unless enveloped in some veil and disguise.1 This was done by that best interpreter of Mother Nature, Plato, when he told how certain Sirens sit upon the separate heavenly orbs, that by their honeyed song they may enchant both gods and men.2 Further, this universal concord and lovely concent, which Pythagoras, in poetic fashion, expressed by harmony, Homer also hinted at very strongly in that golden chain of Jove suspended from Heaven. 3 4 But Aristotle, the imitator and constant calumniator of Pythagoras and Plato, eager to pave his way to glory with the wrecked theories of men so great, imputed to Pythagoras this unheard symphony of the heavens, and music of the spheres. But if either fate or chance had suffered, O father Pythagoras, that your soul in its flight should have passed into me, certainly you would not then lack one to defend you readily, however deep your disrepute and long its durance. And yet why should not the celestial bodies, in those perennial circuits, produce musical sounds? Or does it not seem just to you, Aristotle ? Verily, I should scarcely believe that your intelligences could have endured that sedentary labor of rolling the heavens for so many ages, unless that ineffable melody of the stars had kept them from leaving their places, and persuaded them to stay by the charm of music. But suppose you take away from heaven those fair intelligences, then you both give up the ministering gods to drudgery, and condemn them to a treadmill. Nay, Atlas himself would long ago have withdrawn his shoulders, to the immediate ruin of the heavens, had not that sweet concent charmed him with the 1 By this explanation of the Pythagorean theory Milton shows clearly his own interpretation of the mystical notion of a universal harmony. Cf. above, pp. 96-98. 2 Singulis coelis orbibus Sirenas quasdam insidere tradidit. Milton adapts the words of Macrobius (Comm. in Somn. Scip. 2. 3): singulas ait Sirenas singulis orbibus insidere,' referring to Plato, Rep. 10. 617. 3 Cf. the description in P. L. 3. 570 ff. A reference to Aristotle's criticism of the Pythagorean system, De Coelo 2. 2-10. greatest pleasure while panting and sweating under his burden. Besides, the Dolphin, utterly disgusted at the stars, would long ago have preferred the seas to heaven, had he not been well aware that the vocal orbs of heaven far surpassed the lyre of Arion in sweetness.1 What say you to the belief that the very lark at day-break flies directly into the clouds, and that the nightingale passes the whole solitude of night in song, that they may order their melodies according to the harmonic relations of heaven, to which they attentively listen? Thus also the fable of the Muses dancing day and night around about Jove's altars 2 has prevailed from the remotest beginning of things; thus to Phoebus has been attributed from most ancient times skill on the lyre. Thus venerable antiquity believed that Harmony was the daughter of Jove and Electra, for when she was given to Cadmus in marriage, the whole chorus of the heavens is said to have sounded in concord.3 But even supposing that no one on earth has ever heard this symphony of the stars, shall all things above the sphere of the moon be therefore mute, and sunk in drowsy stupor? Nay rather let us accuse our own feeble ears, which either cannot, or deserve not to receive songs and sounds so sweet. But this melody of the heavens is not wholly inaudible; for who would have thought, O Aristotle, of your goats capering in mid-air, unless because they clearly heard, by their nearness, the heavens giving harmonious sounds, and were unable to restrain themselves from following the choirs? But Pythagoras alone among mortals is said to have heard this con 1 Cf. Ovid, Fast. 2. 80 ff. 2 Cf. Il P. 47-48: And hears the Muses in a ring Aye round about Jove's altar sing. 3 Harmonia was especially honored by the gods upon the occasion of her marriage with Cadmus. Apollo, the Muses, and the Graces are said to have sung and played, and she received gifts from all the gods. Milton alters the story so as to include the entire harmony of heaven. He probably derived his conception from Diodorus 5. 49. Cf. also Pind. Pyth. 3. 90 (160); Eurip. Phoen. 822. 4 Cf. Aristotle, Meteor. 1. 4. 6; Gen. An. 4. 4. 15. |