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ODES
illustrations of masonry
william preston
Ode 1
Hail to the Craft! at whose serene command
The gentle Arts in glad obedience stand:
Hail, sacred Masonry, of source divine,
Unerring sovereign of the unerring line:
Whose plumb of truth, with never failing sway,
Makes the join'd parts of symmetry obey:
whose magic stroke bids confusion cease,
And to the finished Orders gives a place:
Who rears vast structures from the womb of earth,
and gives imperial cities glorious birth.
To work of Art Her merit not confined,
She regulates morals, squares the mind;
Corrects with care the sallies of the soul,
And points the tide of passions where to roll;
On virtue's tablet marks Her moral rule,
And forms her Lodge an universal school;
Where Nature's mystic laws unfolded stand,
and Sense and Science joined go hand in hand.
O may Her social rules instructive spread,
Till Truth erect Her long neglected head!
Till thought deceitful night She dare her ray,
and beam full glorious in the blaze of day!
Till men by virtuous maxims learn to move,
Till all the peopled world Her laws approve,
and Adam's race are bound in brother's love,
Ode II
[Written by a Member of the ALFRED Lodge at Oxford set to
Music by Dr. Fisher, and performed at the Dedication of Freemason's HALL.]
STROPHE.
A I R.
WHAT solemn sounds on holy Sinai rung.
When heavenly lyres by angel fingers strung,
Accorded to th' immortal lay,
That hyrnn'd Creation's natal day
RECITATIVE, accompanied.
Trwas then the shouting sons of morn
Bl,ess'd the great omnific word.;
Abash'ld hoarse jarring atoms heard,
Forgot their pealing strife, And softly crowded into life,
When Order, Law, and Harmony were born
CHORUS.
The mighty Master's pencil warm,
Trac'd out the shadowy form,
And bid each fair proportion grace,
Smiling Nature's modest face.
AIR
Heaven's rarest gifts were seen to join
To deck a finish'd form divine,
And fill the Sovereign Artist's plan;
The Alrnighty's image stampt the glowing frame
And sealed him with the noblest name,
Archetype of beauty, Man.
ANTISTROPHE.
SEMI-CHORUS AND CHORUS.
Ye spirits pure, that roused the tuneful throng.
And loosed to rapture each triumphant tongue
Again with quick instinctive fire,
Each harmonious lip inspire:
Again bid every vocal throat
Dissolve in tender, votive strain.
AIR
Now while yonder white-rob'd train
Before the mystic shrine.
In lowly, adoration join
Now sweep the living lyre and swell the melting note
RECITATIVE
Yet ere the holy rites begin,
The conscious shrine within
Bid your magic song impart.
AIR.
How within the wasted heart
Shook by passion's ruthless power,
Virtue, trimmed her faded flower
To opening buds of fairest fruit:
How from majestic Nature's glowing face
She caught each animating grace,
And planted there the immortal root.
EPODE
RECITATIVE, accompanied,'
Daughter of gods, fair Virtue, if to thee
And thy bright sister Universal Love,
Soul of all good, e'er flow'd the soothing
harmony
Of pious gratulation; from above
To us, thy duteous votaries impart
Preference divine.
AIR.
The sons of antique Art,
In high mysterious jubilee,
With Paean loud, and solemn rite,
Thy holy step invite,
And court thy listening ear,
To drink the cadence clear
That swells the choral symphony.
CHORUS.
To thee, by foot profane untrod
Their votive hands have rear'd the high abode.
RECITATIVE.
Here shall your impulse kind,
Inspire the tranced mind:
AIR'
And lips of Truth shall sweetly tell
What heavenly deeds befit,
The soul by Wisdom's lesson smit;
What praise he claims, who nobly spurns,
Gay vanities of life, and tinsel joys.
For which unpurged fancy burns.
CHORUS.
What pain he shuns, who dares be wise
What glory wins, who dares excel!
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