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— William Blake

Does the Eagle know what is in the pit?

Or wilt thou go ask the Mole:

Can Wisdom be put in a silver rod?

Or Love in a golden bowl?

…

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noun

One who, or that which, accelerates.

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PHILOMELA

43 lines
Matthew Arnold·1822–1888
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Philomela unites the sensibilities and intellectual experience ofmodern Englishmen with the luminousness and simplicity of Greekpoetry."--SAINTSBURY. The myth of the nightingale has long been a favorite with the poets,who have variously interpreted the bird's song. See Coleridge's,Keats's, and Wordsworth's poems on the subject. The most commonversion of the myth, the one followed by Arnold, is as follows:-- "Pandion (son of Erichthonius, special ward to Minerva) had twodaughters, Procne and Philomela, of whom he gave the former inmarriage to Tereus, king of Thrace (or of Daulis in Phocis). Thisruler, after his wife had borne him a son, Itys (or Itylus), weariedof her, plucked out her tongue by the roots to insure her silence,and, pretending that she was dead, took in marriage the other sister,Philomela. Procne, by means of a web, into which she wove her story,informed Philomela of the horrible truth. In revenge upon Tereus, thesisters killed Itylus, and served up the child as food to the father;but the gods, in indignation, transformed Procne into a swallow,Philomela into a nightingale, forever bemoaning the murdered Itylus,and Tereus into a hawk, forever pursuing the sisters."--GAYLEY'S_Classic Myths_. =4.= Use the subjoined questions in studying the poem. =5. O wanderer from a Grecian shore.= See note, l. 27. =8.= Note the aptness and beauty of the adjectives in this line, notone of which could be omitted without irreparable loss. =18. Thracian wild.= Thrace was the name used by the early Greeks forthe entire region north of Greece.[185]=21. The too clear web=, etc. See introductory note to poem forexplanation of this and the following lines. =27. Daulis.= A city of Phocis, Greece, twelve miles northeast ofDelphi; the scene of the myth of Philomela. =Cephessian vale.= Thevalley of the Cephissus, a small stream running through Doris, Phocis,and Boeotia, into the Euboean Gulf. =29. How thick the bursts=, etc. Compare with the following lines fromColeridge:-- "'Tis the merry nightingaleThat crowds and hurries and precipitatesWith fast, thick warble his delicious notes,As he were fearful that an April nightWould be too short for him to utter forthHis love-chant, and disburthen his full soulOf all its music!"--_The Nightingale_.
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