THE LOVES OF THE ANGELS. EDITOR'S REMARKS. Ir has seldom, if ever, before happened, that two contemporaneous and popular poets have taken the same subject, till Moore and Byron, unknowing each other's intention, worked out the apocryphal idea on which the "Heaven and Earth" of the one, and "The Loves of the Angels" of the other, are founded. The peculiarities of each are here singularly developed the fire and gloomy grandeur of Byron, and the exquisite grace and felicitous metaphor of Moore, are wonderfully displayed in these celebrated productions; the contrast is perfect-while one is Titanic in its treatment, the other partakes of that sylph-like beauty which is so great a charm in the writings of the Bard of Erin. Moore had finished "The Loves of the Angels" before Byron had begun his poem; when the former discovered that both had selected the same subject, he immediately hurried his through the press, stating to his brother bard that "if his were not first presented to the public it would be invisible through the brilliancy of the greater luminary." He might, however, have made himself perfectly easy on this point, for never did two poets display the distinctive character of their genius more thoroughly than Byron and Moore in these celebrated productions. The very names of the characters are eminently suggestive of these "arcades ambo." While one is full of grand description, magnificent doubt, and metaphysical declamation, the other is redolent of the most musical metaphors, and exquisite conceits: while one breathes passionate imagination, the other glows with the utmost brilliancy of fancy; both are unreal, but their difference is most complete: one peoples his drama with beings fit for the gloomiest and grandest scenery; the other selects his from those who are calculated for the drawing-room of Arcadia; the very measure in which both are composed is admirably adapted to bring out their various powers. How gracefully Moore enshrines his metaphors: "Sighing, as o'er the shadowy past, Like a tomb-searcher, Memory ran, But the whole poem is so full of these felicities of thought and expression, that there would be no end of quotations were we to indulge the desire to extend them. We shall, therefore, content ourselves with merely calling the reader's attention to that incomparable Love Song "Come, pray with me, my seraph love, "I've fed the altar in my bower With droppings from the incense tree I've shelter'd it from wind and shower, But dim it burns the livelong hour, As if, like me, it had no power Of life or lustre, without thee! "A boat at midnight sent alone To drift upon the moonless sea, A lute, whose leading chord is gone, A wounded bird, that hath but one Imperfect wing to soar upon, Are like what I am, without thee! "Then ne'er, my spirit-love, divide, In life or death, thyself from me; But when again, in sunny pride, Thou walk'st through Eden, let me glide, A prostrate shadow, by thy side Oh happier thus than without thee!" It may, perhaps, interest the public to know that the Second Angel, Rubi, was intended to represent Lord Byron. One remarkable feature about this poem is, its total absence of learning. The angels are amorous and poetical men, and not sensuous spiritualities. Coleridge has very happily ridiculed the prevalent idea of heavenly beings, by terming them "celestial poultry." It is certainly the fact, that the common notion of an angel, is a man with the addition of feathers, in contradistinction to Plato's definition of man, which was a "biped without feathers." Every body knows that the cynic, Diogenes, ridiculed this, by stripping a cock of its plumage, and calling it "Plato's man.' A young poet of the day, Charles Mackay, has, in a poem called the Salamandrine, worked out very ingeniously the passion of a female spirituality for a young warrior. Our readers can compare them at their leisure. In conclusion, we may point out the singular manner in which Moore has run line into line, in order to give variety to the measure. With all deference to so finished a versifier as our author, we do not think he has eminently succeeded; still, his Loves of the Angels is a poem fit to be read in the Boudoir of Paradise. MOORE'S PREFACE. element, and must be reproduced before it can hope to return. Some disciples of Zoroaster once inquired of him, "How the wings of the Soul might be made to grow again?"-" By sprinkling them," he replied, "with the Waters of Life.""But where are those Waters to be found?" they asked. "In the Garden of God," replied Zoro aster. THE Eastern story of the angels Harut and Marut, and the Rabbinical fictions of the loves of Uzziel and Shámchazai, are the only sources to which I need refer, for the origin of the notion on which this Romance is founded. In addition to the fitness of the subject for poetry, it struck me also as capable of affording an allegorical medium, through which might be shadowed out (as I have endeavored to do in the following stories) the fall of the Soul from its original purity—the loss of light and happiness which it suffers in the pursuit of this world's perishable pleasures and he punishments, both from conscience and Divine justice, with which impurity, pride, and presumptuous inquiry into the awful secrets of Heaven are sure to be visited. The beautiful story of Cupid and Psyche owes its chief charm to this sort of "veiled meaning," and it has been my wish (how-light. ever I may have failed in the attempt) to communicate to the following pages the same moral,heaven, such as Gabriel, the angel of Revelation, interest. Among the doctrines, or notions, derived by Plato from the East, one of the most natural and sublime is that which inculcates the pre-existence of the soul, and its gradual descent into this dark material world, from that region of spirit and light which it is supposed to have once inhabited, and to which, after a long lapse of purification and trial, it will return. This belief, under various symbolical forms, may be traced through almost all the Oriental theologies. The Chaldeans represent the Soul as originally endowed with wings, which fall away when it sinks from its native The mythology of the Persians has allegorized the same doctrine, in the history of those genii of light who strayed from their dwellings in the stars, and obscured their original nature by mixture with this material sphere; while the Egyptians, connecting it with the descent and ascent of the sun in the zodiac, considered Autumn as emblematic of the Soul's decline towards darkness, and the reappearance of Spring as its return to life and Besides the chief spirits of the Mahometan Israfil, by whom the last trumpet is to be sounded, and Azrael, the angel of death, there were also a number of subaltern intelligences, of which tradition has preserved the names, appointed to preside over the different stages, or ascents, into which the celestial world was supposed to be divided.' Thus Kelail governs the fifth heaven; while Sadiel, the presiding spirit of the third, is also employed in steadying the motions of the earth, which would be in a constant state of agitation, if this angel did not keep his foot planted upon its orb. Among other miraculous interpositions in favor of Mahomet, we find commemorated in the pages of the Koran the appearance of five thousand angels on his side at the battle of Bedr. The ancient Persians supposed that Ormuzd appointed thirty angels to preside successively over the days of the month, and twelve greater ones to assume the government of the months themselves; among whom Bahman (to whom Ormuzd committed the custody of all animals, except man) was the greatest. Mihr, the angel of the 7th month, was also the spirit that watched over the affairs of friendship and love;-Chûr had the care of the disk of the sun;-Mah was agent for the concerns of the moon;-Isphandârmaz (whom Cazvin calls the Spirit of the Earth) was the tutelar genius of good and virtuous women, &c., &c., &c. For all this the reader may consult the 19th and 20th chapters of Hyde de Relig. Vet. Persarum, where the names and attributes of these daily and monthly angels are with much minuteness and erudition explained. It appears, from the Zend-avesta, that the Persians had a certain office or prayer for every day of the month, (addressed to the particular angel who presided over it,) which they called the Sirouzé. The Celestial Hierarchy of the Syrians, as described by Kircher, appears to be the most regularly graduated of any of these systems. In the sphere of the Moon they placed the angels, in that of Mercury the archangels, Venus and the Sun contained the Principalities and the Powers;-and so on to the summit of the planetary system, where, in the sphere of Saturn, the Thrones had their station. Above this was the habitation of the Cherubim in the sphere of the fixed stars; and still higher, in the region of those stars which are so distant as to be imperceptible, the Seraphim, we are told, the most perfect of all celestial creatures, dwelt. The Sabeans also (as D'Herbelot tells us) had their classes of angels, to whom they prayed as mediators, or intercessors; and the Arabians worshipped female angels, whom they called Benad Hasche, or Daughters of God. |