e tides of Music's golden sea
Setting toward eternity,
Uplifted high in heart and hope are we.
--_Tennyson_.

Music in the best sense has little need of novelty, on the contrary,
the older it is, the more one is accustomed to it, the greater is the
effect it produces.--_Goethe_.

Music is a kind of inarticulate, unfathomable speech, which leads us to
the edge of the infinite, and lets us for moments gaze into
that.--_Carlyle_.

AMONG THE GREAT MASTERS OF MUSIC.

ST. CECILIA.

One of the most ancient legends handed down to us by the early Church
is that of St. Cecilia, the patroness of music and musicians. She is
known to have been honoured by Christians as far back as the third
century, in which she is supposed to have lived.

Doubtless much of fancy has been added, in all the ensuing years, to
the facts of Cecilia's life and death. Let us, however, take the
legend as it stands. It says that St. Cecilia was a noble Roman lady,
who lived in the reign of the Emperor Alexander Severus. Her parents,
who secretly professed Christianity, brought her up in their own faith,
and from her earliest childhood she was remarkable for her enthusiastic
piety: she carried night and day a copy of the Gospel concealed within
the folds of her robe; and she made a secret but solemn vow to preserve
her chastity, devoting herself to heavenly things, and shunning the
pleasures and vanities of the world. As she excelled in music, she
turned her good gift to the glory of God, and composed hymns, which she
sang herself with such ravishing sweetness, that even the angels
descended from heaven to listen to her, or to join their voices with
hers. She played on all instruments, but none sufficed to breathe
forth that flood of harmony with which her whole soul was filled;
therefore she invented the organ, consecrating it to the service of
God. When she was about sixteen, her parents married her to a young
Roman, virtuous, rich, and of noble birth, named Valerian. He was,
however, still in the darkness of the old religion. Cecilia, in
obedience to her parents, accepted the husband they had ordained for
her; but beneath her bridal robes she put on a coarse garment of
penance, and, as she walked to the temple, renewed her vow of chastity,
praying to God that she might have strength to keep it. And it so fell
out; for, by her fervent eloquence, she not only persuaded her husband,
Valerian, to respect her vow, but conve