The Greek 'Strain in English Literature. By Professor John Burnet.
(English Association. la.)—In this address Professor Burnet illustrates- the value of Greek studies by discussing Shakespeare's lines on music, beginning :— "There's not the smallest orb which thou behold'at
But in his motion like an angel sings, Still quiriag to the young-eyed cherubim : Such harmony is in immortal souls."
Lorenzo's theory, he points out, is the Pythagorean doctrine expounded by Plato in the Titruzeus. The angels and cherubim derive from the sirens on the planetary orbits described at the end of the Republic, through the Christian disciples of the Neo- Platonists and their mediaeval successors. "I do not know in what precise way all this reached Shakespeare," says the author, "but I should not be surprised if it were still discoverable." ' The paper is a really valuable comment on the famous passage.
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