While Phyllis is drinking (Thomas Arne)

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• (Posted 2022-04-01)  CPDL #68683: 

Editor: Christopher Shaw (submitted 2022-04-01).   Score information: A4, 3 pages, 409 kB   Copyright: CC BY SA

Edition notes: Please click on the link for preview/playback/PDF download.

General Information

Title: While Phyllis is drinking
Composer: Thomas Arne
Lyricist: Anonymous
Number of voices: 1v   Voicing: solo high
Genre: Secular, Art song

Language: English
Instruments: Basso continuo, violin accompaniment

First published: 1762 Clio and Euterpe, or, British Harmony
Description: Probably written for performance at thge London pleasure gardens.

Original text and translations

English text

While Phyllis is drinking, love to wine in alliance,
With forces united, bid resistless defiance.
Each touch of her lips makes the wine sparkle higher,
And her eyes by her drinking redouble their fire.
Her cheeks grow the brighter, recruiting their colour,
As flowers with sprinkling revive with fresh odour.
His dart dipp'd in wine, love wounds beyond curing,
And the liquor, like oil, makes the flame more enduring.

By cordials of wine, love is kept from expiring,
And our mirth is emliven'd by love and desiring.
Relieving each other, the pleasure is lasting,
And we never are cloy'd, yet are ever a-tasting.
Then Phyllis begin; let our raptures rebound,
And a kiss and a glass be still going round;
Our joys are immortal, while thus we remove,
From love to the bottle, from the bottle to love.