How Sweet the Moonlight

How sweet the moonlight sleeps upon this bank.

Here will we sit and let the sounds of music

Creep in our ears. Soft stillness and the night

Become the touches of sweet harmony.

Sit, Jessica. Look how the floor of Heaven

Is thick inlaid with patens of bright gold.

There’s not the smallest orb which thou behold’st

But in his motion like an angel sings,

Still choiring to the young-eyed cherubins.

Such harmony is in immortal souls,

But whilst this muddy vesture of decay

Doth grossly close it in, we cannot hear it.

From The Merchant of Venice by William Shakespeare.

Abdiel's explanation: Lorenzo is in a garden with his beloved, Jessica. He invites her to sit with him to behold the moonlight and listen to the music, which accords with the setting. He invites her to look up at the stars, all of which sing like angels. Immortals can hear this music, but while we are in mortal garb, we cannot.