The fairy queen

Moritz Daniel Oppenheim, Portrait of Charlotte de Rothschild, 1836 (detail)

"If Love's a Sweet Passion, why does it torment?

If a Bitter, oh tell me whence comes my content?

Since I suffer with pleasure, why should I complain,

Or grieve at my Fate, when I know 'tis in vain?

Yet so pleasing the Pain, so soft is the Dart,

That at once it both wounds me, and tickles my Heart.

........................................."

"If love's a sweet passion" (The Fairy Queen), Act III

Henry Purcell (1659-1695)

Henry Purcell, The Fairy Queen

(Veronique Gens, soprano)