"What god is mightier than Love ?" Let him but doubt her constancy and she will die.

And she plays her trump card: "Mon coeur s'ouvre a ta voix," while the fluttering strings and cooing wood-winds insinuate themselves into the crevices of Samson's moral harness and loosen the rivets that hold it together:-- [figure: a musical score excerpt to the words "My heart, at thy dear voice"] Herein lies the strength and the weakness of music: it must fain be truthful.

Dalila's words may be hypocritical, but the music speaks the speech of genuine passion.

Not until we hear the refrain echoed mockingly in the last scene of the drama can we believe that the passion hymned in this song is feigned.

And we almost deplore hat the composer put it to such disgraceful use.