"The cloud-capp'd towers, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve;
And, like this insubstantial pageant faded,
Leave not a wrack behind."
In the allegro we seem to continue our analogy—in the wondrous isle itself (Isle of Formosa), "full of strange sights and sounds." Here, not Greek Naiads and Dryads, but Christian sprites and fairy-things, or both in loving rivalry, flit and trip invisibly and visibly; here is freshness! here are sunbeams! here simplicity and sweetness (woodland and pastoral beauty)! And if, in the matchless adagio the sea murmurs round the "still-vext Bermoothes," and Ariel fetches thence dew; here we have all-compelling Prospero commanding the most exquisite airy sport—but not for himself—but for the lovers.
The scherzo (to take that next), forces upon us once more the question—how far did Beethoven, in composing, draw upon his early treasures? This delicious burst—or gush—of inspiration, as it were a moment flashing over, might have been written in the same spring months as that other delicious morsel—specially cherished by us; the scherzo ("Allegro") in E flat, in the early sonata of the same key—which has always seemed to us the very breath of spring itself—a page of nature in April. And why should a Beethoven disparage his early works? were they not doch the works of a Beethoven! Alas, he can never be young again, never after equal them, for their breath and spirit, for the April of their prime.
We should like to hear Liszt or Rubinstein play this morsel arranged. It is as delicate as Heller (whom it indeed anticipates) and Mendelssohn, and strong as Wagner;—but nay, Beethoven will compare only with himself. It is originally exquisite and exquisitely original. It has, too, the same magical, nay, mystical beauty whose glamour is over all this musical mirror of the "Tempest." The imaginative Sonata in D minor, which Beethoven himself referred to the enchanting drama—especially the first movement—reflects, I take it, the deeper bases and significance of the poem; tempest-tossed man, with his cries to the Unknowable, almost like a wounded animal, and rays of sunshine pouring still through storm; man, at war with the elements and himself, the elements without and within him; man, so little on this stupendous stage; man, so great with his alone-perception of it; man, so mean and hateful in his baser parts, so colossal, so divine in his higher; so low as animal (lower than they), so high as hero and sage. Indeed, the tremendous conflict of outer and inner life, this appalling discrepancy we seem to meet with everywhere; man's struggle with nature, and the struggle of both with themselves, seems to be the inner picture both of Shakespeare and Beethoven—especially the latter, who was a mighty brooding fermenting soul—how far transcending our Byron and his "Manfreds"!—more allied to "Faust," yet greater, nobler, dearer, difficult to arrive at harmony with others and himself ("perplext in faith, yet pure in deeds"), who seems happy only in the first part of his progress (expedition, undertaking, crusade), and victorious in the middle; and whom, alas! we fancy almost as despairing of solving the problem (é pure troppo per me) in the end, and going down in the tempest—yet, like the traditional Vengeur, with guns all shooting, and flag at the mast-head flying, and glorified in the setting sun.
I will not dwell on the finale, but conclude with some fancies suggested by the rarely beautiful adagio—like a lovely bird from another world, like the phœnix new born. Here is what Elterlein says of the finale:—"The truly phantastic, airy, sprite-like (elfenartige), at times even boding twilight" (the Scotch uncanny gloaming would more approach the original, Unheimlicht Düstere—Scotch, by the way, would often marvellously translate German—they have a mass of expressive words which we have not)—"boding twilight, nay, wild culminates, however, only in the fourth movement. How light and vanishing do these tone-pictures hover and pass, what characteristic glooming (Helldenkel) does not envelope this scene too."
Of course, this symphony cannot compare one moment with the Eroica and C minor, for grandeur, opulence, and power; but it is a lovely interlude, giving us a divine moment of gratification and repose—an Italian spring day by a lake, to a tropical one, with its Himalayas and interwoven forest, "like a cathedral with service on the blazing roof."
And now for the adagio! which I will only preface by this admonition, always to be recollected; viz., that whatever fancies or figures music may suggest, and however the abstract terms—such as sweet, tender, vigorous, grand, &c.—may, and must be applied in common to all composers, yet each composer has a special individuality; and the music that suggests the figures and fancies, the ideas, has, apart from this, for ever a special charm of its own, which cannot be lost, nor yet transcribed. To those who do not, and to those who do approve the fancies, this charm per se remains.
[The Adagio.]
A work of supererogation, the adagio is still sometimes executed at concerts, which rejoices in the sensational title of "Le trille du Diable;" founded, it is said, on a dream of the composer's (Tartini); this, simply-named "Adagio," of Beethoven's, then—in considering which, I mean to surrender myself wholly to poetry—might be a reminiscence of his of music, in a dream, by the angel, Gabriel; or such, for instance, as might have escorted the seraph when he descended, and said, "Ave Maria!"—or it might be an unconscious reminiscence of previous existence of the great and good man; or the strain the Shepherds heard, in the field, watching their flocks by night—again, and more specially, a