[We say: "Now it is time. Let's act, for 'tis the hour." Then turn we but our eyes—lo! death is there! Thus with my plans. When shall I see thee, Espagna, And Venice with her gulf, and Rome with her Campagna; Thou, Sicily, whom volcanoes undermine; Greece, whom we know too well, Sardinia, unknown one, Lands of the north, the west, the rising sun, Pyramids of the Nile, Cathedrals of the Rhine! Who knows? Never perchance!]
Earthly life is but a malady of the soul, an excitement which is kept up by the passions. The natural state of the soul is rest!
Paris, May 2nd [1832]
Here is a whole fortnight that my mind and fingers have been working like two lost spirits, Homer, the Bible, Plato, Locke, Byron, Hugo, Lamartine, Chateaubriand, Beethoven, Bach, Hummel, Mozart, Weber, are all around me. I study them, meditate on them, devour them with fury; besides this I practice four to five hours of exercises (3rds, 6ths, 8ths, tremolos, repetition of notes, cadences, etc., etc.). Ah! provided I don't go mad, you will find an artist in me! Yes, an artist such as you desire, such as is required nowadays!
"And I too am a painter!" cried Michael Angelo the first time he beheld a chef d'oeuvre…Though insignificant and poor, your friend cannot leave off repeating those words of the great man ever since Paganini's last performance. Rene, what a man, what a violin, what an artist! Heavens! what sufferings, what misery, what tortures in those four strings!
Here are a few of his characteristics:—
[Figure: Liszt here writes down several tiny excerpts from musical scores of Paganini's violin music, such as his famous "Caprices">[
As to his expression, his manner of phrasing, his very soul in fact!——
May 8th [1832]
My good friend, it was in a paroxysm of madness that I wrote you the above lines; a strain of work, wakefulness, and those violent desires (for which you know me) had set my poor head aflame; I went from right to left, then from left to right (like a sentinel in the winter, freezing), singing, declaiming, gesticulating, crying out; in a word, I was delirious. Today the spiritual and the animal (to use the witty language of M. de Maistre) are a little more evenly balanced; for the volcano of the heart is not extinguished, but is working silently.—Until when?—