F. Liszt
159. To Edmund von Mihalovich
Dear Excellent Friend,
I wrote the day before yesterday to Do, and was about to continue with a letter to you when a telegram called me subitissimo back to Rome. The thread of my ideas has not been broken on the journey, and I resume our conversation, a trois, on the long gestation—omen of abortion—of the Hungarian Academy of Music.
I trust that my very dear and honored friends will be convinced of my perfect disinterestedness in the question; the idea of an Academy is in no way mine if I become sponsor to it, it will be in self-defence and without any connivance at paternity whatever; I even refuse to help in the procreation of the marmot [brat]; and, far from making myself, before my time, in any way its champion or propagandist, I hesitate over the difficulties which are opposed to its birth. I have explained these many a time to my Budapest friends, and the difficulties have increased rather than diminished during these last three years…
1stly. The financial situation of the country appears to be such that one must scruple to burden the budget with an expenditure beyond urgent needs. My patriotism is sufficiently sincere and lively to counsel me to abstention, including every renunciation that is compatible with my strict duty.
2ndly. It would be a poor luxury to add a third music school to the two schools already existing (meagrely) at Pest. If one cannot emulate with honor the similar establishments of Vienna, Leipzig, etc.—what is the good of troubling any further about it? Now, to give a vigorous impulse to Art among us, we must first unite and fuse into one spirit a set of professors of well- known capability,—a very arduous and ungrateful task, the accomplishment of which demands much intelligence, and a sufficient amount of cleverness and of money.
Other minor, local considerations complicate the matter stilt further; I pass them over in silence today, and will not repeat myself any more except on one point,—my religious devotion to our country and our art. To serve them somewhat, according to the moderate degree of my talent, whether it be in working by myself at my manuscripts (which is what I much prefer), or in cooperating with my friends in public things, this is my simple and exclusive desire, totally removed from the personal pretensions or anxieties of vanity which are wrongly imputed to me.
"Tiszta lelek, tiszta szandek, akar siker, akar nem." ["Pure soul, pure intention, whether the results be favorable or not."— Maxim of Stephan Szechenyi.]
My friends are those who haunt the Ideal; there, dear friend, we "recognise" each other, and shall always do so,—but not "in the mud," illustrated by a fascinating poet, too much celebrated and tainted by the triviality of vulgar applause—Heine. Amongst other things he had predicted that the Cathedral of Cologne would never be finished. "In vain will Franz Liszt give his concerts," etc.—