With hearty thanks and kindest greetings yours,
F. Liszt
Rome, June 13th, 1864
29. To the Committee of the Society for the Support of Needy Hungarian Musicians in Pest.
Gentlemen,
You are good enough to invite me in a very flattering manner to take part in the Association that you are starting, with the object of helping needy and infirm musicians in Hungary. Every tie which unites me to our noble country is dear to me. I cordially accept to be entirely yours, and am pleased to hope that the esteem in which you are held, added to your intelligent solicitude for this good work, will secure it speedily and lastingly excellent results.
The good that you propose to realise is not liable to controversy, but is so plainly evident that you will receive on all sides nothing but approbation, encouragement, help and support. Nevertheless, as you do me the honor to ask my explicit opinion with regard to the statutes of your Society, I will venture to observe that it seems to me desirable not to limit oneself exclusively and for ever to helping sick and infirm musicians—and their needy heirs. Those who are in health, when they are at the same time well-deserving, have a claim also on your sympathy…Without enlarging on this point here, I only recommend to your attention, gentlemen, the statutes (published at Leipzig) of the Association which was formed at Weimar in August 1861, under the name of "Allgemeiner Deutscher Musik- Verein," in which the needs of music and of musicians of our day have been taken into consideration simultaneously.
If I had not the sad honor of being poor I should hasten to put a considerable sum at your disposal. Pray pardon me, then, the moderate offering of a hundred florins which you will shortly receive (through my cousin Dr. Eduard Liszt, of Vienna), and I beg you to accept, gentlemen, the assurance of my sincere desire to render in future the best service to your work, as also the expression of my very distinguished and devoted sentiments.
F. Liszt
Rome, June 18th, 1864 (Madonna Del Rosario)