The German is addicted to Fatherland, and if any human being on the face of the earth has a right to be, it is the German. If any other nationality has a better literature, grander poets, more inspired dreamers, sublimer musicians, better artists, or deeper thinkers, I have not heard of it. The ties which bind him to the Fatherland are too strong ever to be broken, and on the invisible strings which stretch from his heart to Germany are continually sounding the home melodies. Could any more beautiful idea be conceived than the fact that on Friday evening, when the grand chorus at the Fest Hall[1] were singing the glorious German poem, "What is the German's Fatherland," in every part of Germany, in every city, village and hamlet, wherever there was a singing society, this same song was being sung on the same evening, in honor of their brethren assembled at Chicago?
We may laugh at the peculiarities of the Germans, but when we approach German art, it must give us pause. Berlioz and Scribe took the skull of a fool, who had once laughed at the incantation music of Der Freischutz, and when the orchestra had reached that point, placed it before them and said: "Now, laugh if you dare. The music of Von Weber is thundering round you." No man who was not destitute of a soul, and utterly wedded to all gross things, could have felt any other than a religious feeling in the great swell of human voices on Thursday evening, as it surged in great waves of harmony, as it rose like the march of a storm in the Battle Hymn of Rienzi, full of martial inspiration and clarion cries, or died away in the gentle and placid melody of the Lindenbaum of Schubert, sweetest of all song-writers. The man who could go away from that concert without feeling that he was a better man, without having recognized that human nature may soar to the infinite on the wings of song, has sunk his soul so far into the uncleaness of life, that Gabriel will have some difficulty in finding it, what time he sounds his final trumpet call.
The Fest was a notable event, from the bare fact that it gave us the immortal Seventh Symphony of Beethoven, about which the critics and rhapsodists have loved to dream in searching for its hidden meaning, and around which they have woven so many delicate and tender fancies. No two persons probably will ever agree upon the exact event it is intended to illustrate, but it seems to me that there is one idea which must be patent to all. To me, the Seventh Symphony appears to be a true picture of a beautiful life—its allegro full of the longings and joyousness of youth; its allegretto filled with the delicious melancholy of love; its scherzo buoyant with the gladness and ecstasy of living; and its final allegro summing all up in a climax of contentment and hope. It seems to me that when the grand old Master, the Jupiter Tonans of music, whose soul pierced the sublimity of the infinite, wrote this symphony, he must have forgotten all the trials and troubles of life. All the joy of nature, her sunlight and breezes, and the hidden melodies of inanimate things; all the glow and elasticity of life's morning; a passionate love for some golden-haired Gretchen; a rhythm to which fairies might have danced in the moonlight, seem to me to be expressed in this wonderful production—the whole bathed in sunlight and clothed with supernatural beauty. In the Seventh Symphony, Beethoven does not sadden you with the profound melancholy, or inspire you with the sublimity of some of his works, but he gives you new ideas of the beauty and joy of living. And as I sat listening to the masterly performance of the Allegretto by the great orchestra—every player's face lit up with the enthusiasm of the music—every instrument moving in perfect precision—the whole air full of the bewitching, almost supernatural music—there occurred to me a letter which I have received this week, in which the writer wants to know if it is the duty of a Christian to encourage the Saengerfest. Although the letter was signed "A Christian,"—in the presence of the great Master's work the question seemed to me utterly profane. Why! Music is full of religion! The first tidings that ever came from Heaven to man came in music on the plains of Bethlehem. It reaches far down into the soul. It fills it with longings for the Unknown. It reveals the Infinite more clearly than the spoken word. Its tendency is upward. It gives birth to aspirations. It makes a true man, truer. It makes a bad man, better.
If the writer of that letter does not appreciate music, let me commend to him the dictum of the father of modern Protestantism:
"Who loves not wine, woman and song,
Remains a fool his whole life long."
I should not care to deny that Martin Luther was a Christian, even in the face of his rather generous platform—in fact, his specifications would rather go to show that he was. I would advise my letter-writing friend, therefore, if he cannot love wine and woman, at least to love song, and see if it does not make a better Christian out of him. I think he could love every plank in Martin Luther's platform, and still be as good a Christian as Martin Luther was, and pitch ink-stands at the devil quite as vigorously. Before a man is thoroughly fitted for Heaven, he ought to be thoroughly fitted for earth. A great many people who think themselves good enough for Heaven, and are all the time wanting to go there, are not half good enough for earth. It is sheer ingratitude to Divine Providence—this lifting of the eyes so high as never to see the sublime world He has placed you in, with its never-ending scenes of beauty and sublimity, and never to see this life with its joys and possibilities. Fling your theologies to the winds. Unloosen your stiff neck. Don't forever snuff evil in everything around you. Up, and out into the world. Throw yourself into the arms of the loving mother, Nature, and see if there is no religion in her eyes. Get to the secret heart of music, and see if it is not anchored hard by the eternal throne. Draw yourself closer to humanity and to universal brotherhood, and see if there is no religion in it. If your soul does not expand in the operation, and if it does not make a better Christian out of you, then you are hardly good enough for this world, and the sooner you are out of it the better.
June 20, 1868.
