Page:Letters to a Young Lady (Czerny).djvu/15

 The first principles, namely, a knowledge of the keys and of the notes, are the only really tedious and unpleasant points in learning music. When you have once conquered them, you will every day experience more and more amusement and delight in continuing your studies.

Consider the matter, dear Miss Cecilia, as if you were for a time compelled to wend your way among somewhat tangled and thorny bushes, in order to arrive at last at a beautiful prospect, and a spot always blooming in vernal beauty.

The best remedy against this disagreeable necessity is, to endeavour to fix these preliminary subjects on your memory as firmly and quickly as possible. Such pupils as manifest from the very outset a desire and love for the thing, and who strongly and rationally apply their memories to the matter, will acquire a perfect knowledge of the keys and notes in a few weeks; while others, frightened at the apparent tediousness of the acquisition, often lose several months in attaining the same object. Which, then, of these two ways is the better?

Before any thing else, I earnestly entreat you, Miss Cecilia, to acquire a graceful and appropriate position, when sitting at the pianoforte. The seat which you use must be just