Page:The Spirit of French Music.djvu/212

 this rubbish heap of doctrine, pseudo-philosophy, and hermetism, was too vague, too feeble, too lacking in solidity to rouse any feelings, or to present itself in images carrying the strength of inspiration. All this has nothing in common with Wagner's creative genius, it belongs to the weak, or rather unformed portion of his brain. When he has had to translate its verbal expression into music, what has he done? He has put in second-hand music. He has applied to these cold spots musical forms taken from parts of the work that have the warmth of inspiration, forms created by a burst of direct inspiration, which he has adapted by clever though up-hill musical work, better calculated to rejoice the eye of the expert who reads than to touch or charm those who hear it. The Wagnerian ideologies are the wasted part of Wagner's literary invention. They have no part in the pulsing life of his music.

In view of the very peculiar substance of these dramas it is not surprising that the expression of human feelings does not hold the chief place in them. Among the panels of the Wagnerian monument it occupies neither the largest nor the richest in beauties. And yet magnificent specimens are not lacking.

There is no need to dwell at length on Wagner's love duets. Their charms and characteristics are well known.

If the impulse of a passionate and simple tenderness, the gift of two hearts, young and pure, still strangers to mistrust and vanity, opening to each other like expanding rosebuds, if divine and child-like playfulness of heart blending with chaste nobility of feeling,—if these are the things that can lend the finest and most inspiring charm to the expression of love, then Wagner has written no love scene that surpasses that of Lohen-