Page:The Spirit of French Music.djvu/219

 Such novelties are of two kinds. Some constitute progress. Others are changes. The former correspond to a perfecting of music's means of expression, the latter to modifications of taste and sensibility.

The former class have the character of discoveries; they are produced in the course of the period elapsing between the beginnings of modern music and the moment when the language and laws of this music find themselves completely established. From that moment there is no further occasion for them. The latter class are merely a new fashion of employing elements already in use, and crop up whenever new shades of feeling call for new shades of expression.

This distinction is easily made theoretically, but its application might give rise to a great many controversies. What is the moment at which the technique of modern music is to be considered to have reached such a degree of perfection that nothing important could be, and in fact nothing was, added to it? And on what ground are we to decide whether such and such modern musician, who has charmed some and irritated others, but has left no one indifferent by the unprecedented sonorities of his music, how, I ask, are we to decide whether he has merely used the traditional language plus refinements and peculiarities of his own, or whether on the other hand he has not revolutionised the very basis of the language?

It would need a whole treatise to explain oneself thoroughly on these problems. I will confine myself to indicating the principles to which I adhere on this subject with all the stronger certainty because they depend closely on general truths of which I have no doubt whatever. A comparison will help me to define my thought.