Page:The Spirit of French Music.djvu/230

 I have pointed out in what direction Wagner may lead our artists astray, and in what direction he has in fact led some astray. But speaking generally our music has remained independent of his. It has been since his arrival more French than in the immediately preceding period. People who, as some still do, set off Meyerbeer, Adolphe Adam, or Ambrose Thomas against Wagner as representing national music, are utterly wrong. The music of those composers had few French features. They were makers of Italian music, but they were weaker than the Italians; sometimes they were makers of German music, as it only can be made by those who are not Germans.

Moreover the wisest course is not to worry ourselves at all as to whether the music of our musicians conforms or does not conform to the national type. Let us ask only whether it is fine music, whether it is alive. If it possesses those qualities, we may make our minds easy, it is French. For one can create nothing living but with one's own nature. A Frenchman of France who has real talent has a French talent. For the last fifty years our country has shewn in the realm of music the most brilliant fecundity. Since Wagner's death its rank in music is the highest in the world. The half century which has seen the birth of the generation which is at present our pride, in succession to that whose most illustrious representatives I have named, cannot fail to have been French in music.

Let us however lay down a restrictive hypothesis. Let us suppose that considered under its most general aspect, the music—the good music—of this recent and contemporary period does not altogether satisfy us. Let us suppose that with its admirable qualities of nobility, style, sincerity, delicacy, expressive subletysubtlety [sic],