proportion or equality; but the pleasure which they afford, however
innocent, is not the criterion of their truth. The test of pleasure cannot
be applied except to that which has no other good or evil, no truth or
falsehood. But that which has truth must be judged of by the standard of
truth, and therefore imitation and proportion are to be judged of by their
truth alone. 'Certainly.' And as music is imitative, it is not to be
judged by the criterion of pleasure, and the Muse whom we seek is the muse
not of pleasure but of truth, for imitation has a truth. 'Doubtless.' And
if so, the judge must know what is being imitated before he decides on the
quality of the imitation, and he who does not know what is true will not
know what is good. 'He will not.' Will any one be able to imitate the
human body, if he does not know the number, proportion, colour, or figure
of the limbs? 'How can he?' But suppose we know some picture or figure to
be an exact resemblance of a man, should we not also require to know
whether the picture is beautiful or not? 'Quite right.' The judge of the
imitation is required to know, therefore, first the original, secondly the
truth, and thirdly the merit of the execution? 'True.' Then let us not
weary in the attempt to bring music to the standard of the Muses and of
truth. The Muses are not like human poets; they never spoil or mix rhythms
or scales, or mingle instruments and human voices, or confuse the manners
and strains of men and women, or of freemen and slaves, or of rational
beings and brute animals. They do not practise the baser sorts of musical
arts, such as the 'matured judgments,' of whom Orpheus speaks, would
ridicule. But modern poets separate metre from music, and melody and
rhythm from words, and use the instrument alone without the voice. The
consequence is, that the meaning of the rhythm and of the time are not
understood. I am endeavouring to show how our fifty-year-old choristers
are to be trained, and what they are to avoid. The opinion of the
multitude about these matters is worthless; they who are only made to step
in time by sheer force cannot be critics of music. 'Impossible.' Then our