(Vienna, August 8, 1781, to his father. The opera in question was
"Die Entfuhrung aus dem Serail.")

214. "Magnanimity and gentleness have often reconciled the worst
enemies."

(Vienna, July 8, 1791, to his wife, who had somewhat rudely
repulsed the advances of one of the visitors at Baden where she
was taking the waters.)



IN SUFFERING



It is as difficult to call up in the fancy a picture of a
suffering Mozart as a merry Beethoven. The effect of melancholy
hours is scarcely to be found in Mozart's music. When he
composed,--i.e. according to his own expression "speculated"
while walking up and down revolving musical ideas in his mind and
forming them into orderly compositions, so that the subsequent
transcription was a mechanical occupation which required but
little effort,--he was transported to the realm of tones, far
from the miseries of this world. Nor would his happy disposition
permit him long to remain under the influence of grief and care.
None of the letters which sound notes of despair lacks a jest in
which the writer forcibly tears himself away from his gloomy
thoughts. His sufferings came to him from without; the fate of a
Beethoven was spared him. Others brought him pain,--his rivals