you make them reproductive of fresh thoughts in your audience.

You said very truly that you found in composing you could put into music
thoughts which you could not put into words. That is the peculiar
distinction of music. No genuine musician can explain in words exactly
what he means to convey in his music.

How little a libretto interprets an opera; how little we care even to
read it! It is the music that speaks to us; and how?--Through the human
voice. We do not notice how poor are the words which the voice warbles.
It is the voice itself interpreting the soul of the musician which
enchants and enthralls us. And you who have that voice pretend to
despise the gift. What! despise the power of communicating delight!--the
power that we authors envy; and rarely, if ever, can we give delight with
so little alloy as the singer.

And when an audience disperses, can you guess what griefs the singer
may have comforted? what hard hearts he may have softened? what high
thoughts he may have awakened?

You say, "Out on the vamped-up hypocrite! Out on the stage-robes and
painted cheeks!"

I say, "Out on the morbid spirit which so cynically regards the mere
details by which a whole effect on the minds and hearts and souls of
races and nations can be produced!"

There, have I scolded you sufficiently? I should scold you more, if I
did not see in the affluence of your youth and your intellect the cause
of your restlessness. Riches are always restless. It is only to poverty