up defects by external ornament.

We have therefore to recognize two distinct kinds of beauty in art,
two kinds of pleasure that we experience: external, with which
painting and sculpture are alone directly concerned--beauty in the
narrow sense; and inner or organic. Wagner has expressed it in a
sentence which defies even a free translation. Speaking of the lovely
melodies of the Italian opera he says: "_Nicht das schlagende Herz
der Nachtigall begriff man, sondern nur ihren Kehlschlag_." Men
cared only for the pleasing sound of the nightingale's voice, nothing
for the beating heart from which it sprang.

We are now able to understand his famous doctrine that the drama is
the end, music the means, and therefore secondary. In the Italian
opera the relation was reversed; music was made the end, the drama
being only a vehicle for the music. This is dramatically wrong, and
has led to a false and unnatural form of art; in the drama music can
only be a means of dramatic expression.

It is necessary here to enter a caution against a very serious
misunderstanding into which many of Wagner's critics have fallen, a
misunderstanding very natural to those who look upon the drama as a
literary production. It has been supposed that Wagner intended to
subordinate the music to the poetry, as if the function of music were
to illustrate and vivify the more definite thought contained in the
words. This view has been held by many critics, from Aristotle
onwards. It was the view of Gluck, and will be found formulated in the
_epitre dedicatoire_ prefixed to his _Alceste_. Wagner's theory is
essentially different and is peculiarly his own. With him the _drama_
denotes, not the text-book, but the actual performance on the stage,