Life of Mozart

.398 AT THE GRAVE.inheritance of the past, he leaves to posterity the offspringof his individual mind to serve as a germ for new and moreperfect life.It would be presumptuous to attempt to summarise infew phrases the result of a life of ceaseless mental activity,and of strongly marked individuality. In view of this difficultymany biographers take refuge in a comparison of thesubject of their work with other great men, and thus emphasisethe points of resemblance or divergence which existin their natures. No such parallel appears to me morejustifiable than one between Mozart and Raphael.^'' Themajestic beauty which appears to absorb all the other conditionsof art production, and to blend them into purestharmony, is so overpoweringly present in the works of bothmasters that there is no need to enforce the comparison bydwelling on the many points of resemblance in their careerboth as men and artists, and in their moral and intellectualnatures. Such a comparison, however, is not profitableunless it can be shown how and under what conditions thisbeauty, so varied in its manifestations, so similar in itseffects, is produced.^^ Although it will readily be acknowledgedthat Mozart is closely related to Shakespeare^^ infertility, force, and reality of dramatic invention and inbreadth of humour, and to Goethe ^^ in simplicity and naturalnessofhuman sentiment and in plastic clearness of idea,yet here again we are confronted with the distinguishingqualities of great artists in different provinces of art, andMozart's individuality in his own art is as far as ever fromexplanation. The frequently attempted parallels with greata20 Rochlitz, Raphael u. Mozart (A. M. Z., IL, p. 641). Alberti, Raphael u.Mozart: eine Parallele (Stettin, 1856).21 The different conceptions that are here possible is seen from Carpani'shaving bracketed in a comparison of Painters and Musicians (Le Flaydine, p. 215)Pergolese and Raphael, Mozart and Giulio Romano. Beyle compares Mozartwith Domenichino (Vie de Haydn, p. 260).22 Fr. Horn, A. M. Z., IV., p. 421.23Th. Kriebitzsch, Poeten u. Componisten (A. M. Z L., p. 545; FürFreunde d. Tonk., p. 52). He puts down the " Messiah " as Mozart's— no doubtwithout reflection