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Untitled Article
tity , have the faculty of cancelling in the eyes of him who knows human frailty , the greater part of the defects that debase it . Whatever judgment then , may be pronounced on this confession , which will not perhaps be approved by all , we will confine ourselves to establishing that the constitution of men in general
does not tolerate for any length of time the lachrymose style . la music , as in poetry , the mournful and piteous very soon cause ennui , if not disgust ; the sentimental can be supported ( perhaps I may say enjoyed ) rather longer : not , however , beyond certain bounds , which are not very extensive in Italy , but a little more
so in Germany . Nevertheless , even in Germany , if one of the tender compositions of Mozart or Gluck draws applauses from a hundred hands , Rossini ' s " Largo al factotum" draws them from a thousand . The Wertlier ' of Goethe may delight a youth of eighteen , Jacopo Ortis , or Young ' s Night Thoughts may elicit the admiration of some enthusiast almost arrived at manhood :
but the style is false—it is plainly unnatural *—it cannot live long . We may then pardon Rossini for having almost wholly banished from his compositions mournful measures , which were never those of truth ; and , above all , we may pardon him , in that he has eluded the difficulty by an artifice of rhythm ; for , in the
end , the much which we gain by this innovation of his is infinitely more precious than the little we should lose , even though by means of it a fatal anathema should happen to be sent forth , banishing the above-mentioned stylo , pro tempore , from our theatres .
That Sir Walter Scott likewise has trodden the same path , and unmasked ( I may say ) , the same truth in a manner rather humiliating to man ' s hypocrisy , one may easily convince himself by reading over those scenes in which a German author would , in compliment to his subject , have taken the opportunity of excitingto a morbid excess the tender feelings of the heart . Take , for example , the catastrophe in the beautiful romance of ' Kenilworth '
—one of the most novel and terrible that the imagination of a poet ever invented—is it not evidently described with the artifice already spoken of ? The death of Amy Robsart , meditated and planned in the infernal dialogue between Forster and Varney —~ should we not say that it is related alia Terzina , if I may so ex *
press myself , that is to say , with the self same artifice the use and abuse of which is charged against Rossini ? The catastrophe of Lucy , in the ' Bride ofLammcrmoor / taking place amid the gaieties of a wedding banquet ; that of Clara JVIowbray , who expires in the arms of the whimsical hostess , and more particularly the consolations which the surgeon called in to attend her , offers to Tyrrel ;
• Not go : it is quite suitable to some naturef , of whom abundance may b * found in all countries , particularly in Germany . ' Werther' hat gone to t ) ie hMtft tf maojr a nation . Of course the majority prefer mercurial spirits .- —Ed .
Untitled Article
Rossini and Walter Scott . 663
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Sept. 2, 1836, page 563, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2661/page/39/
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