From a Painting by Kloeber.
To face page 40.
BEETHOVEN
BY
ROMAIN ROLLAND
TRANSLATED BY
B. CONSTANCE HULL
WITH A BRIEF ANALYSIS OF THE SONATAS,
THE SYMPHONIES, AND THE QUARTETS BY
A. EAGLEFIELD HULL
MUS. DOC. (OXON).
With 24 Musical Illustrations and 4 Plates
and an Introduction by Edward Carpenter,
Author of Towards Democracy, &c.
NEW YORK
HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY
1917
PREFACE
"I want to prove that whoever acts rightly and
nobly, can by that alone bear misfortune."
BEETHOVEN.
(To the Municipality of Vienna, Feb. 1, 1819.)
The air is heavy around us. The world is stifledby a thick and vitiated atmosphere—an undignifiedmaterialism which weighs on the mind andheart hindering the work of governments andindividuals alike. We are being suffocated. Letus throw open the windows that God's free airmay come in, and that we may breathe the breathof heroes.
Life is stern. It is a daily battle for those notcontent with an unattractive mediocrity of soul.And a sad battle it is, too, for many—a combatwithout grandeur, without happiness, fought insolitude and silence. Weighed down by povertyand domestic cares, by excessive and senselesstasks which waste the strength to no purpose,without a gleam of hope, many souls areseparated from each other, without even the consolation[vi]of holding out a hand to their brothersin misfortune who ignore them and are ignoredby them. They are forced to rely on themselvesalone; and there are moments when even thestrongest give way under their burden of trouble.They call out—for a friend.
Let them then gather around themselves theheroic friends of the past—the great souls whosuffered for the good of universal humanity. Thelives of great men are not written for the proudor for the ambitious; they are dedicated ratherto the unhappy. And who really is not? Tothose who suffer, we offer the balm of their sacredsuffering