male principle, quite simply,
for ever appearing to him under new forms; the woman for whom the
Flying Dutchman longed in his unfathomable distress; the woman who, like
a radiant star, guided Tannhaeuser from the voluptuous caverns of the
Venusberg to the pure regions of the spirit, and drew Lohengrin from his
dazzling heights to the warm bosom of the earth. We find here the new
form of love, not yet fully comprehended but desired and anticipated in
art.

In _Tristan and Isolde_ it is attained completely and in its highest
perfection. We possess in Wagner's letters to Matilda Wesendonk, and in
the diary written for her, the documents of the personal experience out
of which Tristan grew, and which unfold one of the most touching
love-stories. As I have already discussed _Tristan and Isolde_ in a
previous chapter, I will here only quote a passage from a letter written
by Wagner and addressed to Liszt at the time of his first meeting with
Matilda; it fully expresses the harmony of the third stage. "Give me a
heart, a mind, a woman's love in which I can plunge my whole being--who
will fully understand me--how little else I should need in this world!"

It is very significant that side by side with _Tristan_ we have _Die
Meistersinger_, composed a little later on. Here the third stage of love
is realised in its idyllic possibility; the synthesis has been given the
shape of middle-class matter-of-factness, that is to say, the fulfilment
of love in marriage: "I love a maid and claim her hand!" For this reason
the work, although the fundamental idea is not erotic, is entitled to be
placed by the side of _Tristan_ with its demand for the absolute
metaphysical consummation of love.

It is an amazing fact that the same genius should have experienced and
portrayed both stages so perfectly. Doubtless Tannhaeuser and Tristan are
the most personal self-revelations of the great lover, pulsating with
passion, and far remote from the colossal objective world of the
Niebelungs, the lofty serenity of Lohengrin and the wisdom of Parsifal.

Wagner had finished the _Ring_ before he conceived the idea of _Tristan
and Isolde_. (It was printed in 1852.) In the former he intentionally
raised the value of love and its position in the universe to a problem,
embodying his knowledge of the world, and more especially of the modern
world, in supernatural, mythical figures. The greatest ambition of man
is power and wealth, the symbol of which is a gol