hundred and fifty valuable ideas, the one
hundred and fifty men might be justifiable--but as it probably contains
not more than a dozen, the composer may be unconsciously ashamed of
them, and glad to cover them up under a hundred and fifty men. A man
may become famous because he is able to eat nineteen dinners a day, but
posterity will decorate his stomach, not his brain.

Manner breeds a cussed-cleverness--only to be clever--a satellite of
super-industrialism, and perhaps to be witty in the bargain, not the
wit in mother-wit, but a kind of indoor, artificial, mental arrangement
of things quickly put together and which have been learned and
studied--it is of the material and stays there, while humor is of the
emotional and of the approaching spiritual. Even Dukas, and perhaps
other Gauls, in their critical heart of hearts, may admit that "wit" in
music, is as impossible as "wit" at a funeral. The wit is evidence of
its lack. Mark Twain could be humorous at the death of his dearest
friend, but in such a way as to put a blessing into the heart of the
bereaved. Humor in music has the same possibilities. But its quantity
has a serious effect on its quality, "inverse ratio" is a good formula
to adopt here. Comedy has its part, but wit never. Strauss is at his
best in these lower rooms, but his comedy reminds us more of the
physical fun of Lever rather than "comedy in the Meredithian sense" as
Mason suggests. Meredith is a little too deep or too subtle for
Strauss--unless it be granted that cynicism is more a part of comedy
than a part of refined-insult. Let us also remember that Mr. Disston,
not Mr. Strauss, put the funny notes in the bassoon. A symphony written
only to amuse and entertain is likely to amuse only the writer--and him
not long after the check is cashed.

"Genius is always ascetic and piety and love," thus Emerson reinforces
"God's offer of this choice" by a transcendental definition. The moment
a famous violinist refused "to appear" until he had received his
check,--at that moment, precisely (assuming for argument's sake, that
this was the first time that materialism had the ascendancy in this
man's soul) at that moment he became but a man of
"talent"--incidentally, a small man and a small violinist, regardless
of how perfectly he played, regardless to what heights of emotion he
stirred his audience, regardless of the sublimity of his artistic and
financial success.

d'Annunzio, it is told, becoming somewh