ticism
which is so common in musical matters, and which is often positively
injurious, as substituting a factitious public opinion for one that is
genuine. We hope that the favour with which the new oratorio has already
been received will encourage the author to pursue the enviable career
upon which he has entered. Even restricting ourselves to vocal music,
there is still a broad field left open for original work. The secular
cantata--attempted in recent times by Schumann, as well as by English
composers of smaller calibre--is a very high form of vocal music; and
if founded on an adequate libretto, dealing with some supremely grand
or tragical situation, is capable of being carried to an unprecedented
height of musical elaboration. Here is an opportunity for original
achievement, of which it is to be hoped that some gifted and
well-trained composer, like the author of "St. Peter," may find it worth
while to avail himself.

June, 1873.

XIII. A PHILOSOPHY OF ART. [65]

[65] The Philosophy of Art. By H. Taine. New York: Leypoldt &
Holt. 1867.

We are glad of a chance to introduce to our readers one of the works
of a great writer. Though not yet [66] widely known in this country, M.
Taine has obtained a very high reputation in Europe. He is still quite
a young man, but is nevertheless the author of nineteen goodly volumes,
witty, acute, and learned; and already he is often ranked with Renan,
Littre, and Sainte-Beuve, the greatest living French writers.

[66] That is, in 1868.

Hippolyte Adolphe Taine was born at Vouziers, among the grand forests
of Ardennes, in 1828, and is therefore about forty years old. His family
was simple in habits and tastes, and entertained a steadfast belief
in culture, along with the possession of a fair amount of it. His
grandfather was sub-prefect at Rocroi, in 1814 and 1815, under the first
restoration of the Bourbons. His father, a lawyer by profession, was the
first instructor of his son, and taught him Latin, and from an uncle,
who had been in America, he learned English, while still a mere child.
Having gone to Paris with his mother in 1842, he began his studies
at the College Bourbon and in 1848 was promoted to the ecole Normale.
Weiss, About, and Prevost-Paradol were his contemporaries at this
institution. At that time great liberty was enjoyed in regard to
the order and the details of the exercises; so that Taine, with his
surprising rapidity, would do in one week the