alse ideals. He heard its lamentations,
and verily, if ever a genius served his people, then did the genius of
Wagner avail him as the worker of "good deeds." He prophetically
indicated at that time what subsequently became an exquisite reality.
"Only a good deed can help here," he writes after the completion of
"Lohengrin." "A gifted and inspired man must with good fortune attain
to power and influence who can elevate his inmost convictions to the
dignity of law. For it is possible after all, if chance will have it
so that a king will permit a competent man to have his way as well as
an incompetent one. The public can only be educated through facts. So
long as an immense majority is carried away by the mezza-voce of a
virtuoso, its needs are readily discerned and satisfied."

It is now our duty to record how he arrived at this remarkably
independent action of the artist; we follow his notes, as they furnish
the clearest testimony. Their stirring recital is touching enough for
any one who can look upon the nation in the light of the history of
mankind, to which has been assigned its own peculiar ideal problems.

In the meantime the revolution of 1848 had broken out. Although never
really much inclined toward politics, Wagner had foreseen its
necessity; but as soon as he came in contact with its various
elements, he recognized only too clearly that none of the warring
factions had the least conception of his own aims. Notwithstanding
this, he perfected a plan for the reorganization of the stage by which
alone under the circumstances the nation and the time could be
strongly impressed again with the ideal in thought and art. The
political rostrum showed soon enough how blunt were its arrows. And
what of the Catholic syllabus and Protestant "Culturkampf" as well?
Dead children born of dead mothers! Most of all it was important to
create anew for that stage the ideals which would serve to elevate the
time. Even while at work on "Lohengrin," which always made him feel as
if he were on an oasis in a desert waste and for which he gathered
strength from the performance of the Ninth symphony in Dresden,
Siegfried and Friedrich der Rothbart appeared to him. Each contained
the elements which lie nearest the heart. Each was a type and model of
our distinct characteristics. He recognized at once however that
Friedrich I. (Barbarossa) was only the historical regeneration of
Siegfried, and that the latter was in reality the youthful