poet as he was musician, had invested the work
with every charm of tragic beauty, both in the text and poetical
construction as well as in the ingenious design of its dramatic
situations. The work marks a notable era in the history of German
music.

Wagner now fully explained in his book, "Opera and Drama," published
in 1861, the object of his art-revolution. The opera hitherto, as he
said, was not even the germ, how much less the fruit of the art-work
he purposed. On the contrary, the methods hitherto applied must be
completely changed. Music must be made the essential and highest
method of expression of poetry and the drama; but not the principal
theme to which words and situations are subordinated. In this he
unfolded all his artistic experience and claimed that whoever failed
to understand him now, did so because he was determined not to
understand. This can be found more fully treated in the "Allgemeine
Musikgeschichte." To his real friends he presented in the autumn of
the same year that "Communication" which reveals to us his manhood and
is a biography of the soul without parallel.

The high purpose, perceivable from afar, whither his endeavors tended,
appears in the real work of our artist taken up again at last. The
noble and affectionate regard of the family of the rich merchant
Wesendonck, in Zurich, provided him with a pleasant place of rest and
needed support. The performance of "Lohengrin" was a summons to new
deeds. He resumed the Nibelungen poem, and we shall see its powerful
influence upon the national spirit and national art.

"Man receives his first impressions from surrounding nature, and in
it no effect is so strong as that of light." Thus he begins in the
"Wibelungen" of 1850. The day, the sun, appears as the very condition
of life. Praise and adoration are bestowed upon it in contrast with
the dark night which breeds terror. Thus light becomes the cause of
all existence, Father, God. The day-break appears as the victory of
light, and naturally there grow out of it at last moral impressions.
This influence of nature is the foundation of all conceptions of
divinity, the division into distinct religions depending upon the
character of different tribes. The tribal tradition of the Franks,
as the noblest type of the Germans, has the advantage of a steady
development from its ancient origin into historic life. It likewise
shows us in the far distant past the individual God of light as he
slays the m