d the modest goal he
thought of, exceeding his fellows. He won the topmost heights within the
reach of man. The old polyphonists he never tried to rival, but in the
style of music he wrote no composer has gone or can go higher than he. A
wiseacre has said that he left a sterile monument. It may be that
monuments in the British Museum blow and blossom and reproduce their
kind: outside they do not. If the wiseacre meant that Purcell did not
leave, as Haydn and Mozart undoubtedly did, a form in which dullards may
compose until the world is sick, then the wiseacre is right But the
inventors and perfecters of forms have not always wrought an unmitigated
good. If Haydn left a fruitful monument in the symphony, and Handel in
his particular form of oratorio, and if we thankfully praise Haydn and
Handel for these their benefits, must we not also blame Haydn for the
dull symphonies that nearly drove Schumann and Wagner mad, and Handel
for the countless copies of his oratorios that rendered stupid, dull,
and insensible to the beauty of music those generations that have
attended our great musical festivals? The spirit of Purcell's work and
its technique did not die with Purcell: the spirit of much of Handel's
music, and certainly of his masterpiece, _Israel in Egypt_, is
Purcell's; and eighteenth-century contrapuntist though Handel was, much
of his technique came from Purcell. Rightly regarded, Purcell's monument
is anything but sterile. Felix Mottl, worried to exasperation by stale
laments for Mozart's premature death, once lifted up his voice and
thanked God for Mozart, the Heaven-sent man. In the same spirit we may
be thankful for Purcell. In his music we have the full and perfect
expression of all that was fair and sweet and healthy in this England of
ours; "all thoughts, all passions, all delights," that our English
nature is capable of find a voice in his music--if only we will take the
trouble to listen to it. He is neglected, it is true, but he is
immortal: time is nothing: he can wait. If our age neglects him, his age
neglected Shakespeare. Shakespeare's time came; Purcell's cannot be for
ever delayed.

LIST OF WORKS.

Music for over fifty dramas, including _Dioclesian_ (1690), _King
Arthur_ (1692), _Bonduca_, _The Indian Queen_, and _The Tempest_ (1695).

Over two hundred songs, duets, catches, etc.

Twelve sonatas of three parts (1683), ten of four parts (published
1697). _Harpsichord Lessons_ (published 1696