me, the most appropriate and efficient vehicle
of which is the oratorio.

One part of this argument seems to me irrelevant; the other not firmly
founded in fact. It does not follow that because the Greek conscience
evolved the conceptions of rebellious pride and punitive Fate while the
Hebrew conscience did not, therefore the Greeks were the predestined
creators of the art-form out of which grew the opera and the Hebrews of
the form which grew into the oratorio. Neither is it true that because
a people are not disposed toward dramatic creation themselves they can
not, or may not, be the cause of dramatic creativeness in others. Dr.
Chrysander's argument, made in a lecture at the Johanneum in Hamburg in
1896, preceded an analysis of Handel's Biblical oratorios in their
relation to Hebrew history, and his exposition of that history as he
unfolded it chronologically from the Exodus down to the Maccabaean
period was in itself sufficient to furnish many more fit operatic plots
than have yet been written. Nor are there lacking in these stories some
of the elements of Greek legend and mythology which were the
mainsprings of the tragedies of Athens. The parallels are striking:
Jephtha's daughter and Iphigenia; Samson and his slavery and the
servitude of Hercules and Perseus; the fate of Ajax and other heroes
made mad by pride, and the lycanthropy of Nebuchadnezzar, of whose
vanity Dr. Hanslick once reminded Wagner, warning him against the fate
of the Babylonian king who became like unto an ox, "ate grass and was
composed by Verdi"; think reverently of Alcestis and the Christian
doctrine of atonement!

The writers of the first Biblical operas sought their subjects as far
back in history, or legend, as the written page permitted. Theile
composed an "Adam and Eve" in 1678; but our first parents never became
popular on the serious stage. Perhaps the fearful soul of the
theatrical costumer was frightened and perplexed by the problem which
the subject put up to him. Haydn introduced them into his oratorio "The
Creation," but, as the custom goes now, the third part of the work, in
which they appear, is frequently, if not generally omitted in
performance. Adam, to judge by the record in Holy Writ, made an
uneventful end: "And all the days that Adam lived were nine hundred and
thirty years: and he died"; but this did not prevent Lesueur from
writing an opera on his death ten years after Haydn's oratorio had its
first performance. He c