better they became. When he required a theme for a
particular purpose, if the right thought did not at once come to mind,
his practice was to write as near it as possible. By the time this was
done an improvement would suggest itself. He would then write it again,
and before the ink was dry, would start at it yet again, each effort
bringing him nearer the goal, and this progress was the incentive that
led him to continue until the idea he was reaching for became a reality.
His intuitive faculties were highly developed, and he had Goethe's
"heavenly gift" of imagination, but this would have been as nothing
without his power of concentration. All his abilities were focused on
his art. He made everything else subservient to the one idea of
attaining perfection in it. He succeeded too, by giving his genius free
play, by allowing his individuality to shape itself in accordance with
its own laws. The circumstances of his life favored this action.
Responsible to no one for years before reaching maturity, he was nowhere
hampered or repressed as might have been the case had he had a home
life. Strong characters are best left alone to work out their own
development. It is only the weak ones that have to be supported. He met
every demand that his art made on him. It was only by a complete
surrender, by a concentration of all his forces into one channel, that
he attained his results. By losing the world, he gained it. The great
ones in every age, in every art or calling,--those who attained to
saintship,--seers,--prophets,--all went this road.

He had absolute confidence in his judgment. He seldom considered what
his audience would like. The best that was in him was what he gave to
the world. He knew its value, and if others could not understand it, he
knew the time would come when it would be appreciated. In art as in
religion, faith is a necessary preliminary to all great achievements.

In going so far beyond us, in pushing the art to the limit of its
possibilities, Beethoven has made portions of his work inaccessible to
the large body of people who look upon music as an art for enjoyment
only. The same kind of problem that is presented to this generation in
the works of his last years, confronted his contemporaries in those of
his middle life, which were as far beyond the comprehension of his own
generation as the more abstruse works of his last years are beyond the
ability of the present. To a future age, seemingly, has been r