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 relegated, as an heritage of the past, the best fruit of Beethoven’s genius.  When the Mass in D and the last Quartets can be heard frequently, a new era in the art will have been inaugurated.

It would be a mistake to suppose that Beethoven was a pessimist, or a misanthrope.  Placed here to live and suffer, not knowing why it should be so, he yet teaches that relentless fate cannot prevail against those who make a good fight.  “I did not wish to find when I came to die that I had not lived,” said Thoreau, paraphrasing from Voltaire, (most men die without having lived).  “I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear.”  Beethoven’s idea of the purport of life was similar.  He believed, and put his theory into practice, that each man has within himself the potentialities with which he shapes his own destiny.  Fate and Destiny are verities that have to be faced, but they do not have all their own way with us.  Each of us has the power to control his destiny to some extent.  By willing it so the tendency is toward betterment.  Always the highest powers are on our side.  Life, after all, is worth while.  This was the gist of his philosophy.  He sought to establish an optimistic view of life, with the object of making the problem easier to solve.

Fichte, in his work “Ueber das Wesen des Gelehrten”, gives the literary man the place of priest in the world, continually unfolding the Godlike to man.  This was also Beethoven’s aim.  Haydn charged him with being an atheist, but his works as well as his life refute this charge.  The Kyrie and the Agnus Dei of the Mass in D, could never have been produced had he been other than a devout, religious man.  In his journals he continually addresses the Godhead.  Outwardly, however, he gave no sign.  “Religion and general-bass,” he said once, with a touch of humor, “are in themselves two inscrutable things (abgeschlossene Dinge) about which one should not argue.”

He was solicitous that his nephew should receive proper religious instruction, and made this a point in his letters to the magistrates while the lawsuit over him was in progress.  After giving his ideas as to the proper education of the young man, in which French, Greek, music and drawing take a prominent place, he adds, “I have found a holy father who has undertaken to instruct him in his duties as a Christian, as well as a man, for only on this foundation can