over it.  Music he was very far from dropping.  He had played a Weber scene while his stepfather was dying; and he continued to bang away at overtures with such a fingering, as Mr. Bernard Shaw has said, as of necessity would be employed by the average worker at a circular-saw.  But the great awakening was not yet.  He had first to give the world the mightiest drama ever conceived by the mind of an energetic, bright, self-confident boy.

I do not think there is on record a single instance of a great engineer having manifested artistic preferences in his youth, or of a great painter having misspent his boyhood in making toy machines.  Always, from the very beginning, the boy unconsciously, without reflection, instinctively, helplessly, starts away in the direction he is destined to follow as a man; and though some potential great poets may be thwarted and ultimately discouraged and lost to the world, by far the more common phenomenon is that of young geniuses overcoming or brushing aside or dodging all obstacles at all costs (to themselves and every one else) and finding their true road, the path nature shaped them to tread.  At the first glance Wagner might seem a startling exception to the nearly universal rule; but he is no exception.  The theatre was his first love, and to the theatre he ever remained faithful:  only through the theatre did his genius manifest itself; apart from the theatre it may be doubted whether he could have developed into the consummate technical musician of Tristan and the Mastersingers.  Music was his second love, music associated with drama; and throughout his long career we find him engaged, first, in getting his drama true, poignant and effective, and then in allying it with music.  Third in his affections came philosophy; and at this time of day it need scarcely be remarked that he always considered himself a bit of a philosopher, and toyed to the last with philosophy and pseudo-philosophy.  Reams of good paper and gallons of good ink have been used in writing about the musician, the composer of the most magnificent operas in the world; weeks, months, years have gone to the writing.  But all the paper, all the ink, all the labour, all the mental effort and sympathy and love seem a bagatelle when we look through the bibliographies and realize how much paper, ink, effort—­not always to be called mental—­sympathy and love have been used up in expounding Wagner’s philosophy.  The cases of Whitman and Browning make a poor show compared with this case.  I believe there are still some human beings who turn for guidance to Wagner the philosopher.  Later I shall be compelled to say something about the subject.  What Wagner’s docile apostles say does not greatly matter—­in fact, does not matter at all; what Wagner said does demand a little consideration; and we must bear in mind that philosophy and pseudo-philosophy supplied him with the stuff out of which he wove the word-tissue of his dramas.