[Footnote 114:  C. Saint-Saens, Charles Gounod et le Don Juan de Mozart, 1894.]

[Footnote 115: 

    But ten years old, slightly built and pale,
    Yet full of simple confidence and joy (Rimes familieres).

]

[Footnote 116:  Charles Gounod, Memoires d’un Artiste, 1896.]

In Germany, however, they make no mistake about him.  There, the name of Camille Saint-Saens stands for the French classical spirit, and is thought worthiest to represent us in music from the time of Berlioz until the appearance of the young school of Cesar Franck—­though Franck himself is as yet little known in Germany.  M. Saint-Saens possesses, indeed, some of the best qualities of a French artist, and among them the most important quality of all—­perfect clearness of conception.  It is remarkable how little this learned artist is bothered by his learning, and how free he is from all pedantry.  Pedantry is the plague of German art, and the greatest men have not escaped it.  I am not speaking of Brahms, who was ravaged with it, but of delightful geniuses like Schumann, or of powerful ones like Bach.  “This unnatural art wearies one like the sanctimonious salon of some little provincial town; it stifles one, it is enough to kill one."[117] “Saint-Saens is not a pedant,” wrote Gounod; “he has remained too much of a child and become too clever for that.”  Besides, he has always been too much of a Frenchman.

[Footnote 117:  Quoted from Saint-Saens by Edmond Hippeau in Henry VIII et L’Opera francais, 1883.  M. Saint-Saens speaks elsewhere of “these works, well written, but heavy and unattractive, and reflecting in a tiresome way the narrow and pedantic spirit of certain little towns in Germany” (Harmonie et Melodie).]

Sometimes Saint-Saens reminds me of one of our eighteenth-century writers.  Not a writer of the Encyclopedie, nor one of Rousseau’s camp, but rather of Voltaire’s school.  He has a clearness of thought, an elegance and precision of expression, and a quality of mind that make his music “not only noble, but very noble, as coming of a fine race and distinguished family."[118]

He has also excellent discernment, of an unemotional kind; and he is “calm in spirit, restrained in imagination, and keeps his self-control even in the midst of the most disturbing emotions."[119] This discernment is the enemy of anything approaching obscurity of thought or mysticism; and its outcome was that curious book, Problemes et Mysteres—­a misleading title, for the spirit of reason reigns there and makes an appeal to young people to protect “the light of a menaced world” against “the mists of the North, Scandinavian gods, Indian divinities, Catholic miracles, Lourdes, spiritualism, occultism, and obscurantism."[120]

His love and need of liberty is also of the eighteenth century.  One may say that liberty is his only passion.  “I am passionately fond of liberty,” he wrote.[121]