Mozart profited by Haydn’s early attempts, and his best sonatas are vastly superior to most of Haydn’s.  After Mozart’s death, and even for some years before, Haydn seemed to have caught much of the spirit of the younger composer.  He showed this especially in his London symphonies, but also in one or two of his later sonatas.  “This mutual reaction,” says Jahn, “so generously acknowledged by both musicians, must be taken into account in forming a judgment on them.”

Haydn, though fully conscious of his own powers, practically acknowledged the superiority of his brother-artist.  On learning of Mozart’s death, he exclaimed:  “Posterity will not see such talent for a century to come!”—­a prophecy which, at the time it was uttered, seemed likely of fulfilment.

CHAPTER VI

PREDECESSORS OF BEETHOVEN

I. Muzio Clementi

Muzio Clementi, born at Rome in 1752, was brought to England by Alderman Beckford, father of the author of Vathek, and at Fonthill Abbey he had leisure to study the works of Handel, John Sebastian Bach, Emanuel Bach, Domenico Scarlatti, and Paradies.  Clementi, like Scarlatti, was a virtuoso; but although both indulged largely in technical display, they were true and intelligent artists.  In Scarlatti, the balance between his musical ideas and the form in which they were presented was almost perfect; in Clementi, virtuosity often gained the ascendency over virtue.  With the latter, however, as indeed with E. Bach, Haydn, Mozart, and many other composers, the necessity of earning a living, and therefore of writing for “long” ears, mixed with the love of fame, produced works which, like the old Eden tree, contained both good and evil.  To judge such great men really fairly, the chaff ought to be separated from the wheat; and the chaff ought to be thoroughly removed, even at the risk of sometimes losing a portion of wheat.

To the true lover of music, choice selections are more precious than complete collections; the latter are, of course, necessary to those whose business it is to study the rise and development of the various composers.  The pianoforte sonatas of Mozart, Haydn, Dussek, and Clementi might be reduced to very moderate compass.  To suggest that any one of Beethoven’s thirty-two should be removed out of its place would now sound flat blasphemy; but art progresses, and some even now are falling into oblivion.  The catalogue of music performed at the Popular Concerts during the history of the past thirty-five years shows pretty clearly which sonatas of Beethoven are likely to live long, and which not.  But to return to Clementi.  He published his first three sonatas (Op. 2, Nos. 1-3) in 1770, the year in which Beethoven was born; and the influence which he exerted over that master was considerable.  In Beethoven’s library were to be found many sonatas of Clementi, and the