capable at any age of the mistakes of judgment when delique bus writings of his sublime predecessor. 2. THE HISTORIAN OF THE SOUL. Prefixed to Pauline, as we have seen, is a passage from C. Agrippa, and the words "Ego illa non probo, sed narro are printed in capitals. Here, then, at the age of twenty, we find the poet already conscious of ✓ his peculiar gift and call. I am the Historian of the Soul, in effect he says. I do not commend to you what I shall show you of the soul, but simply show it. Eight years later we find him comparing himself in a humorous strain to a showman, "motley on back, and pointing-pole in hand," ready to describe the "man" Sordello whom he has "made." The aptness of the citation from C. Agrippa lies in the fact that Agrippa was asking the indulgence of the reader for work written at about the same period of life as Pauline; and a fine and famous book was the Occult Philosophy. Moreover, C. Agrippa is one of Browning's fellows ✓ and friends of the past, a mystic and a mage like himself; in other words, one of those piercing and profound spirits who are always enigmas, disliked and suspected by the "dullards" of each generation. Browning tells us (through C. Agrippa) to beware lest we break our heads or poison ourselves over his verses. The fear is hinted again in the first lines of Pauline. I do not know whether any broken heads or poisoned veins have been caused by Browning's writings, but it appears that he has found after fifty years' work that the "drink he has brewed" is too strong for the heads of the many in his generation.1 There is another point about C. Agrippa which he has in common with our poet. Agrippa was a profound psychologist. During Agrippa's lifetime there was much talk of keys and clues to the Occult Philosophy. I will quote something he said on the subject, because it will be seen, I believe, to illustrate a certain vein of thought in Browning, who has shown himself in several poems to be in his way a believer in magic and necromancy. In one of his letters Agrippa said, "This is the true and occult philosophy of the wonders of Nature. The key thereto is Intelligence" (Ep. 19). In another letter he says that the astounding stories of the invincible power of magical art, of astrology, alchemy, and the philosopher's stone, were all idle and false if taken literally; at the same time, these traditions of serious philosophers were not lies. Then he adds, "We must not seek the principle of such great operations outside ourselves. There dwells a spirit in us which can produce all the wonders performed by mathematicians, alchemists, and astrologers." 1 Pacchiarotto. "Nos habitat, non Tartara, sed nec sidera cœli, 2 From Scheible's Kleiner Wunder-Schauplatz (Preface). The germ of a similar theory of the true Magic may be found in Pauline. After tracing the truth of self-consciousness in general, the poet adds that in his case it is Paracelsus (p. 58) is made to scoff at the "Black Arts" as idle pedantry; and the thought is repeated, "Truth is within ourselves There is an inmost centre in us all where truth abides in fulness." This inner light is a central principle of Browning's writings. The True, the Beautiful, the Good, all are subjective. Religion, Art, Ethics, all are modes of one spiritual æsthesis. If we break up that unity we become false in thought. This principle he has applied with the greatest firmness and self-consistency to Christianity. Here, then, lies the seat of the magician's power, as Browning knows it and has used it. In Sordello he is himself an archimage and a necromancer, who can call up ghosts at pleasure from the past. I see in the newspaper that some society is to be started to inquire further into ghosts. What need can there be of this so long as we have Browning amongst us? I should think there is no man who has so made us feel, if we are capable of feeling it, that the spiritual world is real and the only reality, that there is no space nor time between the spirit and its objects, that "love is all and death is naught." All ghost-lore seems melancholy imbecility after that which Browning has taught us. The theory of Art is with Browning the theory of Magic. A single true work of art is capable of exhausting our faculty of wonder, because it presents the supreme triumph of spirit over matter. If we have once taken in the significance of a god or hero in Homeric poetry, or in Pheidias' sculpture, we have found ourselves at the centre of all wonder. "Nothing ever will surprise me now Who stood beside the naked Swift-footed, In specially religious associations the same inner light of the soul is what is known as the "realizing power of faith," of which it has been said that it can move mountains, and that all things are possible to it. So recently as in Pacchiarotto, Browning repeats the thought with emphasis in the poem Natural Magic: "Impossible! only-I saw. it! A fairy tale! Only-I feel it!" 1 p. 13; cf. Sludge, p. 207. 2 Pauline, T Tonsetzkunst); on the art of forming the voice (Stimmbildungskunst), &c. These publications raised a critical storm against Vogler, who was accused of "charlatanism," and of not producing in his famous school the wonderful results he had predicted. Nevertheless, this school did produce some illustrious musicians. The names of Winter, Knecht, and Ritter speak for themselves. During the latter years of his residence at Mannheim, Vogler had been appointed chaplain and second kappel-meister, and at this period composed a "Miserere,” of which Mozart speaks very slightingly. Indeed Mozart is so bitter that one is tempted to accept M. Fétis' suggestion that he owed the Abbé some personal grudge. In 1779 Charles Theodore succeeded to the Electorate of Bavaria, and settled down at Munich, whither Vogler followed him. Towards 1780 Vogler had composed a little opera, Te Merchant of Smyrna, an overture and some entr'actes to Hamlet; Ino, a ballet, and Lampredo, a melodrama. In 1781 his opera Albert III. was produced at the Court Theatre of Munich. This did not meet with the admiration its composer had anticipated, and he shortly after resigned his posts of chaplain and master of the choir. There is some doubt as to Vogler's next movements, but it is probable that, tired of being a continual butt for the German critics, he went abroad to appeal to the musicians of other nations. At any rate he was in Paris in 1783, and his comic opera La Kermesse was brought out, but failed so signally that the performance could not be concluded. After this failure Vogler travelled in Spain, Greece, and the East, returning to Europe in 1786, when he proceeded to Sweden, and was there appointed Kapel-meister1 to the King. About this time Vogler had the "musical instrument of his invention," which he called an "Orchestrion," constructed. In 1789 Vogler himself performed upon his "instrument" at Amsterdam, but with no success. Certain enthusiastic admirers exalted the orchestrion above the most beautiful organs of Holland, with the result that other critics had recourse to violent accusations in order to depreciate Vogler's invention. The latter now went to London with his organ, and in January 1790 gave a series of concerts. These proved eminently successful; the Abbé realized some £1200 (30,000 francs), and made a name He 1 It is difficult to say what Vogler's functions as kappel-meister were. might have been simply the director of the church choir, or, as is probable, director also of the orchestra, and charged with superintending all the musical productions at Court. 2 This was a very compact organ, in which four key-boards of five octaves each, and a pedal board of thirty-six keys, with swell complete, were packed a cube of nine feet. See Fetis's Biographie Universelle des Musiciens,— of as an organist. He was then commissioned to reconstruct the organ the Pantheon on the plan of his Orchestrion, and at a later date Vogler received like commissions at Copenhagen and at Neu Ruppin in Prussia. On his return to Germany in August 1790 the Abbé met with most brilliant receptions at Coblenz, Frankfort, and in Suabia, and at last succeeded in attracting general attention to his compositions. His opera Castor and Pollux was performed at Mannheim in 1791, and obtained a legitimate success, the overture and some numbers of the score being printed. Soon after Vogler published at Spire a collection of pieces under the title of Polymelos, or characteristics of the music of different peoples. In the same year Vogler performed several times on the organ at Hamburg, and his opera Gustavus Adolphus was brought out in Stockholm a few days before the assassination of Gustavus III. In this town Vogler also lectured on his system of harmony, and published a treatise in Swedish on the same subject. In the spring of 1794 Vogler again visited Paris, wishing, he said, to study the genre of music adopted by the French revolutionists at the public fêtes, and to add the result of his observations to the materials of his Polymelos. At Paris he gave an organ recital in the Church of St. Sulpice, at which many artists were present, and which added immensely to his already high reputation. Thus the Paris of 1794 avenged the insults of 1783. Vogler returned to fulfil his engagement at Stockholm, but his duties as Kapel-meister took up so little of his time during the minority of Gustavus IV., and so rarely afforded him an opportunity for distinguishing himself, that in 1796, at the conclusion of his engagement, he asked for his pension; but the successful results obtained by him in his School of Music induced the Duke of Sudermanie, regent of the kingdom, to beg him to prolong his stay in Sweden. This Vogler consented to do, and remained there till 1799, when he received a pension of 500 écus. He next visited Denmark, founding a School of Music at Copenhagen. Here Vogler also published many works, his Choral System appearing in 1800. In the same year he produced what is considered his finest work, Hermann de Unna, a drama with overture, choruses, songs, and dance music, originally composed to a Swedish libretto. This drama proved a great success, and was performed the following year at Berlin, the score being published at Leipzig. At Berlin Vogler gave several concerts, and published his Data zur Akustik. From Berlin he proceeded to Prague, where he remained about two years, delivering lectures at the University. In 1803 he left Prague for Vienna, where he wrote his opera Samori, which was performed in 1804. The war drove Vogler from Austria in 1805, and he returned to Munich, where his opera Custor and Pollux was performed on the R |