(Vienna, December 15, 1781, to his father. Constanze seems to have been made for Mozart; they went through the years of their brief wedded life like two children.)
194. "Dearest, best of friends!"
"Surely you will let me call you that? You can not hate me so greatly as not to permit me to be your friend, and yourself to become mine? And even if you do not want to be my friend longer, you can not forbid me to think kindly of you as I have been in the habit of doing. Consider well what you said to me today. Despite my entreaties you gave me the mitten three times and told me to my face that you would have nothing further to do with me. I, to whom it is not such a matter of indifference as it is to you to lose a sweetheart, am not so hot tempered, inconsiderate or unwise as to accept that mitten. I love you too dearly for that. I therefore beg you to ponder on the cause of your indignation. A little confession of your thoughtless conduct would have made all well,—if you do not take it ill, dear friend, may still make all well. From this you see how much I love you. I do not flare up as you do; I think, I consider, and I feel. If you have any feeling I am sure that I will be able to say to myself before night: Constanze is the virtuous, honor-loving, sensible and faithful sweetheart of just and well-meaning Mozart."
(Vienna, April 29, 1782, to his fiancee, Constanze Weber. She had played at a game of forfeits such as was looked upon lightly by the frivolous society of the period in Vienna. Mozart rebuked her and she broke off the engagement. The letter followed and soon thereafter a reconciliation. Mozart had said to her: "No girl who is jealous of her honor would do such a thing.")
195. "She is an honest, good girl of decent parents;—I am able to provide her with bread;—we love each other and want each other!…It is better to put one's things to rights and be an honest fellow!—God will give the reward! I do not want to have anything to reproach myself with."
(Vienna, July 31, 1782, to his father, who had given his consent, hesitatingly and unwillingly, to the marriage of his son who was twenty-six years old. On August 7 Mozart wrote to him: "I kiss your hands and thank you with all the tenderness which a son should feel for his father, for your kind permission and paternal blessing.")
196. "If I were to tell you all the things that I do with your portrait, you would laugh heartily. For instance when I take it out of its prison house I say 'God bless you, Stanzerl! God bless you, you little rascal,—Krallerballer—Sharpnose—little Bagatelle!' And when I put it back I let it slip down slowly and gradually and say 'Nu,—Nu,—Nu,—Nu;' but with the emphasis which this highly significant word demands, and at the last, quickly: 'Good-night, little Mouse, sleep well!' Now, I suppose, I have written down a lot of nonsense (at least so the world would think); but for us, who love each other so tenderly, it isn't altogether silly."
(Dresden, April 13, 1789, to his wife in Vienna.)
197. "Dear little wife, I have a multitude of requests; 1mo, I beg of you not to be sad.
"2do, that you take care of your health and not trust the spring air.
"3tio, that you refrain from walking out alone, or, better, do not walk out at all.
"4to, that you rest assured of my love. Not a letter have I written to you but that your portrait was placed in front of mine.
"5to, I beg of you to consider not only my honor and yours in your conduct but also in appearances. Do not get angry because of this request. You ought to love me all the more because I make so much of honor."
(Dresden, April 16, 1789, to his wife, in Vienna, who was fond of life's pleasures.)
198. "You can not imagine how slowly time goes when you are not with me! I can't describe the feeling; there is a sort of sense of emptiness, which hurts—a certain longing which can not be satisfied, and hence never ends, but grows day by day. When I remember how childishly merry we were in Baden, and what mournful, tedious hours I pass here, my work gives me no pleasure, because it is not possible as was my wont, to chat a few words with you when stopping for a moment. If I go to the Clavier and sing something from the opera (Die Zauberflote) I must stop at once because of my emotions.—Basta!"
(Vienna, July 7, 1791, to his wife, who was taking the waters atBaden.)
199. "I call only him or her a friend who is a friend under all circumstances, who thinks day or night of nothing else than to promote the welfare of a friend, who urges all well-to-do friends and works himself to make the other person happy."
(Kaisersheim, December 18, 1778, to his father. Mozart was making the journey from Mannheim to Munich in the carriage of a prelate. The parting with his Mannheim friends, especially with Frau Cannabich, his motherly friend, was hard. "For me, who never made a more painful parting than this, the journey was only half pleasant—it would even have been a bore, if from childhood I had not been accustomed to leave people, countries and cities.")
200. "Permit me to beg for a continuance of your precious friendship, and to ask you to accept mine for now and forever; with an honest heart I vow it to you everlastingly. True it will be of little use to you; but it will be the more durable and honest for that reason. You know that the best and truest friends are the poor. Rich people know nothing of friendship!—especially those who are born rich and those who have become rich fortuitously,—they are too often wrapped up completely in their own luck! But there is nothing to fear from a man who has been placed in advantageous circumstances, not through blind, but deserved good fortune, through merit,—a man who did not lose courage because of his first failures,—who remained true to his religion and trust in God, was a good Christian and an honest man and cherished and valued his true friend,—in a word,—a man who has deserved better fortune—from such a man, there is nothing to fear."
(Paris, August 7, 1778, to his friend Bullinger, in Salzburg, to whom he felt beholden for the gentle and considerate way in which he had broken the news of his mother's death to the family.)
201. "My friend, had I but the money which many a man who does not deserve it wastes so miserably,—if I only had it! O, with what joy would I not help you!—But, alas! those who can will not, and those who would like to can not!"
(Paris, July 29, 1778, to Fridolin Weber, father of Constanze.The letter was found but recently among some Goethe autographs.)
Mozart's father brought him up to be worldly wise. While journeying at a tender age through the world with his father the lad became an eye witness of the paternal business management with all its attention to detail; of the art of utilizing persons and conditions in order to achieve material results. As a youth he repeats the journeys accompanied by his mother whom he loses by death in Paris. Regularly from Salzburg his father sends him letters full of admonitions and advice, the subjects almost systematically grouped. The worldly wisdom of the son is the fruit of paternal education, which he did not outgrow up to the day of his death. But life, experience, was also an educator; a seeming distrust of mankind speaks out of many a passage in his letters, but on the whole he thought too well of his fellow men, and remained blind to the faults of his false friends who basely exploited him for their own ends. Although gifted with keen powers of observation he always followed his kind heart instead of his better judgment and his sister spoke no more than the truth when she said after his death: "Outside of music he was, and remained, nearly always, a child. This was the chief trait of his character on its shady side; he always needed a father, mother, or other guardian."
202. "Reflect, too, on this only too certain truth: it is not always wise to do all the things contemplated. Often one thinks one thing would be most advisable and another unadvisable and bad, when, if it were done, the opposite results would disclose themselves."
(Mannheim, December 10, 1777, to his father, when a plan for an appointment in Mannheim came to naught.)
203. "I am not indifferent but only resolved, and therefore, I can endure everything with patience,—provided, only, that neither my honor nor the good name of Mozart shall suffer therefrom. Well, since it must be so, so be it; only I beg, do not rejoice or sorrow prematurely; for let happen what may it will be all right so long as we remain well—happiness exists only in the imagination."
(Mannheim, November 29, 1777, to his father, who had upbraided him because of his reckless expenditures. At the time Mozart was hoping for an appointment at Mannheim.)
204. "Dearest and best of fathers:—You shall see that things go better and better with me. What use is this perpetual turmoil, this hurried fortune? It does not endure.—Che va piano va, sano. One must adjust himself to circumstances."
(Vienna, December 22, 1781, to his father, just before Mozart's marriage engagement to Constanze Weber.)
205. "Now, to put your mind at ease, I am doing nothing without reasons, and well-founded ones, too."
(Vienna, October 21, 1781, to his "little cousin," who may still have cherished hopes of capturing her merry kinsman.)
206. "I have no news except that 35, 59, 60, 61, 62, were the winning numbers in the lottery, and, therefore, that if we had played those numbers we would have won; but that inasmuch as we did not play those numbers we neither won nor lost but had a good laugh at others."
(Milan, October 26, 1771, to his sister.)
207. "Everybody was extremely courteous, and therefore I was also very courteous; for it is my custom to conduct myself towards others as they conduct themselves towards me,—it's the best way to get along."
(Augsburg, October 14, 1777, to his father.)
208. "In Vienna and all the imperial hereditaments the theatres will all open in six weeks. It is wisely designed; for the dead are not so much benefited by the long mourning as many people are harmed."
(Munich, December 13, 1780, to his father. Empress Maria Theresa had died on November 29. Mozart had greatly revered her from his youth. Nevertheless he takes a practical view of the situation since the production of his opera "Idomeneo" is imminent. He requests of his father to have his "black coat thoroughly dusted, cleaned and put to rights," and to send it to him, since "everybody would go into mourning, and I, who will be summoned hither and thither, must weep along with the others.")
209. "Rest assured that I am a changed man; outside of my health I know of nothing more necessary than money. I am certainly not a miser,—it would be difficult for me to change myself into one—and yet the people here think me more disposed to be stingy than prodigal; and for a beginning that will suffice. So far as pupils are concerned I can have as many as I want; but I do not want many; I want better pay than the others, and therefore I am content with fewer. One must put on a few airs at the beginning or one is lost, i.e. one must travel the common road with the many."
(Vienna, May 26, 1781, to his father.)
210. "Depend confidently on me. I am no longer a fool, and you will still less believe that I am a wicked and ungrateful son. Meanwhile trust my brains and my good heart implicitly, and you shall never be sorry. How should I have learned to value money? I never had enough of it in my hands. I remember that once when I had 20 ducats I thought myself rich. Need alone teaches the value of money."
(Vienna, May 26, 1781, to his father.)
211. "If it were possible that it should vex me I should do my best not to notice it; as it is, thank God, there is no need of my deceiving myself because only the opposite could vex me, and I should have had to decline, which is always too bad when one is dealing with a grand gentleman."
(Vienna, October 5, 1782, to his father. Mozart had expected to give music lessons to a princess, but another teacher was chosen. Continuing in the same letter, he says: "I need only tell you his fee and you will easily be able to judge from it the strength of the master—400 florins. His name is Summerer.")
212. "I shall compose an opera but not in order, for the sake of 100 ducats, to see the theatre earn four times as much in a fortnight. I shall perform my opera at my own cost and make at least 1,200 florins in three performances; then the director can have the work for 50 ducats. If he does not want it I shall have received my pay and can utilize the opera elsewhere. I hope that you have never observed a tendency to dishonest dealing in me. One ought not to be a bad fellow, but neither ought one to be a stupid who is willing to let others benefit from the work which cost him study, care and labor, and surrender all claims for the future."
(Vienna, October 5, 1782, to his father. Mozart's plans for exploiting his opera were never realized.)
213. "Yesterday I dined with the Countess Thun, and tomorrow I shall dine with her again. I let her hear all that was complete; she told me that she would wager her life that everything that I have written up to date would please. In such matters I care nothing for the praise or censure of anybody until the whole work has been seen or heard; instead I follow my own judgment and feelings."
(Vienna, August 8, 1781, to his father. The opera in question was"Die Entfuhrung aus dem Serail.")
214. "Magnanimity and gentleness have often reconciled the worst enemies."
(Vienna, July 8, 1791, to his wife, who had somewhat rudely repulsed the advances of one of the visitors at Baden where she was taking the waters.)
It is as difficult to call up in the fancy a picture of a suffering Mozart as a merry Beethoven. The effect of melancholy hours is scarcely to be found in Mozart's music. When he composed,—i.e. according to his own expression "speculated" while walking up and down revolving musical ideas in his mind and forming them into orderly compositions, so that the subsequent transcription was a mechanical occupation which required but little effort,—he was transported to the realm of tones, far from the miseries of this world. Nor would his happy disposition permit him long to remain under the influence of grief and care. None of the letters which sound notes of despair lacks a jest in which the writer forcibly tears himself away from his gloomy thoughts. His sufferings came to him from without; the fate of a Beethoven was spared him. Others brought him pain,—his rivals through envy, the Archbishop through malevolence, the Emperor through ignorance. Sufferings of this character challenged opposition and called out his powers, presenting to us a Mozart full of temperament and capable of measuring himself with any opponent.
He never lost hope even when hope seemed most deceptive. It is therefore impossible to speak of a suffering Mozart in the sense that we speak of a suffering Beethoven; fate was kind even at his death, which was preceded by but a brief illness.
215. "I am still full of gall!…Three times this—I do not know what to call him—has assailed me to my face with impertinence and abuse of a kind that I did not want to write down, my best of fathers, and I did not immediately avenge the insult because I thought of you. He called me a wretch (Buben), a licentious fellow, told me to get out and I—suffered it all, feeling that not only my honor but yours as well was attacked; but,—it was your wish,—I held my tongue."
(Vienna, May 9, 1781, to his father, who had heard with deep concern of the treatment which his son was enduring at the hands of the Archbishop of Salzburg, and who feared for his own position. At the close of the letter Mozart writes: "I want to hear nothing more about Salzburg; I hate the archbishop to the verge of madness.")
216. "The edifying things which the Archbishop said to me in the three audiences, particularly in the last, and what I have again been told by this glorious man of God, had so admirable a physical effect on me that I had to leave the opera in the evening in the middle of the first act, go home, and to bed. I was in a fever, my whole body trembled, and I reeled like a drunken man in the street. The next day, yesterday, I remained at home and all forenoon in bed because I had taken the tamarind water."
(Vienna, May 12, 1781, to his father. The catastrophe between Mozart and the archbishop is approaching.)
217. "Twice the Archbishop gave me the grossest impertinences and I answered not a word; more, I played for him with the same zeal as if nothing had happened. Instead of recognizing the honesty of my service and my desire to please him at the moment when I was expecting something very different, he begins a third tirade in the most despicable manner in the world."
(Vienna, June 13, 1781, to his father. See the chapter"Self-Respect and Honor.")
218. "All the world asserts that by my braggadocio and criticisms I have made enemies of the professional musicians! Which world? Presumably that of Salzburg, for anybody living in Vienna sees and hears differently; there is my answer."
(Vienna, July 31, to his father, who had sent Mozart what the latter called "so indifferent and cold a letter," when informed by his son of the great success of his opera, "Die Entfuhrung aus dem Serail." As on previous occasions Salzburg talebearers had been busying themselves.)
219. "I rejoice like a child at the prospect of being with you again. I should have to be ashamed of myself if people could look into my heart; so far as I am concerned it is cold,—cold as ice. Yes, if you were with me I might find greater pleasure in the courteous treatment which I receive from the people; but as it is, it is all empty. Adieu!—Love!"
(Frankfort, September 30, 1790, to his wife. Mozart had made the journey to Frankfort to give concerts amidst the festivities accompanying the coronation of Leopold II, hoping that he could better his financial condition. Not having been sent at the cost of the Emperor, like other Court musicians, he pawned his silver, bought a carriage and took with him his brother-in-law, a violinist named Hofer. "It took us only six days to make the journey." He was disappointed in his expectations. "I have now decided to do as well as I can here and look joyfully towards a meeting with you. What a glorious life we shall lead; I shall work—work!")
220. "Dreams give me no concern, for there is no mortal man on earth who does not sometimes dream. But merry dreams! quiet, refreshing, sweet dreams! Those are the thing! Dreams which, if they were realities, would make tolerable my life which has more of sadness in it than merriment."
(Munich, December 31, 1778, to his father. During Mozart's sojourn in Paris the love of Aloysia Weber had grown cold, and Mozart was in the dolors.)
221. "Happy man! Now see,—I have got to give still another lesson in order to earn some money."
(1786, to Gyrowetz, on the latter's departure for Italy.)
222. "You can not doubt my honesty, for you know me too well for that. Nor can you be suspicious of my words, my conduct or my mode of life, because you know my conduct and mode of life. Therefore,—forgive my confidence in you,—I am still very unhappy,—always between fear and hope."
(Vienna, July 17, 1788, to his faithful friend, Puchberg, whom he has asked for money on account of the severe illness of his wife.)
223. "You know my circumstances;—to be brief, since I can not find a true friend, I am obliged to borrow money from usurers. But as it takes time to hunt among these un-Christian persons for those who are the most Christian and to find them, I am so stripped that I must beg you, dear friend, for God's sake to help me out with what you can spare."
(One of many requests for help sent to Puchberg. It was sent in 1790 and the original bears an endorsement: "May 17, sent 150 florins.")
224. "If you, worthy brother, do not help me out of my present predicament I shall lose my credit and honor, the only things which I care now to preserve."
(Vienna, June 27, 1788, to Puchberg, who had sent him 200 florins ten days before. Puchberg was a brother Mason.)
225. "How I felt then! How I felt then! Such things will never return. Now we are sunk in the emptiness of everyday life."
(Remarked on remembering that at the age of fourteen he had composed a "Requiem" at the command of Empress Maria Theresa and had conducted it as chapelmaster of the imperial orchestra.)
226. "Did I not tell you that I was composing this 'Requiem' for myself?"
(Said on the day of his death while still working on the "Requiem" for which he had received so mysterious a commission. The work had been ordered by a Count Walsegg, who made pretensions to musical composition, and who wished to palm it off as a work of his own, written in memory of his wife. Mozart never knew him.)
227. "I shall not last much longer. I am sure that I have been poisoned! I can not rid myself of this thought."
(Mozart believed that he had been poisoned by one of his Italian rivals, his suspicion falling most strongly on Salieri. ["As regards Mozart, Salieri cannot escape censure, for though the accusation of having been the cause of his death has been long ago disproved, it is more than possible that he was not displeased at the removal of so formidable a rival. At any rate, though he had it in his power to influence the Emperor in Mozart's favor, he not only neglected to do so, but even intrigued against him as Mozart himself relates in a letter to his friend Puchberg. After his death, however, Salieri befriended his son, and gave him a testimonial which secured him his first appointment." C.F. Pohl, in "Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians."])
228. "Stay with me to-night; you must see me die. I have long had the taste of death on my tongue, I smell death, and who will stand by my Constanze, if you do not stay?"
(Reported by his sister-in-law, Sophie, sister of Constanze.)
229. "And now I must go just as it had become possible for me to live quietly. Now I must leave my art just as I had freed myself from the slavery of fashion, had broken the bonds of speculators, and won the privilege of following my own feelings and compose freely and independently whatever my heart prompted! I must away from my family, from my poor children in the moment when I should have been able better to care for their welfare!"
(Uttered on his death-bed.)
As regards his manner of life and morals Mozart long stood in a bad light before the world. The slanderous stories all came from his enemies in Vienna, and a long time passed before their true character was recognized. A great contribution to this end was made by the publication of his letters, which disclose an extraordinarily strong moral sense. The tale of an alleged liaison with a certain Frau Hofdamel, as a result of which the deceived husband was said to have committed suicide, has been proved to be wholly untrue and without warrant.
It may be said, indeed, that Mozart was an exception among the men of his period. The immorality of the Viennese was proverbial. Karoline Pichler, a contemporary, writes as follows in her book of recollections of the eighth decade of the eighteenth century: "In Vienna at the time there reigned a spirit of appreciation for merriment and a susceptibility for every form of beauty and sensuous pleasure. There was the greatest freedom of thought and opinion; anything could be written and printed which was not, in the strictest sense of the words, contrary to religion and the state. Little thought was bestowed on good morals. There was considerable license in the current plays and novels. Kotzebue created a tremendous sensation. His plays…and a multitude of romances and tales (Meissner's sketches among other things) were all based on meretricious relations. All the world and every young girl read them without suspicion or offence. More than once had I read and seen these things; 'Oberon' was well known to me; so was Meissner's 'Alcibiades.' No mother hesitated to acquaint her daughter with such works and before our eyes there were so many living exemplars whose irregular conduct was notorious, that no mother could have kept her daughter in ignorance had she tried."
Mozart was a passionate jester and his jokes were coarse enough; of that there is no doubt. But these things were innocent at the time. The letters of the lad to his little cousin in Augsburg contain many passages that would be called of questionable propriety now; but the little cousin does not seem to have even blushed. The best witness to the morality of Mozart's life is his wife, who, after his death, wrote to the publishing firm of Breitkopf and Hartel: "His letters are beyond doubt the best criterion for his mode of thought, his peculiarities and his education. Admirably characteristic is his extraordinary love for me, which breathes through all his letters. Those of his last year on earth are just as tender as those which he must have written in the first year of our married life;—is it not so? I beg as a particular favor that special attention be called to this fact for the sake of his honor."
He was a Freemason with all his heart, and gave expression to his humanitarian feeling in his opera "The Magic Flute." Without suspicion himself, he thought everybody else good, which led to painful experiences with some of his friends.
230. "Parents strive to place their children in a position which shall enable them to earn their own living; and this they owe to their children and the state. The greater the talents with which the children have been endowed by God, the more are they bound to make use of those talents to improve the conditions of themselves and their parents, to aid their parents and to care for their own present and future welfare. We are taught thus to trade with our talents in the Gospels. I owe it, therefore, to God and my conscience to pay the highest gratitude to my father, who tirelessly devoted all his hours to my education, and to lighten his burdens."
(From his request for dismissal from service in August, 1777. He wished to undertake an artistic tour with his father. He received his dismissal from the Archbishop of Salzburg, who granted it right unwillingly, however.)
231. "Only one thing vexed me a trifle,—the question whether I had forgotten confession. I have no complaint to make, but I do ask one favor, and that is that you do not think so ill of me! I am fond of merriment, but, believe me, I can also be serious. Since I left Salzburg (and while still in Salzburg) I have met persons whose conduct was such that I would have been ashamed to talk and act as they did though they were ten, twenty or thirty years older than I! Again I humbly beg of you to have a better opinion of me."
(Mannheim, December 30, 1777, to his father, in answer to a letter of reproaches.)
232. "With all my heart I do wish Herr von Schiedenhofen joy. It is another marriage for money and nothing else. I should not like to marry thus; I want to make my wife happy,—not have her make my fortune. For that reason I shall not marry but enjoy my golden freedom until I am so situated that I can support wife and children. It was necessary that Herr Sch. should marry a rich woman; that's the consequence of being a nobleman. The nobility must never marry from inclination or love, but only from considerations of interest, and all manner of side considerations. Nor would it be becoming in such persons if they were still to love their wives after the latter had done their duty and brought forth a plump heir."
(Mannheim, February 7, 1778, to his father.)
233. "In my opinion there is nothing more shameful than to deceive an honest girl."
(Paris, July 18, 1778, to his father.)
234. "I am unconscious of any guilt for which I might fear your reproaches. I have committed no error (meaning by error any act unbecoming to a Christian and an honest man). I am anticipating the pleasantest and happiest days, but only in company with you and my dearest sister. I swear to you on my honor that I can not endure Salzburg and its citizens (I speak of the natives). Their speech and mode of life are utterly intolerable."
(Munich, January 8, 1779, to his father, who was urging his return from Paris to take the post of chapelmaster in Salzburg. The musicians of Salzburg were notorious because of their loose lives.)
235. "From the way in which my last letter was received I observe to my sorrow that (just as if I were an arch scoundrel or an ass, or both at once) you trust the tittle-tattle and scribblings of other people more than you do me. But I assure you that this does not give me the least concern. The people may write the eyes out of their heads, and you may applaud them as much as you please, it will not cause me to change a hair's breadth; I shall remain the same honest fellow that I have always been."
(Vienna, September 5, 1781, to his father, who was still listening to the slander mongers. Mozart could not lightly forget the fact that it was due to these gentlemen that he had been forced to leave the house of the widow Weber with whose daughter Constanze he was in love.)
236. "You have been deceived in your son if you could believe him capable of doing a mean thing….You know that I could not have acted otherwise without outraging my conscience and my honor….I beg pardon for my too hasty trust in your paternal love. Through this frank confession you have a new proof of my love of truth and detestation of a lie."
(Vienna, August 7, 1782, to his father, whose consent to his son's marriage did not arrive till the day after.)
237. "Dearest and best of fathers:—I beg of you, for the sake of all that is good in the world, give your consent to my marriage with my dear Constanze. Do not think that it is alone because of my desire to get married; I could well wait. But I see that it is absolutely essential to my honor, the honor of my sweetheart, to my health and frame of mind. My heart is ill at ease, my mind disturbed;—then how shall I do any sensible thinking or work? Why is this? Most people think we are already married; this enrages the mother and the poor girl and I are tormented almost to death. All this can be easily relieved. Believe me it is possible to live as cheaply in expensive Vienna as anywhere else; it all depends on the housekeeping and the orderliness which is never to be found in a young man especially if he be in love. Whoever gets a wife such as I am going to have can count himself fortunate. We shall live simply and quietly, and yet be happy. Do not worry; for should I (which God forefend!) get ill today, especially if I were married, I wager that the first of the nobility would come to my help….I await your consent with longing, best of fathers, I await it with confidence, my honor and fame depend upon it."
(Vienna, July 27, 1782.)
238. "Meanwhile my striving is to secure a small certainty; then with the help of the contingencies, it will be easy to live here; and then to marry. I beg of you, dearest and best of fathers, listen to me! I have preferred my request, now listen to my reasons. The calls of nature are as strong in me, perhaps stronger, than in many a hulking fellow. I can not possibly live like the majority of our young men. In the first place I have too much religion, in the second too much love for my fellow man and too great a sense of honor ever to betray a girl…."
(Vienna, December 18, 1781. [The whole of this letter deserves to be read by those who, misled by the reports, still deemed trustworthy when Jahn published the first edition of his great biography, believed that Mozart was a man of bad morals. Unfortunately Mozart's candor in presenting his case to his father can scarcely be adjusted to the requirements of a book designed for general circulation. Let it suffice that in his confession to his father Mozart puts himself on the ground of the loftiest sexual purity, and stakes life and death on the truthfulness of his statements. H.E.K.])
239. "You surely can not be angry because I want to get married? I think and believe that you will recognize best my piety and honorable intentions in the circumstance. O, I could easily write a long answer to your last letter, and offer many objections; but my maxim is that it is not worth while to discuss matters that do not affect me. I can't help it,—it's my nature. I am really ashamed to defend myself when I find myself falsely accused; I always think, the truth will out some day."
(Vienna, January 9, 1782, to his father. In the same letter he continues: "I can not be happy and contented without my dear Constanze, and without your satisfied acquiescence, I could only be half happy. Therefore, make me wholly happy.")
240. "As I have thought and said a thousand times I would gladly leave everything in your hands with the greatest pleasure, but since, so to speak, it is useless to you but to my advantage, I deem it my duty to remember my wife and children."
(June 16, 1787, to his sister, concerning his inheritance from his father who had died on May 28.)
241. "Isn't it true that you are daily becoming more convinced of the truth of my corrective sermons? Is not the amusement of a fickle and capricious love far as the heavens from the blessedness which true, sensible love brings with it? Do you not often thank me in your heart for my instruction? You will soon make me vain! But joking aside, you do owe me a modicum of gratitude if you have made yourself worthy of Fraulein N., for I certainly did not play the smallest role at your conversion."
(Prague, November 4, 1787, to a wealthy young friend, name unknown.)
242. "Pray believe anything you please about me but nothing ill. There are persons who believe it is impossible to love a poor girl without harboring wicked intentions; and the beautiful word mistress is so lovely!—I am a Mozart, but a young and well meaning Mozart. Among many faults I have this that I think that the friends who know me, know me. Hence many words are not necessary. If they do not know me where shall I find words enough? It is bad enough that words and letters are necessary."
(Mannheim, February 22, 1778, to his father, who had rebuked him for falling in love with Aloysia Weber, who afterward became his sister-in-law.)
Mozart was of a deeply religious nature, reared in Salzburg where his father was a member of the archiepiscopal chapel. Throughout his life he remained a faithful son of the church, for whose servants, however, he had little sympathy.
The one man whom Mozart hated from the bottom of his soul was Archbishop Hieronymus of Salzburg who sought to put all possible obstacles in the way of the youthful genius, and finally by the most infamous of acts covered himself everlastingly with infamy. Though Mozart frequently speaks angrily and bitterly of the priests he always differentiates between religion, the church and their servants. Like Beethoven, Mozart stood toward God in the relationship of a child full of trust in his father.
His reliance on Providence was so utter that his words sometimes sound almost fatalistic. His father harbored some rationalistic ideas which were even more pronounced in Mozart, so that he formed his own opinion concerning ecclesiastical ceremonies and occasionally disregarded them. His cheery temperament made it impossible that his religious life should be as profound as that of Beethoven.
243. "I hope that with the help of God, Miss Martha will get well again. If not, you should not grieve too deeply, for God's will is always the best. God will know whether it is better to be in this world or the other."
(Bologna, September 29, 1770, to his mother and sister inSalzburg. The young woman died soon after.)
244. "Tell papa to put aside his fears; I live, with God ever before me. I recognize His omnipotence, I fear His anger; I acknowledge His love, too, His compassion and mercy towards all His creatures, He will never desert those who serve Him. If matters go according to His will they go according to mine; consequently nothing can go wrong,—I must be satisfied and happy."
(Augsburg, October 25, 1777, to his father, who was showering him with exhortations on the tour which he made with his mother through South Germany.)
245. "Let come what will, nothing can go ill so long as it is the will of God; and that it may so go is my daily prayer."
(Mannheim, December 6, 1777, to his father. Mozart was waiting with some impatience to learn if he was to receive an appointment from Elector Karl Theodore. It did not come.)
246. "I know myself;—I know that I have so much religion that I shall never be able to do a thing which I would not be willing openly to do before the whole world; only the thought of meeting persons on my journeys whose ideas are radically different from mine (and those of all honest people) frightens me. Aside from that they may do what they please. I haven't the heart to travel with them, I would not have a single pleasant hour, I would not know what to say to them; in a word I do not trust them. Friends who have no religion are not stable."
(Mannheim, February 2, 1778, to his father. For the reasons mentioned in the letter Mozart gave up his plan to travel to Paris with the musicians Wendling and Ramen. In truth, perhaps, his love affair with Aloysia Weber may have had something to do with his resolve.)
247. "I prayed to God for His mercy that all might go well, to His greater glory, and the symphony began….Immediately after the symphony full of joy I went into the Palais Royal, ate an iced cream, prayed the rosary as I had promised to do, and went home. I am always best contented at home and always will be, or with a good, true, honest German."
(Paris, July 3, 1778, to his father. The symphony in question is no longer in existence, although Mozart wanted to write it down again at a later date.)
248. "I must tell you my mother, my dear mother, is no more.—God has called her to Himself; He wanted her, I see that clearly, and I must submit to God's will. He gave her to me, and it was His to take her away. My friend, I am comforted, not but now, but long ago. By a singular grace of God I endured all with steadfastness and composure. When her illness grew dangerous I prayed God for two things only,—a happy hour of death for my mother, and strength and courage for myself. God heard me in His loving kindness, heard my prayer and bestowed the two mercies in largest measure."
(Paris, July 3, 1778, to his good friend Bullinger, in Salzburg, who was commissioned gently to bear the intelligence to Mozart's father. At the same time Mozart, with considerate deception, wrote to his father about his mother's illness without mentioning her death.)
249. "I believe, and nothing shall ever persuade me differently, that no doctor, no man, no accident, can either give life to man or take it away; it rests with God alone. Those are only the instruments which He generally uses, though not always; we see men sink down and fall over dead. When the time is come no remedies can avail,—they accelerate death rather than retard it….I do not say, therefore, that my mother will and must die, that all hope is gone; she may recover and again be well and sound,—but only if it is God's will."
(Paris, July 3, 1778, to his father, from whom he is concealing the fact that his mother is dead. He is seeking to prepare him for the intelligence which he has already commissioned Bullinger to convey to the family.)
250. "Under those melancholy circumstances I comforted myself with three things, viz.: my complete and trustful submission to the will of God, then the realization of her easy and beautiful death, combined with the thought of the happiness which was to come to her in a moment,—how much happier she now is than we, so that we might even have wished to make the journey with her. Out of this wish and desire there was developed my third comfort, namely, that she is not lost to us forever, that we shall see her again, that we shall be together more joyous and happy than ever we were in this world. It is only the time that is unknown, and that fact does not frighten me. When it is God's will, it shall be mine. Only the divine, the most sacred will be done; let us then pray a devout 'Our Father' for her soul and proceed to other matters; everything has its time."
(Paris, July 9, 1778, to his father, informing him of his mother's death.)
251. "Be without concern touching my soul's welfare, best of fathers! I am an erring young man, like so many others, but I can say to my own comfort, that I wish all were as little erring as I. You, perhaps, believe things about me which are not true. My chief fault is that I do not always appear to act as I ought. It is not true that I boasted that I eat fish every fast-day; but I did say that I was indifferent on the subject and did not consider it a sin, for in my case fasting means breaking off, eating less than usual. I hear mass every Sunday and holy day, and when it is possible on week days also,—you know that, my father."
(Vienna, June 13, 1781—another attempt at justification against slander.)
252. "Moreover take the assurance that I certainly am religious, and if I should ever have the misfortune (which God will forefend) to go astray, I shall acquit you, best of fathers, from all blame. I alone would be the scoundrel; to you I owe all my spiritual and temporal welfare and salvation."
(Vienna, June 13, 1781.)
253. "For a considerable time before we were married we went together to Holy Mass, to confession and to communion; and I found that I never prayed so fervently, confessed and communicated so devoutly, as when I was at her side;—and her experience was the same. In a word we were made for each other, and God, who ordains all things and consequently has ordained this, will not desert us. We both thank you obediently for your paternal blessing."
(Vienna, August 17, 1782.)
254. "I have made it a habit in all things to imagine the worst. Inasmuch as, strictly speaking, death is the real aim of our life, I have for the past few years made myself acquainted with this true, best friend of mankind, so that the vision not only has no terror for me but much that is quieting and comforting. And I thank my God that He gave me the happiness and the opportunity (you understand me) to learn to know Him as the key to true blessedness."
(Vienna, April 4, 1787, to his father, who died on the 28th of the following month. One of the few passages in Mozart's letters in which there are suggestions of the teachings of Freemasonry. In 1785 he had persuaded his father to join the order, with the result that new warmth was restored to the relationship which had cooled somewhat after Mozart's marriage.)
255. "To me that again is art twaddle! There may be something true in it for you enlightened Protestants, as you call yourselves, when you have your religion in your heads; I can not tell. But you do not feel what 'Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi' and such things mean. But when one, like I, has been initiated from earliest childhood in the mystical sanctuary of our religion; when there one does not know whither to go with all the vague but urgent feelings, but waits with a heart full of devotion for the divine service without really knowing what to expect, yet rises lightened and uplifted without knowing what one has received; when one deemed those fortunate who knelt under the touching strains of the Agnus Dei and received the sacrament, and at the moment of reception the music spoke in gentle joy from the hearts of the kneeling ones, 'Benedictus qui venit,' etc.;—then it is a different matter. True, it is lost in the hurly-burly of life; but,—at least it is so in my case,—when you take up the words which you have heard a thousand times, for the purpose of setting them to music, everything comes back and you feel your soul moved again."
(Spoken in Leipsic, in 1789, when somebody expressed pity for those capable musicians who were obliged to "employ their powers on ecclesiastical subjects, which were mostly not only unfruitful but intellectually killing." Rochlitz reports the utterance but does not vouch for its literalness.)