It is extremely difficult to assign Mozart a definite place in the musical Pantheon without praising him too highly on the one hand, or going to the other extreme and belittling his genius by pointing out the evident fact that noble, beautiful, sprightly, sweet and charming as were his compositions, he has not left so large an influence upon the later course of music as quite a number of artists apparently his inferiors. His influence in music was largely temporary, but none the less indispensable to musical progress. To the neat and symmetrical periods of the Haydn symphony and sonata, with their fresh, thematic treatment, Mozart added a tender grace and sweetness like the conceptions of a Raphael in painting. He was the apostle of melody. If he had never written, the art of music would have remained something quite different from what we know it. And wherever there are lovers of refined, noble melody, there will the music of Mozart be loved. Moreover, in his best symphonies, such as the one in G minor, and the "Jupiter" in C, there is a boldness and freedom of flight which Beethoven scarcely surpassed. He was at his best as a composer of operas. He was one of the fathers of the artistic song, with music for every stanza differing according to the sentiment of the words; and while the dramatic coloration is not forgotten in his operas, they are a constant flow of charming, inexhaustible melody, which sings most divinely. In short, taking his works through and through, Mozart was what, in the words of Mr. Matthew Arnold, we might call the composer of "sweetness and light." His music glows with the radiance of immortal beauty. [Illustration] CHAPTER XXVII. BEETHOVEN AND HIS WORKS.