Now, when we contrast the suite with the fugue, the first difference that strikes us is that while the fugue, of polyphonic and ecclesiastical origin, is not definitely rhythmical, but proceeds somewhat amblingly and without division into segments of definite duration, the suite movements, owing their origin as they do either to songs intended to be sung to verses of equal length, or to dances intended to accompany symmetrical motions of the body, are markedly rhythmical--are made up, in fact, of phrases of equal length, balancing one another and giving an impression of complete symmetry. A fugue proceeds like a prose sentence; a gavotte or a bourrée or a minuet sounds more like a stanza of verses. In short, the fundamental element in a dance or song is not a fragmentary motif, but a complete phrase, filling, as a rule, two measures, though sometimes four, eight, or even three or five. The phrase begins with a motif, but fills it out with additional matter rounded off by some kind of cadence. That the phrase is thus a more complex and extended unit than the motif, a few examples from Bach will make clear. [Music: score] [Illustration: FIGURE XII. EXAMPLES OF PHRASES. Gavotte from BACH’S Fifth French Suite.] [Music: score] [Illustration: Bourrée, from BACH’S Third Suite for 'Cello.] It will be seen at once that in each case the second phrase answers or supplements the first. Like it in length and in general contour, it is at the same time more positive and final, so that the combined effect of the two is much like that of a couplet of verses. The first phrase, in fact, arouses in our minds an expectation, which only the second can satisfy; so that we have here a new and larger application of the now familiar device for binding together successive impressions. So characteristic is the supplementation of one phrase by another that theorists have adopted a set terminology suggested by it, calling the first phrase in all such cases the “antecedent phrase,” and the second the “consequent phrase.” It will also be noted, however, that the pair of phrases, once heard, becomes itself a unit in the mind, and arouses a new expectation of further matter to establish a still larger balance; and a reference to the pieces of Bach cited will show that Bach in each case follows up his pair of two-measure phrases by a four-measure phrase which supplements them as they supplemented each other. And so the process goes on, the piece growing ever larger and more complex by a regular accretion, until at last a phrase of definite and entire finality is reached, and the movement stands complete. All short songs and dances illustrate this progressive accretion of phrases into larger and larger units, by means of a constant unfolding of new expectations and fulfilments. To trace it out, to analyse what the composer has so ingeniously built up, is one