Franz was twenty years old, when at last his parents consented to his thorough professional education. The Leipsic Conservatory not having been founded, the music school of the famous theorist and composer, Friedrich Schneider, in Dessau, was at that time held in highest esteem, and there Franz was sent. The rather patriarchal, old fashioned, pedantic spirit which prevailed in this school, could certainly offer to the young aspiring student substantial knowledge, though it could do but little to develop his poetic nature. Yet he learned a great deal there, and laid a most excellent foundation to the eminent theoretical knowledge and mastery in the strict contrapuntal and polyphonic style by which he later won such a high distinction. Besides this, the ever fresh impulses of his own nature and the inspiring intercourse with congenial fellow students helped to mature his own musical individuality. A peculiar influence is attributed to a certain Reupsch, whom Franz describes as quite extraordinary in improvisations on the organ and in the treatment of chorals. Nothing has ever been published of all the works (consisting of pianoforte sonatas, a mass, etc.) which were composed during these years. Franz felt that his nature would lead him upon an independent path of his own, but his instinct had not yet found this sphere. After two years of study he returned home, only to meet with new opposition and mistrust in his talent. No position was offered him, no compositions appeared in print; and it was then that the sympathy of his faithful mother remained his best comfort. In the circles of cultivated dilettanti he learned that the intrinsic value of a work of art is found in its inner significance, and that its formal value, if it be a really artistic production, should be a matter of course. This is the very idea for which Robert Schumann was then fighting, and which men like Wagner, Liszt and Berlioz have made the principle of their artistic creed. Yet all true art rests on the closest harmony between both elements, where the form is the necessary and most perfect expression of the ideal contents, the two forming a perfect union. What a blessing was it that Franz in this way found rich opportunities to become acquainted with old Italian music, and with the three great German masters, Bach, Schubert and Schumann, whose works have most essentially influenced the moulding of his own musical language.