"A strange comparison!" "And yet, perhaps, it is more appropriate than it would seem at first. Doesn't a bath stimulate and excite, calm, or quicken the blood, wash away the grime of everyday life from the limbs, and soothe all manner of pain? But it stills neither hunger nor thirst, and he who bathes too often feels his nervous strength relaxed, his blood over-excited, and his organs toned down to a voluptuous languor. Isn't it just so with music? It is possible our thanks are due to her alone that mankind has gradually lost its bestiality, and grown nearer the likeness of God. But this is equally certain, that men who now carry this enjoyment to excess sink gradually into a vegetating dream-life, and that if a time should come when music should really be exalted as the highest art, the highest problems of humanity would remain unsolved, and the very marrow of mankind would be forceless and feeble.--I know well," he continued, without noticing that the people in the _salon_ were listening to his monologue, and that groups of listeners had approached the door--"I know well that these are heresies which one cannot utter in certain circles without being stoned a little. Nor would I care to discuss the question with a musician, for he would scarcely understand what I really mean. The effect of this art 'of thinking in tones' is gradually to dissolve all that is solid in the brain into a softened mass, and only the great, truly creative talents can preserve the capacity and disposition for other intellectual interests. That the highest masters of every art stand on an equality with one another, I need not say. As to the others, the expression which some one used in regard to lyric poets maybe justly used toward them--'They are like geese whose livers have been fattened; excellent livers, but sick geese.' How can the balance of the intellectual powers be preserved, when any one sits nine hours a day at an instrument and continually practises the same exercises? And for that reason I should be careful how I tried to convince a musician of the error of his fanaticism. But to you, who are an æsthetic by profession--" He chanced to let his eyes wander toward the door, and broke off suddenly. He noticed now, for the first time, before what an audience he had been speaking. The professor observed his surprise, and grinned maliciously.