Besides these three men, the Bachs boasted several able composers in the generations preceding Johann Sebastian,(40) men who undoubtedly would have obtained higher positions, wider reputation, and more brilliant fortune if they could have torn themselves from their native Thuringia to display their gifts elsewhere in Germany or abroad. But none of the Bachs seems to have felt an inclination to migrate. Modest in their needs, frugal by nature and training, they were content with little, engrossed in and satisfied by their art, and wholly indifferent to the decorations which great men of that time were wont to bestow on artists as special marks of honour. The fact that others who appreciated them were thus distinguished did not rouse the slightest envy in the Bachs. The Bachs not only displayed a happy contentedness, indispensable for the cheery enjoyment of life, but exhibited a clannish attachment to each other. They could not all live in the same locality. But it was their habit to meet once a year at a time and place arranged beforehand. These gatherings generally took place at Erfurt, Eisenach, and sometimes at Arnstadt. Even after the family had grown very large, and many of its members had left Thuringia to settle in Upper and Lower Saxony and Franconia, the Bachs continued their annual meetings. On these occasions music was their sole recreation. As those present were either Cantors, Organists, or Town Musicians, employed in the service of the Church and accustomed to preface the day’s work with prayer, their first act was to sing a Hymn. Having fulfilled their religious duty, they spent the rest of the time in frivolous recreations. Best of all they liked to extemporise a chorus out of popular songs, comic or jocular, weaving them into a harmonious whole while declaiming the words of each. They called this hotch-potch a “Quodlibet,” laughed uproariously at it, and roused equally hearty and irrepressible laughter in their audience.(41) It is suggested that German Comic Opera has its origin in these trifles. But the “Quodlibet” was a familiar institution in Germany at a much earlier period. I possess a collection of them printed and published at Vienna in 1542.(42) But these light-hearted Thuringians, and even those of their family who treated their art more seriously and worthily, would not have escaped oblivion had there not emerged in the fulness of time one whose genius and renown reflected their splendour and brilliancy on his forbears. This man, the glory of his family, pride of his countrymen, most gifted favourite of the Muse of Music, was Johann Sebastian Bach. [Bach’s Home at Eisenach] Bach’s Home at Eisenach CHAPTER II. THE CAREER OF BACH