[Footnote 74: Born in 1663, Duke Wilhelm Ernst reigned from 1683. Early becoming a widower, and left without children, he adopted a somewhat retired mode of life, as we may judge. At the palace, "Wilhelmsburg," everyone had to retire at nine o'clock in summer and eight in winter. He evinced a marked taste for theological studies and discussions; in 1710 he brought together in a synod one hundred pastors, and he built or repaired a number of churches and seminaries. He was also interested in numismatics. This austerity was in some degree tempered by concerts, whose programs were performed (J.O. Köhler tells us, _Historische Münzbelustigung_, Nuremberg, 1730) by sixteen picked musicians, dressed in Hungarian costume (Bach _en tzigane_!). Further, the duke built a theatre in 1696; the patronage accorded to the troupe of Gabriel Möller, "Hofcomödiant" (court comedian), was not of long duration; it had already ceased in 1709.] [Footnote 75: Prince Johann Ernst was of a weak constitution; he died in 1715, at the age of nineteen years, and the only way he could make his insomnia bearable was to keep with him in his room during entire nights Walther, his music teacher, who would play for him his favorite pieces.] [Footnote 76: Johann Gottfried Walther was born in 1684, and from 1707 held the position of town organist in Weimar. Not only was he a good musician, but he was also a theoretician of merit; while he learned from his friend Bach the principles of the old school of Sweelinck, the traditions of which had descended through the teachings of Reinken and Buxtehude (see _J.G. Walther als Theoretiker_.--Study by Gehrmann in the _Vierteljahrschrift für Musikwissenschaft_, 1891), Bach, on the other hand, was able to obtain other advantages from this interchange; Walther was remarkably well-schooled in harmony, and from his thorough knowledge, of long standing, of Italian chamber music, he undoubtedly was not indirectly connected with these new studies of Bach's.] Bach's temperament, so entirely different, was certain to draw its lesson from association with such works; the precise moment has now arrived when, by his own determination, he shall profit by it; he is master of his own virtuosity; and both his manual dexterity and his present position make it possible for him to choose what he will retain of the ideas which crowd upon his imagination in such profusion. To succeed in such a choice were already to produce a work of art; but to bring these ideas into their proper relative order, the selection once made, is the achievement of a great artist. The Italians had for a long time possessed precisely this sense of correct succession; this architectural aspect of the art could not fail to attract, by its harmony of proportions, those who had always displayed so much taste in works of sculpture.