The publication of the _Clavierübung_ may be fixed at about the year 1739. The prelude and fugue in _E_ minor[118] are probably anterior to this work; a minute study of the autographs has given Ph. Spitta reason to place the composition between 1727 and 1736. [Footnote 118: P. ii, 9. B.-G. xv, p. 236.] In the strict succession broadly established by a prelude developed at length (137 measures), follows the fugue, of still greater dimensions (231). It is the longest of all the Bach fugues, but, despite its proportions, the interest does not flag for a moment. Here again Bach constructed his subject upon that same chromatic progression to which he already owed so many expressive combinations; but the theme soon retires into the background of this fugue; it is but the excuse for a counter-theme of singular pathos, which assumes the importance of a symphonic subject, freely treated. We should place by the side of this masterpiece the prelude and fugue in _B_ minor.[119] The beauties of this composition are of a character quite as lofty, to which no analysis can do justice. It is a sort of soul-language, of which Hegel says, in his _Aesthetik_: "If we consider all intercourse of the soul with the beautiful as a deliverance, as a release from all trouble, it is in music that we must seek the completeness of that liberation." [Footnote 119: P. ii, 10. B.-G. xv, p. 199.] Undoubtedly it is also "that internal harmony which lifts us for an instant out of the infinite depths of longing, which delivers the soul from the oppression of the will, which diverts our attention from all that is importunate, showing us things divested of all the influences of anticipation, of every personal interest, becoming objects of disinterested contemplation, and not of covetousness; thus this repose, vainly sought along the open paths of desire, but which has always eluded us, appears to us, as it were, of its own volition, and vouchsafes the realization of peace in plenty. This free condition of sadness Epicurus pronounced the chief of all good, the happiness of the gods."[120] [Footnote 120: Schopenhauer. _Lichtstrahlen aus seinen Werken._ J. Frauenstädt, Leipzig, 1874.] To the six greater preludes and fugues also belong the prelude in _C_ major[121]--which, reproduced in an altered form by Bach himself upon another occasion, recalls in both its forms the beginning of the Concerto in _C_ major for two clavecins--and the prelude in _C_ minor,[122] the fugue of which (as we have already seen) must be earlier in date. Otherwise the great fugue in _A_ minor,[123] the prelude of which, included with the fugue in this series, is still replete with souvenirs of Buxtehude, and would thus revert to the Weimar period. [Footnote 121: P. ii, 1.] [Footnote 122: P. ii, 6. B.-G. xv, p. 218. Here are noticeable reminiscences from the _Recordare_ in the _Dies Irae_ of Legrenzi, for eight-part chorus, three _violes_ and organ.] [Footnote 123: P. ii, 8. B.-G. xv.]