Finally, we would mention the prelude in _C_ major in 9-8 time[124]; it recalls in its movement a fantasia by Froberger. [Footnote 124: P. ii, 7. B.-G. xv, p. 228.] It is curious to observe that the fugue which follows it played a part in the inspiration of _Die Meistersinger_, in its analogous figures, and in resuming the subject at the close, this time in augmentation, like a chorale melody. Is it not of some interest to see brought together, in a work of Bach's, these extremes in music? Froberger, with all his inheritance of past centuries; Wagner, proclaiming the dawn of a new art? THE CHORALE PRELUDES (_VORSPIELE_)--TRIOS--FANTASIAS--FUGUES We have seen to what an early period of Bach's life his first free compositions revert; perhaps of still earlier origin are the works which the Chorales inspired in him. Liturgical in character, and thus all the more closely identified with the popular sources from which he sometimes drew his own inspirations in order to idealize them mystically in a sort of "_procession en Dieu_," the chorale is the soul of Lutheran religious music. Far more; this universal prayer, the spiritualized communion of the faithful (their sole participation, really, in a dogma freely interpreted), passed from the inner temple to the outer court, like the reading of Holy Writ; the Bible was the book of the family, the volume of chorales its musical breviary. The very first arrangements of chorales made by Bach convey a little of that intimate charm, of that impression of "home" and its domestic circle, where in the evening the hymns are sung between the reading of two chapters from the Evangelists; it would seem as though the young man, an orphan, in imparting to them their expression of quiet sympathy, desired that they should take the place of those same intimate pleasures which had been denied him. In fact, the "_Partite_," these two sets of variations upon "_Christ, der Du bist der helle Tag_" and "_Gott, Du frommer Gott_,"[125] lend themselves but poorly to the somewhat formal solemnity of a public service. [Footnote 125: These variations are contained in the fifth volume of the Peters edition (Part ii, 1 and 2).]