[Footnote 11: The subject is taken from Cicero's Somnium Scipionis, which is followed even in details; Metastasio has incorporated the myth of Silius Italicus, who in the fifteenth book of his "Punica" makes Virtus and Voluptas appear to Scipio, that he may choose between manly courage and sensual enjoyment; Metastasio makes the apparitions Costanza and Fortuna ta suit the occasion.] [Footnote 12: G. A. Moreschi, Riflessioni intorno le feste ed azione teatrali (vor Metastasio, Opp., XII., p. IV.).] [Footnote 13: Metastasio recommends this ending to Farinelli's imitation. (Opp. post, I., p. 301).] [Footnote 14: This overture has also been prepared for independent performance by the addition of a closing movement (161 K.).] === MOZART BY DAVID WIDGER CHAPTER IX. ORATORIO. THE commonly received opinion[1] that the oratorio originated in the devotional exercises held in the oratories of monasteries, {ORIGIN OF ORATORIO.} (193) and thrown into the form of a musical drama by Filippo Neri (1515-1595), is without foundation. All that can confidently be asserted is that he caused _laudi spirituali_, a kind of motett,[2] to be sung by way of recreation, and that he organised carnival performances ("rappresentazioni") which withdrew the mind from worldly follies;[3] whether, and in what degree, music had to do with these we do not know.[4] The "Rappresentazione dell' Anima e del Corpo," by Emilio de' Cavalieri, who sought to reproduce the old tragedy on the same principles as Peri in the opera, was arranged for representation on a stage ("palco"), with scenery, costumes, and dances, and contained recitatives and choruses.[5] One performance took place, according to the preface to the score, in February, 1599, in the oratorium of the church of S. Maria, in Vallicella,[6] and this Della Valle remembered having attended when a boy.[7] Henceforward sacred dialogues and {ORATORIO.} (194) dramas set to music were frequent in Rome and elsewhere, and were given not only before the congregation _dell' oratorio_,[8] but in churches, monasteries, and palaces. The history of the development of these rappresentazione or azione sacra, also called oratorio,[9] has not yet been traced in detail.[10] In time the performances were confined to Lent, when no opera was given, and although action and costume gradually disappeared from the churches,[11] and the whole assumed more and more the form of a concert, yet the dramatic element, or at least the dialogue, always remained. The connection with the service of the church was so far maintained that a mass and an address from a boy preceded the oratorio, and a sermon was delivered between its two parts.[12] The growth of the azione sacra kept pace with that of the opera seria.