These oscillations of mood were very frequent, the changes often very abrupt, with Wagner; also he rarely worked at only one opera at a time. The _Dutchman_ was conceived before _Rienzi_ was finished; _Tannhäuser_ and _Lohengrin_ were slowly shaping themselves in his imagination while he scored the _Dutchman_; the _Mastersingers_ libretto, in its first form, was drafted immediately after _Tannhäuser_ was finished, and before _Lohengrin_ was begun; the composition of the _Ring_, _Tristan_ and the _Mastersingers_ went on simultaneously. He did not totally exhaust one group of ideas and emotions before proceeding to another, and the result is twofold. First, the moods belonging of right to one opera often found their way for moments into another, so that the description I have given above of his various alternations is very rough, though it is in the main accurate; second, the true antipodes of one opera may not be that which stands next to it in chronological arrangement, but one which he did not complete till years afterwards. I have just digressed a little about _Parsifal_, because it, and not the _Mastersingers_, is the true contrary and complement to _Tannhäuser_. _Parsifal_ is pitilessly logical, _Tannhäuser_ wildly illogical; _Parsifal_ preaches the gospel of renunciation, of the will to dwarf and stunt one's physical, mental and moral growth: _Tannhäuser_ preaches nothing at all, but is an affirmation of the necessity and moral loveliness of healthy relations between the two sexes, with a totally uncalled-for and incredible falling away or repentance at the end, on the part of one who has in no way sinned--to wit, Tannhäuser; the music of _Parsifal_ is sickly, tired, with mystical chants that make one's gorge rise in disgust; the music of _Tannhäuser_ is strong, healthy, full of manly passion--even at its saddest it is free of the nauseating whining of _Parsifal_. II