Since that summer in Carlsbad I read Goethe every day, that is, when I read at all. He (Goethe) has killed Klopstock for me. You are surprised? And now you laugh? Ah ha! It is because I have read Klopstock. I carried him about with me for years while walking and also at other times. Well, I did not always understand him, of course. He leaps about so much and he begins at too lofty an elevation. Always _Maestoso_, D-flat major! Isn’t it so? But he is great and uplifts the soul nevertheless. When I could not understand him I could sort of guess. If only he did not always want to die! That will come quickly enough. Well, it always sounds well, at any rate, etc. Thus, whatever scattered hints bearing upon the point come under our notice combine to impart a noble idea of Beethoven’s poetic taste and culture, and to show that the allusions to the ancient classic authors in his letters and conversation were not made for display, but were the natural consequence of a love for and a hearty appreciation of them derived from their frequent perusal in translations. BEETHOVEN AS A LETTER-WRITER Beethoven’s correspondence forms so important a portion of his biography that something must be said here upon his character as a letter-writer. A few of his autograph letters bear marks of previous study and careful elaboration; but, in general, whatever he wrote in the way of private correspondence was dashed off on the spur of the moment, and with no thought that it would ever come under any eye but that for which it was intended. It is therefore easy to imagine how energetically he would have protested could he have known that his most insignificant notes were preserved in such numbers, and that the time would come when they would all be made public; or, still worse, that some which were but the offspring of momentary pique against those with whom he lived in closest relations would be used after his death to their injury; and that outbursts of sudden passion--when the wrong was perhaps as often on his side as on the other--after all the parties concerned had passed away, would have an almost judicial authority accorded to them.