Kapp, who has written a life of Franz Liszt, goes Bélart one better in hinting that the infatuated couple transformed their idealism into realism. Bélart does not believe this; neither does Emil Ludwig, the latest critical commentator on Wagner. But neither critic gives the profoundest proof that the love of Richard and Mathilde was an exalted, platonic one, _i. e._, the proof psychologic. I firmly believe that if Mathilde Wesendonk had eloped with Wagner in 1858, as he begged her to do, Tristan and Isolde might not have been finished; at all events, the third act would not have been what it now is. A mighty longing is better for the birth of great art than facile happiness. For the first time in his selfish unhappy life Wagner realised Goethe's words of wisdom: "Renounce thou shalt; shalt renounce." It was a bitter sacrifice, but out of its bitter sweetness came the honey and moonlight of Tristan and Isolde. Wagner suffered, Mathilde suffered, Otto Wesendonk suffered, and last, but not least, Minna Wagner, the poor pawn in his married game, suffered to distraction. Let us begin with a quotation on the last page but three of Bélart's book: "Remarked Otto Wesendonk to a friend: 'I have hunted Wagner from my threshold....'" This was in August, 1858. Wagner first met the Wesendonks about 1852, three years after he had fled to Zurich from Dresden because of his participation in the uprising of 1849. (Wagner as amateur revolutionist!) Thanks to the request of his wife Mathilde, Otto Wesendonk furnished a little house on the hill near his splendid villa for the Wagners. First christened "Fafner's Repose," Wagner changed the title to the "Asyl," and for a time it was truly an asylum for this perturbed spirit.