The Life of Mozart, including his Correspondence. By Edward Holmes, author of "A Ramble among the Musicians of Germany. New York: Harper & Brothers. 1845.

HE "child of song" has ever strong claims upon mankind! His art peculiarly appeals to our best feelings and kindest sympathies. The element of music is deeply implanted in the human heart by Him of infinite goodness; who, in mercy, has left to fallen man a love for the beautiful, to cheer, elevate, and instruct. Music expresses ideas as well as feelings. Its appeals are not merely sensual, as has been said, but speak to the soul through the medium of the senses with a richer, a deeper, and a more emphatic meaning than words can convey. The art, as the source of pleasure and recreation from the toil and cares of life, has our attention and regard. Its claims are higher as an instrument to civilize and VOL. V.-No. 4.

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subdue man in his rugged state; to refine and cultivate the heart and sentiments; to aid the influence of science and the arts. Our admiration and reverence are, however, augmented in a ten-fold degree, when music, from a beautiful, becomes a sublime art, in being dedicated to the service of the DEITY, the great author of the harmonious, the beautiful, and the sublime in nature. Man in his better state is ever moved by the "concord of sweet sounds." That music which nature stirs within his soul was first called forth by an emotion of gratitude to God for his wondrous works; those of the material universe, but above them the soul with its adornments and aspirations. How truly the poet has joined to the "morning hymn" of the "first parents" in Paradise, the invocation!

"These are thy glorious works, Parent of good,
Almighty, thine this universal frame,
Thus wondrous fair; thyself how wondrous then!
Unspeakable, who sitt'st above these heav'ns
To us invisible, or dimly seen

In these thy lowest works; yet these declare
Thy goodness beyond thought, and pow'r divine."

Music has always been among the most useful allies of religion. She called forth its earliest aspirations, and the Christian church has continually watched over and directed the progress of musical science. The solemn church song or hymn, which was at first sung in one voice only, or by octaves, is the basis of modern music. A subsequent invention, "figured music," was originated by the church as early as the seventh century. The art was cherished during the "ages of faith" by its mingling in the service of the altar, and being a constituent of Catholic worship. In those much abused times, music was even one of the branches of a learned education: being included in the quadrivium,-" arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, and music." The history of this most beautiful science, or art, (as it may most properly be called,) is part and parcel of the history of the church, even to the present time. The sovereign pontiffs ever cherished it, and have been its munificent and discriminating patrons. One of them, the truly great Gregory, has continued the impress of his style even to the music of our day. We have neither space nor time to follow the gradual stages in the progress of the art under the sanction and protection of the church. The preceding remarks are merely intended as introductory to a brief notice of one of the greatest masters of sacred composition, a fit theme for a Catholic pen, and highly suitable to the pages of a Catholic periodical.

The "sublime and beautiful" unite in the almost inspired productions of MoZART's great genius. His lyre was strung in tune to every department of his art,

"Whether reason or fancy, the gay or the grave;" but its very best and sweetest strains are offerings at the source of all inspiration, and dedicated to the service of religion. This fact furnishes the great claim of Mozart upon our grateful remembrance and profound admiration. His reputation is "world-wide," and as a household word

with all; not alone with the professor or the amateur, but even among those having but a dull, if any, sense of harmony and musical effect. It has outlived petty jealousies, the trammels of fashion, the hackneyed conceit of mannerism, and straitened circumstances, which obscured his early fame, and indeed, also, to some extent, the glory of his name while he lived. His genius was universal. Unprecedented rapidity of production, universality of power, a permanent influence on art, the models he created and has left us, and the constantly advancing march of his genius arrested in the season of greatest hope,-all unite in placing the name of MOZART first, and alone, among musicians.

The American reader, before the publication of the work with the title of which we have prefaced this notice, had immediate access, in English, to no connected life of the greatest of musicians. A good and full life of Mozart was a desideratum which, it seems to us, has been supplied by the able work of Mr. Holmes. The "Life" appeared first in London; the volume before us being from the recent American republished edition. Some of our publishers have fallen into the fashion, rather disingenuous, to say the least, and "more honored in the breach than the observance," of re-issuing British works here without the slightest credit to the foreign source. No one would imagine, from the title-page and appearance of our copy, but that the Messrs. Harpers had paid for, and originally published the manuscript from the author himself. They do not even say "thank'e!" to the English edition, from which theirs is taken. This system of reprisals upon British literature is not by any means creditable. But our concern now is with the author, not the book speculator. Mr. Holmes' work is quite full; perhaps as bulky as would please that important class, the buyers, whose tastes it is necessary that the author, who lives by his pen, should consult. It sketches, with tact