CAPACITY FOR FRIENDSHIP
Genius lives essentially alone. It is too rare to find its like
with ease, and too different from the rest of men to be their
companion.
--SCHOPENHAUER.
For many years Beethoven had not been on speaking terms with the friend
of his youth, Stephen von Breuning. The year 1815, which had cost him
his brother Karl, also deprived him of Stephen's friendship. Two
versions are given as to the cause of the quarrel which estranged them.
One is that Stephen had warned him not to trust his brother Karl in
money matters. Another, and probably the correct one, is that Stephen
endeavored to dissuade the master from adopting the young Karl in event
of his brother's death. In either case Von Breuning acted entirely in
Beethoven's interest without considering the possible consequences to
himself; his disinterestedness was poorly rewarded however. Beethoven
was bound by every obligation of friendship to him, but, with his usual
want of tact, told his brother just what Stephen had said. Naturally
Karl resented this interference in their family affairs, and succeeded
in inflaming his brother's mind against Von Breuning. The estrangement
resulted. Karl died shortly after, and a mistaken sense of loyalty
toward his dead brother helped to keep alive Beethoven's anger against
his former friend. There is no record of his having so much as mentioned
the latter's name in the following ten years, although he and Von
Breuning lived in the same city and had many friends in common.
As time passed, and one after another of Beethoven's friends were lost
to him--through death or otherwise--his thoughts no doubt often reverted
to this old friend. It must often have occurred to him that Breuning's
companionship would be more enjoyable than that of some of the friends
of these years. An accidental meeting with him on the bastion one
evening in August of 1825, happily led to a reconciliation. Beethoven's
eyes were at last opened to the injustice done Von Breuning, upon which
he wrote him a letter, so imbued with penitence, so fraught with the
desire of obliterating his past unkindness, so filled with yearning and
tenderness, that it must have compensated Stephen for all the pain of
the past years.
Accompanying the letter was his portrait painted many years before. The
letter has been frequently published. It is so characteristic of the man
that it can hardly be omitted:
"Behind this portrait, dear, good Stephen, may all be forever buried
which has for so long kept us apart. I have torn your heart I know. The
agitation that you must constantly have noticed in me has punished me
enough. It was not malice that prompted my behavior toward you. No! I
should then be no longer worthy of your friendship. I was led to doubt
you by people who were unworthy of you and of me. My portrait has long
ago been intended for you. You know that I had always intended it for
some one. To whom could I give it so with warmest love as to you, true,
faithful, noble Stephen. Forgive me for causing you suffering. My own
sufferings have equaled yours. It was not until after our separation
that I realized how dear you are and always will be to my heart."
All this in English sounds cold and stunted when compared with the fire
of the original. Beethoven never spared himself when making amends for
past misconduct.
From this time on the name of Von Breuning appears again in his letters
and he found much comfort in intercourse with his family. He was always
a welcome guest at Breuning's house. A friendship was soon inaugurated
between the master and Stephen's son, a bright lad of twelve years. He
nicknamed him Ariel, when sending him on errands, probably with
reference to his agility.
Such incidents as the quarrels with Breuning, his dismissal of
Schindler, Schuppanzich, and Count Lichnowsky during the preliminary
work of the testimonial concert, his suspicions of his friends at the
second concert when he invited them to a dinner, and then charged them
with an attempt to defraud him,--these at first glance, especially if
considered apart, lead to the conclusion that Beethoven was not intended
for friendship. This was not the case however. His deafness and
preoccupation with his work, led him to keep aloof to some extent from
others, but it is undeniable that he greatly valued this sentiment and
actively fostered it. Perhaps, like Thoreau, he expected too much from
it, and could find no one to respond to the measure of his
anticipations. He was probably disappointed one way or another, with
every friend that came to him, but to the end kept alive his faith in
humankind, and managed always to maintain intimate and friendly
relations with one or more persons. There is no interval from his
twentieth year up to his death, of which this cannot be said. He was
essentially gregarious and recognized the need of friendship. That he
was unlike his fellow human beings--essentially different--he knew. He
often sought to bridge these differences, in order to make friendly
intercourse with others possible.
Among the friends of this period may be mentioned Hüttenbrenner,
Schubert's friend. Schubert himself would have prized Beethoven's
friendship in the highest degree, but he was too modest to bring it
about. The junior by twenty years, and in Beethoven's lifetime unknown
to fame, it devolved on him to take the initiative in this matter. A
meeting could easily have been arranged as both dined at the same
restaurant, and Hüttenbrenner could have managed to bring them together.
Beethoven was generally approachable when not at work, and was always
well disposed toward young musicians of talent, but the habitually
modest estimate which Schubert placed on himself, coupled with the
regard amounting to reverence which he entertained for Beethoven, was
sufficient to deter the younger man. He indeed attempted a meeting in
1822, but the result was a fiasco owing to his extreme diffidence.
Having composed some variations on a French air (opus 10) he desired to
dedicate them to Beethoven and prevailed on Diabelli to arrange a
meeting, as well as call with him on the master, since he feared to go
alone. Beethoven's demeanor toward him was genial and friendly. When
Schubert attempted conversation the master handed him a pencil and
paper. He was too nervous to write in reply, but managed to produce his
composition, which Beethoven examined with some appearance of interest.
The master finally came upon some incorrect harmonization (Schubert had
never received a proper technical training) and in mild terms called the
young composer's attention to it. This so disconcerted him that he fled
to the street, regardless of consequences. The incident is related by
Schindler, but is called into question by Kreissle, who wrote an
exhaustive biography of Schubert. Kreissle says that Beethoven was not
at home when Schubert called.
Excessive diffidence was not the distinguishing trait of another young
man, Karl Holz, who had ingratiated himself into the master's favor in
these years. Holz had a post under government, was of good social
position, possessed fine conversational powers, and was an all-round
entertaining and agreeable person. He was a musician of first-rate
attainments, a member of the Schuppanzich Quartet, and occasionally
acted as director of the Concert Spirituel of Vienna.
Holz's gayety and light-heartedness helped to dispel the melancholy
which had become habitual with Beethoven at this time. He had the
discernment to see that such an atmosphere was unsuited to a young man
of Karl's temperament, and may very well have encouraged Holz's visits
on his nephew's account. The situation had its defects however, as
Holz's convivial habits were communicated to Beethoven, who was led at
times to drink more wine than was good for him. Beethoven, in one of his
letters to his nephew, reproached him with being a thorough Viennese, to
which the young man retorted in kind, alluding to the master's
friendship with Holz. This was before the reconciliation with Von
Breuning had been effected. After that event he saw him less frequently.
The young man however, retained his hold on the master's regard and
maintained the footing of an intimate friend for the remainder of his
life. Flashes of the old humor constantly appear in his letters to Holz,
which, though tinctured somewhat with coarseness, make pleasanter
reading than his remark to Fanny del Rio--"My life is of no worth to
myself. I only wish to live for the boy's sake." Holz took him out of
this mood.
In the last year of his life Beethoven, at Holz's request appointed him
his biographer as follows:
VIENNA, _Aug. 30, 1826_.
I am happy to give my friend, Karl Holz, the testimonial he
desires, namely,--that I consider him well qualified to write my
biography if indeed, I may presume to think this will be desired. I
place the utmost confidence in his faithfully transmitting to
posterity what I have imparted to him for this purpose.
LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN.
Holz, however, was not equal to the requirements, and this duty was
relegated to Schindler.
A curious change affected Beethoven in his later years on the subject of
money. It was not avarice, that "good old-gentlemanly vice" of Byron's
which influenced him, but it resembled it at times. With his nephew as
the inciting cause, money, to which he had hitherto been indifferent,
now assumed a new value to him. This is evidenced by absurd economies
(alternated it is true by occasional extravagances), which are a feature
of this time. The diminution of his pension, the nature of the
compositions of these years from which for the most part no money was
available, the cessation of his teaching (Von Frimmel mentions a pupil,
Hirsch, who had a few lessons from him in 1817, which was probably the
last of Beethoven's sporadic attempts in this direction, as his deafness
must have made teaching extremely difficult), were all factors which
rendered money a scarce article with him. In the same ratio in which his
income had been diminished, his expenses were increased by the
maintenance and education of his nephew, which in large part was borne
by Beethoven.
This new estimate of the value of money was strengthened by the
conviction that Karl would never do anything for himself, and that
provision must be made for his future. To this must be attributed his
solicitude for money which is constantly in evidence in his letters to
his friends, as well as to his publishers, in which latter the
disposition to drive a good bargain comes to the fore now for the first
time. His letters to Ries are full of the subject of making money. "Wäre
ich nicht noch immer der arme Beethoven," he says with unconscious
humor, in one of the letters. "If I could but get to London, what would
I not write for the Philharmonic Society. If it please God to restore my
health, which is already improved, I may yet avail myself of the several
propositions made me, not only from Europe, but even North America, and
thus my finances might again prosper."
His naïve reference to this country[D] refers to the offer made him by
the Händel and Haydn Society of Boston for an oratorio, the text of
which was to be furnished by them. His work on the Ninth Symphony
prevented him from accepting it, but it is something that will always
redound to the credit of the society. That the critical faculty should,
already at that time, have been sufficiently well developed in this
country as to lead to such a commission, augurs well for its future
art-history. While one portion were engaged in subduing the wilderness,
fighting Indians, extending the frontier, others were already reaching
out for the highest and best in art and literature.[E] It is a pleasant
reflection that this country is no longer the terra incognita in musical
matters that it was in Beethoven's time. The ready recognition extended
Wagner from the first here, has, no doubt, helped to bring this about.
[D] When writing this letter Beethoven could have had no prevision that
in this aboriginal North America, in a little village called Natick,
there was then living a five-year-old boy, answering to the name of
Alexander W. Thayer, who was eventually to furnish a biography of the
master, so painstaking, exact and voluminous, that it is unique in its
class. The Beethoven biography was Thayer's life-work, to which he
gladly sacrificed his means as well, and was then only brought down to
the year 1816. Thayer's name will always be associated with that of
Beethoven, it is such a record-making work. It is published only in
German at this writing (1904), but an English translation is promised on
completion of the second edition, one volume of which has appeared in
1902. Mr. Thayer died in 1897.
[E] That Beethoven's genius had at an early date impressed itself on the
minds of Americans, was commented on by Margaret Fuller in 1841. She
says:
"It is observable as an earnest of the great future which opens for this
country, that such a genius (Beethoven) is so easily and so much
appreciated here, by those who have not gone through the steps that
prepared the way for him in Europe. He is felt because he expressed in
full tones the thoughts that lie at the heart of our own existence,
though we have not found means to stammer them as yet."
Meanwhile Ries, in London, was making active propaganda for him, with
the result that an offer had come to him from Charles Neate asking him
to come to London with a symphony and a concerto for the Philharmonic
Society. Neate was a great admirer of Beethoven. He had spent eight
months in Vienna some years previously, and the two became good friends
during this sojourn. Three hundred guineas, and a benefit concert in
which five hundred pounds more was to be guaranteed him, was the
inducement held out for coming. This large sum tempted him strongly,
placing him, so to speak, between two fires. The character of his nephew
was such that he could not be left behind, while his education would be
interrupted if he took him along. His entries in his journal show with
what dread and apprehension he faced the ordeal of going among
strangers. The project never would have been considered but for his
desire to provide for Karl's future. The journey was never undertaken,
but the project was never abandoned. It occupied his thoughts even in
his last illness.
The scores of the Mass and Symphony were sold to Messrs. Schott of
Mayence, one thousand florins having been obtained for the Mass, and six
hundred for the Symphony. This put him in easy circumstances for a
while, although the money question was a source of anxiety to him, more
or less, for the remainder of his life. The ten thousand florins
invested in Bank of Austria shares in 1815 was almost intact. He had
drawn on it once or twice when matters had come to an extremity with
him, but to touch it in any other case seemed to him like betraying a
trust, since it had been set aside as a provision for his nephew. Just
before the testimonial concert, he was at times absolutely without
funds, his housekeeper being occasionally required to advance money from
her savings to tide him over until a windfall should happen. The
proceeds from the seven subscriptions to the Mass in D, amounting to
three hundred and fifty ducats (about eight hundred dollars) helped him
out to some extent, and something must have been coming in all the while
from his previous publications. With good management there would have
been sufficient for a man of his simple requirements, but in nothing was
he so deficient as in business ability, or the faculty of looking after
his worldly concerns. He was probably cheated right and left in his
household matters.