249. “Freedom,--progress, is purpose in the art-world as in universal
creation, and if we moderns have not the hardihood of our ancestors,
refinement of manners has surely accomplished something.”
(Middling, July 29, 1819, to Archduke Rudolph.)
250. “The boundaries are not yet fixed which shall call out to talent
and industry: thus far and no further!”
(Reported by Schindler.)
251. “You know that the sensitive spirit must not be bound to miserable
necessities.”
(In the summer of 1814, to Johann Kauka, the advocate who represented
him in the prosecution of his claims against the heirs of Prince
Kinsky.)
252. “Art, the persecuted one, always finds an asylum. Did not Daedalus,
shut up in the labyrinth, invent the wings which carried him out into
the open air? O, I shall find them, too, these wings!”
(February 19, 1812, to Zmeskall, when, in 1811, by decree of the
Treasury, the value of the Austrian currency was depreciated one-fifth,
and the annuity which Beethoven received from Archduke Rudolph and the
Princes Lobkowitz and Kinsky reduced to 800 florins.)
253. “Show me the course where at the goal there stands the palm of
victory! Lend sublimity to my loftiest thoughts, bring to them truths
that shall live forever!”
(Diary, 1814, while working on “Fidelio.”)
254. “Every day is lost in which we do not learn something useful. Man
has no nobler or more valuable possession than time; therefore never put
off till tomorrow what you can do today.”
(From the notes in Archduke Rudolph’s instruction book.)
255. “This is the mark of distinction of a truly admirable man:
steadfastness in times of trouble.”
(Diary, 1816.)