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This, rather than, as Marx says, the last movement of Symphony No. 2,
might be designated the finale of finales (?)--"The most sublime
chaunt of triumph ever pealed forth by an orchestra." _Multum in
parvo_ I have put a mark against the D, because that one touch (of
nature) makes all the difference; nay, I had almost said, stamps the
passage. Substitute a B, and the emphasis is lost, together with the
originality. Nevertheless, the movement is hardly of equal value
throughout; it has its "worser half;" and is also, unfortunately, too
long. As in so many other cases, ideas are repeated, repeated already.
But this is not the worst; the worst is, that the overwhelming effect
of the stupendous burst is seriously impaired. It should have
"Smitten once, to smite no more."
This terrible "elaboration," so superfluously "necessary"; such a
fancied _sine quâ non_! Here, we must seriously repeat the protest
against the conventional custom; nay, almost raise the question,
whether it is not rather a reproach to Beethoven (the original) that
he did not get out of this thoughtless old groove. Here, the idea did
not extrude the form, but rather _con_formed to it; was, as it were,
poured into the traditional mould. But the form should be the
eventuation of the idea, of the germ-soul ("_pensiero di Dio_"), as in
a living organism (tree, _e.g._, or man).[A] With regard to the
"worser half" we ventured to speak of, it is simply, as in so many
cases, even in Beethoven himself, and notably (as we have so often
felt) in the _Lieder ohne Worte_; there, very rarely is the second
motive equal to the first; the first _was motive_--the "germ-soul,"
inner necessity of the piece, _perforce_ giving birth to it; the
second was factitious. In the present case, does not this subject--
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seem really trifling (nay, almost jiggy) by
the side of the grand opening, so broad and victorious? We are rather
reminded of that traditional movement, whose ambling hilarity is our
special horror, viz., the Rondo--we hope by now decently dead and
buried; nay, we think, too, of the Sonata in G (Op. 31). This unlucky
subject seems to us as unworthy its glorious predecessor as the last
movement of that sonata is unworthy of the first--that burst of
inspiration, like water from the rock, rolling on into broad
_Symphonische Dichtung_. (In the course of the present _motiv_,
consecutive octaves are prominent). A little further on--one bar and a
half, true Beethoven, is worth a page of such undignified _Tonspiel_.
It is one of those bars which convey a "shock of delight" whenever
they catch the musician's eye--
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[A] Neither can we but regret the re-introduction of the "allegro"
subject; that sublime idea had already done its true work (as we
feel), and there only remained to break into one overwhelming burst of
triumph, and then an end.
Few pleasures could be more elegant than to extend such an idea _ad
lib._ as an andante on the organ. (We can imagine its effect as a
prelude in some old rural church--say on a mellow Sunday afternoon).
Another notable point is, the "grinding out" (long before Berlioz) of
the minor second against the tonic; an effect of extraordinary
resolution and power--
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eloquently expressive, indeed, of a determination to bear it out
against the shocks of doom. In this and other traits, we have the true
Beethoven--such spiritual energy as (except in Handel, and with him it
was less human) had not yet been dreamt of; such suffering in strife,
and yet such glorying in it; such temptations in the wilderness (of
his own heart, as well as elsewhere); such final victorious success!
And, here we are brought back into our old more genial vein and
strain; we forget the spots on the sun, and lose ourselves in his
overpowering effulgence. This "_erhabensten Triumphgesang_" is, to us,
that of resurrection; when the ponderous lid was burst from within
with light, which at once--so the great fancy expatiates--redoubled
the splendour of day all over the world. Handel's selected words--nay,
and very remarkably, the great flash-of-chorus itself (one could,
indeed, imagine it as having suggested Beethoven's, they are so much
alike)--come into the mind,--
"By Man came also the Resurrection of the Dead."
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