ROMANTIC MUSIC (The Arts) The ideals of instrumental music At one point in the study of the Romantic period of music, we come upon the first of several apparently opposing conditions that plague all attempts to grasp the meaning of Romantic as applied to the music of the 19th century. This opposition involved the relation between music and words. If instrumental music is the perfect Romantic art, why is it acknowledged that the great masters …showed first 75 words of 860 total…

…showed last 75 words of 860 total…ideas of Romantic music in these words: 'Music embodies feeling without forcing it - as it is forced in its other manifestations, in most arts and especially in the art of words - to contend and combine with thought....it is the embodied and intelligent essence of feeling; capable of being apprehended by our senses, it permeates them like a dart, like a ray, like a dew, like a spirit, and fills our soul.'