“Music…embraces at once the real and the ideal… By suspending the rhythm that gives it movement and life, it can assume the aspect of death. With the play of harmonic means at its disposal, it might confine itself…to being a pleasant diversion for the mind; or, in its melodic sport, limit itself to tickling the ear. But when it concentrates at one and the same time all its powers on the sense of hearing which it skillfully charms or offends, on the nervous system which it excites, the