DANGER OF SPECIALISING 331 



untied, unconfined in a groove, free and appreciating 

 his freedom, intensely interested in life in all its 

 aspects and manifestations, not in human life only, 

 but in all life. His teaching should then be of the 

 greatest value in such a question as this. Above all 

 things he must be one who judges for himself. I 

 also take it that there are many men of this kind 

 who are quite free, perfectly emancipated, and are, 

 perhaps, at the same time, prudently reticent. This 

 reticence, however, it not for me, and I have actually 

 found others of a like mind with mine who are not 

 afraid to let their thoughts be known to anyone. 



It is the range of the observer which trains the 

 senses and the brain. The danger is that he may 

 take one branch of life and give all his attention to 

 that. To specialise is to lose your soul. To speculate 

 is to love your own soul. It might be said again by 

 my imaginary critic that too much may lead to 

 the development of the reasoning faculties at the 

 expense of the aesthetic, that this may decay, and 

 that in any case it becomes less and less as we grow 

 old. I can say that in my case the exact contrary 

 is the truth, since it is not continued interest in 

 phenomena, but the continued growth in strength of 

 the aesthetic faculty which produces decay of interest 

 in art generally, though I cannot say in all art, music 

 and poetry still being exceptions. 



There is a modern orchestral music which is said 

 to be not emotional, but a recent higher development 

 of the art. This is a matter which has no place here, 

 since I am concerned solely with the origin of music 



