Thoroughgoingness

"Besides the eloquence it lends to Gesture, the Orchestra may become a vital factor in the exposition of the poet's aim: " The language of the orchestra, moreover, is able to attach itself just as intimately to the verse-melody as to the gesture, and thus to develop into a messenger of the very thought itself, transmitting it to Feeling." This being one of the salient features of Wagnerian Drama, and, in the logic and thoroughgoingness of its application, a wholly new device, I must quote at somewhat greater length : — When the emotion that forms the subject of a line of verse has clothed itself in a sufficiently distinctive melodic theme, " it has become the property of pure Music " — to put it a little more clearly, that particular group or combination of tones has become as much identified in our minds with the sentiment expressed, providing we are quick of ear, as the sounds of the word " anger " with that passion itself."