"A few moments' rest and refreshment"

Rested and refreshed from my week off (really, truly, an entire week! I have to remember how good this feels...).

To get back into the swing of things (blogging included), "rest and refreshment" in a very different context:


September 22, 1802

Gentlemen,

It was a most pleasant surprise to receive such a flattering letter from a part of the world where I could never have imagined that the products of my poor talents were known. But when I see that not only is my name familiar to you, but my compositions are performed by you with approval and satisfaction, the warmest wishes of my heart are fulfilled: to be considered a not wholly unworthy priest of this sacred art by every nation where my works are known. You reassure me on this point as regards your fatherland, but even more, you happily persuade me -- and this cannot fail to be a real source of consolation to me in my declining years -- that I am often the enviable means by which you, and so many other families sensible of heartfelt emotion, derive, in their homely circle, their pleasure -- their enjoyment. How reassuring this thought is to me! Often, when struggling against the obstacles of every sort which oppose my labors; often, when the powers of mind and body weakened, and it was difficult for me to continue in the course I had entered on;-- a secret voice whispered to me, "There are so few happy and contented people here below; grief and sorrow are always their lot; perhaps your labors will once be a source from which the care-worn, or the man burdened with affairs, can derive a few moments' rest and refreshment." This was indeed a powerful motive to press onwards, and this is why I now look back with cheerful satisfaction on the labors expended on this art, to which I have devoted so many long years of uninterrupted effort and exertion...

Your wholly obedient servant,
Joseph Haydn