The Sun.
London, England, 1863-06-12 00:00:00

HER MAJESTY'S THEATRE.

FAUST.
Goethe's celebrated " Soul Poem," as it is so
reverently called in Germany, and which in its
scheme at le_st has been acknowledged generally.

ls the most imaginative work of our age, has long
since exhausted every homage that could be paid
to it by art. Painting, sculpture, music, and the
drama have reflected it in turn, and made more
familiar every aspect of it which c:uld exer-
cise the fancy or give a further stimulus to
he already excited sympathies. To this
end its twofold character abundantly con-
. . .

(laced. In completion of that series of analogies
which it is intended to present as the picture of the
course of a daring and erring human soul, th;s
poem is found to exhibit both its infinite end finite
ride—man in his religious and philosophic, and
man in his purely st.cial and domestic aspect.
Suggested, on the one hand, by the book of Job,
where we see a mortal by divine permission sub-
jt cted to the special and probationary influence of
the Spirit of Evil—this poem presents, on the other,
a purely domestic story, in which we have a conflict
presented to us of the spiritual and animal tendencies,
and wherein this conflict is not on.y painted in
the bosom of the hero, but contra,ted in two beings
—one of whom is lost through scepticism, and the
other saved by penitence. Here it is man that is
made the tempter, and woman who becomes the
victim—woman, type of all emotion, who, as her
heart veers to earth or heaven, is degraded or re-
deemed ! It is this story of '° Faust and Margaret"
that has really won for Goathe's paem its extensive
popularity. Much of his religion is very doubtful ;
much of his philosophy unintelligible—an enigma to
nis profoundest students, and probably even to him
self ; but in his story of a pure and loving nature,
betrayed by the trust proper to its fervour, and by
a higher being whose wilful baseness degrades his
own nature more than hers—it has appealed to every
bosom, and not only excited sympathy, but conci-
liated tastes the most exacting and diversified.
Passing over the evidence on this point in the
illustrations it has prompted in nearly every form
of art, it is interesting to observe how especially it
was thought adapted to the agencies of music.
GBethe himself, anxious to give more emphasis to
its lyric and dramatic character, wished his poem
to be accompanied by music when it was
proposed to place it on the stage. Others fel
t hat it would be more successful if thrown entirely
into a lyrical form, suolo as Kreutzer and Lind-
painter, both of whom have illustrated its first part,
and Pierson, who has composed its second. The
illustrious Spohr wes at length induced to produce
the poem as an opera—a task he executed with
great learning, but with little poetry or genius.
sladlle. Bertin followed in his wake with scarcely

more success in France, and at last, seine five year,-
since, it received the first dramatic setting that at
all approached its merits in that produc-
tion of M. Gounod, which filled Paris with such
a furore, and which, since transferred to
Germany, has, in all its principal theatres,
and among the Poet's devoted worshippers excited
a sensation comparable to nothing but the first per-
formance of "Don Juan." Such a triumph most
people would consider quite decisive of its claims,
and would be naturally tempted to ask how it is
that a work that for five years has been supplying
the highest excitement not only to our lively neigh-
bours but also to the calmer and more exacting
minds of profound musicians and true poets,
should never have been transferred to our own
country till now. This is a question, however, which
we know is more easily asked than answered,
and so content ourselves with announcing that the
first performance of the opera in England, at Her
Majesty's Theatre, last night, set the seal to the
course of successes which has attended its produc-
ion generally—being one of the most brilliant and
decided triumphs which has ever been witnessed in
country.
As it is impossible on a first hearing to detail the
merits of such a work, and especially under the dis
advantages which attend a first performance, wt
shall defer to another occasion the minute attention
it demands, and content ourselves at present
with giving its character and general lea
tures. We would premise, then, by ob•
serving that its characteristics are its vivacity,
picturesqueness, and a profound and graceful ten-
d
aasmeur
ron
fue
aiases
te,
surface—but
:met
ar
gi
ti thannl,aet: anyscarcely
ly positivelt
grasps
with
t hoer
hand mai k marked
master all the outward life of the story—all the
emotion and
all the character that float upon the
in the religious ihfitieuc
reaches to the grandeur
which is inseparable from such a theme—whether
e that redeems Margaret, or