Handel and Bach

Extract

It is a gratification to me to be invited to resume the subject which was broached to you on the last occasion of our meeting. It is personally a gratification to myself, and more than this, I esteem it for the fact that the subject has proved so interesting to the Musical Association as to elicit a second day's attention to it. The present year, being the two-hundredth since the birth of the illustrious musicians whose names head this dissertation, draws attention particularly to them and their merits. Handel's birthday is passed by a week, Bach's will be on the fortnight after next Saturday. Here we stand between the two, who are more than any other two musicians parallel to each other. I attempted, when I had the gratification of speaking to you before, to collate the several periods of their lives; and I will, with your patient indulgence, resume from the point at which it was necessary on that occasion to break off.