Plato taught
that music is as essential to the mind as air is to the body, and that
children should be familiarized with harmonies and rhythms that they
might be more gentle, harmonious and rhythmical, consequently better
fitted for speech and action.
"Song brings of itself a cheerfulness that wakes the heart to joy,"
exclaimed Euripides, and certain it is a large measure of joy surrounds
those who live in an atmosphere of music. It has a magic wand that lifts
man beyond the petty worries of his existence. "Music is a shower-bath
of the soul," said Schopenhauer, "washing away all that is impure." Or
as Auerbach put it: "Music washes from the soul the dust of everyday
life."
Realizing the influence of music, Martin Luther sang the Reformation
into the hearts of the people with his noble chorals in which every one
might join. He called music a mistress of order and good manners, and
introduced it into the schools as a means of refinement and discipline,
in whose presence anger and all evil would depart.
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