Excerpt from Musiciens d'Autrefois: L'Opera Avant l'Opera l'"orfeo" De Luigi Rossi, Lully, Gluck, Gretry, Mozart Ainsi la connaissance des arts elargit et anime l'idee que l'on se fait d'un peuple, d'apres sa seule litterature. Combien cette idee sera encore enrichie, si, pour la completer, nous recourons a la musique! La musique deroute ceux qui ne la sentent point; sa matiere semble insaisissable: elle echappe au raisonne ment, elle parait sans contact avec la realite. Quels secours l'histoire pourrait-elle donc tirer de ce qui parait hors de l'espace, hors de l'histoire? About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.