Had I
been a plagiarist, how many pilferings would have been manifest, and
what care would have been taken to point them out to the public! But I
had done nothing of the kind. All attempts to discover any such
thing were fruitless: nothing was found in my music which led to the
recollection of that of any other person; and my whole composition
compared with the pretended original, was found to be as new as the
musical characters I had invented. Had Mondonville or Rameau undergone
the same ordeal, they would have lost much of their substance.
The Bouffons acquired for Italian music very warm partisans. All
Paris was divided into two parties, the violence of which was
greater than if an affair of state or religion had been in question.
One them, the most powerful and numerous, composed of the great, of
men of fortune, and the ladies, supported French music; the other,
more lively and haughty, and fuller of enthusiasm, was composed of
real connoisseurs, and men of talents and genius. This little group
assembled at the opera-house, under the box belonging to the queen.
The other party filled up the rest of the pit and the theater; but the
heads were mostly assembled under the box of his majesty. Hence the
party names of Coin du Roi, Coin de la Reine,* then in great
celebrity. The dispute, as it became more animated, produced several
pamphlets. The king's corner aimed at pleasantry; it was laughed at by
the Petit Prophete. It attempted to reason; the Lettre sur la
Musique Francaise refuted its reasoning.
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