The foregoing table may be compared with that of the Haydn variations in Chapter VII. While the general scheme is the same--for the two themes are in each case presented several times--the Beethoven variations are much more concise, and at the same time much more fully expressive and illustrative of the original theme. Haydn's variations are naïve; Beethoven's are conscious. Beethoven presents his themes from widely different points of view; Haydn presents charmingly elaborate versions of the same melodies. "Composers did not for a long while," says Parry,[46] "find out the device of making the same tune or 'theme' appear in different lights, so as to make studies of different aspects of the same story under changing conditions, as in Robert Browning's _Ring and the Book_."
These entirely distinct presentations of the original idea give to this movement an especial charm, placing it far above any of Haydn's or Mozart's variations.
III. INDIVIDUALITY OF THE ANDANTE OF THE FIFTH SYMPHONY.
The peculiar charm of this andante lies not so much in its melodies, beautiful as they are, as in the individuality of their treatment. The first version of the theme as it appears in Beethoven's sketch-book is shown in Figure LVI (_a_), and at (_b_) is given the first part of the completed theme.
It will be observed that the original idea was somewhat mechanical in its rhythm, and lacked that variety imparted to the completed theme by the tied note at the beginning of measure 3 and at the middle of measure 5. Beethoven's original intention must have been quite at variance in other ways with what he finally evolved, for he marks his first sketch, "Andante quasi Minuetto," _i. e._ "in the style of the minuet," and of this there is left no evidence whatever.
Each variation of this theme is quite distinct from the original, particularly in its mood. While the original theme has a calm and even pensive beauty, full of sentiment, the two variations of it are less serious and, at times, verge on the humorous and playful (as at measure 108), or on the grotesque (as at measure 115). But in the episodes that occur between the variations--in the transitions or links between the different parts--Beethoven's fancy has fullest play. He ranges all the way from comedy to tragedy, from delicate gaiety to lumbering, Brobdingnagian heaviness. Simple raillery seizes him when, at measure 160, he allows the violin to take up the familiar motive and toss it to the basses and take it back again, or when he amuses himself with weaving thirds up and down (134), crossing and recrossing, spinning out the little three-note motive into a fine web, which is finally torn apart as the whole orchestra thunders out the secondary theme (148).