My very dear and honoured Friend,
Indeed I doubt that this letter will catch you at Mariafeld, but I presume it will be sent on to you. I really am simply writing to prevent the thought arising in you, that I could be unthankful to you.
At your house I had to surmount the fearful labour-pains of my good-fortune, and you were my midwife: we saw and felt nothing but the awe and anguish of that birth; thus may it be with actual mothers — a fight 'twixt life and death, where the thought of that which is to be born fades out entirely for the while, and the pangs alone are left as reality. Yet I hardly know how I could have endured it all and finally been able to bid goodbye to you in tolerable self-possession on the whole, tho' without any visible hope, if there had not lurked in my being's depths a sort of consciousness that my unprecedented sufferings at least had won me a title to some higher import, and a title which, even if not conceded by the world, yet raised me so much higher above the world, and thus, albeit in deepest misery, made me inwardly a charmed and blessed man.
You, dear friend, can bear witness that I have a right to rate my sufferings thus high. Reflect, to what a depth I was abased. Farther it surely could not go? And truly so far had it gone! But see, priceless friend! this deepest humbling has raised me at last: I felt that, if it had been possible for me to bear this, and yet stay meek and kindly, there must be something higher meant with me. Like lightning it flashed through me, that the curtain must suddenly rise, and some wondrous happiness be shewn to me. You felt so, too; plainly did you speak it out. Avow it, we both were as if inspired by God. Friend, and this was my feeling: whether the curtain would lift in this life, or only with death, indeed was all one to me: that lift it would, I knew. — So it came that, when my wondrous happiness arrived, I was not at all affrighted: of itself I had been perfectly sure; merely the drastic swiftness of its entry, exactly now, on this very day, at this hour, — that startled me. The envoy was with me at the moment when letters came in from Vienna, reporting the most abominable consequences of the disastrous step of my friends and representatives, so that I decided to set off at once for Vienna. My envoy accompanied me to Munich, where I had to spend the night as I had missed the right train, and the next morning I was hindered by terrible sickness from continuing my journey that day. However, I pulled myself sufficiently together to visit the young King after midday. At once all was clear and appointed: the curtain was drawn up. After a few days I pursued my journey to Vienna; what nothing but the despairing energy of personal sacrifice could have accomplished erewhile, was now an easy business to arrange. I came back with my servants and my faithful hound to my new last home, where, borne by the divinest love, I now enjoy the wondrous fortune we gave birth to in that fever-night at Mariafeld.
Have no doubt of this, my dear. This is the fortune which alone can fully balance all the sorrows I have had to bear with to the utmost misery. I feel that, had it not arrived, I should yet have deserved it: and that affords me warrant of its lasting. However, if you would learn the credentials of the godlike origin of this good luck, you now shall hear them. In the year of the first performance of my Tannhäuser (the work with which I first entered my new and thorny path), in the month (August) in which I felt impelled to such excessive productivity that I sketched the Lohengrin and Meistersinger at like time, a mother bore my guardian angel.
At the time when I had just finished my Tristan at Lucerne, was straining every nerve to gain the possibility of settlement on German soil (Baden), and turned at last to Paris in despair, there to wear myself out with undertakings against my nature — in his 15th year the youth was attending his first performance of my Lohengrin, which took such hold of him that he thenceforth drew his self-tuition from the study of my works and writings, and has openly declared to his entourage, as now to me, that I have been his sole true teacher and bringer-up. He follows my career and hardships, the Parisian atrocities, my ruin in Germany, and cherishes one only wish, to gain the power to prove the height of his affection to me. It was the youth's one, truly devouring grief, not to know how to win from his obtuse environment that needful interest in me. At the beginning of last March, I know the day, the miscarriage of every attempt to mend my broken state grew clear to me: in helpless despair I looked with open eyes toward all that was so horribly degradingly arriving. Then the King of Bavaria dies — quite unexpectedly — and my compassionate guardian angel — against all rules of Fate — ascends a throne. His earliest care a month thereafter, is to send for me: while I am draining the cup of sorrow to its lowest dregs, with your merciful aid, the envoy already is seeking me in my deserted home at Penzing; he must bring the King a pen, a pencil from me. — How and when he found me at last, you know. — My dear, no doubt is possible here: — That was it, and that it is! — Ah! at last a tie that brings with it no pains and tortures! What it is for me, to have this glorious youth before me! On my birthday he presented me with a beautiful oil-portrait, for which he had sat expressly for me. This wonderful picture has taught me how to shew to others, too, that I have "genius": there, see there, you have my "Genius" before your eyes!
An intimate friend of the King's has assured me that it seems to him the youth is so strict and serious in matters of government merely so as to avoid the influence of anyone, and thus secure himself the fullest liberty and independence to live for his love to me. He is thoroughly aware who I am, and what I need: not a word have I had to waste about my situation. He feels that a King's prerogative must assuredly suffice to keep all common cares from me, to give me altogether to my Muse, and procure me every means to produce my works when and how I wish. At present he mostly resides in a little castle near to me; in 10 minutes the carriage takes me there. Daily he sends either once or twice. Then I fly as to a sweetheart. 'Tis a fascinating interview. This thirst for instruction, this comprehension, this quiver and glow, I have never encountered in such splendid unrestraint. And then this charming care [...]
Source: Richard Wagner's Letters to Wesendonck et al., trans. and indexed by William Ashton Ellis (Grant Richards, 1899), No. 59