Dear just Man!
Please accept my belated thanks for your Bayreuth visit as well as your report of your recent Berlin adventure! And in order to come at once to the gravest point in connection with the latter, I beg of you to say that under no circumstances will I give my consent to this projected lottery.
There can really be nothing more humiliating than the position into which I have been forced by exaggerated reports as to the significance of a “Wagneriana” in Berlin, and by being thus made to believe that I could accept such assistance which, of a certainty, would drive me on to the shoals.
If anyone should offer me two hundred thousand thalers toward the realisation of my idea, I should be profoundly grateful to such a person; on the other hand, to ask of me the authorisation for a lottery seems to be simply a swindle which cannot be too firmly repulsed. . . . It seems also premature to me, valued friend, to issue a proclamation in regard to a society the aim of which is placed far beyond the goal which lies nearest and yet is so difficult to reach, namely, the first performance of my Festival Play. Every possible effort will be necessary to ensure the attainment of this goal; I shall accomplish it if I am patiently supported; my chief anxiety on this point is directed towards my dependence upon the King of Bavaria.
I am already recruiting for the Ninth Symphony, and expect definite news soon in regard to the instrumentalists.
If the laying of the corner-stone goes off according to my programme, I hope for much assistance from the impression it makes.
Cordial greetings for your colleagues, the just men. Hoping to see you soon in Bayreuth!
Yours most devotedly,
Richard Wagner.
Source: The Story of Bayreuth as Told in the Bayreuth Letters of Richard Wagner, trans. and ed. Caroline V. Kerr (Small, Maynard and Company, 1912), No. 18