Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791), was a master German musical composer and pianist.  Only living till the age of thirty-five, Mozart has forever earned a place as one the most renowned geniuses in the history of music.  He composed symphonies, operas, concertos, sonatas, and choral and chamber pieces, together, totaling over six hundred works.  He composed for royalty all across Europe, as well as having met the famous composer, Franz Josef Haydn.

On July 3, 1778, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart wrote from Paris to a friend:

"Mourn with me!  This has been the most melancholy day of my life; I am now writing at two o'clock in the morning.  I must tell you that my mother, my darling mother, is no more.  God has called her to Himself; I clearly see that it was His will to take her from us, and I must learn to submit to the will of God.  The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away....  I am fully convinced that God has so ordained it.

"All I would ask of you at present is, to act the part of a true friend, by preparing father by degrees for this sad intelligence....  May God give him strength and courage!  My dear friend, I am consoled not only now, but I have been for some time past.

By the mercy of God, I have borne it with all firmness and composure.  When the danger became imminent, I prayed my heavenly Father for only two things - a happy death for my mother, and strength and courage for myself, and our gracious God heard my prayer, and conferred those two boons fully upon me." ¹

In a letter, Mozart wrote:

"It is a great consolation for me to remember that the Lord, to whom I had drawn near in humble and child-like faith, has suffered and died for me, and that He will look on me in love and compassion." ²

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart insisted:

"Neither a lofty degree of intelligence nor imagination nor both together go to the making of genius.  Love, love, love, that is the soul of genius." ³

¹ July 3, 1778, in a letter from Paris to a friend.  Lady Wallace, The Letters of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Vol. II, pp. 275-276.  Stephen Abbott Northrop, D.D., A Cloud of Witnesses (Portland, Oregon: American Heritage Ministries, 1987), p. 332-333.

² Lady Wallace, The Letters of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Vol. I, pp. 210-211.  Stephen Abbott Northrop, D.D., A Cloud of Witnesses (Portland, Oregon: American Heritage Ministries, 1987), p. 332-333.

³ Attributed.  John Bartlett, Bartlett's Familiar Quotations (Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1855, 1980), p. 402.