Your Excellency!
The pressing opportunity afforded me by a friend of mine and a great admirer of yours (as I am also) [Anderson footnote: “Franz Oliva, who delivered this letter to Goethe on May 2nd.”], who is leaving Vienna very soon, allows me only a moment in which to thank you for the long time I have known you (for that I have done since my childhood) –– That is so little for so much –– Bettine Brentano Has assured me that you would receive me kindly, or, I should say, as a friend. But how could I think of such a welcome, seeing that I can approach you only with the greatest reverence and with an inexpressibly profound feeling of admiration for your glorious creations! –– You will shortly receive from Leipzig through Breitkopf & Härtel my music for Egmont, that glorious Egmont on which I have again reflected through you, in which I have felt and reproduced in music [Opus 84] as intensely as I felt when I read it –– I should very much like to have your opinion on my music for Egmont. Even your censure Will be useful to me and my art and will be welcomed as gladly as the greatest praise.
Your Excellency’s profound admirer
Ludwig van Beethoven