 If , in the famous garden and cemetery scenes the dialogue of the two lovers , Juliet 's asides , and Romeo 's passionate outbursts are not sung , if the duets of love and despair are given to the orchestra , the reasons are numerous and easy to comprehend . First , and this alone would be sufficient , it is a symphony and not an opera . Second , since duets of this nature have been handled vocally a thousand times by the greatest masters , it was wise as well as unusual to attempt another means of expression . It is also because the very sublimity of this love made its depiction so dangerous for the musician that he had to give his imagination a latitude that the positive sense of the sung words would not have given him , resorting instead to instrumental language , which is richer , more varied , less precise , and by its very indefiniteness incomparably more powerful in such a case . 
