Beginning with Beethoven, however, composers began to exhibit great freedom in the application of Sonata-Form. - Walter Raymond Spalding

[T]he rhythm of music, akin to the human heart-beat and to the ceaseless change and motion, which is the basic fact in all life, apeals at once to our own physical vitality.

The best eulogy of Schumann is the recognition that many of the tendencies in modern music, which we now take for granted, date from him: the exaltation of freedom and fancy over the mere formal presentation, the union of broad culture with musical technique, and the recognition of music as the art closest in touch with the aspirations of humanity. He was an idealist with such perseverance and clearness of aim that his more characteristic work can never die.

The Development, beginning in measure 132, is a striking example of how difficult it was—even for an exponent of freedom in musical expression like Schumann—to break loose from the shackles of arbitrary form.