The meaning is not simply that the music is sad and elegant. The words place lovers, rivals, proud figures, servants, and tyrants of the heart inside a courtly game, while the music insists that every feeling keep its step. Around 2:50, the short command to "observe the measure" becomes the key: social cruelty is allowed here only when it wears form.

That makes the ending colder than a private farewell. From 4:46 through 6:10, adoration, hatred, cursed love, and goodbye keep circling as if they belong to the same ritual of manners. The Pavane means by making emotional violence behave beautifully. Its grace is not escape from pressure; it is the rule pressure must obey in public.