Matthew Arnold
Matthew Arnold
Matthew Arnoldwas an English poet and cultural critic who worked as an inspector of schools. He was the son of Thomas Arnold, the famed headmaster of Rugby School, and brother to both Tom Arnold, literary professor, and William Delafield Arnold, novelist and colonial administrator. Matthew Arnold has been characterised as a sage writer, a type of writer who chastises and instructs the reader on contemporary social issues...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth24 December 1822
suffering intellectual thrones
And amongst us one, Who most has suffer'd, takes dejectedly His seat upon the intellectual throne.
winning wind soul
Hither and thither spins The wind-borne mirroring soul, A thousand glimpses wins, And never sees a whole.
weed wind light
Sand-strewn caverns, cool and deep, Where the winds are all asleep; Where the spent lights quiver and gleam; Where the salt weed sways in the stream.
autumn boys play
Coldly, sadly descends The autumn evening. The Field Strewn with its dank yellow drifts Of wither'd leaves, and the elms, Fade into dimness apace, Silent; hardly a shout From a few boys late at their play!
disappointment new-beginnings years
Thou waitest for the spark from heaven! and we, Light half-believers of our casual creeds, Who never deeply felt, nor clearly will'd, Whose insight never has borne fruit in deeds, Whose vague resolves never have been fulfill'd; For whom each year we see Breeds new beginnings, disappointments new; Who hesitate and falter life away, And lose to-morrow the ground won to-day Ah! do not we, wanderer! await it too?
self political ordinary
Everything in our political life tends to hide from us that there is anything wiser than our ordinary selves.
eye whales sailing
Where great whales come sailing by, Sail and sail, with unshut eye, Round the world for ever and aye.
found best-poetry sustaining
The best poetry will be found to have a power of forming, sustaining, and delighting us, as nothing else can.
ideas consciousness spontaneity
The governing idea of Hellenism is spontaneity of consciousness ; that of Hebraism, strictness of conscience .
righteousness eternal
The eternal not ourselves that makes for righteousness.
two interesting want
What really dissatisfies in American civilisation is the want of the interesting, a want due chiefly to the want of those two great elements of the interesting, which are elevation and beauty.
voice giving people
Consider these people, then, their way of life, their habits, their manners, the very tones of their voice; look at them attentively; observe the literature they read, the things which give them pleasure, the words which come forth out of their mouths, the thoughts which make the furniture of their minds; would any amount of wealth be worth having with the condition that one was to become just like these people by having it?
perfection mind inward
Culture, then, is a study of perfection, and perfection which insists on becoming something rather than in having something, in an inward condition of the mind and spirit, not in an outward set of circumstances.
nature sky light
Is it so small a thing to have enjoyed the sun, to have lived light in the sky, to have loved, to have thought, to have done?