The San Francisco call., 1896-11-29
Self-Dependcnce.
MkfrHEw ARNOLD.


And look OF passionate desire
e Oerthe and to the stars send:
: I" Yeowho from my childhood uphave Gained me-
Calm me, ah, compose me to the END"
"Ah, once more" cried, .'ye stars, ye waters
.. ON my heart your mighty charm renew;
still, still let me, as gaze upon you,
: Feel my soul becoming vast like you"
From the intense, clear, star sown vault Of
heaven,
Over the lit seas unquiet way,
In the rustling night air, came the answer;
" Would'st thou be as these are? Live as tneyF
"Unanrighted by the silence round them
oUndistfacted by the sights they see,
These demand not thai the things without them
Yield them love- amusement sympathy.
"And with Joy the stars perform their shiping
And the sea its loug moon silvered rolt
For alone they live, nor pine with noting
All the fever OF some differing soul
.cBounded by themselves ard unobservant,
e. In what state Gods other works may be,
In their own tasks al heir powers pouring
These attain the mighty life you see."
Oh, air-born Voice! long since, severely clear
cry like thine in my own heart hear,
"Resolve to be thyself: and know that he
VINO finds himself loses his misery"
Probably Matthew Arnold's recently pub
lished lie tterswill interest the reader in exact
proportion to:his previous understanding and
appreciation of Arnold S life and work. 1t is
doubtful whether we OF to-day realize how
much of what is taken as matter OF course in
our modern way of thinking is due to The in
fluence OF Matthew Arnold in the pastor
whether we are aware that many of the words
and phrases which are now used so gliply,
such as s'barbarlans," "Philstinism" and
others, were first applied in their present
;. sense by him. part of his power and influ-
ence day; in those "epoch-making phrases"
which were so trenehaut, which so keenly
characterized a class tendency that they
20 quickly became common prop erty. John Fiske
aadmost yof.the later ethical writers speak of
- ne. power. (which makes for righteousness,
but Arnold was thefather of the term. He itwas
who:wrote of that ''stream of tendency, not.
ourselves. which makes for righteousness. "
g. He:it was who spoke of the function of criti-
:: cisIn as an endeayor ''to see she object in.
itself. it really Is" 1t was he who said that.
,.'.reiigion is morality touched with emotion"
It was he who characterized the pagan and.
q. Christian ideals as the reign on the one hand
OF the:"senses endthe understanding" and on
the other OF the "heart and the imagination"
1t seems to have been his great desire to
c. unite these two by the aid of the imaginative
oGca sion" to follow in the footsteps of his
sublime Goethe; who "neither made man too
!. much q God. ,.nor God too much man.
depth and, sweetness of mind, as we'll as toll
: eTsnce and an understanding of all the past.
He:feTtth obligation OF preaching the gospel
of:"sweetness and light'' to his generation.
:. He. desired TO: ihumine, with the aid of his
tory and. philosophy, their Bible and their
.Egion, This effort OF his has been sovariously
regarded that by some he was considered little
Short: of agnostic and by others he was re-
o :cefved ass great teacher.
He is remarkably sparing in the use of
Irony, considering the temptation his ability
. in that: direction must have been to him. He
" real ized fully the greater power of persuasion.
In his designation OF the aristocracy as ''bar-
=. ba riaus" he does not use the word in con-
tempiuous sense. He speaks OF their culture
being mostly exterior cufture-a care for. the
body, for: outward gifts and graces and ae-
accomplishments, and he says: "Does not
.osubtle criticism lead US to make, even on the
good looks and politeness Of our aristocracy,
land OF even the most fascinating half OF that
class-the feminine half-the one qualifying
E. remark that in these charming gifts there
:: SHOULD perhaps be, for ideal perfection, a
shade more SQUIRE
It is impossible to mora than suggest these
=; few points of Mathew Arnods philosophy be-
fore coming TO the consideration of his letters.
-: 1t was his express wish that no biography OF
him should be written 1t is now eight years
since his death and these are the. first of his
mother and wife and sisters, and record the
.labors and the achievements OF well Iegu-
lated life. We find nothing tempesIuous here.
as in the letters of poor Carlyle. There is no
laying bare of the heart, no revealing of the
tragedy underlying the commonplace of life.
Happy is that country which hath no his
tory" Mathew Arnolds domes tic life seems
to have been singularly serene and unevent-
full. fit had not been we feel pretty certain
he would have put no record of it on paper.
He was born in 1922. He showed marked
ability at school, was to be expected from
the son of hfs fGther, the great Thomas Arnold
of Rugby. AT Oxford he took honors and won
.the Newdigate prize for poem on Cromwell.
. After leaving college he was appointed pri-
p ayate secretaryoto Lord Lansoown. HIS letters
at this time TO his mother and sisters show his
extremely radical views. In one to his mother,
written in 1S48, he says: "The hour OF the
hereditary peefage and eldest sonship and
immense properties has, am convinced, as
Lamartineowould say, struck"
His views became somewhat modified with
: increasing years. but his attitude was always
fearless and uncomp promising. In 1851 he
was appointed Inspector OF Schools, and this
enabled him to marry. These earlier letters
show US good deal of his mind but very little
of his heart The first letter to Miss Wight
oinan, who soon after became Mrs..Arnod, is a
most extraordinary epistle, regarded in the
:
brief and curt record of his doings, and the
reader sincerely hopes that some affecuonate
passages MAY have been eliminated before
. publication. We understand now, as never
before, Arnold's condemnation of poor;Keats'
E loye letters.those ardent, passionate, pitiful
;. letters from the dying poet 10 h is sweetheart
which seem hardly 10 merit so severe a iudg-
ment We suspect that in his you ger years
Matthew Arnold was one of those men who
fear that to be demonstrative is to be uudigni-
:, fed. His Letters express little emotion, even
though written under what must have been
great stress ofefeeling, the death OF his
. two sons THE elder, most lovable boy, who
had all his life been great sufferer, died at
the age of 16, after lingering illness. The
/. morning after. his death the friend who COM
piled these letters tells us that he found
Matthew Arnold consoling himself by reading
Marcus Aurelius Fouryears laterethe younger
son died verya suddenly, in his eighteenth
year. This secondo bereavement was a terri
8 BILE grief to both parents, yet Arnold writes of
.A.o-s s,,e n1xva