Quote

Not a having and a resting, but a growing and a becoming, is the character of perfection as culture conceives it.

Matthew Arnold

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Matthew Arnold
Age: 65 †
Born: 1822
Born: December 24
Died: 1888
Died: April 15
Journalist
Literary Critic
Poet
School Inspector
University Teacher
Writer
Laleham
Surrey
Conceives
Resting
Perfection
Personality
Becoming
Growing
Culture
Character

More quotes by Matthew Arnold

Image
Say, has some wet bird-haunted English lawn Lent it the music of its trees at dawn?
Matthew Arnold
Image
The governing idea of Hellenism is spontaneity of consciousness that of Hebraism, strictness of conscience .
Matthew Arnold
Image
Protestantism has the method of Jesus with His secret too much left out of mind Catholicism has His secret with His method too much left out of mind neither has His unerring balance, His intuition, His sweet reasonableness. But both have hold of a great truth, and get from it a great power.
Matthew Arnold
Image
Greatness is a spiritual condition.
Matthew Arnold
Image
With aching hands and bleeding feet We dig and heap, lay stone on stone We bear the burden and the heat Of the long day, and wish 'twere done. Not till the hours of light return All we have built do we discern.
Matthew Arnold
Image
Force and right are the governors of this world force till right is ready.
Matthew Arnold
Image
If Paris that brief flight allow, My humble tomb explore! It bears: Eternity, be thou My refuge! and no more.
Matthew Arnold
Image
Six years-six little years-six drops of time.
Matthew Arnold
Image
No, no! The energy of life may be Kept on after the grave, but not begun And he who flagg'd not in the earthly strife, From strength to strength advancing--only he His soul well-knit, and all his battles won, Mounts, and that hardly, to eternal life.
Matthew Arnold
Image
Creep into thy narrow bed, Creep, and let no more be said!
Matthew Arnold
Image
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.
Matthew Arnold
Image
For this is the true strength of guilty kings, When they corrupt the souls of those they rule.
Matthew Arnold
Image
But there remains the question: what righteousness really is. The method and secret and sweet reasonableness of Jesus.
Matthew Arnold
Image
Calm soul of all things! make it mine To feel, amid the city's jar, That there abides a peace of thine, Man did not make, and cannot mar! The will to neither strive nor cry, The power to feel what others give! Calm, calm me more! nor let me die Before I have begun to live.
Matthew Arnold
Image
The pursuit of perfection, then, is the pursuit of sweetness and light.... He who works for sweetness and light united, works to make reason and the will of God prevail.
Matthew Arnold
Image
The world hath failed to impart the joy our youth forebodes failed to fill up the void which in our breasts we bear.
Matthew Arnold
Image
The sea of faith Was once, too, at the full, and round earth's shore Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled. But now I only hear Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar, Retreating, to the breath Of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear And naked shingles of the world.
Matthew Arnold
Image
Now, the whole world hears Or shall hear,--surely shall hear, at the last, Though men delay, and doubt, and faint, and fail,-- That promise faithful:--Fear not, little flock! It is your Father's will and joy, to give To you, the Kingdom!
Matthew Arnold
Image
Grey time-worn marbles Hold the pure Muses. In their cool gallery, By yellow Tiber, They still look fair.
Matthew Arnold
Image
ForTime, not Corydon, hath conquered thee.
Matthew Arnold