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Sanity -- that is the great virtue of the ancient literature the want of that is the great defect of the modern, in spite of its variety and power.

Matthew Arnold

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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
Great
Sanity
Spite
Variety
Ancient
Virtue
Modern
Literature
Defect
Power
Defects

More quotes by Matthew Arnold

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God's Wisdom and God's Goodness!--Ah, but fools Mis-define thee, till God knows them no more. Wisdom and goodness they are God!--what schools Have yet so much as heard this simpler lore. This no Saint preaches, and this no Church rules: 'Tis in the desert, now and heretofore.
Matthew Arnold
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There is no better motto which it [culture] can have than these words of Bishop Wilson, To make reason and the will of God prevail.
Matthew Arnold
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We, peopling the void air, Make Gods to whom to impute The ills we ought to bear With God and Fate to rail at, suffering easily.
Matthew Arnold
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For science, God is simply the stream of tendency by which all things seek to fulfill the law of their being.
Matthew Arnold
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Have something to say, and say it as clearly as you can. That is the only secret.
Matthew Arnold
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To hear the world applaud the hollow ghost Which blamed the living man.
Matthew Arnold
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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
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Not deep the poet sees, but wide.
Matthew Arnold
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Nature, with equal mind, Sees all her sons at play, Sees man control the wind, The wind sweep man away.
Matthew Arnold
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The heart less bounding at emotion new, The hope, once crushed, less quick to spring again.
Matthew Arnold
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To have the sense of creative activity is the great happiness and the great proof of being alive.
Matthew Arnold
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If Paris that brief flight allow, My humble tomb explore! It bears: Eternity, be thou My refuge! and no more.
Matthew Arnold
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Below the surface stream, shallow and light, Of what we say and feel below the stream, As light, of what we think we feel, there flows With noiseless current, strong, obscure and deep, The central stream of what we feel indeed.
Matthew Arnold
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The pursuit of perfection, then, is the pursuit of sweetness and light.
Matthew Arnold
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But thou, my son, study to make prevail One colour in thy life, the hue of truth.
Matthew Arnold
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Years hence, perhaps, may dawn an age, More fortunate, alas! than we, Which without hardness will be sage, And gay without frivolity.
Matthew Arnold
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How many minds--almost all the great ones--were formed in secrecy and solitude!
Matthew Arnold
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Others abide our question. Thou art free. We ask and ask. Thou smilest and art still, Out-topping knowledge.
Matthew Arnold
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Six years-six little years-six drops of time.
Matthew Arnold
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Ah! two desires toss about The poet's feverish blood One drives him to the world without, And one to solitude.
Matthew Arnold