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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.

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
Interesting
American
Two
Elevation
Great
Chiefly
Really
Civilisation
Dues
Elements
Beauty

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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We cannot kindle when we will The fire which in the heart resides, The spirit bloweth and is still, In mystery our soul abides: But tasks in hours of insight will'd Can be through hours of gloom fulfill'd.
Matthew Arnold
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English civilization the humanizing, the bringing into one harmonious and truly humane life, of the whole body of English society that is what interests me.
Matthew Arnold
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Children of men! the unseen Power, whose eye Forever doth accompany mankind, Hath look'd on no religion scornfully That men did ever find.
Matthew Arnold
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The freethinking of one age is the common sense of the next.
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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In our English popular religion the common conception of a future state of bliss is that of ... a kind of perfected middle-class home, with labour ended, the table spread, goodness all around, the lost ones restored, hymnody incessant.
Matthew Arnold
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On Sundays, at the matin-chime, The Alpine peasants, two and three, Climb up here to pray Burghers and dames, at summer's prime, Ride out to church from Chamberry, Dight with mantles gay, But else it is a lonely time Round the Church of Brou.
Matthew Arnold
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Weary of myself, and sick of asking What I am, and what I ought to be, At this vessel's prow I stand, which bears me Forwards, forwards, o'er the starlit sea.
Matthew Arnold
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Calm's not life's crown, though calm is well.
Matthew Arnold
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Six years-six little years-six drops of time.
Matthew Arnold
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Alas! is even love too weak To unlock the heart, and let it speak?
Matthew Arnold
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Culture is both an intellectual phenomenon and a moral one
Matthew Arnold
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I am bound by my own definition of criticism : a disinterested endeavour to learn and propagate the best that is known and thought in the world.
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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For poetry the idea is everything the rest is a world of illusion, of divine illusion. Poetry attaches its emotion to the idea the idea is the fact. The strongest part of our religion today is its unconscious poetry.
Matthew Arnold
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Come, dear children, let us away Down and away below!
Matthew Arnold
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Religion is ethics heightened, enkindled, lit up by feeling
Matthew Arnold
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The eternal not ourselves that makes for righteousness.
Matthew Arnold
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Thou waitest for the spark from heaven! and we, Light half-believers in our casual deeds . . . Who hesitate and falter life away, And lose tomorrow the ground won today- Ah, do not we, Wanderer, await it too?
Matthew Arnold