Matthew Arnold Part 1

Matthew Arnold.

by G. W. E. Russell.

PREFACE

It may be thought that some apology is needed for the production of yet another book about Matthew Arnold. If so, that apology is to be found in the fact that nothing has yet been written which covers exactly the ground a.s.signed to me in the present volume.

It was Arnold's express wish that he should not be made the subject of a Biography. This rendered it impossible to produce the sort of book by which an eminent man is usually commemorated--at once a history of his life, an estimate of his work, and an a.n.a.lysis of his character and opinions. But though a Biography was forbidden, Arnold's family felt sure that he would not have objected to the publication of a selection from his correspondence; and it became my happy task to collect, and in some sense to edit, the two volumes of his Letters which were published in 1895. Yet in reality my functions were little more than those of the collector and the annotator. Most of the Letters had been severely edited before they came into my hands, and the process was repeated when they were in proof.

A comparison of the letters addressed to Mr. John Morley and Mr. Wyndham Slade with those addressed to the older members of the Arnold family will suggest to a careful reader the nature and extent of the excisions to which the bulk of the correspondence was subjected. The result was a curious obscuration of some of Arnold's most characteristic traits--such, for example, as his over-flowing gaiety, and his love of what our fathers called Raillery. And, in even more important respects than these, an erroneous impression was created by the suppression of what was thought too personal for publication. Thus I remember to have read, in some one's criticism of the Letters, that Mr. Arnold appeared to have loved his parents, brothers, sisters, and children, but not to have cared so much for his wife. To any one who knew the beauty of that life-long honeymoon, the criticism is almost too absurd to write down.

And yet it not unfairly represents the impression created by a too liberal use of the effacing pencil.

But still, the Letters, with all their editorial shortcomings (of which I willingly take my full share) const.i.tute the nearest approach to a narrative of Arnold's life which can, consistently with his wishes, be given to the world; and the ground so covered will not be retraversed here. All that literary criticism can do for the honour of his prose and verse has been done already: conscientiously by Mr. Saintsbury, affectionately and sympathetically by Mr. Herbert Paul, and with varying competence and skill by a host of minor critics. But in preparing this book I have been careful not to re-read what more accomplished pens than mine have written; for I wished my judgment to be, as far as possible, unbia.s.sed by previous verdicts.

I do not aim at a criticism of the verbal medium through which a great Master uttered his heart and mind; but rather at a survey of the effect which he produced on the thought and action of his age.

To the late Professor Palgrave, to Monsieur Fontanes, and to Miss Rose Kingsley my thanks have been already paid for the use of some of Arnold's letters which are published now for the first time. It may be well to state that whenever, in the ensuing pages, pa.s.sages are put in inverted commas, they are quoted from Arnold, unless some other authors.h.i.+p is indicated. Here and there I have borrowed from previous writings of my own, grounding myself on the principle so well enounced by Mr. John Morley--"that a man may once say a thing as he would have it said, [Greek: dis de ouk endechetai]--he cannot say it twice."

G.W.E.R.

CHRISTMAS, 1903.

CONTENTS

PAGE

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION 1

CHAPTER II

METHOD 17

CHAPTER III

EDUCATION 48

CHAPTER IV

SOCIETY 111

CHAPTER V

CONDUCT 172

CHAPTER VI

THEOLOGY 210

LIST OF ILl.u.s.tRATIONS

Matthew Arnold, 1884 _Frontispiece_

FACING PAGE

Laleham Ferry 16

Thomas Arnold, D.D. 32

Laleham Church 48

Fox How, Ambleside 64

The House at Laleham, where Matthew Arnold first went to School 80

Rugby School 96

Balliol College, Oxford 112

Fisher's Buildings, Balliol College 128

Oriel College, Oxford 144

Matthew Arnold, 1869 160

Pains Hill Cottage, Cobham, Surrey 176

The Union Rooms, Oxford 192

Matthew Arnold, 1880, from the Painting by G.F. Watts, R.A. 208

Pains Hill Cottage, Cobham, from the Lawn 224

Matthew Arnold, 1884 240

Matthew Arnold's Grave at Laleham 256