Arnold, Matthew, 1822-1888; Critics -- Great Britain -- Biography; Poets, English -- 19th century -- Biography
'Blest are the pure in
heart, for they shall see God.' There is purity." Charity was indeed the
law of Arnold's life. He loved with a passionate and persistent love. He
loved his wife with increasing devotion as years went on, when she had
become "my sweet Granny," and they both felt that "we are too old for
separations." He loved with equal fondness his mother (whom in his
brightness, fun, and elasticity he closely resembled), the sisters who
so keenly shared his intellectual tastes, his children living and
departed. "Dick[34] was a tower of strength." "Lucy[35] is such a
perfect companion." "Nelly[36] is the dearest girl in the world." "That
little darling[4] we have left behind us at Laleham; and he will soon
fade out of people's remembrance, but _we_ shall remember him as long as
we live, and he will be one more bond between us, even more perhaps in
his death than in his sweet little life." "It was exactly a year since
we had driven to Laleham with darling Tommy[38] and the other two boys
to see Basil's[37] grave; and now we went to see _his_ grave, poor
darling." "I cannot write Budge's[39] name without stopping to look at
it in stupefaction at his not being alive."
Outside the circle of his family, his affection was widely bestowed and
faithfully maintained. He had the true genius of friendship, and when
he signed himself "affectionately" it meant that he really loved.
Enmities he had none. If ever he had suffered injuries they were
forgiven, forgotten, and buried out of sight. Even in the controversies
where his strongest convictions were involved, he steadily abstained
from bitterness, violence, and detraction. "Fiery hatred and malice," he
said, with perfect truth, "are what I detest, and would always allay or
avoid if I could."
In the preface to his _Last Essays on the Church and Religion_, he takes
those two great lessons of the Christian Gospel--Charity and
Chastity--and goes on to show how they illustrate "the _natural truth_
of Christianity," as distinct from any considerations of Revelation or
Law. "Now, really," he says, writing in 1877, "if there is a lesson
which in our day has come to force itself upon everybody, in all
quarters and by all channels, it is the lesson of the _solidarity_, as
it is called by modern philosophers, of men. If there was ever a notion
tempting to common human nature, it was the notion that the rule of
'every man for himself' was the rule of happiness. But at last it turns
out as a matter of experience, and so plainly that it is coming to be
even generally admitted--it turns out that the only real happiness is in
a kind of impersonal higher life, where the happiness of others counts
with a man as essential to his own. He that loves his life does really
turn out to lose it, and the new commandment proves its own truth by
experience."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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