Arnold, Matthew

Matthew (1822-1888), an English man of letters. He was a son of Dr. Thomas Arnold, the famous head master of Rugby. He was educated at Oxford. He taught for a time in his father's school and held various government positions. In 1851 he was appointed an inspector of schools, a position which he held until 1883, when he retired on a pension of $1,250. During his inspectorship he visited the schools of France and Germany. He delivered lectures at Oxford University, and in 1886 he visited the United States, where he delivered a series of critical lectures in the principal cities. Of his poems, Sohrab and Rustum is best known. Arnold is at his best as a writer of critical essays. In these he attacked British "Philistinism." His most noted volumes are Culture and Anarchy, Literature and Dogma, Essays in Criticism, Mixed Essays, and Discourses in America. The following quotation defines Arnold's attitude:

The people who believe most that our greatness and welfare are provided by our being very rich, and who most give their lives and thoughts to becoming rich, are just the very people whom we call Philistines. Culture says: "Consider these people, then, their way of life, their habits, their manners, the very tones of their voice; look at them attentively; observe the literature they read, the things which give them pleasure, the words which come forth out of their mouths, the thoughts which make the furniture of their minds; would any amount of wealth be worth having with the condition that one was to become just like these people by having it?" And thus culture begets a dissatisfaction which is of the highest possible value in stemming the common tide of men's thoughts in a wealthy and industrial community, and which saves the future, as one may hope, from being vulgarized, even if it cannot save the present.