Page:Matthew Arnold, Coates, Century, April 1894.djvu/2

Rh MATTHEW ARNOLD.

T is told of one of our poets that, when in England, he was asked who took Matthew Arnold's place in America, and he answered, "Matthew Arnold." The reply would still be just, and, excepting as he fills it, the place of Matthew Arnold must long continue vacant. Men of genius are not replaced, and if, dying, they leave their work half done, the loss is irreparable. But Arnold's message was delivered, whether in verse or prose, with an amplitude and distinctness to which few messages may lay claim, and is "full of foretastes of the morrow."

Wordsworth expressed regret that the critics found so much fault with his poetry, because, as he remarked with Olympian simplicity, "They deprive the youth of my country of what would be a blessing to them." A similar feeling as to the ignorance and misapprehension which prevail regarding Matthew Arnold and his work induces me to write briefly as to the impression left by each upon my mind.

Readers of Mr. Arnold will recall the definiteness and meaning given by him to the use of the verb to know. To know the Greeks, in his sense, is not merely to have a knowledge of some set of facts concerning them; to be more or less accurately informed as to their appearance, dress, occupations, manners, tastes, language, etc.: it is to enter into the racial phenomena, the peculiar spirit, the elemental and developed genius, of that unique people.

Many say they knew Mr. Arnold whose conversation proves their knowledge to have consisted in having read, with ill choosing, some one or two of his poems, whence to conclude him not a poet; some one or two of his essays, whereby to discover him unsound; or in having met him once, twice perhaps, with the result of having misknown him utterly. It has been remarked that the comparative paucity of the reading public which really knows and appreciates his distinction is a phenomenon of contemporary literary taste.

There are melodies the full sweetness of which the ear immediately seizes. But who that is a