ARNOLD THE [POET]
[p.xvi]
Matthew Arnold was essentially a man of the intellect. No other author of modern times, perhaps no other English author of any time, appeals so directly as he to the educated classes. Even a cursory reading of his pages, prose or verse, reveals the scholar and the critic. He is always thinking, always brilliant, never lacks for a word or phrase; and on the whole, his judgments are good. Between his prose and verse, however, there is a marked difference, both in tone and spiritual quality. True, each possesses the note of a lofty, though stoical courage; reveals the same grace of finish and exactness of phrase and manner; and is, in equal degree, the output of a singularly sane and noble nature; but here the comparison ends; for, while his prose is often stormy and contentious, his poetry has always about it an atmosphere of entire repose. The cause of this difference is not far to seek. His poetry, written in early manhood, reflects his inner self, the more lovable side of his nature; while his prose presents the critic and the reformer, pointing out the good and bad, and permitting at times a spirit of bitterness to creep in, as he endeavors to arouse men out of their easy contentment with themselves and their surroundings.
With the exception of occasional verses, Arnold's poetical career began and ended inside of twenty years. The reason for this can only be conjectured, and need not be dwelt upon here. But although his poetic life[p.xvii] was brief, it was of a very high order, his poems ranking well up among the literary productions of the last century. As a popular poet, however, he will probably never class with Tennyson or Longfellow. His poems are too coldly classical and too unattractive in subject to appeal to the casual reader, who is, generally speaking, inclined toward poetry of the emotions rather than of the intellect—Arnold's usual kind. That he recognized this himself, witness the following quiet statements made in letters to his friends: "My poems are making their way, I think, though slowly, and are perhaps never to make way very far. There must always be some people, however, to whom the literalness and sincerity of them has a charm.... They represent, on the whole, the main movement of mind of the last quarter of a century, and thus they will probably have their day, as people become conscious to themselves of what that movement of mind is, and interested in the literary productions which reflect it." Time has verified the accuracy of this judgment. In short, Arnold has made a profound rather than a wide impression. To a few, however, of each generation, he will continue to be a "voice oracular,"—a poet with a purpose and a message.
Arnold's Poetic Culture.—Obviously, the sources of Arnold's culture were classical. As one critic has tersely said, "He turned over his Greek models by day and by night." Here he found his ideal standards, and here he brought for comparison all questions that engrossed his thoughts. Homer (he replied to an inquirer) and[p.xviii] Epictetus (of mood congenial with his own) were props of his mind, as were Sophocles, "who saw life steadily and saw it whole," and Marcus Aurelius, whom he called the purest of men. These like natures afforded him repose and consolation. Greek epic and dramatic poetry and Greek philosophy appealed profoundly to him. Of the Greek poets he wrote: "No other poets have lived so much by the imaginative reason; no other poets have made their works so well balanced; no other poets have so well satisfied the thinking power; have so well satisfied the religious sense." More than any other English poet he prized the qualities of measure, proportion, and restraint; and to him lucidity, austerity, and high seriousness, conspicuous elements of classic verse, were the substance of true poetry. In explaining his own position as to his art, he says: "In the sincere endeavor to learn and practise, amid the bewildering confusion of our times, what is sound and true in poetic art, I seem, to myself to find the only sure guidance, the only solid footing, among the ancients. They, at any rate, knew what they wanted in Art, and we do not. It is this uncertainty which is disheartening, and not hostile criticism." And again: "The radical difference between the poetic theory of the Greeks and our own is this: that with them, the poetical character of the action in itself, and the conduct of it, was the first consideration; with us, attention is fixed mainly on the value of separate thoughts and images which occur in the treatment of an action. They regard the whole; we regard the parts. We have poems which[p.xix] seem to exist merely for the sake of single lines and passages, and not for the sake of producing any total impression. We have critics who seem to direct their attention merely to detached expressions, to the language about the action, not the action itself. I verily believe that the majority of them do not believe that there is such a thing as a total impression to be derived from a poem at all, or to be demanded from a poet. They will permit the poet to select any action he pleases, and to suffer that action to go as it will, provided he gratifies them with occasional bursts of fine writing, and with a show of isolated thoughts and images; that is, they permit him to leave their poetic sense ungratified, provided that he gratifies their rhetorical sense and their curiosity."
Arnold has illustrated, with remarkable success, his ideas of that unity which gratifies the poetical sense, and has approached very close to his Greek models in numerous instances; most notably so in his great epic or narrative poem, Sohrab and Rustum, which is dealt with elsewhere in this introduction. Perhaps we could not do better than to quote for our consideration at this time, a fine synthesis of Mr. Arthur Galton. He says: "In Matthew Arnold's style and in his manner, he seems to me to recall the great masters, and this in a striking and in an abiding way.... To recall them at all is a rare gift, but to recall them naturally, and with no strained sense nor jarring note of imitation, is a gift so exceedingly rare that it is almost enough in itself to place a[p.xx] writer among the great masters; to proclaim that he is one of them. To recall them at all is a rare gift, though not a unique gift; a few other modern poets recall them too; but with these, with every one of them, it is the exception when they resemble the great masters. They have their own styles, which abide with them; it is only now and then, by a flash of genius, that they break through their own styles, and attain the one immortal style. Just the contrary of this is true of Matthew Arnold. It is his own, his usual, and his most natural style which recalls the great masters; and only when he does not write like himself, does he cease to resemble them.... No man who attains to this great style can fail to have a distinguished function; and Matthew Arnold, like Milton, will be 'a leaven and a power,' because he, too, has made the great style current in English. With his desire for culture and for perfection, there is no destiny he would prefer to this, for which his nature, his training, and his sympathies, all prepared him. To convey the message of those ancients whom he loved so well, in that English tongue which he was taught by them to use so perfectly;—to serve as an eternal protest against charlatanism and vulgarity;—is exactly the mission he would have chosen for himself.... The few writers of our language, therefore, who give us 'an ideal of excellence, the most high and the most rare,' have an important function; we should study their works continually, and it should be a matter of passionate concern with us, that the 'ideals,' that is, the definite and perfect[p.xxi] models, should abide with us forever." The Greeks recognized three kinds of poetry,—Lyric, Dramatic, and Epic. Arnold tried all three. First, then, as a lyricist.
Arnold as a Lyricist.—Lyric poetry is the artistic expression of the poet's individual sentiments and emotions, hence it is subjective. The action is usually vapid, the verse musical, the time quick. Unlike the Epic and Drama, it has no preferred verse or meter, but leaves the poet free to choose or invent appropriate forms. In this species of verse Arnold was not wholly at ease. As has been said, one searches in vain through the whole course of his poetry for a blithe, musical, gay or serious, offhand poem, the true lyric kind. The reason for this is soon discovered. Obviously, it lies in the fundamental qualities of the poet's mind and temperament. Though by no means lacking in emotional sensibility, Arnold was too intellectually self-conscious to be carried away by the impulsiveness common to the lyrical moods. With him the intellect was always master; the emotions, subordinate. With the lyricist, the order is, in the main, at least, reversed. The poet throws off intellectual restraint, and "lets his illumined being o'errun" with music and song. This Arnold could not or would not do. Then, too, Arnold's lyrics are often at fault metrically. This, combined with frequent questionable rhymes, argues a not too discriminating poetical ear. He also lacked genius in inventing verse forms, and hence found himself under the necessity of employing or adapting those already in use. In this respect he was notably inferior[p.xxii] to Tennyson, many of whose measures are wholly his own. Again, considerable portions of his lyric verse consist merely of prose, cut into lines of different length, in imitation of the unrhymed measures of the Greek poet, Pindar. The Bishop of Derry, commenting on these rhythmic novelties, likens them to the sound of a stick drawn by a city gamin sharply across the area railings,—a not inapt comparison. That they were not always successful, witness the following stanza from Merope:—
"Thou confessest the prize
In the rushing, blundering, mad,
Cloud-enveloped, obscure,
Unapplauded, unsung
Race of Calamity, mine!"
Surely this is but the baldest prose. At intervals, however, Arnold was nobly lyrical, and strangely, too, at times, in those same uneven measures in which are found his most signal failures—the unrhymed Pindaric. Philomela written in this style is one of the most exquisite bits of verse in the language. As one critic has put it, "It ought to be written in silver and bound in gold." In urbanity of phrase and in depth of genuine pathos it is unsurpassed and shows Arnold at his best. Rugby Chapel, The Youth of Nature, The Youth of Man, and A Dream are good examples of his longer efforts in this verse form. In the more common lyric measures, Arnold was, at times, equally successful. Saintsbury, commenting on Requiescat, says that the poet has "here achieved the triple union of simplicity, pathos, and (in the best[p.xxiii] sense) elegance"; and adds that there is not a false note in the poem. He also speaks enthusiastically of the "honey-dropping trochees" of the New Sirens, and of the "chiselled and classic perfection" of the lines of Resignation. Herbert W. Paul, writing of Mycerinus, declares that no such verse has been written in England since Wordsworth's Laodamia; and continues, "The poem abounds in single lines of haunting charm." Among his more successful longer lyrics are The Sick King in Bokhara, Switzerland, Faded Leaves, and Tristram and Iseult, and Epilogue to Lessing's LAOCOON, included in this volume.