f the completed picture which
they make. They do not, like the Carlyle-Emerson correspondence, show a
hand that could not set pen to paper without writing picturesquely, but
they do reveal a character of great soundness and sweetness, and one in
which the affections play a surprisingly important part, the love of
flowers and books, of family and friends, and of his fellow men. His
life was human, kindly and unselfish, and he allowed no clash between
the pursuit of personal perfection and devotion to the public cause,
even when the latter demanded sacrifice of the most cherished projects
and adherence to the most irritating drudgery.

II

[Sidenote: Arnold's Place among Nineteenth-Century Teachers]

By those who go to literature primarily for a practical wisdom presented
in terms applicable to modern life, the work of Arnold will be reckoned
highly important, if not indispensable. He will be placed by them among
the great humanizers of the last century, and by comparison with his
contemporaries will be seen to have furnished a complementary
contribution of the highest value. Of the other great teachers whose
work may most fitly be compared with his, two were preeminently men of
feeling. Carlyle was governed by an overmastering moral fervor which
gave great weight to his utterances, but which exercised itself in a
narrow field and which often distorted and misinterpreted the facts.
Ruskin was governed by his affections, and though an ardent lover of
truth and beauty, was often the victim of caprice and extravagance.
Emerson and Arnold, on the other hand, were governed primarily by the
intellect, but with quite different results. Emerson presents life in
its ideality; he comparatively neglects life in its phenomenal aspect,
that is, as it appears to the ordinary man. Arnold, while not without
emotional equipment, and inspired by idealism of a high order,
introduces a yet larger element of practical season. _Tendens manus ripae
ulterioris amore_, he is yet first of all a man of this world. His chief
instrument is common sense, and he looks at questions from the point of
view of the highly intelligent and cultivated man. His dislike of
metaphysics was as deep as Ruskin's, and he was impatient of
abstractions of any sort. With as great a desire to further the true
progress of his time as Carlyle or Ruskin, he joined a greater calmness
and disinterestedness. "To be less and less personal in one's desires
and workings" he