by: Matthew Arnold
The sea is calm to-night.
The tide is full, the moon lies fair
Upon the straits; on the French coast the light
Gleams and is gone; the cliffs of England stand;
Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.
Come to the window, sweet is the night-air!
Only, from the long line of spray
Where the sea meets the moon-blanched land,
Listen! you hear the grating roar
Of pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling,
At their return, up the high strand,
Begin, and cease, and then again begin,
With tremulous cadence slow, and bring
The eternal note of sadness in.
Sophocles long ago
Heard it on the A gaean, and it brought
Into his mind the turbid ebb and flow
Of human misery; we
Find also in the sound a thought,
Hearing it by this distant northern sea.
The Sea of Faith
Was once, too, at the full, and round earth's shore
Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled.
But now I only hear
Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,
Retreating, to the breath
Of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear
And naked shingles of the world.
Ah, love, let us be true
To one another! for the world, which seems
To lie before us like a land of dreams,
So various, so beautiful, so new,
Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
And we are here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night.
4 comments:
this poem talks abuot the changes that about to happen in England.at first,ENGLAND saw itself a super nation,the greatest one so it refused the change that come from France.Then it accepts that change.ALSO the poet introduces the importance of faith .It directs us when we are lost in the world of science.this poem indicates that life is short and everything inside it can decieve us.
I agree with you Tahreer. England has been changed because people there were far from divine and they were affected by the fake light of chang.
Arnold’s central message is the Challenges to the validity of long-standing theological and moral precepts have shaken the faith of people in God and religion. Arnold’s sees that the pillar of faith supporting society was perceived as crumbling under the weight of scientific postulates. Consequently, the existence of God and the whole Christian scheme of things was cast in doubt. Arnold, who was deeply religious, lamented the dying of the light of faith, as symbolized by the light he sees in “Dover Beach” on the coast of France, which gleams one moment and is gone the next. He remained a believer in God and religion, although he was open to and advocated an overhaul of traditional religious thinking. In God and the Bible
arnold here inserts alot of images in this poem which we cant understand the poem without understanding them. all these images are around the main theme challenges of the Challenges to the validity of long-standing theological and moral precepts have shaken the faith of people in God and religion. he is sad of people wo are materialistic and not religious " Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
And we are here as on a darkling plain" we are in dark without faith
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