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MATTHEW ARNOLD

NUMBERS; OR, THE MAJORITY AND THE REMNANT

[Lecture by Matthew Arnold, poet and critic (born in Laleham, England, December 24, 1822; died in Liverpool, April 15, 1888), delivered first in New York, Chickering Hall, October 30, 1883, opening his series of "Discourses in America" (the others being "Literature and Science" and "Emerson") given during his visit to the United States in the autumn and winter of 1883-84. The lecturer was introduced to his New York audience, a large and representative gathering, by Parke Godwin, who took occasion to pay a tribute to him as a critic, philosopher, and poet, and also to his father, Dr. Thomas Arnold, “the schoolmaster of Rugby, who enlarged his classroom till it comprised the whole English-speaking race." When Mr. Arnold made his first appearance in Boston, with this lecture, in Horticultural Hall, November 7th, he was introduced by Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, as follows: "Ladies and Gentlemen: The position in which I find myself this evening reminds me of a story told me by a schoolmate, a nephew of the late Washington Allston, in reference to Mr. Edmund Dana. He was of short stature, and was walking the streets of London with a gentleman much taller than himself, when the latter was run against by one of those persons styled roughs, but more fittingly ruffians. The gentleman who experienced the collision promptly handed his coat to the little man, and struck an attitude of resistance. The conference was not a long one, and the tall man having got the better of it, one of the English crowd, who always like fair play, shouted, 'Hurrah for the gentleman!' Another voice supplemented the cry with, And hurrah for the little man that held his coat.' [Laughter.] The friend who was to have played the part of the little man' of my story was Rev. Phillips Brooks, who is unfortunately prevented from coming this evening by indisposition. I have been asked to fill his place, which, in my point of view, is beyond my capacity. [Laughter.] Happily, little is required of one who is to introduce the distinguished speaker of this evening. Were it only that he is the son of Thomas Arnold his welcome would be as wide as the realm over which the English language is spoken. Were he of unknown parentage he would be welcomed as a poet,

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the writer of noble verse, lofty and inspiring; as a critic, incisive, plain-spoken, honest, going to the heart of his subjects, the terror of Dagon and the Philistines; as a man, worthy of the grand name he bears. I have the pleasure of introducing Mr. Matthew Arnold." [Applause.] The audience, which then greeted Mr. Arnold with warm applause, was described as characteristic of Boston-a grouping of men and women prominent in the leading professions and in society, whose presence insured the distinguished visitor a satisfying welcome and an intelligent reception of his ideas." The "Literature and Science," which was not new, having been originally given as the Rede Lecture at Cambridge, England, was read first in Brooklyn, in the Academy of Music, on November 19th, Dr. Richard S. Storrs introducing the lecturer. The "Emerson " was delivered first in Boston, in Chickering Hall, November 30th. These lectures were repeated in various parts of the country, Numbers" perhaps the most frequently. The term "the remnant," as Mr. Arnold subsequently wrote home to one of his friends, went the rounds of the United States, and, he added, "I now understand what Dizzy'* meant when he said that I performed a great achievement' by launching phrases.'"]

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LADIES AND GENTLEMEN:-There is a characteristic saying of Dr. Johnson: "Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel." The saying is cynical, many will even call it brutal; yet it has in it something of plain, robust sense and truth. We do often see men passing themselves off as patriots, who are in truth scoundrels; we meet with talk and proceedings laying claim to patriotism, which are these gentlemen's last refuge. We may all of us agree in praying to be delivered from patriots and patriotism of this sort. Short of such, there is undoubtedly, sheltering itself under the fine name of patriotism, a good deal of selfflattery and self-delusion which is mischievous. "Things are what they are, and the consequences of them will be what they will be; why, then, should we desire to be deceived?" In that uncompromising sentence of Bishop Butler's is surely the right and salutary maxim for both individuals and nations.

Yet there is an honorable patriotism which we should satisfy if we can, and should seek to have on our side. At home I have said so much of the characters of our society and the prospects of our civilization, that I can hardly escape the like topic elsewhere. Speaking in America, I cannot well avoid saying something about the prospects * Disraeli.

of society in the United States. It is a topic where one is apt to touch people's patriotic feelings. No one will accuse me of having flattered the patriotism of that great country of English people on the other side of the Atlantic, amongst whom I was born. Here, so many miles from home, I begin to reflect with tender contrition, that perhaps I have not-I will not say flattered the patriotism of my own countrymen enough, but regarded it enough. Perhaps that is one reason why I have produced so very little effect upon them. It was a fault of youth and inexperience. But it would be unpardonable to come in advanced life and repeat the same error here. You will not expect impossibilities of me. You will not expect me to say that things are not what, in my judgment, they are, and that the consequences of them will not be what they will be. I should make nothing of it; I should be a too palpable failure. But I confess that I should be glad if in what I say here I could engage American patriotism on my side, instead of rousing it against me. And it so happens that the paramount thoughts which your great country raises in my mind are really and truly of a kind to please, I think, any true American patriot, rather than to offend him.

The vast scale of things here, the extent of your country, your numbers, the rapidity of your increase, strike the imagination, and are a common topic for admiring remark. Our great orator, Mr. Bright, is never weary of telling us how many acres of land you have at your disposal, how many bushels of grain you produce, how many millions you are, how many more millions you will be presently, and what a capital thing this is for you. Now, though I do not always agree with Mr. Bright, I find myself agreeing with him here. I think your numbers afford a very real and important ground for satisfaction.

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Not that your great numbers, or indeed great numbers of men anywhere, are likely to be all good, or even to have the majority good. The majority are bad," said one of the wise men of Greece; but he was a pagan. Much to the same effect, however, is the famous sentence of the New Testament: "Many are called, few chosen." This appears a hard saying; frequent are the endeavors to elude

it, to attenuate its severity. But turn it how you will, manipulate it as you will, the few, as Cardinal Newman well says, can never mean the many.

Perhaps you will say that the majority is, sometimes, good; that its impulses are good generally, and its action is good occasionally. Yes, but it lacks principle, it lacks persistence; if to-day its good impulses prevail, they succumb to-morrow; sometimes it goes right, but it is very apt to go wrong. Even a popular orator, or a popular journalist, will hardly say that the multitude may be trusted to have its judgment generally just, and its actions generally virtuous. It may be better, it is better, that the body of the people, with all its faults, should act for itself, and control its own affairs, than that it should be set aside. as ignorant and incapable, and have its affairs managed for it by a so-called superior class, possessing property and intelligence. Property and intelligence cannot be trusted to show a sound majority themselves; the exercise of power by the people tends to educate the people. But still, the world being what it is, we must surely expect the aims and doings of the majority of men to be at present very faulty, and this in a numerous community no less than in a small one. So much we must certainly, I think, concede to the sages and to the saints.

Sages and saints are apt to be severe, it is true; apt to take a gloomy view of the society in which they live, and to prognosticate evil to it. But then it must be added that their prognostications are very apt to turn out right. Plato's account of the most gifted and brilliant community of the ancient world, of that Athens of his to which we all owe so much, is despondent enough. "There is but a very small remnant," he says, "of honest followers of wisdom, and they who are of these few, and who have tasted how sweet and blessed a possession is wisdom, and who can fully see, moreover, the madness of the multitude, and that there is no one, we may say, whose action in public matters is sound, and no ally for whosoever would help the just, what," asks Plato, 'are they to do? They may be compared," says Plato, "to a man who has fallen among wild beasts; he will not be one of them, but he is too unaided to make head against them; and before he can do

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any good to society or his friends, he will be overwhelmed and perish uselessly. When he considers this, he will resolve to keep still, and to mind his own business; as it were standing aside under a wall in a storm of dust and hurricane of driving wind; and he will endure to behold the rest filled with iniquity, if only he himself may live his life clear of injustice and of impiety, and depart, when his time comes, in mild and gracious mood, with fair hope.”

Plato's picture here of democratic Athens is certainly gloomy enough. We may be sure the mass of his contemporaries would have pronounced it to be monstrously overcharged. We ourselves, if we had been living then, should most of us have by no means seen things as Plato saw them. No, if we had seen Athens even nearer its end than when Plato wrote the strong words which I have been quoting, Athens in the very last days of Plato's life, we should most of us probably have considered that things were not going badly with Athens. There is a long sixteen years' administration-the administration of Eubulus -which fills the last years of Plato's life, and the middle years of the fourth century before Christ. A temperate German historian thus describes Athens during this ministry of Eubulus: "The grandeur and loftiness of Attic democracy had vanished, while all the pernicious germs contained in it were fully developed. A life of comfort and a craving for amusement were encouraged in every way, and the interest of the citizens was withdrawn from serious things. Conversation became more and more superficial and frivolous. Famous courtesans formed the chief topic of talk; the new inventions of Thearion, the leading pastry-cook in Athens, were hailed with loud applause; and the witty sayings which had been uttered in gay circles were repeated about town as matters of prime importance."

No doubt, if we had been living then to witness this, we should from time to time have shaken our heads gravely, and said how sad it all was. But most of us would not, I think, have been seriously disquieted by it. On the other hand, we should have found many things in the Athens of Eubulus to gratify us. "The democrats," says the same historian whom I have just quoted, "saw in Eubulus one

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