Culture and Anarchy

Matthew Arnold gathered these essays in 1869 to argue that culture, which he called the pursuit of perfection and “the best which has been thought and said in the world,” could steady a nation drifting toward disorder. Writing amid the industrial and political turmoil of Victorian England, he feared his countrymen had mistaken wealth, machinery, and personal liberty for real progress. He sorts English society into Barbarians, Philistines, and Populace, and sets the conduct-driven spirit he calls Hebraism against the free play of mind he calls Hellenism. His plea for “sweetness and light” became one of the most quoted phrases in English criticism. Read it here as a free PDF and EPUB edition.