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Anti-Desperation

By Matthew Arnold

Topics: classic

Long fed on boundless hopes, O race of man,     How angrily thou spurnst all simpler fare!     Christ, some one says, was human as we are;     No judge eyes us from heaven, our sin to scan;     We live no more, when we have done our span.     Well, then, for Christ, thou answerest, who can care?     From sin, which heaven records not, why forbear     Live we like brutes our life without a plan!     So answerest thou; but why not rather say     Hath man no second life? Pitch this one high!     Sits there no judge in heaven, our sin to see?     More strictly, then, the inward judge obey!     Was Christ a man like us? Ah! let us try     If we then, too, can be such men as he!

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"Long fed on boundless hopes, O race of man,..."

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Author:Matthew Arnold

"Long fed on boundless hopes, O race of man,..." by Matthew Arnold

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Matthew Arnold

About Matthew Arnold

Matthew Arnold (1822–1888) was an English poet and critic whose poems "Dover Beach" and "The Scholar Gipsy" explore Victorian doubt and the search for meaning. His critical work "Culture and Anarchy" (1869) remains influential in literary and cultural studies.

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"Down the Savoy valleys sounding,     Echoing round..."

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