Matthew Arnold on Sophocles

“Be his My special thanks, whose even-balanced soul From first youth tested up to extreme old age Business could not make dull, nor passion wild; Who saw life steadily, and saw it whole; The mellow glory of the Attic stage, Singer of sweet Colonus, and its child.”

“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 Ægæan, 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.”