Essay on Dover Beach

Essay on "Dover Beach," by Matthew Arnold

I have struggled with the concept of a benevolent "God" or "higher power" all my life. Although that concept is now a part of my personal philosophy and is at the heart of how I define myself as a human being, the years that it took to arrive at that state were every bit as rocky as the shore of Matthew Arnold’s "Dover Beach."

The author uses the audio and visual imagery of pebbles on a beach to describe a philosophical journey. He hears the "eternal note of sadness" (671, line 14) in the sounds of the waves of Dover beach, and concludes that there is no God, no peace, and no end to pain. This humanist view may be his paradigm at the dawn of the industrial age, when God was slowly being replaced by science. It may also be the result of feeling cheated by a religious system that promises truth and delivers hypocrisy, as has been my experience.

Regardless of the cause, he is clearly disenchanted with a faith that once rang true to him...