“What actions are the most excellent? Those, certainly, which most powerfully appeal to the great primary human affections: to those elementary feelings which subsist permanently in the race, and which are independent of time.”

— Matthew Arnold

"Preface to Poems" (1853)
Context: What actions are the most excellent? Those, certainly, which most powerfully appeal to the great primary human affections: to those elementary feelings which subsist permanently in the race, and which are independent of time. These feelings are permanent and the same; that which interests them is permanent and the same also.

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Matthew Arnold 166

English poet and cultural critic who worked as an inspector… 1822–1888

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