St. Paul and Protestantism, with an Essay on Puritanism and the Church of England

Matthew Arnold, the Victorian era's most eloquent literary critic, turns his precision and wit on the foundations of Protestant faith in this 1870 work. He undertakes a careful archaeology of St. Paul's actual teachings, then examines how Puritanism has transformed them into rigid mechanical doctrine. The result is neither orthodox defense nor outright attack, but something more interesting: an attempt to rescue the spiritual core of Christianity from its theological custodians. Arnold finds Paul's living faith cramped into a system of election, assurance, and mechanical soteriology that would have bewildered the apostle. The companion essay extends this critique to the broader English religious landscape, examining how Puritanism and the Church of England have shaped (and limited) the nation's spiritual life. Arnold, writing from the heart of the Victorian crisis of faith, seeks a Christianity that can survive intellectual honesty without collapsing into mere culture or skepticism.