m of despair. In the first part of the stanza, Arnold characterizes the sea as divine. "Lay like the bright folds of a girdle", stimulates the reader's visual sense and causes a sense of peace. Arnold refers to the sea as the "Sea of Faith", to portray how the speaker respects and despises the sea at the same time. However, in the last five lines, Arnold returns the reader to the dismal view of the land struggling with the sea, with a man caught in between. The cycle of the speaker's thoughts is portrayed in the writing style. The poem bounces from contentment to despair, just as the speaker is feeling. These literary styles fully illustrate and complete the story's mood. Arnold utilizes this part of the poem to advance from the sea to the "Sea of Faith" with "girdled furls" to expose hopelessness to "the naked shingles of the world".In the last stanza, Arnold ties all of the thoughts of the speaker together, while incorporating imagery, to illustrate how by examining nature and history, the reader has reached the reality of the inevitable. Arnold portrays how the speaker bitterly sees "the world, which seems "to lie before us like a land of dreams" "hath really neither joy, nor love nor light". Arnold uses repetition here to illustrate the despair and hopelessness of the situation. The descriptive adjectives also stimulate visual sensations and images of the dismal sea destroying the land beneath it. Arnold leaves the reader with the harsh reality of the "ignorant armies clashing by night". This metaphor ties together how the speaker's battle is very similar to a soldier's battle. The speaker's battle; however, is futile to fight, because he knows he will never win.The fluctuating mood and usage of descriptive adjectives illustrates the setting and ties the poem together to create the mood. The image of the tides battling with the land when they meet, is merged with the consequent destiny of humanity to battle futile fig...
