Ring Out, Wild Bells

This beautiful poem lyric forms the part of In Memoriam. It is the third Christmas after the death of the poet's friend Arthur Hallam. The poet veers away from his past grief which saps the mind, and looks to the sunny future and the radiant and roust hopes for mankind.
In Christian countries it is customary on the night of December 31, Church bells to set ringing till the midnight, when they stop for sometime to indicate the departure of the old year and the arrival of the new one. The poet wishes that just as the old year passes by and rejoicings take place as the new year ushers in, so should all the weak, degrading and discordant, be, pressed out of the lives of nations, to be replaced by all that is strong, ennobling and peace-giving.
The brief lyric is a momentous social document and focuses on many contemporary social ills which the poet wishes to be rung out with the old year. The 19th Century saw Britain progress greatly in its science and industrial sectors. Materialism was at its peak and so was the divide between the rich and the poor.