they exist in nature; they are dependent upon those fixed laws of
intellectual being, of spiritual affection, and moral choice, which
constitute the rationality of man. And the actual, positive merit
of a poetical production--that real merit, which consists in native
vitality, in inherent capacity to live--does not lie in the glitter
or costliness of the decorations with which it is invested--nor
in the force with which it is made to spring from the mind of its
creator into the minds of others--nor yet in the scale of magnitude
upon which the ideas belonging to the subject are illustrated in
the work; but rather, as we suppose, obviously, and in all cases,
upon the integrity and truth with which the particular form that has
been contemplated by the artist, is brought out, and the distinctness
with which that one specific impression which is appropriate to
it, is attained. This is the kind of excellence which we ascribe
to Mr. Morris; an excellence of a lofty order; genuine, sincere, and
incapable of question; more valuable in this class of composition
than in any other, because both more important and more difficult.
For the song appears to us to possess a definiteness peculiarly
jealous and exclusive; to be less flexible in character and to
permit less variety of tone than most other classes of composition.
If a man shall say, "I will put more force into my song than your
model allows, I will charge it with a greater variety of impressions,"
it is well; if he is skilful, he may make something that is very
valuable. But in so far as his work is more than a song, it is not
a song. In all works of Art--wherever form is concerned--excess
is error.

The just notion and office of the modern song, as we think of it,
is to be the embodiment and expression, in beauty, of some one
of those sentiments or thoughts, gay, moral, pensive, joyous, or