Text: Edgar Allan Poe (ed. John H. Ingram), “George P. Morris,” The Works of Edgar Allan Poe — Vol. IV: Autography & Criticisms (1875), 4:280-282

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THERE are few cases in which mere popularity should be considered a proper test of merit; but the case of song-writing is, I think, one of the few. When I speak of song-writing we mean, of course, the composition of brief poems with an eye to their adaptation for music in the vulgar sense. In this ultimate destination of the song proper, lies its essence — its genius. It is the strict reference to music — it is the dependence upon modulated expression — which gives to this branch of letters a character altogether unique, and separates it, in great measure and in a manner not sufficiently considered, from ordinary literature; rendering it independent of merely ordinary proprieties; allowing it, and in fact demanding for it, a wide latitude of Law; absolutely insisting upon a certain wild license and indefinitiveness — an indefinitiveness recognised by every musician who is not a mere fiddler, as an important point in the philosophy of his science — as the soul, indeed, of the sensations derivable from its practice — sensations which bewilder while they enthral — and which, perhaps, would not so enthral if they did not so bewilder.

That indefinitiveness which is, at least, one of the essentials of true music, must, of course, be kept in view by the song-writer; while, by the critic, it should always be considered in his estimate of the song. It is, in the author, a consciousness — sometimes, merely an instinctive appreciation, of this necessity for the indefinite, which imparts to all songs, richly conceived, that free, affluent, and hearty manner, little scrupulous about niceties of phrase, which cannot be better expressed than by the hackneyed French word abandonnement, and which is so strikingly exemplified in both the serious and joyous ballads and carols of our old English progenitors. Wherever verse has been found most strictly married to music, this feature prevails. It is thus the essence of all antique song. It is the soul of Homer. It is [page 281:] the spirit of Anacreon. It is even the genius of Æschylus. Coming down to our own times, it is the vital principle in De Béranger. Wanting this quality, no song-writer was ever truly popular, and, for the reasons assigned, no song-writer need ever expect to be so.

These views properly understood, it will be seen how baseless are the ordinary objections to songs proper, on the score of “conceit,” (to use Johnson's word), or of hyperbole, or on various other grounds tenable enough in respect to poetry not designed for music. The “conceit,” for example, which some envious rivals of Morris have so much objected to —

this “conceit” is merely in keeping with the essential spirit of the song proper. To all reasonable persons it will be sufficient to say that the fervid, hearty, free-spoken songs of Cowley and of Donne — more especially of Cunningham, of Harrington and of Carew — abound in precisely similar things; and that they are to be met with, plentifully, in the polished pages of Moore and of Béranger, who introduce them with thought and retain them after mature deliberation.

Morris is very decidedly our best writer of songs — and, in saying this, I mean to assign him a high rank as poet. For my own part, I would much rather have written the best song of a nation than its noblest epic. One or two of Hoffman's songs have merit — but they are sad echoes of Moore, and even if this were not so (everybody knows that it is so) they are totally deficient in the real song-essence. “Woodman, Spare that Tree,” and “By the Lake where droops the Willow” are compositions of which any poet, living or dead, might justly be proud. By these, if by nothing else, Morris is immortal. It is quite impossible to put down such things by sneers. The affectation of contemning them is of no avail — unless to render manifest the envy of those who affect the contempt. As mere poems, there are several of Morris's compositions equal, if not superior, to either of those just mentioned, but as songs I [page 282:] much doubt whether these latter have ever been surpassed. In quiet grace and unaffected tenderness, I know no American poem which excels the following: