WILLIAM    MORRIS

   allowed to think of what he is doing, and to vary his
   work as the circumstances of it vary, and his own moods.
   He must be forever stirring to make the piece at which he
   is at work better than the last. He must refuse at
   anybody's bidding to turn out,-I won't say a bad,-but
   even an indifferent piece of work, whatever the public
   wants, or thinks It wants. He must have a voice, and a
   voice worth listening to, in the whole affair."
                           The production of this skilled
   handicraftsman was, in Morris's belief, an ideal not
   beyond realization. His system was that of setting the
   nearest person to do whatever work needed to be done.
   He preferred general intelligence to innate manual
   dexterity. He inveighed against that excessive division
   of labor which cramps and sterilizes the modern artificer.
   He demanded a knowledge of drawing as the basis of all
   manual arts and as an essential element of a general
   education which should be worthy of the name. In a
   word, he sought to unite the artist and the workman in
   one person, and thus to prevent the making of designs
   which the designer can not produce with his own hands.
                           Although the artistic principles
   of Morris have been questioned, it is acknowledged that
   personally he made them successfuL In his own case, he
   did not divorce practice and theory; since to his immense
   production of designs,-which in textile fabrics alone
   numbered more than six hundred,--he added the experi-
   ence of a thorough craftsman. Furthermore, he did not
   allow his own interests and occupations, absorbing and
   exacting though they were, to blind him to the arger
   questions of the hour, in which he could be of service to
   his country, his century and the world; as is evidenced
by his action and prominence in the Society for the
   Preservation of Ancient Buildgs,and by the fearless
   enthusiasm with which he disseminated Socialistic
   propaganda. He laid down no empty formulas, and like
   his master Chaucer's "Poure Parson," first he wrought,