ABSTRACT
To a place among the first class of English poets the writer of The Borough has no claim. It may even be doubted by some whether he has a right, in the second class, to a place beside the lighter, more graceful, and more elegant melodies of Campbell, Scott, and Moore, whose friendship he lived to enjoy. But though his verse may lack refinement and smoothness, though it fail in point of humour, and be deficient in stirring those deeper emotions and profounder mysteries of man's being, which Byron, Wordsworth, and Tennyson have plumbed to their inmost depths; yet, keenness and truth of observation, wondrous power of imagination, intense honesty of purpose, firm love of truth, hatred of all shams, and a power of reproducing the aspect of common things; the hard, exact features of the daily life which went on about him,- were his to a degree rarely excelled. These he put to the readiest and best use that he knew and understood, and on them must rest his claims as a poet. It may only be a picture of outer, common, life; but it is a true picture, and as such, is worthy of life, and must live. It may be painted only in the boldest, plainest, commoneSt words; but it is the work of a true artist, and has a clear right to a place in the gallery of genius.
