And made life lurid when it should be drab;
In short I branded as a brilliant dauber
The man who gave us Pecksniff and Micawber.
True, there are blots—like spots upon the sun—
And genius, lavish of imagination,
In sheer profusion always has outrun
The bounds of strict artistic concentration;
But when detraction’s worst is said and done,
How much remains for fervent admiration,
How much that never palls or wounds or sickens