 Morris 's behaviour was often erratic . He was of a nervous disposition , and throughout his life relied on networks of male friends to aid him in dealing with this . Morris ' friends nicknamed him " Topsy " after a character in Uncle Tom 's Cabin . He had a wild temper , and when sufficiently enraged could suffer seizures and blackouts . Rossetti was known to taunt Morris with the intention of trying to enrage him for the amusement of himself and their other friends . Biographer Fiona MacCarthy suggests that Morris might have suffered from a form of Tourette 's syndrome as he exhibited some of the symptoms . In later life he suffered from gout , a common complaint among middle @-@ class males in the Victorian period . Morris 's ethos was that one should " have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful , or believe to be beautiful . " He also held to the view that " No work which cannot be done with pleasure in the doing is worth doing " , and adopted as his personal motto " If I can " from the fifteenth @-@ century Flemish painter Jan van Eyck . 
