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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/35299-8.txt b/35299-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b25c505 --- /dev/null +++ b/35299-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,5268 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Real Robert Burns, by J. L. Hughes + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Real Robert Burns + +Author: J. L. Hughes + +Release Date: February 17, 2011 [EBook #35299] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE REAL ROBERT BURNS *** + + + + +Produced by The Online Distributed Proofreading Team at +https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images +generously made available by The Internet Archive.) + + + + + + + + + +THE REAL ROBERT BURNS + + + + + THE REAL ROBERT BURNS + + + BY J. L. HUGHES, LL.D. + Author of 'Dickens as an Educator,' &c. + + + LONDON: 38 Soho Square, W.1 + W. & R. CHAMBERS, LIMITED + + EDINBURGH: 339 High Street + THE RYERSON PRESS + + TORONTO: Corner Queen and John Streets + + + + + Printed in Great Britain. + W. & R. CHAMBERS, LTD., LONDON and EDINBURGH. + + + + +CONTENTS. + + + CHAPTER PAGE + + FOREWORD 7 + + I. THE TRUE VALUES OF BIOGRAPHY 9 + + II. THE EDUCATIONAL ADVANTAGES OF BURNS 17 + + III. THE CHARACTERISTICS OF BURNS 35 + + IV. BURNS WAS A RELIGIOUS MAN 63 + + V. BURNS THE DEMOCRAT 99 + + VI. BURNS AND BROTHERHOOD 126 + + VII. BURNS A REVEALER OF PURE LOVE 135 + + VIII. BURNS A PHILOSOPHER 167 + + IX. THE DEVELOPMENT OF BURNS 197 + + + + +FOREWORD. + + +The writer of the following pages learned years ago to reverence the +memories of Burns and Dickens. Frequently hearing one or the other +attacked from platform or pulpit, and believing both to be great +interpreters of the highest things taught by Christ, as the basis of the +development of humanity towards the Divine, he resolved that some day he +would try to help the world to understand correctly the work of these two +great men. His book, _Dickens as an Educator_, has helped to give a new +conception of Dickens, as an educational pioneer and as a philosopher. The +purpose of this book is to show that Burns was well educated, and that +both in his poems and in his letters he was an unsurpassed exponent of the +highest human ideals yet expressed of religion--democracy based on the +value of the individual soul, brotherhood, love, and the philosophy of +human life. + +The writer believes that gossiping in regard to the weakness of the living +is indecent and degrading, but that it is pardonable as compared with the +debasing practice of gossiping about the weaknesses of the dead. Those who +can wallow in the muck of degraded biographers are only a degree less +wicked than the biographers themselves, who sin against the dead, and sin +against the living by providing debasing matter for them to read. + +The evidence to prove the positions claimed to be true in this book is +mainly taken from the poems and letters of Burns himself. Some may doubt +the sincerity of Burns. Carlyle had no doubt about his sincerity or his +honesty. He says of the popularity of Burns: 'The grounds of so singular +and wide a popularity, which extends, in a literal sense, from the palace +to the hut, and over all regions where the English tongue is spoken, are +well worth inquiring into. After every just deduction, it seems to imply +some rare excellence in these works. What is that excellence? To answer +this question will not lead us far. The excellence of Burns is, indeed, +among the rarest, whether in poetry or in prose, but, at the same time, it +is plain and easily recognised--_his sincerity, his indisputable air of +truth_.' + +Speaking of the moral character of Burns, Carlyle said: 'We are far from +regarding him as guilty before the world, as guiltier than the average; +nay, from doubting that _he is less guilty than one of ten thousand_.... +What he _did_ under such circumstances, and what he _forbore to do_, alike +fill us with astonishment at the _natural strength and worth of his +character_.' + +Shakespeare says in _Hamlet_: 'Ay, sir, to be honest, as this world goes, +is to be one man picked out of ten thousand.' Carlyle chose Burns as one +of ten thousand. + +These quotations should help two classes of men: the 'unco guid,' who +believe evil stories, most of which had no real foundation; and those +professed lovers of Burns who love him for his weaknesses. The real Robert +Burns was not weak enough to suit either of these two classes. 'Less +guilty than one in ten thousand' is a high standard. + +To do something to help all men and women to a juster understanding of the +real Robert Burns is the aim of the writer. Let us learn, and ever +remember, that he was a reverent writer about religion, a clear +interpreter of Christ's teaching of democracy and brotherhood, a profound +philosopher, and the author of the purest love-songs ever written. + + + + +THE REAL ROBERT BURNS. + + + + +CHAPTER I. + +THE TRUE VALUES OF BIOGRAPHY. + + +A man's biography should relate the story of his development in power, and +his achievements for his fellow-men. Biography can justify itself only in +two ways: by revealing the agencies and experiences that formed a man's +character and aided in the growth of his highest powers; and by relating +the things he achieved for humanity, and the processes by which he +achieved them. + +Only the good in the lives of great men should be recorded in biographies. +To relate the evil men do, or describe their weaknesses, is not only +objectionable, it is in every way execrable. It degrades those who write +it and those who read it. Biography should not be mainly a story; it +should be a revelation, not of evil, but of good. It should unfold and +impress the value of the visions of the great man whose biography is being +written, and his success in revealing his high visions to his fellow-men. +It should tell the things he achieved or produced to make the world +better; the things that aid in the growth of humanity towards the divine. +The biographer who tells of evils is, from thoughtlessness or malevolence, +a mischievous enemy of mankind. + +No man's memory was ever more unjustly dealt with than the memory of +Robert Burns. His first editor published many poems that Burns said on his +death-bed should be allowed 'to sink into oblivion,' and told all of +weakness that he could learn in order that he might be regarded as just. +He considered justice to himself of more consequence than justice to +Burns, or to humanity. His only claim to be remembered is the fact that he +prepared the poems of Burns for publication, and wrote his biography. It +is much to be regretted that he had not higher ideals of what a biography +should be, not merely for the memory of the man about whom it is written, +but for its influence in enlightening and uplifting those who read it. +Biographers should reveal not weaknesses, but the things achieved for God +and humanity. + +Carlyle, writing of the biographers of Burns, says: 'His former +biographers have done something, no doubt, but by no means a great deal, +to assist us. Dr Currie and Mr Walker, the principal of these writers, +have both, we think, mistaken one important thing: their own and the +world's true relation to the author, and the style in which it became such +men to think and to speak of such a man. Dr Currie loved the poet truly, +more perhaps than he avowed to his readers, or even to himself; yet he +everywhere introduces him with a certain patronising, apologetic air, as +if the polite public might think it strange and half unwarrantable that +he, a man of science, a scholar and a gentleman, should do such honour to +a rustic. In all this, however, we readily admit that his fault was not +want of love, but weakness of faith; and regret that the first and kindest +of all our poet's biographers should not have seen farther, or believed +more boldly what he saw. Mr Walker offends more deeply in the same kind, +and both err alike in presenting us with a detached catalogue of his +attributes, virtues, and vices, _instead of a delineation of the resulting +character as a living unity_.' + +The biographers of Robert Burns criticised reputed defects of his--defects +common among men of all classes and all professions in his time--but +failed to give him credit for his revelations of divine wisdom. They +bemoaned his lack of religion--though he was a reverently religious +man--instead of telling the simple truth that he was the greatest +religious reformer of his time in any part of the world. They said he was +not a Christian because he did not perform certain ceremonies required by +the churches, when freer and less bigoted men would have told the real +fact, that he was one of the world's greatest interpreters of Christ's +highest ideals--democracy and brotherhood. He still holds that high rank. +They related idle gossip about his vanity and other trivial stories, +instead of being content with proclaiming him the greatest genius of his +time in the comprehensiveness of his visions, and in the scope of his +powers. Some of them tried to prove that he was not a loyal man; they +should have revealed him as the giant leader of men in making them +conscious of the value of liberty and of the right of every man to its +fullest enjoyment. + +The oft-repeated charge of disloyalty was disproved when the charge was +made during the life of Burns, but the false accusation has been accepted +as a fact by many people to the present time. Fortunately the records of +the Dumfries Volunteers have been discovered recently, and Mr William +Will has published them in a book entitled _Robert Burns as a Volunteer_. +They prove most conclusively that Burns was a truly loyal man. When the +Provost of Dumfries called a meeting of the citizens of Dumfries to +consider the need of establishing a company of Volunteers Burns attended +the meeting, and was chosen as a member of a small committee to write to +the king asking permission to form a company. When permission was granted +by the king, Burns joined the company on the night when it was first +organised, and sat up most of the night composing 'The Dumfries +Volunteers,' the most inspiring poem of its kind ever written. It did more +to arouse the people of Scotland and England to put down the bolshevism of +the time than any other loyal propaganda. + +The minutes of the Volunteer Company in Dumfries give a perfect answer to +the basest slander ever made against Burns--that he had sunk so low as a +hopelessly vile drunkard the respectable people of Dumfries would not +associate with him; that he was ostracised by the community at large. Yet +this 'ostracised man' was chosen by the best citizens of Dumfries as one +of the committee to write to King George, and was elected as a member of +the committee to manage the company. This slander was so generally +accepted in Carlyle's time that even Carlyle himself wrote that Burns did +not die too soon, as he had lost the respect of his fellow-men, and had +lost also the power to write. His first statement is proved to have no +true foundation by the record of the Dumfries Volunteer Company, and the +second by the fact that Burns wrote the greatest poem ever written by any +man to interpret Christ's highest visions, democracy and brotherhood, 'A +Man's a Man for a' That,' the year before he died, and 'The Dumfries +Volunteers.' The second year before his death he wrote 'The Tree of +Liberty' and 'The Ode to Liberty,' and the third year before he died he +wrote the clarion call to fight in defence of freedom, 'Scots, wha hae.' +These poems have no equals in any literature of their kind. During the +same three years of his life he wrote one hundred and seventeen other fine +songs and sent them to Edinburgh for publication, the last one on the +ninth day before his death. It should be remembered, too, that Burns had +to ride two hundred miles each week in the discharge of his duty to the +government; and that after the organisation of the Volunteer Company he +had to drill four hours each week, and attend the meetings of the company +committee. The minutes of the company show he was never fined for absence. + +The last meeting he attended before his fatal illness was called to +prepare a letter of gratitude to God for preserving the life of the king +when the London bolshevistic mob tried to kill him on his way to the House +of Commons. Assisting to prepare this letter to the king was the last +public act of Burns. + +Had his weaknesses been tenfold what they were, his biographers should +have said nothing about them, for in spite of his human weakness he had +divine power to reveal to all men Christ's teachings--democracy and +brotherhood, based on the value of the individual soul. He was also the +greatest poet of religion, ethics, and love; and he holds a high place +among the loving interpreters of Nature. + +To relate facts in his life to account for the development of his powers, +so that he was able to be so great a revealer of the highest things in the +lives of men and women, should have been the work of his biographers. + +It is worthy of note that Wordsworth wrote to the publishers of the +biography of Burns in regard to the true attitude of a biographer. He +objected to recording imputed failings, and expressed indignation at Dr +Currie for devoting so much attention to the infirmities of Burns. + +Chambers and Douglas were in most respects better than his other early +biographers. The Rev. Lauchlan MacLean Watt, of Edinburgh, wrote for the +Nation's Library in 1914 the sanest, truest book yet written about Burns. + + + + +CHAPTER II. + +THE EDUCATIONAL ADVANTAGES OF BURNS. + + +Many people still speak of Burns as an 'uneducated man.' Although a +farmer, he was in reality a well-educated man. He was not a finished +scholar in the accepted sense of the universities, but both in his poetry +and in his unusually forceful and polished prose he was superior to most +of the university men of his time. He had read many books, the best books +that his intelligent father could buy, or that he could borrow from +friends or from libraries. In addition to school-books, he names the +following among those books read in his youth and young manhood--_The +Spectator_, Pope's Works, Shakespeare, Works on Agriculture, _The +Pantheon_, Locke's _Essay on the Human Understanding_, Stackhouse's +_History of the Bible_, Justice's _British Gardener_, Boyle Lectures, +Allan Ramsay's Works, Doctor Taylor's _Doctrine of Original Sin_, _A +Select Collection of English Songs_, Hervey's _Meditations_, Thomson's +Works, Shenstone's Works, _The Letters by the Wits of Queen Anne's +Reign_, Sterne's _Tristram Shandy_, Mackenzie's _The Man of Feeling_, +Macpherson's _Ossian_, two volumes of _Pamela_, and one novel by Smollett, +_Ferdinand, Count Fathom_. In addition to these he had read some French +and some Latin books, guided by one of the greatest teachers of his time, +John Murdoch, who was so great that when he established a private school +in London his fame spread to France, and some leading young men, notably +Talleyrand, came to receive his training and inspiration. + +William Burns read regularly at night to his two sons, Robert and Gilbert, +and after the reading the three fellow-students discussed the matter that +had been read, each from his own individual standpoint. As the boys grew +older they read books during their meals, so earnest were they in their +desire to become acquainted with the best thought of the world's leaders, +so far as it was available. David Sillar has stated that Robert generally +carried a book with him when he was alone, that he might read and think. +When Robert settled at Ellisland he aroused an interest among the people +of the district, and succeeded in establishing a circulating library. + +His father, though a labourer, was supremely desirous that his family +should be educated and thoughtful. This desire prompted him to become a +farmer, that he might keep his family at home. He was an independent +thinker himself, and by example and experience he trained his sons to love +reading and to think independently. Robert never thought he was thinking +when he let other people's thoughts run through his mind. + +The result of the reading and thinking which their father led Robert and +Gilbert to do was most gratifying. The influence on Robert's mind must be +recognised. He became not only a great writer in prose and in poetry, but +a great orator as well. He stood modestly, but conscious of his power, and +proved his superiority both in conversation and impromptu oratory to the +leading university men of his time in Edinburgh. Gilbert, too, became an +original thinker and a writer of clear and forceful English. In a long +letter to Dr Currie he discussed very profoundly and very independently +some deep psychological ideas in excellent language. Few men of his time +could have written more thoughtfully or more definitely. As illustrations +of Robert's learning, as well as of his independent thought in relating +the books he read to each other and to human life, two instances are worth +recording. First, in a letter to Dr Moore,[1] of London, an author of +some distinction, who had sent him a copy of one of his books, Burns said, +1790: 'You were pleased to express a wish for my opinion of your work, +which so flattered me that nothing less would serve my overweening fancy +than a formal criticism on the book. In fact, I have gravely planned a +comparative view of you, Fielding, Richardson, and Smollett in your +different qualities and merits as novel writers. This, I own, betrays my +ridiculous vanity, and I may probably never bring the business to bear, +but I am fond of the spirit young Elihu shows in the Book of Job--"And I +said, I will also declare my opinion."' + +To Mrs Dunlop he wrote, 1788: 'Dryden's _Virgil_ has delighted me. I do +not know whether the critics will agree with me, but the _Georgics_ are to +me by far the best of Virgil. It is indeed a species of writing entirely +new to me, and has filled my head with a thousand fancies of emulation.... +I own I am disappointed in the _Æneid_. Faultless correctness may please, +and does highly please, the letter critic; but to that awful character I +have not the most distant pretensions. I do not know whether I do not +hazard my pretensions to be a critic of any kind, when I say that I think +Virgil, in many instances, a servile copier of Homer. If I had the +_Odyssey_ by me, I could parallel many passages where Virgil has evidently +copied, but by no means improved, Homer. Nor can I think there is anything +of this owing to the translators; for from everything I have seen of +Dryden, I think him in genius and fluency of language Pope's Master.' + +But a small percentage of university graduates of his time could have +written independent criticisms, wise or otherwise, of Homer and Virgil, or +even of English writers, as clearly as Burns did. They could have told +what the opinions of other people were in regard to Homer and Virgil; they +could have told what they had been told. Burns had been trained to think +by his father, and to express his own thoughts about the books he read; +they had merely been informed. The advantage in real education was greatly +in favour of Burns. Their memories had been stored with opinions of +others; his mind had been trained to read carefully, to relate the +thoughts of others to life, to decide as to their wisdom, and to think +independently himself. His education from books was somewhat limited, but +the development of his mind that came from discussions of the value of the +matter read was vital, and helped him to relate himself to men, to nature +around him, to the universe, and to God. + +In schools Burns had not a very extended experience. When six years old he +was sent to a small school beside the mill on the Doon at Alloway. His +teacher gave up the school soon after Burns began to attend it. Mr Burns +secured the co-operation of several of his neighbours, and they engaged a +young man named Murdoch to teach their children, agreeing to take him in +turn as their guest, and to pay him a small salary. The fact that John +Murdoch formed a high estimate of Mr Burns is a proof of the ability and +sincerity of the father of the poet. + +When Burns was seven years old his father removed to Mount Oliphant farm, +but Robert continued to attend the school of Mr Murdoch, about two miles +away, in Alloway. The books used were a spelling-book, the New Testament, +the Bible, Mason's _Collection of Prose and Verse_, and Fisher's _English +Grammar_. + +Mr Murdoch gave up his Alloway school when Burns was nine years old. After +that time the teacher of his sons was their father. He taught them +arithmetic, and bought them Salmon's _Geographical Grammar_, Derham's +_Physico- and Astro-Theology_, Hay's _Wisdom of God in the Creation_, and +the _History of the Reigns of James I. and Charles I. of England_. Robert, +when eleven years old, showed a deep interest in the study of grammar and +language, and 'excelled as a critic in substantives, verbs, and +participles.' In his twelfth year he was kindled in his patriotic spirit +by the _Life of Sir William Wallace_. Wallace remained a hero to him +throughout his life. In his thirty-fifth year he wrote the grandest call +to the defence of liberty ever written, beginning: + + Scots, wha hae wi' Wallace bled. + +In his eleventh year, which seemed to be a kindling epoch in his mind, his +mother's brother gave him a collection of _Letters by the Wits of Queen +Anne's Reign_. He read them over and over again, greatly delighted by both +their contents and their literary style. They had a distinct influence in +forming his own prose style, as during his twelfth year he conducted an +imaginary correspondence of quite an extensive character and in a stately +style. + +When he was thirteen the greatest kindler of his early powers, John +Murdoch, became teacher of English in the Ayr High School. Robert was +sent to board with him to study grammar and composition. He received +instruction from Murdoch in French and in Latin. He continued the study of +French in the evenings at home, as he had obtained a French dictionary and +a French grammar. + +His formal education, so far as it became an element in the cultivation of +his mind and the development of his supreme powers, ended with the few +weeks spent with John Murdoch in Ayr. They were epoch weeks to Burns; +transforming weeks, because of the increased range of his learning, but +made infinitely more richly transforming by the revelation of new visions +of life, and by the culture gained by association with a man of rare +ability and supreme kindling power, such as John Murdoch undoubtedly +possessed. A genius like Burns, living with a great teacher like Murdoch, +could in a month get many of the new revelations, the new visions, and the +strong impulses that should come into a growing soul as the result of a +university course. + +Burns, in his seventeenth year, was sent to Kirkoswald to study +mensuration and surveying. He intended to become a surveyor. Peggy Thomson +lived next door to the school he attended. He met Peggy, loved her madly, +and found it impossible to study longer. He afterwards wrote two beautiful +poems to her. His school life for a brief period in Kirkoswald had little +influence in the development of his power, except for the organisation of +a debating society composed of a companion, William Niven, and himself. +They met weekly to hold debates, and these debates were greatly enjoyed by +Burns. His practice in debating societies afterwards organised by him in +Tarbolton and in Mauchline not only developed in him his unusual +oratorical ability, but at the same time gave him mental training of vital +importance. Impromptu speaking surpasses any other known educational +process in developing the human mind. However, Burns could neither study +for Hugh Rodger nor debate with William Niven after he fell in love with +Peggy Thomson, so, after a sleepless week, he went home. + +Some may wonder, when they learn that for a time Burns took more interest +in studying Euclid's _Elements of Geometry_ than in any other department +of study in his home under his father's guidance. When the Rev. Archibald +Alison sent him his book, _Essays on the Principles of Taste_, Burns +thanked him, and in his letter said: 'In short, sir, except Euclid's +_Elements of Geometry_, which I made a shift to unravel by my father's +fireside in the winter evenings of the first season I held the plough, I +never read a book which gave me such a quantum of information, and added +so much to my stock of ideas, as your _Essays on the Principles of +Taste_.' + +Burns evidently studied geometry at the time his mind was ripe for new +development by that special study. All children and young people would be +fortunate if they could be guided to the special study capable of arousing +their deepest interest, and therefore capable of promoting their highest +development, at the special period of their mental growth when that +particular study will awaken their deepest and most productive interest. + +Robert's mind appears to have had a splendid power of adaptation to the +books and studies which his father secured for his sons. Gilbert says: +'Robert read all these with an avidity and industry scarcely to be +equalled; and no book was so voluminous as to slacken his industry, or so +antiquated as to damp his researches.' Dr Moore wrote to Burns in 1787: 'I +know very well you have a mind capable of attaining knowledge by a shorter +process than is commonly used, and I am certain you are capable of making +better use of it, when attained, than is generally done.' + +This makes it easier to understand why Burns had a mind so well stored +with so many kinds of knowledge; and knowledge classified by himself, and +related to life, so well that he could use it readily when he required to +do so. The university men in Edinburgh marvelled more at the vastness of +his stores of different kinds of knowledge, when he met them with +dignified calmness, than they did because of his wonderful gifts of poetic +genius. Douglas says of Burns in Edinburgh: 'Burns did not fail to mix by +times with the eminent men of letters and philosophy, who then shed lustre +on the name of Scotland.' + +Lockhart wrote: 'Burns's poetry might have procured him access to these +circles; but it was the extraordinary resources he displayed in +conversation, the strong sagacity of his observations on life and manners, +the splendour of his wit, and the glowing energy of his eloquence, that +made him the serious object of admiration among these practised masters of +the arts of talk. Even the stateliest of these philosophers had enough to +do to maintain the attitude of equality when brought into contact with +Burns's gigantic understanding; and every one of them whose impressions +on the subject have been recorded agrees in pronouncing his conversation +to have been the most remarkable thing about him.' + +Speaking of this, Chambers properly says: 'We are thus left to understand +that the best of Burns has not been, and was not of a nature to be, +transmitted to posterity.' Why was Burns, though a ploughman, able to meet +a galaxy of leaders in different spheres of learning, and culture, and +philosophy, and outshine any of them in his own special department? The +answer is simple. He had two great teachers to kindle him and guide him in +the development of his remarkable natural powers: his father, William +Burns, and his teacher and friend, John Murdoch. + +His father made it certain that he would possess a wide range of knowledge +of the best available books on religious, ethical, and philosophical +subjects--philosophy of science and philosophy of the mind; and, better +than that, he trained him definitely by nightly practice to digest, and +expound, and relate, and even dare to disbelieve, the opinions expressed +in the books he read. In nightly discussions with his father and Gilbert +his mind became keen and broad, and he became self-reliant. He had not +merely stored knowledge in his mind, he had wrought the knowledge into his +being, as an element of his growing power. Like great players of chess who +sometimes meet several opposing players of eminence at the same time and +vanquish them all at one period of play, Burns could meet the leaders of +many departments of progress, culture, and philosophy at the same time, +and stand calm and serene in glory with each leader on the crest of his +own special mountain of knowledge. + +From John Murdoch he received the inspiration of a vital comradeship, a +fine training in English language--grammar, and a good introduction to +literature--and visions of higher relationships to his fellow-men and to +God. + +However, great as Murdoch was as a kindler and a teacher, the education of +Robert Burns was mainly due to his remarkable father. Alexander Smith, in +his memoir of Burns, which Douglas claimed to be 'the finest biography of +its extent ever written,' speaking of William Burns, says: 'In his whole +mental build and training he was superior to the people by whom he was +surrounded. He had forefathers he could look back to; he had family +traditions which he kept sacred. Hard-headed, industrious, religious, +somewhat austere, he ruled his house with a despotism which affection and +respect on the part of the ruled made light and easy. To the blood of the +Burnses a love of knowledge was native, as valour in the old times was +native to the blood of the Douglases.' + +John Murdoch wrote of William Burns: 'Although I cannot do justice to the +character of this worthy man, yet you will perceive from what I have +written _what kind of person had the principal part in the education of +the poet_. He spoke the English language with more propriety, both with +respect to diction and pronunciation, than any man I ever knew with no +greater advantages; this had a very good effect on the boys, who talk and +reason like men much sooner than their neighbours.' + +These two quotations help us to understand William Burns as a great +teacher of his sons, and his daughters, too, although he did not deem it +quite so important to educate his daughters as his sons. It is perfectly +clear that the paternal despotism spoken of by Mr Smith, which indeed was +supposed to be necessary one hundred and fifty years ago, was not the +reason why his boys so early talked and reasoned like men. William Burns +was the elderly friend of his sons, not a despot, when he trained them to +love reading, and much better to speak freely their individual opinions +about what they read. This naturally led his sons to speak like men early +and fearlessly. Despotism on the part of the father would have had +directly the opposite effect. + +Gilbert Burns sums up his father's estimate of early education and good +training when he says: 'My father laboured hard, and lived with the most +rigid economy, that he might be able to keep his children at home, thereby +having an opportunity of watching the progress of our young minds and +forming in them early habits of piety and virtue; and from this motive +alone did he engage in farming, the source of all his difficulties and +distresses.' + +Robert, after his father's death, wrote to his cousin, and said his father +was 'the best of friends, and the ablest of instructors.' + +In the sketch of his life sent to Dr Moore, of London, he wrote: 'My +father, after many years of wanderings and sojournings, picked up a pretty +large quantity of observation and experience, to which I am indebted for +most of my pretensions to wisdom.' + +An important element in the education of Burns was his love of Nature. +His mind was specially susceptible to development by Nature in any of its +forms of beauty or of majesty. A friend who was his guide through the +grounds of Athole House, when he was making his tour through the +Highlands, in a letter to Mr Alex. Cunningham, wrote: 'I had often, like +others, experienced the pleasures which arise from the sublime or elegant +landscape, but I never saw those feelings so intense as in Burns.' + +Burns was born and spent his early life and young manhood in a district +whose beauty has few equals anywhere. Its rivers--Ayr, Doon, Afton, Lugar, +Fail, and Cessnock; all, except Afton, within easy walking distance of his +homes in Ayrshire--with their beautifully wooded banks, were, in a very +definite way, transforming agencies in the growth of his mind, and +therefore most important elements in his highest education. The 'winding +Nith,' which flowed within a few yards of the home he built on Ellisland +farm, around the promontory on which stand the ruins of Lincluden Abbey, +and on through Dumfries, continued during the last few years of his life +the educational work of the rivers of his native Ayrshire. + +The mind of Burns was brought into unity with spiritual ideals through +the influence of Nature more productively than by any other agency. He +walked in the gloaming, according to his own statement, by the riverside +or in woodland paths when he was composing his poems. While residing in +Dumfries he had a favourite walk up the Nith to Lincluden Abbey, amid +whose ruins he sat in the gloaming, and on moonlight nights often till +midnight, recording the visions that came to him in that sacred +environment of wooded river and linn (waterfall). + +There was much similarity between the most vital educational development +of Burns and of Mrs Browning. In _Aurora Leigh_, the record of her own +growth, she describes her true education, although not her actual life's +history. Aurora loses her mother in her fifth year, and lives with her +father for nine great years near Florence; she says: + + So nine full years our days were hid with God + Among His mountains. I was just thirteen, + Still growing like a plant from unseen roots + In tongue-tied springs; and suddenly awoke + To full life, and life's needs and agonies, + With an intense, strong, struggling heart beside + A stone-dead father. Life struck sharp on death + Makes awful lightning. + +Her years till thirteen are spent mainly in her father's fine library +reading what she most loved of the treasuries of the world. Her own +statement of her father's educational guidance is: + + My father taught me what he had learnt the best + Before he died, and left me--grief and love; + And seeing we had books among the hills, + Strong words of counselling souls, confederate + With vocal pines and waters, out of books + He taught me all the ignorance of men, + And how God laughs in heaven when any man + Says, 'Here I'm learned; this I understand; + In that I'm never caught at fault or doubt.' + +Like Burns she reads good books with joyous interest; like Burns she has a +father deeply interested in her education who teaches her vital things; +and like Burns she loves to learn from the 'vocal pines and waters,' and +finds her richest revelations for her mind 'with God among His mountains.' + +The hills of Ayrshire, the rivers, and the river-glens, whose sides are +covered with beautiful trees, were to Burns kindlers of high ideals, and +revealers of God. + + + + +CHAPTER III. + +THE CHARACTERISTICS OF BURNS. + + +He was a truly independent democrat. The love of liberty was the basic +element of his character. His fundamental philosophy he expressed in the +unanswered and unanswerable questions: + + Why should ae man better fare, + And a' men brothers? + + _Epistle to Dr Blacklock._ + + If I'm designed yon lordling's slave, + By Nature's law designed, + Why was an independent wish + E'er planted in my mind? + + _Man was Made to Mourn._ + +To the Right Hon. John Francis Erskine he wrote: 'The partiality of my +countrymen has brought me forward as a man of genius, and has given me a +character to support. In the Poet I have avowed manly and independent +sentiments, which I trust will be found in the Man.' + +Referring to the fact that his father's family rented land from the +'famous, noble Keiths,' and had the honour of sharing their fate--their +estates were forfeited because they took part in the rebellion of +1715--he says: 'Those who dare welcome Ruin and shake hands with Infamy, +for what they believe sincerely to be the cause of their God and their +King, are--as Mark Antony in Shakespeare says of Brutus and +Cassius--"Honourable men."' + +Though his father was not born in 1715, he undoubtedly got from his family +the principles of independence and the love of liberty which he afterwards +taught to his sons, and which Robert propagated with so much zeal. + +In a letter to Mrs Dunlop he wrote: 'Light be the turf upon his breast who +taught, "Reverence thyself."' + +To Lord Glencairn, after expressing his gratitude, he said: 'My gratitude +is not selfish design--that I disdain; it is not dodging after the heel of +greatness--that is an offering you disdain. It is a feeling of the same +kind with my devotion.' + +In many of his letters he expresses the same sentiments. In his Epistle to +his young friend, Andrew Aiken, he advises him, among other things, + + To gather gear by every wile + That's justified by honor; + Not for to hide it in a hedge, + Nor for a train attendant; + But for the glorious privilege + Of being independent. + +In a letter to Mr William Dunbar, dealing with his consciousness of his +responsibility for his children, he wrote, 1790: 'I know the value of +independence; and since I cannot give my sons an independent fortune, I +shall give them an independent line of life.' + +Writing to Mrs Dunlop about his son--her god-son--Burns said: 'I am myself +delighted with the manly swell of his little chest, and a certain +miniature dignity in the carriage of the head, and the glance of his fine +black eye, which promise the undaunted gallantry of an independent mind.' + +In 'A Man's a Man for a' That' he says: + + Ye see yon birkie, ca'd 'a lord,' + Wha struts, and stares, and a' that; + Tho' hundreds worship at his word, + He's but a coof for a' that. blockhead + For a' that, and a' that, + His ribband, star, and a' that, + The man o' independent mind + He looks and laughs at a' that. + +In the same great poem he crystallises a fundamental truth in the immortal +couplet: + + The rank is but the guinea stamp, + The man's the gowd for a' that. gold + +To Mrs Dunlop he wrote in 1787: 'I trust I have too much pride for +servility, and too little prudence for selfishness.' + +To Mrs M'Lehose he wrote in 1788: 'The dignifying and dignified +consciousness of an honest man, and the well-grounded trust in approving +heaven, are two most substantial foundations of happiness.' + +To Mrs Dunlop he wrote in 1788: 'Two of my adored household gods are +independence of spirit and integrity of soul.' + +To Mrs Graham he wrote in 1791: 'May my failings ever be those of a +generous heart and an independent mind.' + +To John Francis Erskine he wrote in 1793: 'My independent British mind +oppression might bend, but could not subdue.' + +In the 'Vision' the message he says he received from Coila, the genius of +Kyle, the part of Ayrshire in which he was born, was: + + Preserve the dignity of Man, with soul erect. + +Burns has been criticised for meddling with what his critics called +politics. The highest messages Christ gave to the world were the value of +the individual soul, and brotherhood based on the unity of developed +individual souls. His highest messages were understood by Burns more +clearly than by any one else during his time, and Burns was too great a +man to be untrue to his greatest visions. His poems are still among the +best interpretations of Christ's ideals of democracy and brotherhood. + +The supreme aim of Burns was to secure for all men and women freedom from +the unnatural restrictions of class or custom, so that each individual +might have equal opportunity for the development of his highest element of +power, his individuality, or self-hood--really the image of God in each. +God gave him the vision of the ideal: 'Why should ae man better fare, and +a' men brothers?' and he tried to reveal the great vision to the world to +kindle the hearts of men. + +Burns was a devoted son, and a loving, considerate, respectful, and +generous brother. After his father died, Robert wrote to his cousin: 'On +the 13th current I lost the best of fathers. Though, to be sure, we have +had long warning of the impending stroke, still the feelings of nature +claim their part, and I cannot recollect the tender endearments and +paternal lessons of the best of friends and the ablest of instructors +without feeling what, perhaps, the calmer dictates of reason would partly +condemn. + +'I hope my father's friends in your country will not let their connection +in this place die with him. For my part, I shall ever with pleasure--with +pride--acknowledge my connection with those who were allied by the ties +of blood and friendship to a man whose memory I shall ever honour and +revere.' + +On the stone above his father's grave in Alloway Kirkyard are engraved the +words Burns wrote as his father's epitaph: + + O ye, whose cheek the tear of pity stains, + Draw near with pious reverence and attend! + Here lies the loving husband's dear remains, + The tender father, and the gen'rous friend; + The pitying heart that felt for human woe; + The dauntless heart that feared no human pride; + The friend of man--to vice alone a foe; + For ev'n his failings leaned to virtue's side. + +John Murdoch warmly approved of this epitaph of his former pupil and +friend Robert. He wrote: 'I have often wished, for the good of mankind, +that it were as customary to honour and perpetuate the memory of those who +excel in moral rectitude, as it is to extol what are called heroic +actions.' + +When Burns found that the Edinburgh edition of his poems had brought him +about five hundred pounds, he loaned Gilbert one hundred and fifty pounds +to assist him to get out of debt, in order that his mother and sisters +might be placed in a position of security and greater happiness. In a +letter to Robert Graham of Fintry, explaining the circumstances that led +him to accept the position of an exciseman, he first explains that +Ellisland farm, which he rented, was in the last stage of worn-out poverty +when he got possession of it, and that it would take some time before it +would pay the rent. Then he says: 'I might have had cash to supply the +deficiencies of these hungry years; but I have a younger brother and three +sisters on a farm in Ayrshire, and it took all my surplus over what I +thought necessary for my farming capital to save not only the comfort, but +the very existence, of that fireside circle from impending destruction.' + +He helped with sympathy, advice, and material support a younger brother +who lived in England. His true attitude towards his own wife and family is +shown in his 'Epistle to Dr Blacklock': + + To make a happy fireside clime + For weans and wife, + Is the true pathos and sublime + Of human life. + +The greatest dread of his later years was that he might not be able to +provide for his family in case of his death. + +Burns was an upright, honest man. To the mother of the Earl of Glencairn +he wrote: 'I would much rather have it said that my profession borrowed +credit from me, than that I borrowed credit from my profession.' + +To James Hamilton, of Glasgow, he wrote: 'Among some distressful +emergencies that I have experienced in life, I have ever laid it down as +my foundation of comfort--that he who has lived the life of an honest man +has by no means lived in vain.' + +To Sir John Whitefoord he wrote in 1787: 'Reverence to God and integrity +to my fellow-creatures I hope I shall ever preserve.' + +In a letter to John M'Murdo in 1793 he wrote: 'To no man, whatever his +station in life, have I ever paid a compliment at the expense of truth.' + +In 'Lines written in Friar's Carse' he wrote: + + Keep the name of Man in mind, + And dishonour not your kind. + +To Robert Ainslie he wrote: 'It is much to be a great character as a +lawyer, but beyond comparison more to be a great character as a man.' + +To Andrew Aiken, in his 'Epistle to a Young Friend,' he wrote: + + Where you feel your honour grip, + Let that aye be your border. + +In 'A Man's a Man for a' That' he expresses his faith in righteousness as +a fundamental element in character, where he says: + + The honest man, tho' e'er sae poor, + Is king o' men for a' that. + +Burns had a sympathetic heart that overflowed with kindness for his +fellow-men, and even for animals, domestic and wild. In a letter to the +Rev. G. H. Baird in 1791 he said: 'I am fain to do any good that occurs in +my very limited power to a fellow-creature, just for the selfish purpose +of clearing a little the vista of retrospection.' + +It was the big heart of Burns that directed the writing of the first part +of that sentence, and his modesty that led to the expression of the second +part. The joy of remembering a good deed was never his chief reason for +doing it. In a 'Tragic Fragment' he wrote: + + With sincere though unavailing sighs + I view the helpless children of distress. + +A number of stories have been preserved to prove that while Burns was +strict and stern in dealing with smugglers, and others who made a practice +of breaking the law by illegally selling strong drink without licence, he +was tenderly kind and protective to poor women who had little stores of +refreshments to sell to their friends on fair and market days. + +Professor Gillespie related that he overheard Burns say to a poor woman of +Thornhill one fair-day as she stood at her door: 'Kate, are you mad? Don't +you know that the Supervisor and I will be in upon you in the course of +forty minutes? Good-bye t'ye at present.' + +His friendly hint saved a poor widow from a heavy fine of several pounds, +while the annual loss to the revenue would be only a few shillings. + +He was ordered to look into the case of another old woman, suspected of +selling home-brewed ale without licence. When she knew his errand she +said: 'Mercy on us! are ye an exciseman? God help me, man! Ye'll surely no +inform on a puir auld body like me, as I hae nae other means o' leevin' +than sellin' my drap o' home-brewed to decent folk that come to Holywood +Kirk.' + +Burns patted her on the shoulder and said: 'Janet, Janet, sin awa', and +I'll protect ye.' + +In 'A Winter Night' Burns reveals a deep and genuine sympathy with the +outlying cattle, the poor sheep hiding from the storm, the wee helpless +birds, and even for the fox and the wolf; and mourns because the pitiless +tempest beats on them. + +Carlyle says of 'A Winter Night' that 'it is worth seven homilies on +mercy, for it is the voice of Mercy herself. Burns indeed lives in +sympathy; his soul rushes into all the realms of being; nothing that has +existence can be indifferent to him.' + +The auld farmer's 'New Year Morning Salutation to his Auld Mare, Maggie,' +reveals a profound and affectionate sympathy more tender than the pity he +felt for the animals and birds that suffered from the winter storm. It is +based on long years of friendly association in co-operative achievement. +From the New Year's wish at the beginning, to the end, where he assures +her that she is no less deserving now than she was + + That day ye pranced wi' muckle pride + When ye bure hame my bonnie bride; + And sweet and gracefu' she did ride + Wi' maiden air! + +and tells her that he has a heapet feed of oats laid by for her, and will +also tether her on a reserved ridge of fine pasture, where she may have +plenty to eat and a comfortable place on which to rest; each verse is full +of pleasant memories. + +His kindly sympathy is as appreciative as if she had been a human being +instead of a mare. + +'Poor Mailie's Elegy' is a natural expression of sorrow in the heart--the +great, loving heart of Burns--for the death of the pet lamb. He says: + + He's lost a friend and neighbour dear + In Mailie dead. + Thro' a' the toun she trotted by him; + A lang half-mile she could descry him; + Wi' kindly bleat, when she did spy him, + She ran wi' speed; + A friend mair faithfu' ne'er cam nigh him, + Than Mailie dead. + +So in the pathos and emotion shown for the mouse whose home his plough +destroyed at the approach of winter; for the wounded hare that limped past +him; for the starving thrush with which he offered to share his last +crust; and for the scared water-fowl that flew from him, when he regretted +that they had reason to do so on account of man's treatment of them, he +gives ample evidence of the warmth of the glow of his sympathy. + +One of the most prominent characteristics of Burns was loyalty to his +native land. One of his earliest dreams, when he was a boy, was a hope +that some day he might be able to do something that would bring honour to +Scotland. In his Epistle to Mrs Scott of Wauchope-House he says: + + I mind it weel, in early date, + When I was beardless, young, and blate, bashful + + * * * * * + + When first amang the yellow corn + A man I reckoned was, + + * * * * * + + E'en then a wish (I mind its power), + A wish that to my latest hour + Shall strongly heave my breast; + That I for poor auld Scotland's sake + Some usefu' plan or book could make, + Or sing a sang at least. + The rough burr-thistle, spreading wide + Amang the bearded bear, barley + I turned the weeder-clips aside + And spared the symbol dear: + No nation, no station, + My envy e'er could raise; + A Scot still, but blot still, without + I knew nae higher praise. + +The boy who had such a reverent feeling in his heart for the thistle, the +symbol of his native land, that he did not like to cut it, continued +throughout his life to have a reverence for the land itself, and tried to +honour it in every possible way. + +He did make the book and sing the songs that brought more lasting glory to +Scotland than any other work done by any other man or combination of men +in his time. + +He wrote more than two hundred and fifty love-songs, and he refused to +accept a shilling for them, though he needed money very badly. Many of his +love-songs were the direct out-pouring of his heart, the overflow of his +love for Nellie Kirkpatrick and Peggy Thomson, the girl lovers of his +boyhood; and for Alison Begbie, Jean Armour, Mary Campbell, and Mrs +M'Lehose; but most of his love-songs were 'fictitious,' as he said they +were in the inscription on the copy of his works presented to Jean +Lorimer, the Chloris of his Ellisland and Dumfries period. They were +written mainly to provide pure language and thought for fine melodies of +Scotland composed long before his time; but the words of the songs that +were sung to them were indelicate. He wrote his unequalled songs for +Scotland's sake, and by doing so he gave to Scotland the gift of the +sweetest love-songs ever written. But for these sacred songs his patriotic +spirit resented the idea of acceptance of material reward. No higher +revelation of genuine patriotism was ever shown than this. + +Burns was a sensitive and very shy man. He is commonly supposed to have +been just the opposite. He was brought up in a home at Mount Oliphant +where he rarely associated with other people. Months sometimes passed +without an evening spent in any other way than in reading and discussions +of the matter read by his father, Gilbert, and himself; so in boyhood and +early youth he was reserved. When he began to go out among other young men +his comparatively developed mind, his very unusual stores of +knowledge--not merely stored, but classified and related--and his +extraordinary power of eloquence made him at once a leader and a +favourite, so he soon overcame his reserve and shyness with young men. It +was not so with young women. He had been trained to wait for introductions +to them. He was walking past Jean Armour, when she was at the town pump at +Mauchline getting water to sprinkle the clothes on the bleaching-green, +without speaking to her, and she spoke to him, recalling a remark she +heard him make at the annual dance on the evening of the fair. He was +twenty-five, and she was eighteen. He would have passed close to her in +respectful silence if she had not spoken. + +Sir Walter Scott wrote: 'I was told, but did not observe it, that his +address to females was extremely deferential.' + +Scott did not mean to suggest a doubt about what he was told, but just to +intimate that he had not had opportunity to observe the fact. Scott met +Burns only once in company, and Scott was a boy at the time. + +He dearly and reverently loved Alison Begbie when he was twenty-one. She +was the first woman whom he asked to become his wife. She was a servant in +a farm-house on the banks of Cessnock Water, in the neighbourhood of +Lochlea farm. He was twenty-two when he asked her to marry him, and he was +so shy, even at that age, that he could not propose when he was with her. +She did not accept his offer. Few women of his acquaintance would have +refused to accept his written proposal. Probably none of them--not even +Alison Begbie--would have refused him if he had been able to overcome his +shyness, and had proposed in person instead of by letter. + +He wrote five letters to Alison Begbie, and definitely asked her to marry +him in the fourth letter. In the first he said: 'I am a stranger in these +matters, as I assure you that you are the first woman to whom I ever made +such a declaration, so I declare I am at a loss how to proceed. I have +more than once come into your company with a resolution to say what I have +just now told you; but my resolution always failed me, and even now my +heart trembles for the consequence of what I have said.' + +The following copies of the letter containing his proposal (the fourth), +and of his reply to her refusal, if read carefully, should reveal several +admirable characteristics of Burns. + + 'LOCHLEA, 1781. + + 'MY DEAR E.,[2]--I have often thought it a peculiarly unlucky + circumstance in love that, though in every other situation in life, + telling the truth is not only the safest, but actually by far the + easiest way of proceeding, a Lover is never under greater difficulty + in acting, or more puzzled for expression, than when his passion is + sincere, and his intentions are honourable. I do not think that it is + very difficult for a person of ordinary capacity to talk of love and + fondness which are not felt, and to make vows of constancy and + fidelity which are never intended to be performed, if he be villain + enough to practise such detestable conduct; but to a man whose heart + glows with the principles of integrity and truth, and who sincerely + loves a woman of amiable person, uncommon refinement of sentiment, + and purity of manners--to such a one in such circumstances I can + assure you, my Dear, from my own feelings at this present moment, + _Courtship_ is a task indeed. + + There is such a number of foreboding fears, and distrustful anxieties + crowd into my mind when I am in your company, or when I sit down to + write to you, that what to speak or what to write I am altogether at + a loss. + + 'There is one rule which I have hitherto practised, and which I shall + invariably keep with you, and that is, honestly to tell you the plain + truth. There is something so mean and unmanly in the arts of + dissimulation and falsehood, that I am surprised they can be used by + any one in so noble, so generous a passion as Virtuous Love. No, my + dear E., I shall never endeavour to gain your favour by such + detestable practices. If you will be so good and so generous as to + admit me for your partner, your companion, your bosom friend through + life, there is nothing on this side of eternity shall give me greater + transport; but I shall never think of purchasing your hand by any + arts unworthy of a man, and, I will add, of a Christian. There is one + thing, my Dear, which I earnestly request of you, and it is this: + that you would soon either put an end to my hopes by a peremptory + refusal, or cure me of my fears by a generous consent. + + 'It would oblige me much if you would send me a line or two when + convenient. I shall only add further, that if a behaviour regulated + (though perhaps but very imperfectly) by the rules of Honour and + Virtue, if a heart devoted to love and esteem you, and an earnest + endeavour to promote your happiness; if these are qualities you would + wish in a friend, in a husband, I hope you shall ever find them in + your real friend and sincere lover.' + +After her refusal he wrote: + + 'LOCHLEA, 1781. + + 'I ought in good manners to have acknowledged the receipt of your + letter before this time, but my heart was so shocked with the + contents of it, that I can scarcely yet collect my thoughts so as to + write to you on the subject. I will not attempt to describe what I + felt on receiving your letter. I read it over and over, again and + again, and though it was in the politest language of refusal, still + it was peremptory; you "were very sorry you could not make me a + return, but you wish me--what without you I can never obtain--you + wish me all kinds of happiness." It would be weak and unmanly to say + that without you I never can be happy; but sure I am, that sharing + life with you would have given it a relish that, wanting you, I can + never taste. + + 'Your uncommon personal advantages, and your superior good sense, do + not so much strike me; these possibly in a few instances may be met + with in others; but that amiable goodness, that tender, feminine + softness, that endearing sweetness of disposition, with all the + charming offspring of a warm, feeling heart--these I never again + expect to meet with in such a degree in this world. All these + charming qualities, heightened by an education much beyond anything I + have ever met with in any woman I ever dared to approach, have made + an impression on my heart that I do not think the world can ever + efface. My imagination had fondly flattered itself with a wish--I + dare not say it ever reached a hope--that possibly I might one day + call you mine. I had formed the most delightful images, and my fancy + fondly brooded over them; but now I am wretched for the loss of what + I really had no right to expect. I must now think no more of you as a + mistress, still I presume to ask to be admitted as a friend. As such + I wish to be allowed to wait on you, and as I expect to remove in a + few days a little farther off, and you, I suppose, will perhaps soon + leave this place, I wish to see you or hear from you soon; and if an + expression should perhaps escape me rather too warm for friendship, + I hope you will pardon it in, my dear Miss ---- (pardon me the dear + expression for once), + + 'R. B.' + +Those who say that these letters 'have an air of taskwork and constraint +about them' should remember that Burns formed the style of his +letter-writing when but a boy from a book containing the letters of +leaders of Queen Anne's time, which was given to him by his uncle. His own +letters on all subjects are written in a dignified style. It is worth +noting that Motherwell, who criticised the style of the letters, says of +them: 'They are, in fact, the only sensible love-letters we have ever +seen.' + +Though naturally a very shy man, he grew to be happier as his powers +developed. In his teens and young manhood he had fits bordering on +despondency. But he passed through them and became more buoyant in spirit, +and, though poor, was contented. + +In 'My Nannie O' he wrote: + + Come weel, come woe, I care na by, + I'll tak what Heaven will sen' me. + +In 'It is na, Jean, thy Bonnie Face,' he said: + + Content am I if Heaven shall give + But happiness to thee. + +This shows that consideration for others was one of his sources of +happiness. + +In his 'Epistle to James Smith' he wrote: + + Truce with peevish, poor complaining! + Is Fortune's fickle Luna waning? + E'en let her gang! + Beneath what light she has remaining + Let's sing our sang. + +Dr John M'Kenzie of Mauchline, in 1810, thirteen years after the death of +Burns, described a visit made to see his father when he was ill. In it he +says: 'Gilbert, in the first interview I had with him at Lochlea, was +frank, modest, well-informed, and communicative. The poet seemed distant, +suspicious, and without any wish to interest or please. He kept himself +very silent in a dark corner of the room; and before he took any part in +the conversation, I frequently detected him scrutinising me during my +conversation with his father and brother. + +'But afterwards, when the conversation, which was on a medical subject, +had taken the turn he wished, he began to engage in it, displaying a +dexterity of reasoning, an ingenuity of reflection, and a familiarity with +topics apparently beyond his reach, by which his visitor was no less +gratified than astonished.' + +Burns lived next door to Dr M'Kenzie after he was married the second time +to Jean Armour. They were great friends. Burns wrote a masonic poem to +him, and called him 'Common-sense' in 'The Holy Fair.' + +In the letter from which the above quotation is made, Dr M'Kenzie says +Robert took his characteristics mainly from his mother, and that Gilbert +resembled his father. + +Burns looked like his mother, and inherited his temperamental +characteristics mainly from her. + +Burns had a definitely religious tendency as one of his strong +characteristics when he was a child. In the sketch of his life that he +wrote to Dr Moore, of London, when he was twenty-eight years old, he says +that as a boy he possessed 'an enthusiastic idiot-piety. I say idiot-piety +because I was then a child.' + +He wrote several religious poems while living on Lochlea farm and on +Mossgiel farm. 'The Cotter's Saturday Night' was written at Mossgiel. + +Throughout his life his religious tendency was one of his characteristics. +This will be considered more fully in the chapter on 'Burns's Great Work +for Religion.' + +Burns was the warm, personal friend of the best people in every district +in or near which he lived. He must have been a good man who could count +among his friends such men and women as the following: Lord Glencairn, Mrs +Dunlop, the Earl of Eglintoun, Dr Moore, Dr M'Kenzie, Gavin Hamilton, Hon. +Henry Erskine, the Duchess of Gordon, Right Rev. Bishop Geddes, Robert +Graham of Fintry, Robert Riddell, Robert Aiken, the Earl of Buchan, Prof. +Dugald Stewart, Dr Candlish, Sir John Whitefoord, John Murdoch, Dr +Blacklock, Dr Hugh Blair, Alex. Cunningham, Rev. Archibald Alison, Sir +John Sinclair, Rev. John M'Math, and the best ministers of the 'New +Licht,' or progressive class; the leading professors in Edinburgh +University, and the leading schoolmasters in his neighbourhood. In fact, +he was loved and respected by leaders of all classes except the 'Auld +Licht' preachers. He lives on and becomes more popular as he becomes +better known. + +His one characteristic that would most fully represent him and his work +for God and humanity is his propelling tendency to be a reformer of +conditions. He accepted no existing conditions as good enough. He saw +quickly and clearly the defects of conditions as they existed, and he +never hesitated to attack any evil that he could help to overthrow. He +saw that individual freedom and pure religion were vital and essential +elements of human progress and happiness. He saw with unerring vision the +lack of freedom and of vital religion in the lives of the people; so to +make all men free, to give all children equal opportunity to develop the +best in their souls, and to purify religion from superstition, hypocrisy, +bigotry, and kindred evils that were blighting it, became his highest +purposes. + +What was the character of Burns in the estimation of the leading people of +his own time? On replying to a request that he would use his influence in +favour of Burns for an appointment Sir John Whitefoord wrote: 'Your +character as a man, as well as a poet, entitles you, I think, to the +assistance of every inhabitant of Ayrshire.' + +Sir John owned the Ballochmyle estate near Mauchline, and was one of the +leading country gentlemen of Ayrshire in his time. + +Mr Archibald Prentice, editor of the _Manchester Times_, was the son of a +prominent man who lived about half-way between Mauchline and Edinburgh, at +Covington, in Lanarkshire. Mr Prentice, senior, was a great admirer of +Burns, as were leaders everywhere. Mr Archibald Prentice, writing about +his father's affectionate respect for Burns, said; 'My father, though a +strictly moral and religious man himself, always maintained that the +virtues of the poet greatly predominated over his faults. I once heard him +exclaim with hot wrath, when somebody was quoting from an apologist, +"What! do _they_ apologise for _him_! One half of his good, and all his +bad divided among a score of them, would make them a' better men!" + +'In the year 1809 I resided for a short time in Ayrshire, in the +hospitable house of my father's friend Reid, and surveyed with a strong +interest such visitors as had known Burns. I soon learned how to +anticipate their representations of his character. The men of strong minds +and strong feelings were invariable in their expressions of admiration; +but the _prosy_, consequential _bodies_ all disliked him as exceedingly +dictatorial. The men whose religion was based on intellect and high moral +sentiment all thought well of him; but the mere professors [of religion] +"with their three-mile prayers and half-mile graces" denounced him as +worse than an infidel.' + +The progress of religious reformers has always been a thorny one. The +Master, Christ Himself, was crucified by the 'Auld Lichts' of His time, +and they stoned Stephen to death. So, through the centuries unprogressive +theologians have persecuted and often murdered the religious reformers, +who saw the evils in theology, and wished to remove them from the creeds +that blighted men's souls. They burned Latimer in England; and Luther in +Germany was saved by the action of his friends by shutting him in Wartburg +Castle for protection. Religious reformers in the time of Burns were not +burned or stoned to death, but they were persecuted and prosecuted before +the Church Courts by men who did not approve of their higher visions of +truth. Burns himself was regarded as unorthodox, but his creed is much +more in harmony with the religious thought of to-day than it was with the +creed of the 'Auld Licht' preachers. One of the marvels of human +development through the ages has been that the bigoted theologians of each +succeeding century resented the attempts of men with clearer vision to +reform their creeds. + +Men who truly believe in God cannot believe that any creed made by men can +be infallible; they should know that from generation to generation +humanity consciously grows towards the Divine, and that as they climb they +see in the clearer spiritual air new visions of higher meaning in regard +to life and to vital religion, revealing to each man new conceptions of +his duty to God and to his fellow-men. + +Lovers of Burns reverence his memory because he was so great and so wise a +reformer, and did so much to make men truly free, and to make religion a +more vitally uplifting agency in the hearts of men. + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + +BURNS WAS A RELIGIOUS MAN. + + +'Burns a religious man!' scoffers exclaim. 'He was a drunkard.' Burns was +a moderate drinker compared with most of the ministers of his time. If +drinking whisky was a disqualification for religious character in the time +of Burns, a large proportion of the ministers of his time were +disqualified. Burns should not, in all fairness, be judged by the +standards of our time. More than fifty years after Burns died it was +customary for even Methodist ministers in Canada, when visiting the +members of their churches, to accept a little whisky punch as an evidence +of good fellowship and comradeship. This custom persisted in Scotland and +England for more than a century after Burns died, and in many places it +exists still. In a letter to Mr William Cruickshank in 1788 he said: 'I +have fought my way severely through the savage hospitality of this +country--the object of all hosts being to send every guest to bed drunk if +they can.' + +Burns was not speaking of hotel-keepers, but of homes of people of high +respectability. He wrote in 1793: 'Taverns I have totally abandoned, but +it is the private parties in the family way among the hard-drinking +gentlemen of the country that do me the mischief.' + +He did occasionally go to the Globe Tavern in Dumfries after 1793, when +the guest of visitors who came to Dumfries solely for the purpose of +meeting him and having the honour of entertaining him. + +In his short life of Burns, Alexander Smith says: 'If he drank hard, it +was in an age when hard drinking was fashionable. If he sinned in this +respect, he sinned in company with English Prime Ministers, Scotch Lords +of Session, grave dignitaries of the Church in both countries, and +thousands of ordinary blockheads who went to their graves in the odour of +sanctity, and whose epitaphs are a catalogue of all the virtues.' + +Burns spoke with all sincerity, in a letter to his friend Samuel Clark of +Dumfries, when he wrote: 'Some of our folks about the Excise office, +Edinburgh, had, and perhaps still have, conceived a prejudice against me +as being a drunken, dissipated character. I might be all this, you know, +and yet be an honest fellow; but you know that _I am an honest fellow_, +and am nothing of this.' His superiors in the Excise department gave him +a high record for accuracy and honesty in his work. + +Other objectors say: 'He could not be religious, because he attacked +religion.' This statement is not correct. He attacked the evils that in +his time robbed religion of its vital power, but never religion. Emerson +says: 'Not Luther, not Latimer, struck stronger blows against false +theology than did the poet Burns.' + +To Clarinda, Burns wrote: 'I hate the superstition of a fanatic, but I +love the religion of a man.' + +In his poem 'The Tree of Liberty' he lays the blame of the terrible +degradation of the French peasantry on + + Superstition's wicked brood. + +In his 'Epistle to John Goudie' he speaks of + + Poor gapin', glowrin' superstition. + +He attacked superstition, but not religion. + +He attacked hypocrisy, and true men are grateful to him because he did so. + +In his 'Epistle to Rev. John M'Math,' the 'New Licht' minister of +Tarbolton, Burns says: + + God knows I'm not the thing I should be, + Nor am I ev'n the thing I could be; + But twenty times I rather would be + An atheist clean, + Than under gospel colours hid be + Just for a screen. + +He ridiculed hypocrisy, and we are grateful to him for doing so. Nothing +more contemptible than a religious hypocrite can be made of a being +created in the image of God. Hypocrisy is not religion. + +He attacked bigotry, one of the most savage monsters that ever tried to +block the way of Christ's highest teaching, the brotherhood of man. No +phenomenal religious absurdity is more incomprehensible than the idea that +Christianity can be promoted by the multiplication of religious +denominations; especially when, as in the time of Burns, and long after +his time, leaders of so-called Christian denominations refused to have +fellowship with each other, or to unite on a common platform in working +for the promotion of Christian ideals. How trivial the formalisms of +theologians seem that kept men apart whom Christ desired to become +co-operative and loving brothers, working harmoniously together for the +achievement of the great visions he revealed! + +He wrote to Clarinda, 1788: 'I hate the very idea of a controversial +divinity; and I firmly believe that every upright, honest man, of whatever +sect, will be accepted of the Deity.' + +In his 'Epistle to John Goudie' Burns calls bigotry + + Sour bigotry on its last legs. + +He wrote this in 1785, and much more than a century later bigotry is still +on its legs, but it is tottering to its final overthrow. Burns attacked +bigotry, but not religion. + +He attacked the doctrine of predestination, as taught in his time, a most +soul-dwarfing doctrine, calculated to rob humanity of motives to stimulate +it to greater and nobler efforts to achieve for God. He makes Holy Willie +say he deserved damnation five thousand years before he was born. Few +people now regard predestination as an element in vital religion. + +He attacked one of the most horribly blasphemous doctrines ever preached, +but preached in the time of Burns, and long after: + + That God sends ane to heaven and ten to hell + For His ain glory. + +He puts this impious doctrine into the mouth of Holy Willie. More than +half a century after the time of Burns, preachers in the presence of +mothers of their dead babies taught that the babes could not go to heaven +because they were too young to be 'believers in Christ;' and being unable +to account for their statements logically, would say, 'God did these +things for His own glory.' Burns attacked such horrible teaching, but in +doing so he was not attacking religion. + +Burns did not believe in the use of the fear of hell as a means of +promoting true religion. There is no soul-kindling power in fear. Fear is +one of the most powerful agencies of evil in preventing the conscious +development of the soul, and of the faith that each soul should have in +God as the source of power, in Christ as the revealer of individual power, +and in himself as God's partner. Fear is a negative agency that appeals to +the weaker side of character. Humanity will not be able to make the rapid +progress towards the Divine that it should make until fear ceases to be a +motive in the minds of men, women, and children. In his great 'Epistle to +a Young Friend' Burns says: + + The fear o' hell's a hangman's whip + To haud the _wretch_ in order. keep + +Burns proved himself to be a philosopher when he attacked the common plan +of using fear o' hell to make men religious. This was not attacking +religion. + +The Rev. L. MacLean Watt says: 'While the professional Christians of +Scotland were fighting about Hell, the humble hearts by the lowly +firesides, with the open book before them, were enriched by the knowledge +of heaven; and while the hypocrites in holy places were scourging those +who were in their power with the thorns of Christ, there were cotters in +their kitchens that had found the healing and the balm of the warm blood +of a Redeemer who died on Calvary for _a wider world_ than theologians +seemed to know.' + +Speaking further of the theologians of the time of Burns the Rev. Mr Watt +says: 'Their idea of God was shaped in fashion like themselves--merciless, +remorseless, hating, and hateful; His only passion seeming to their narrow +souls to be damnation and torture of the wretched, lost, and wandering. +Their preachers loved to picture the souls of the condemned swathed in +batches lying in eternal anguish of a most real blazing hell as punishment +for some small offence, or as having been outcast from grace through the +wanton exercise of divine prerogatives. To commend such a God for worship +were like praising and complimenting the cruel child who, for sport, spent +a whole day plucking the limbs and wings from the palpitating body of some +poor, helpless insect. It was a false and blasphemous insult to the human +intelligence.' + +Burns had the good fortune to be a cotter, trained by a father who was a +remarkably able man, a great teacher, and a reverently religious man of +very advanced ideals; and it took a century or more of theological +evolution to bring the religious teaching of the world up to the standards +of belief of the Ayrshire cotter. + +He attacked the doctrine of Faith without Works. In a letter to Gavin +Hamilton, one of the leading men of the town of Mauchline, a warm, +personal friend of the poet, and an advanced thinker among 'New Licht' +laymen, he wrote in a humorous but really profound way: 'I understand you +are in the habit of intimacy with that Boanerges of Gospel powers, Father +Auld. Be earnest with him that he will wrestle in prayer for you that you +may see the vanity of vanities in trusting to, even practising, the carnal +moral works of charity, humanity, and generosity; things which you +practised so flagrantly that it was evident you delighted in them, +neglecting, or perhaps profanely despising, the wholesome doctrine of +_faith without works_, the only hope of salvation.' + +Burns did not say a word against faith in Christ, or love for Christ, or +reverence for the teaching of Christ. So true a Christian as Dean Stanley +said Burns was a 'wise religious teacher.' Burns deplored the fact that +the love of Christ--the highest revelation of love ever given to the +world--should be limited to saving the individual believer from eternal +punishment. That was degrading the highest love into selfishness. Burns +pleaded for loving service for humanity, and for Christ's highest +revelation, brotherhood, as evidence of vital Christian-hood; not merely +'sound believing.' This was not attacking religion. He attacked the men +who attacked other men, like Gavin Hamilton among laymen, and Rev. Dr +M'Gill of Ayr among ministers, because they had advanced ideas regarding +religion. + +He attacked the gloom and awful Sunday solemnity of those who professed to +be religious. The world owes him a debt of gratitude for helping to remove +the shadows of religious gloom from human lives. In his poem 'A +Dedication,' addressed to Gavin Hamilton, he advises him ironically, in +order that he may be acceptable to Daddy Auld and others of the 'Auld +Licht' creed, to + + Learn three-mile pray'rs an' half-mile graces, + Wi' weel-spread looves, an' lang, wry faces; palms + Grunt up a solemn, lengthened groan, + And damn a' parties [religious] but your own; + I'll warrant then you're nae deceiver, + A steady, sturdy, staunch believer. + +If true religion means anything vitally hopeful to a man, it should mean +what Burns said it meant to him in a letter to Mrs Dunlop: 'My dearest +enjoyment.' + +In his wise poem, 'Epistle to a Young Friend,' he says: + + But still the preaching cant forbear, + And ev'n the rigid feature. + +He attacked the 'unco guid,' who delighted to tell how good they were +themselves, and how many were the weaknesses and evil-doings of their +neighbours. He had no more respect for the self-righteous than Christ had. +The fact that he attacked and exposed them, and spoke kindly and +reasonably to them, in his great 'Address to the Unco Guid,' is an +evidence that in this respect at any rate he was a true Christian. One of +the most comprehensively Christian doctrines ever written is the verse: + + Who made the heart, 'tis He alone + Decidedly can try us; + He knows each heart--its various tone, + Each spring--its various bias. + + Then at the balance let's be mute, + We never can adjust it; + What's done we partly may compute, + But know not what's resisted. + +There is sound philosophy in the first verse of the poem addressed to the +unco guid: + + The rigid righteous is a fool, + The rigid wise another. + +He often advised the 'douce folks' to be considerate of those who had +greater temptations than they knew; and advised them to try to help them +to overcome their temptations, and with Christian comradeship win their +admiration and sympathetic co-operation in some department of achieving +good. + +In the time of Burns nothing would have surprised a wayward man or woman +more than to have received genuine sympathy and respectful comradeship +from members of the Church, the institution that claimed to represent +Christ, who told the story of the one stray lamb, and the story of the +prodigal son; the Great Teacher who said, 'Let him that is without sin +cast the first stone.' + +Burns attacked superstition, hypocrisy, bigotry, predestination (taught in +its most repellent form in the time of Burns), the equally repellent +doctrine that 'God sends men to hell for His own glory;' fear of hell as a +basis of religious life; faith without works; religious gloom; and the +spirit of the unco guid. He helped to free religion from these evils more +than any other man of his time did; but that was just the opposite to +attacking religion. + +In the 'Holy Fair' and 'The Twa Herds' he criticised with biting sarcasm +certain things connected with religion in his time, from which it is now +happily free. But he did not attack religion. The Rev. L. MacLean Watt, +when summing up the great work Burns did for true religion, especially in +'The Holy Fair,' 'The Twa Herds,' and 'Holy Willie's Prayer,' says: 'It +was in consequence of this ecclesiastical contact that he was, ere long, +involved in a bitter and incessant warfare with the mediæval shadows of +ultra-Calvinism, which laid upon the people the bondage of a rigid +predestinarianism, the terrible result of which in parochial religion was, +that it became a commonplace in the matter of conduct that it did not +matter what you did so long as you believed certain hard and fast tenets +dealing with the purpose of God and the future of the human soul. This +could not but inevitably lead to the observation of grave discrepancies +between creed and conduct; and the setting up of the greatest hypocrisies, +veiled in the cloak of religiousness, that yet, with searching eye of +judgment, sat testing the conduct of better men. Burns was one of the +better men.' + +His own attitude towards true religion is shown in his 'Epistle to the +Rev. John M'Math,' a progressive Presbyterian minister in Tarbolton. In it +he says: + + All hail, Religion! maid divine! + Pardon a muse sae mean as mine, + Who in her rough, imperfect line + Thus daurs to name thee; + To stigmatise _false friends_ of thine + Can ne'er defame thee. + +He stigmatised false friends of religion, but not religion itself. + +There are some who yet say 'Burns could not have been a religious man, +because he was a sceptic.' Burns was an independent thinker. His mind did +not accept dogmas or creeds without investigation. In his father's fine +school he was not trained to think he was thinking, when he was merely +allowing the ideas of others to run through his head on the path of +memory. Burns was not trained to believe that he believed, but to think +till he believed; and to accept in the realm beyond his power to reason +great fundamental principles that supplied the conscious needs of his own +heart, as those principles are revealed in the Bible. + +In a letter to Mrs Dunlop he wrote: 'I am a very sincere believer in the +Bible; but I am drawn by the conviction of a man, not by the halter of an +ass.' + +To Mrs Dunlop he wrote, 1788: 'My idle reasonings sometimes made me a +little sceptical, but the necessities of my own heart always gave the cold +philosophisings the lie.' + +To Mr Peter Stuart he wrote, referring to the poet Fergusson, 1789: 'Poor +Fergusson! If there be a life beyond the grave, which I trust there is; +and if there be a good God presiding over all Nature, which I am sure +there is--thou art now enjoying existence in a glorious world, where worth +of the heart alone is the distinction of man.' + +To Mrs Dunlop, to whom more than to any other person he revealed the +depths of his heart, he wrote again, 1789: 'In vain would we reason and +pretend to doubt. I have myself done so to a very daring pitch; but when I +reflected that I was opposing the most ardent wishes, and the most darling +hopes of good men, and flying in the face of all human belief, in all +ages, I was shocked at my own conduct.' + +To Robert Aiken he wrote, 1786: 'Though sceptical in some points of our +current belief, yet I think I have every evidence for the reality of a +life beyond the stinted bourne of our present existence.' + +To Dr Candlish, of Edinburgh, he wrote, 1787: 'Despising old women's +stories, I ventured into the daring path Spinoza trod, but my experience +with the weakness, not the strength, of human power _made me glad to grasp +revealed religion_.' + +To Clarinda he wrote, 1788: 'The Supreme Being has put the immediate +administration of all this for wise and good ends known to Himself into +the hands of Jesus Christ, a great personage whose relation to Him we +cannot comprehend, but whose relation to us is that of a Guide and +Saviour.' + +In his epistle to his young friend Andrew Aiken, he sums up in two lines +his attitude to scepticism: + + An atheist's laugh's a poor exchange + For Deity offended. + +The men who believe most profoundly are those who honestly doubted in +early life, but who naturally loved truth, and sought it with hopeful +minds till they found it. Burns was not a sceptic. He was a reverently +religious man. No man could have written 'The Cotter's Saturday Night' who +was not a reverently religious man. His father, from the earliest years, +when his children were old enough to understand them, began to teach them +fundamental religious principles. They took root deeply in Robert's mind. +William Burns preferred not to use the 'Shorter Catechism,' so he wrote a +special catechism for his own family. It is a remarkable production for a +man in his position in life. It deals with vitally fundamental principles, +and shows a clear understanding of the Bible. + +Burns wrote several short religious poems in his early young manhood, +probably his twenty-second and twenty-third years, showing that his mind +was deeply impressed by the majesty, justice, and love of God. Two of +these poems are paraphrases of the Psalms. + +The fact that religion was one of the most important elements of his +thought and life is amply proved by the five letters he wrote to Alison +Begbie in his twenty-first and twenty-second years--even before he wrote +his early religious poems. Love-letters though they were, they related +nearly as much to religion as to love. Some people have tried to say +irreverently smart things about the absurdity of writing about religion in +letters to his loved one. Both the religion and the love of his letters to +the first woman he ever asked to marry him are too sacred to provoke +ridicule in the minds of men with proper reverence for either religion or +love. No one can carefully read these five letters without having a +deeper respect for Burns, the young gentleman who loved so deeply that he +regarded love worthy to be placed in association with religion. Religion +was the subject that had been given first place in his life and thought by +the teaching and the life of his father, who had meant infinitely more to +him than most fathers ever mean to their sons. + +In his epistle to Andrew Aiken he recommends, in the last verse but one, +two things of vast importance 'when on life we're tempest-driv'n': first, + + A conscience but a canker. without + +Second, + + A correspondence fixed wi' Heaven + Is sure a noble anchor. + +Many people read the last couplet without consciously thinking what a +correspondence fixed with Heaven means. Clearly it may have three +meanings: prayer, communion in spirit with the Divine, and similarity to +or harmony with the divine spirit. + +Burns had family worship in his home every day to the end of his life when +he was not absent, and though some scoffers may smile, he was earnest and +sincere in trying to conduct for himself and for his family a +'correspondence fixed with heaven' in a spirit of communion with the +Divine Father. He had other altars for communion with God in addition to +his home. He composed his poems in the gloaming after his day's work, in +favourite spots in the deep woods, where he was 'hid with God' alone. God +revealed Himself to Burns in the woods and by the sides of his sacred +rivers more fully than in any other places. One of the most sacred shrines +in Scotland is the great root under one of the mighty beeches of the fine +park on Ballochmyle estate, on which Burns sat so often to compose his +poems in the long Scottish twilights, and later on in the moonlight, when +he lived on Mossgiel farm. Then next night, at his desk over the stable at +Mossgiel, he would rewrite them and improve their form. + +No man but a religious man would have written, in his 'Epistle to a Young +Friend,' as Burns did to Andrew Aiken: + + The great Creator to revere + Must sure become the creature. + +When in Irvine, in his twenty-third year, he wrote a letter to his father. +As usual, he wrote not of trivial matters, but of the great realities of +time and eternity. Among other serious things he wrote: 'My principal, +and, indeed, my only pleasurable, employment is looking backwards and +forwards in a moral and religious way.' In the same letter he wrote: + + The soul, uneasy and confined, at home + Rests and expatiates in a life to come.[3] + +Burns follows this quotation by saying to his father: 'It is for this +reason that I am more pleased with the 15th, 16th, and 17th verses of the +7th Chapter of Revelation than with any ten times as many verses in the +whole Bible, and would not exchange the noble enthusiasm with which they +inspire me for all that the world has to offer.' + +His imagination enabled him to see clearly the glories of joy, and +service, and association, and reward, in the heavenly paradise, as +revealed in those triumphant verses. + +To Mrs Dunlop he wrote, 1788: 'Religion, my honoured Madam, has not only +been all my life my chief dependence, but my dearest enjoyment.... An +irreligious poet would be a monster.' + +In his 'Grace before Eating' he reveals his gratitude and conscious +dependence on God: + + O Thou, who kindly dost provide + For every creature's want! + We bless Thee, God of Nature wide, + For all Thy goodness lent. + +In 'Winter: a Dirge' he says, in reverent submission to God's will: + + Thou Power supreme, whose mighty scheme + Those woes of mine fulfil, + Here firm I rest, they must be best, + Because they are Thy Will. + +In a poem to Clarinda he wrote, recognising the blessing of Gods universal +presence, not in awe so much as in joy: + + God is ever present, ever felt, + In the void waste, as in the city full; + And where He vital breathes, there must be joy! + +In the 'Cotter's Saturday Night' he teaches absolute faith in God, and +indicates man's true relationship to the Divine Father: + + Lest in temptation's path ye gang astray, + Implore His counsel and assisting might: + They never sought in vain, that sought the Lord aright. + +Writing in condemnation of a miserably selfish miser, he said: + + See these hands, ne'er stretched to save, + Hands that took, but never gave; + Keeper of Mammon's iron chest, + Lo, there she goes, unpitied and unblest; + She goes, but not to realms of everlasting rest. + + And are they of no more avail, + Ten thousand glittering pounds a year? + In other worlds can Mammon fail, + Omnipotent as he is here? + O, bitter mockery of the pompous bier, + While down the wretched Vital Part is driven! + The cave-lodged beggar, with a conscience clear, + Expires in rags, unknown, and goes to heaven. + +The philosophy of his mind, and the affectionate sympathy of his heart +made Burns believe that unselfish service for our fellow-men should be one +of the manifestations of true religion. + +In the fine poem he wrote to Mrs Dunlop on New Year's Day, 1790, he says: + + A few days may, a few years must, + Repose us in the silent dust. + Then is it wise to damp our bliss? + Yes--all such reasonings are amiss! + The voice of Nature loudly cries, + And many a message from the skies, + That something in us never dies; + That on this frail, uncertain state + Hang matters of eternal weight; + That future life in worlds unknown + Must take its hue from this alone; + Whether as heavenly glory bright, + Or dark as Misery's woeful night. + Let us the important Now employ, + And live as those who never die. + Since, then, my honoured first of friends, + On this poor living all depends. + +Any honest man who reads those lines must admit that Burns was a man of +deep religious thought and feeling. + +Mrs Dunlop, to whom he wrote so many letters, was one of the leading women +of Scotland in her time. She was a woman of great wisdom and deep +religious character. Like the other great people who knew Burns, she was +his friend. Many of his clearest expressions of his religious opinions are +contained in his letters to her. In a letter to her on New Year's morning, +1789, he said: 'I have some favourite flowers in Spring, among which are +the mountain-daisy, the hare-bell, the foxglove, the wild brier-rose, the +budding birk [birch], and the hoary hawthorn, that I view and hang over +with particular delight. I never hear the loud, solitary whistle of the +curlew in the Summer noon, or the wild, mixing cadence of a troop of +grey-plover in an Autumnal morning, without feeling an elevation of soul +like the enthusiasm of Devotion or Poetry. Tell me, my dear friend, to +what can this be owing? Are we a piece of machinery that, like the Æolian +harp, passive, takes the impression of the passing accident? Or do these +workings argue something within us above the trodden clod? I own myself +partial to these proofs of those awful and important realities--a God that +made all things--man's immaterial and immortal nature--and a world of weal +or woe beyond death and the grave--these proofs that we deduct by dint of +our own powers of observation. However respectable Individuals in all ages +have been, I have ever looked on Mankind in the lump to be nothing better +than a foolish, head-strong, credulous, unthinking Mob; and their +universal belief has ever had extremely little weight with me. Still, I am +a very sincere believer in the Bible.' + +In September 1789 he wrote to Mrs Dunlop: 'Religion, my dear friend, is +true comfort! A strong persuasion in a future state of existence; a +proposition so obviously probable, that, setting revelation aside, every +nation and people, so far as investigation has reached, for at least four +thousand years, have, in some mode or other, firmly believed it.' + +To Mrs Dunlop, in 1792, he wrote: 'I am so convinced that an unshaken +faith in the doctrines of religion is not only necessary by making us +better men, but also by making us happier men, that I shall take every +care that your little god-son [his son], and every creature that shall +call me father, shall be taught them.' + +One of his most beautiful religious letters was written to Alexander +Cunningham, of Edinburgh, in 1794: 'Still there are two pillars that bear +us up amid the wreck of misfortune and misery. The _one_ is composed of +the different modifications of a certain noble, stubborn something in man, +known by the names of courage, fortitude, magnanimity. The _other_ is made +up of those feelings and sentiments which, however the sceptic may deny +them, or the enthusiast may disfigure them, are yet, I am convinced, +original and component parts of the human soul; those _senses of the +mind_, if I may be allowed the expression, which connect us with and link +us to, those awful, obscure realities--an all-powerful and equally +beneficent God, and a world to come, beyond death and the grave. The first +gives the nerve of combat, while a ray of hope beams on the field; the +last pours the balm of comfort into the wounds which time can never cure. + +'I do not remember, my dear Cunningham, that you and I ever talked on the +subject of religion at all. I know some who laugh at it, as the trick of +the crafty FEW, to lead the undiscerning MANY; or at most as an uncertain +obscurity, which mankind can never know anything of, and with which they +are fools if they give themselves much to do. Nor would I quarrel with a +man for his irreligion, any more than I would for his want of a musical +ear. I would regret that he was shut out from what, to me and to others, +were such superlative sources of enjoyment. It is in this point of view, +and for this reason, that I will deeply imbue the mind of every child of +mine with religion. If my son should happen to be a man of feeling, +sentiment, and taste, I shall thus add largely to his enjoyments. Let me +flatter myself that this sweet little fellow, who is just now running +about my desk, will be a man of a melting, ardent, glowing heart; and an +imagination, delighted with the painter and rapt with the poet. Let me +figure him wandering out in a sweet evening, to inhale the balmy gales, +and enjoy the glowing luxuriance of the spring; himself the while in the +blooming youth of life. He looks abroad on all Nature, and thro' Nature up +to Nature's God; his soul, by swift delighting degrees, is rapt above this +sublunary sphere, until he can be silent no longer, and bursts out into +the glorious enthusiasm of Thomson: + + '"These, as they change, Almighty Father--these + Are but the varied God; the rolling year + Is full of thee." + +'and so on, in all the spirit and ardour of that charming hymn. + +'These are no ideal pleasures; they are real delights; and I ask what of +the delights among the sons of men are superior, not to say equal, to +them? And they have this precious, vast addition, that conscious Virtue +stamps them for her own, and lays hold on them to bring herself into the +presence of a witnessing, judging, and approving God.' + +In 1788 he wrote to Clarinda: 'My definition of worth is short: truth and +humanity respecting our fellow-creatures; reverence and humility in the +presence of that Being, my Creator and Preserver, and who, I have every +reason to believe, will be my judge.' + +Again to Clarinda he wrote in 1788: 'He who is our Author and Preserver, +and will one day be our Judge, must be--not for His sake in the way of +duty, but from the natural impulse of our hearts--the object of our +reverential awe and grateful adoration. He is almighty and all-bounteous; +we are weak and dependent; hence prayer and every other sort of devotion. +"He is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to +everlasting life;" consequently it must be in every one's power to embrace +His offer of everlasting life; otherwise He could not in justice condemn +those who did not.' + +Again in 1788 he wrote to Clarinda: 'In proportion as we are wrung with +grief, or distracted with anxiety, the ideas of a Compassionate Deity, an +Almighty Protector, are doubly dear.' + +To Mrs Dunlop, in 1795, a year and a half before he died, he wrote: 'I +have nothing to say to any one as to which sect he belongs to, or what +creed he believes; but I look on the man who is firmly persuaded of +Infinite Wisdom and Goodness superintending and directing every +circumstance that can happen in his lot--I felicitate such a man as having +a solid foundation for his mental enjoyment; a firm prop and stay in the +hour of difficulty, trouble, and distress; and a never-failing anchor of +hope when he looks beyond the grave.' + +This quotation emphasises his lifelong faith in God, and his belief in his +own immortality. It also shows his perfect freedom from bigotry, and the +broadness of his creed. + +In his first 'Commonplace Book' he wrote: 'The grand end of Human being is +to cultivate an intercourse with that Being to whom we owe life, with +every enjoyment that renders life delightful; and to maintain an +integritive conduct towards our fellow-creatures; that by so forming Piety +and Virtue into habit, we may be fit members for that society of the +Pious, and the Good, which reason and revelation teach us to expect beyond +the grave.' + +There are no truly good men who will yield to the temptation to speak +sneeringly of any man who fails in his life to reach his highest ideals. +The little-minded men who may sneer at Burns, when they read this +quotation written in his youth, should read his 'Address to the Unco Guid' +over and over, till they get a glimmering comprehension of its meaning. +Whatever the puny minds may be focussed on in the life of Burns, they +should be 'mute at the balance.' They should remember that Burns did more +than any man of his time for true religion, and that to the end of his +life his mind and heart overflowed with the same faith and gratitude to +God that he almost continuously expressed throughout his life. + +A final quotation from the letters of Burns about religion may fittingly +be taken from a letter to Robert Aiken, written in 1786: 'O thou unknown +Power! Thou Almighty God who hast lighted up Reason in my breast, and +blessed me with immortality! I have frequently wandered from that order +and regularity necessary for the perfection of Thy works, yet Thou hast +never left me nor forsaken me.' + +Burns was a reverently religious man. Dean Stanley said: 'Burns was a wise +religious teacher.' Principal Rainy objected to Dean Stanley's view +because 'Burns had never become a member of a church on profession of +Faith in Christ.' Professor Rainy either did not remember, or had never +realised, that Burns had done more to reveal Christ's highest +teachings--the value of the individual soul, and brotherhood--than any +other man in the church, or out of it, in Scotland in his time; and also +did more to make religion free from false theology and dwarfing practices, +than any other man of his time, or of any other time in Scotland. + +Rev. L. MacLean Watt, of Edinburgh, in his most admirable book on Burns, +answers Principal Rainy's objections with supreme ability, as the +following quotations amply prove: 'Because a man does not categorically +declare his belief in Christ, as that belief is formulated in existing +dogmatic statements of theological authority, it does not mean that he +abhors that belief; nor even though he withhold himself from explicitly +uttering that confession of the Christian faith, does it preclude him from +being a religious teacher. A man may have an enormous influence as a +religious teacher, and yet never have made a formal statement of +Christianity, nor signed a Christian creed.'--'The measure of a man's +faithfulness to the better side of his nature is not to be gauged by the +depth of his fall, but the height to which he rises.... Burns was, +unfortunately, confronted by a narrow and self-righteous set, who were +enslaved to doctrine and dogma, rather than to the practice of the +Christian life with charity and humanity of spirit, part and parcel of a +system of petty tyrannies and mean oppressions, the exercise of which made +for exile from the fold, because of the spiritual conceit and sectarian +humbug which created such characters as "Holy Willie," and the "Unco +Guid," with the superior airs of religious security from which they looked +down on all besides.' + +We should test neither the terrible theologians of his time--those men who +attacked Burns and called him irreligious, because he had a clear vision +of a higher, holier religion than the one they preached--nor Burns himself +by the conditions of our own time. It is unjust both to Burns and to his +enemies to do so. + +A comparison of the religious principles of the best Christians in the +world nearly a century and a half after his time will show, however, that +the creed of the present is more--much more--like the creed of Burns than +the creed of the dreadful theologians of his time. The creed of the +religious leaders a century hence will be still more like the creed of +Robert Burns than is the creed of to-day. + +The following creed is taken from the letters of Burns, expressed in his +own language, except the last article, which is found in longer form in +many of his letters, and more nearly in 'The Hermit,' in which he says: + + Let me, O Lord! from life retire, + Unknown each guilty, worldly fire, + Remorse's throb, or loose desire; + And when I die + Let me in this belief expire-- + To God I fly. + + +THE CREED OF ROBERT BURNS. + + 1. Religion should be a simple business, as it equally concerns the + ignorant and the learned, the poor and the rich. + + 2. There is a great and incomprehensible Being to whom I owe my + existence. + + 3. The Creator perfectly understands the being He has made. + + 4. There is a real and eternal distinction between vice and virtue. + + 5. There must be a retributive scene of existence beyond the grave. + + 6. From the sublimity, the excellence, and the purity of His + doctrines and precepts, I believe Jesus Christ came from God. + + 7. Whatever is done to mitigate the woes, or increase the happiness + of humanity, is goodness. + + 8. Whatever injures society or any member of it is iniquity. + + 9. I believe in the immaterial and immortal nature of man. + + 10. I believe in eternal life with God. + +Carlyle expressed regret that 'Burns became involved in the religious +quarrels of his district.' This statement proves that Carlyle failed fully +to comprehend the religious character of Burns. His chivalrous nature was +partly responsible for his entering the battle waged by the 'Auld Lichts' +against his dear friend the Rev. Dr M'Gill of Ayr and Gavin Hamilton of +Mauchline; but his chief reason was his innate determination to free +religion from the evils taught and practised in the name of religion in +his time. He had the soul of a reformer, and the two leading elements in +his soul were Religion and Liberty for the individual. It would have +robbed the world of one of the greatest steps in human progress towards +the Divine made in the eighteenth century, if Burns had failed to be true +to the greatest things in his mind and heart. + +Carlyle had clearly not studied the religious elements in either the poems +or the letters of Burns, or he could not have written his comparison +between Burns and Locke, Milton, and Cervantes, who did in poverty and +unusual difficulties grand work. He asks: 'What, then, had these men which +Burns wanted? Two things; both which, it seems to us, are indispensable +for such men. They had a true religious principle of morals, and a single, +not a double, aim in their activity. They were not self-seekers and +self-worshippers; but seekers and worshippers of something far better than +self. Not personal enjoyment was their object; but a high heroic idea of +Religion, of Patriotism, of Heavenly Wisdom in one form or the other form +ever hovered before them. + +It passes understanding to comprehend how Carlyle could regard Burns as a +'selfish' man, or a man with 'a double aim'--that is, two conflicting and +opposing aims that he wasted his power in trying to harmonise. + +Burns had three great aims: Purer Religion, a just Democracy, and closer +Brotherhood; but these aims are in perfect harmony. + +Carlyle ends the contrast between Burns and his model trio--Locke, Milton, +and Cervantes--by saying of Burns: 'He has no religion; in the shallow +age, where his days were cast, Religion was not discriminated from the New +and Old Light _forms_ of Religion; and was, with these, becoming obsolete +in the minds of men.' + +'The heart not of a mere hot-blooded, popular verse-monger, or poetical +_Restaurateur_, but of a true poet and singer, worthy of the old religions +heroic, had been given him, and he fell in an age, not of heroism and +religion, but of scepticism, selfishness, and triviality, when true +nobleness was little understood, and its place supplied by a hollow, +dissocial, altogether barren and unfruitful principle of Pride.' + +In a just comparison between Burns and the three named by Carlyle, Burns +will need no apologists. Burns, directly in opposition to the statement +of Carlyle, was more vitally religious and less selfish than any of them. +When twenty-one years of age he said, in one of his beautiful love-letters +to Alison Begbie: 'I grasp every creature in the arms of universal +benevolence, and equally participate in the pleasures of the happy, and +sympathise with the miseries of the unfortunate.' This alone proves that +Burns was one of the least selfish men who ever lived. + +As an heroic teacher of vital religion Burns was infinitely greater than +any other man of his time, and has been much more influential since his +time in promoting Christ's ideals than the men named by Carlyle. He was a +fearless hero, and so meets the requirements specified by Carlyle, +because, when he recognised the evils connected with religion in his time, +when true religion was, to use Carlyle's words, 'becoming obsolete,' he +valiantly attacked them, hoping to enable his fellow-men to see the vision +of true religion which his father had given him by his life and teaching. + +There was absolutely no justification for calling Burns a mere +verse-monger. To write such a wild nightmare dream about Scotland's +greatest and most self-less poet was unworthy of one of Scotland's leading +prose-writers. + +It seems almost ludicrous to take notice of the assertion that Burns had +not a high ideal of patriotism, as compared with the three ideal men of +Carlyle--Burns, whose love for Scotland was a sacred feeling, a holy fire +that never ceased to burn. This criticism needs no answer now. + + + + +CHAPTER V. + +BURNS THE DEMOCRAT. + + +No man ever comprehended Christ's ideals regarding democracy more fully +than did Burns. Christ based His teaching of the need of human liberty on +His revelation of the value of the individual soul. Burns clearly +understood Christ's ideals regarding individual freedom, and faithfully +followed Him. + +The message of Coila in 'The Vision' to Burns was: + + Preserve the dignity of man + With soul erect. + +This was the central thought in the work of Burns regarding the freedom of +all mankind: freedom from oppression by other men; freedom from the +bondage imposed on the peasant and the labouring man by customs organised +by so-called 'higher classes'; freedom from the hardship and sorrow of +poverty; freedom for each child to grow under proper conditions of +nourishment, of physical development, and of educational training. + +His whole nature was stirred to dignified indignation and resentment by +class distinctions among men and women who were all created in the image +of God, and who, in accordance with the teaching of Christ, should be +brothers. He despised class distinctions which were made by man, whether +the distinctions were made on the basis of rank or wealth. He was ashamed +of the toadies who reverenced a lord merely because he chanced to be born +a lord, and pitied those who accepted without protest inferiority to men +of wealth. He was so true a democrat that he freely and respectfully +recognised the worth of members of the aristocracy or of the wealthy class +whose ability and high character made them worthy of respect; but he held +in contempt those who assumed superiority simply because of rank or gold. + +One of his most brilliant poems is 'A Man's a Man for a' That.' In it he +gives comprehensive expression to his opinions, based on the fundamental +principle, + + The honest man, though e'er sae poor, + Is King o' men for a' that. + + Is there for honesty poverty, + That hangs his head an' a' that? + + The coward-slave, we pass him by; + We dare be poor for a' that. + + For a' that, an' a' that, + Our toils obscure, an' a' that; + The rank is but the guinea stamp, + The man's the gowd for a' that. gold + + Ye see yon birkie, ca'd a lord, + Wha struts, and stares, an' a' that; + Tho' hundreds worship at his word, + He's but a coof for a' that: blockhead + + For a' that, an' a' that, + His ribband, star, an' a' that; + The man of independent mind + He looks and laughs at a' that. + + A prince can mak a belted knight, + A marquis, duke, an' a' that; + But an honest man's aboon his might, above + Gude faith he maunna fa' that. must not try + + For a' that, an' a' that, + Their dignities an' a' that, + The pith o' sense, an' pride o' worth, + Are higher ranks than a' that. + +Labouring man on farm or in factory, this is your charter. Let this be +your creed. Sing this great democratic hymn at your gatherings--ay, sing +it in your homes with your children, and each time you sing it, it should +kindle some new light in your soul that will bring you new vision of the +greatest fact in connection with human life and duty, that you are alive +to be God's partner, and that while you remain honest, and unselfishly +consider the rights of others, as fully as you consider your own, you are +entitled to stand with kings, because you are an honest man. + +The discussion between Cæsar the aristocratic dog and Luath the cotter's +dog is a fair representation of class conditions in Scotland in the time +of Burns. Cæsar describes the laird's riches, his idleness, his rackèd +rents, and the compulsory services required from the poor tenants; dilates +on the wastefulness in connection with the meals even of the servants in +the homes of the great; and expresses surprise that poor folks could exist +under their trying conditions. + +Luath admits that sometimes the strain on the cotter was very severe: +digging ditches, building dykes with dirty stones, baring a quarry, 'an' +sic like,' as a means of sustaining a lot of ragged children with nothing +but his hand labour. He acknowledges that, when ill or out of work, it +sometimes seems hopeless; but, after all, though past his comprehension, +the poor folks are wonderfully contented, and stately men and clever +women are brought up in their homes. + +Cæsar then expatiates on the contemptuous way the poor are 'huffed, and +cuffed, and disrespecket.' He especially sympathises with the poor on +account of the way tenants are treated by the laird's agents on +rent-day--compelled to submit to their insolence, while they swear and +threaten to seize their property; and concludes that poor folks must be +very wretched. + +Luath replies that, after all, they are not so wretched as he thinks; that +their dearest enjoyments are in their wives and thriving children; that +they often forget their private cares and discuss the affairs of kirk and +state; that Hallowe'en and Christmas celebrations give them grand +opportunities for happiness that make them forget their hardships and +sorrows, and that during these festivals the old folks are so cheery and +the young ones are so frolicsome that he 'for joy has barket wi' them!' +Still, he admits that it is owre true what Cæsar says, and that many +decent, honest folk 'are riven out, baith root and branch, some rascal's +pridefu' greed to quench.' + +Cæsar then describes the reckless way in which the money received from +the poor cotters was wasted at operas, plays, mortgaging, gambling, +masquerading, or taking trips to Calais, Vienna, Versailles, Madrid, or +Italy; and finally to Germany, to some resort where their dissipations may +be overcome by drinking muddy German water. + +Luath is surprised to learn that the money for which the cotters have +toiled so hard should be spent so wastefully; and wishes the gentry would +stay at home and take interest in the sports of their own country, as it +would be so much better for all: laird, tenant, and cotter. He closes by +saying that many of the lairds are not ill-hearted fellows, and asks Cæsar +if there is not a great deal of true pleasure in the lives of the rich. + +Cæsar replies: + + Lord, man, were ye but whyles where I am, + The gentles ye wad ne'er envy them. + +Admitting that they need not starve or work hard through winter's cold or +summer's heat, or suffer in old age from working all day in the wet, he +says: + + But human bodies are sic fools, + For a' their colleges and schools, + That when nae real ills perplex them, + They mak enow themsels to vex them; + An' aye the less they hae to sturt them, + In like proportion less will hurt them. + + A country fellow at the pleugh, + His acres till'd, he's right eneugh; + A country girl at her wheel, + Her dizzens dune, she's unco weel; + But gentlemen, and ladies warst, + Wi' ev'n-down want o' wark are curst. + They loiter, lounging, lank and lazy; + Tho' deil-haet ails them, yet uneasy; + Their days insipid, dull, an' tasteless; + Their nights unquiet, lang, and restless. + An' even their sports, their balls and races, + Their galloping through public places, + There's sic parade, sic pomp an' art, + The joy can scarcely reach the heart. + + The ladies arm-in-arm in clusters, + As great and gracious a' as sisters; + But hear their absent thoughts o' ither, + They're a' run deils and jads thegither. + Whyles, ower the wee bit cup an' plaitie, + They sip the scandal-potion pretty; + Or lee-lang nights, wi' crabbet leuks, + Pore ower the devil's pictured beuks; cards + Stake on a chance a farmer's stackyard, + An' cheat like ony unhanged blackguard. + There's some exceptions, man an' woman; + But this is gentry's life in common. + +Burns was a philosopher, and he knew such conditions were wrong, and that +they should not be allowed to last. They are better, after more than a +century, since Burns became the champion of the poor; but the great +problem, 'Why should ae man better fare, and a' men brothers?' is not +properly answered yet. The wisest among the aristocracy know this, and +admit it, and sincerely hope that the inevitable evolution to juster +conditions and relationships may be brought about by constitutional means, +and not by revolution. + +Professor Dugald Stewart, of Edinburgh University, wrote: 'I recollect +once he told me, when I was admiring a distant prospect in one of our +morning walks, that the sight of so many smoking cottages gave a pleasure +to his mind none could understand who had not witnessed, like himself, the +happiness and the worth which they contained.' + +It was not the unhappiness of the peasantry that stirred the democratic +heart of Burns. It was 'man's inhumanity' to his fellow-men; the +assumption of those belonging to the so-called upper classes that they had +a divine right to hold higher positions than the common people, and that +the poorer people should be contented in the 'station to which God had +called them,' that led Burns to write so ably in favour of democracy. He +recognised no human right to establish stations to which people were +called, and in which they should remain, in spite of their right to fill +any positions for which they had proved their fitness. He could not be so +irreverent or so unreasonable as to believe God could establish the +conditions found all around him, so he claimed the right of every child to +full opportunity for its best development, and to rise honourably to any +position to which it could attain. + +In a letter to Miss Margaret Chalmers, 1788, he wrote: 'What signify the +silly, idle gewgaws of wealth, or the idle trumpery of greatness? When +fellow-partakers of the same nature fear the same God, have the same +benevolence of heart, the same nobleness of soul, the same detestation of +everything dishonest, and the same scorn at everything unworthy--in the +name of common-sense, are they not equals?' + +To Mrs Dunlop he wrote in 1788: 'There are few circumstances, relating to +the unequal distribution of good things of this life, that give me more +vexation (I mean in what I see around me) than the importance the opulent +bestow on their trifling family affairs, compared with the very same +things on the contracted scale of the cottage. Last afternoon I had the +honour to spend an hour or two at a good woman's fireside, where the +planks that composed the floor were decorated with a splendid carpet, and +the gay table sparkled with silver and china. 'Tis now about term-day [a +regular time twice a year was fixed for hiring servants], and there has +been a revolution among those creatures [servants], who, though in +appearance partakers, and equally noble partakers, of the same nature as +Madame, are from time to time--their nerves, sinews, their health, +strength, wisdom, experience, genius, time, nay, a good part of their very +thoughts--sold for months and years, not only to the necessities but the +caprices of the important few. We talked of the insignificant creatures; +nay, notwithstanding their general stupidity and rascality, did some of +the poor devils the honour to commend them. But light be the turf upon his +breast who taught "Reverence thyself!" We looked down on the unpolished +wretches, their impertinent wives, and clouterly brats, as the lordly bull +does on the little, dirty anthill, whose puny inhabitants he crushes in +the carelessness of his ramble, or tosses in the air in the wantonness of +his pride.' + +Such experiences added fuel to the divine purpose in his mind to free a +large portion of his fellow-countrymen from the bonds that had been bound +on their bodies and souls by long years of class presumption and heartless +tyranny, which, till Burns attacked them, had grown more unjust and +contemptuous as generation succeeded generation. + +Burns's reverence for real manhood, a basic principle of true democratic +spirit, is shown in the closing verse of his 'Elegy on Captain Matthew +Henderson': + + Go to your sculptured tombs, ye Great, + In a' the tinsel trash o' state! + But by thy honest turf I'll wait, + Thou man of worth! + And weep the ae best fellow's fate + E'er lay in earth. + +To John Francis Erskine he wrote, 1793: 'Burns was a poor man from birth +and an exciseman from necessity; but--I will say it--the sterling of his +honest worth no poverty could debase, and his independent British mind +oppression might bend, but could not subdue.... Can I look tamely on and +see any machination to wrest from them the birthright of my boys--the +little, independent Britons, in whose veins runs my own blood?... Does +any man tell me that my full efforts can be of no service, and that it +does not belong to my humble station to meddle with the concerns of a +nation? I can tell him that it is on such individuals as I that a nation +has to rest, both for the hand of support and the eye of intelligence. The +uninformed Mob may swell a Nation's bulk, and the titled, tinsel, courtly +throng may be its feathered ornament; but the number of those who are +elevated enough in life to reason and reflect, yet low enough to keep +clear of the venal contagion of a court--these are a nation's strength.' + +He wrote the letter, from which this is an extract, because some +super-loyalists were trying to undermine his reputation on account of his +independence of spirit and his democratic principles, with a view to +having him removed from the paltry position he held as an Excise officer. + +He was proudly, sensitively independent. He inherited his temperamental +characteristics from his mother. He was happier defending others than +working for himself. Writing to the Earl of Eglintoun, he said: 'Mercenary +servility, I trust, I shall ever have as much honest pride as to detest.' + +Writing to Mr Francis Grose, F.S.A., in 1790, about Professor Dugald +Stewart, he said: 'Mr Stewart's principal characteristic is your favourite +feature--that sterling independence of mind which, though every man's +right, so few men have the courage to claim, and fewer still the +magnanimity to support.' + +In 1795, the year before his death, he wrote three poems favourable to the +election of Mr Heron, the Whig candidate. In the first poem he said: + + The independent commoner + Shall be the man for a' that. + +Mrs Riddell, writing of Burns after his death, said: 'His features were +stamped with the hardy character of independence.' + +He was a democrat whose democracy was based on the rock of independence +and a character that 'preserved the dignity of man with soul erect.' + +Burns saw both sides of the ideal of freedom. He hated tyrants, and he +despised those who tamely submitted to tyranny. The inscription on the +Altar to Independence, erected by Mr Heron at Kerroughtree, written by +Burns, reads: + + Thou of an independent mind, + With soul resolv'd, with soul resign'd; + Prepar'd Power's proudest frown to brave, + Who wilt not be, nor have a slave; + Virtue alone who dost revere, + Thy own reproach alone dost fear-- + Approach this shrine, and worship here. + +The man of whom Burns approved was 'one who wilt not _be_ nor _have_ a +slave.' + +In 'Lines Inscribed in a Lady's Pocket Almanac' he says: + + Deal Freedom's sacred treasures free as air, + Till Slave and Despot be but things that were. + +In the 'Lines on the Commemoration of Rodney's Victory' he wrote: + + Be Anarchy cursed, and be Tyranny damned; condemned + And who would to Liberty e'er be disloyal + May his son be a hangman--and he his first trial. + +Burns was a philosopher whose mind had been trained to look at both sides +of a question, and estimate truly their relationships to each other. Even +in one of his beautiful poems to his wife, written after he was married, +'I Hae a Wife o' My Ain,' he wrote: + + I am naebody's lord, + I'll be slave to naebody. + +While Burns was an intense lover of freedom, he had no sympathy with those +who would overturn constituted authority. He wished to achieve the freedom +of the people, but to achieve it by constitutional means. He was a +national volunteer in Dumfries, and he composed a fine patriotic song for +the corps to sing. He revealed his balanced mind in the following lines in +that song: + + The wretch that would a tyrant own, + And the wretch, his true-born brother, + Who would set the mob aboon the throne, above + May they be damned together. + +Burns had as little respect for a king who was a tyrant, as he had for a +tyrant in any other situation in life; but he clearly saw the wicked folly +of allowing mob-rule to be substituted for constitutional authority. + +In the Prologue written to be spoken by an actor on his benefit night, +Burns wrote: + + No hundred-headed Riot here we meet + With decency and law beneath his feet; + Nor Insolence assumes fair Freedom's name. + +Here, again, he records the dominant ideal of his mind through life; but +at the same time he utters a warning against ignorant and wild theorists, +who, in their madness, would overthrow civilisation. + +He overflows again on his favourite theme in the 'Lines on the +Commemoration of Rodney's Victory,' when he was proposing toasts: + + The next in succession I'll give you's the King! + Whoe'er would betray him, on high may he swing! + And here's the grand fabric, the free Constitution, + As built on the base of our great Revolution. + +The love of liberty grew stronger in his heart and in his mind as he grew +older. In his songs, and in his letters, he frequently moralised on +independence of character and the value of liberty. In a letter to the +_Morning Chronicle_ he said, 1795: 'I am a Briton, and must be interested +in the cause of liberty.' + +To Patrick Miller he sent a copy of his poems in 1793, accompanied by a +letter expressing gratitude for his kindness and appreciation of him 'as a +patriot who in a venal, sliding age stands forth the champion of the +liberties of my country.' + +In his love-song, 'Their Groves o' Sweet Myrtle,' he compares the boasted +glories of tropical lands with the beauty of his beloved Scotland, and +boasts in pride of the charms of the + + Lone glen o' green breckan, ferns + Wi' the burn stealing under the lang yellow broom, + +and of the sweetness of + + Yon humble broom bowers, + Where the blue-bell and gowan lurk, lowly, unseen. + +He cannot close the song, however, without claiming that beautiful as are +the 'sweet-scented woodlands' of these foreign countries, they are, after +all, 'the haunt of the tyrant and slave,' and that + + The slave's spicy forests, and gold-bubbling fountains, + The brave Caledonian views wi' disdain; + He wanders as free as the winds of his mountains. + +Burns celebrated the success of the French Revolution in a poem entitled +'The Tree of Liberty.' His heart bled for the peasantry of France, whom +the aristocrats had treated so contemptuously, and with such lack of +consideration, and cruelty. He rejoiced in the overthrow of their +oppressors, and the establishment of a republican form of government. In +this poem he gives credit to Lafayette, the great Frenchman who had gone +to assist the people of the United States in their brave struggle to get +free. He asks blessings on the head of the noble man, Lafayette, in the +verse: + + My blessings aye attend the chiel + Wha pitied Gallia's slaves, man, + And staw a branch, spite o' the deil, stole + Frae yont the western waves, man. + Fair Virtue watered it wi' care, + And now she sees wi' pride, man, + How weel it buds and blossoms there, + Its branches spreading wide, man. + + * * * * * + + A wicked crew syne, on a time, + Did tak a solemn aith, man, oath + It ne'er should flourish to its prime, + I wat they pledged their faith, man. + Awa they gaed, wi' mock parade, + Like beagles hunting game, man, + But soon grew weary o' the trade, + And wished they'd stayed at hame, man. + + Fair Freedom, standing by the tree, + Her sons did loudly ca', man; + She sang a song o' liberty, Marseillaise + Which pleased them ane and a', man. + By her inspired, the new-born race + Soon drew the avenging steel, man; + The hirelings ran--her friends gied chase + And banged the despot weel, man. + + * * * * * + + Wi' plenty o' sic trees, I trow, + The warld would live at peace, man; + The sword would help to mak' a plough; + The din o' war wad cease, man. + +The greatest poem Burns wrote to rejoice at the victorious progress of +humanity towards freedom was his 'Ode to Liberty,' written to express his +supreme gratification at the success of the people of the United States in +their struggle for independence from England. He wrote it, as he wrote +most of his poems during his life in Dumfries, in the moonlight in +Lincluden Abbey ruins, on the Nith River, just outside of Dumfries. He +introduces the ode in a poem named 'A Vision.' + +He tells that, at midnight, while in the ruins, he saw in the roofless +tower of the abbey, a vision: + + By heedless chance I turned my eyes, + And, by the moonbeam, shook to see + A stern and stalwart ghaist arise, ghost + Attired as minstrels wont to be. + + Had I a statue been o' stane, + His daring look had daunted me; + And on his bonnet graved was plain, + The sacred posy, 'Libertie.' + + And frae his harp sic strains did flow + Might rouse the slumbering dead to hear; + But oh! it was a tale of woe, + As ever met a Briton's ear! + +The ghost tells the story of the tyranny England exercised over the people +of the United States, and of the breaking of the tyrant's chains. Burns +had no more respect for despotism by an English king than he had for the +despotism of a tyrant in any other land. He knew the people of the +American colonies were right. England's greatest statesman, Pitt, had +said so, when the colonists, driven to desperation, rebelled; so the +ghost's revelation should be to a liberty-loving Briton's ear 'a tale of +woe.' + +The ode begins: + + No Spartan tube, no Attic shell, + No lyre Æolian I awake; + 'Tis liberty's bold note I swell; + Thy harp, Columbia, let me take! + See gathering thousands, while I sing, + A broken chain exultant bring, + And dash it in the tyrant's face, + And dare him to his very beard, + And tell him he no more is feared-- + No more the despot of Columbia's race! + A tyrant's proudest insults braved, + They shout--a People freed! They hail an Empire saved. + + * * * * * + + But come, ye sons of Liberty, + Columbia's offspring, brave and free. + In danger's hour still flaming in the van, + Ye know and dare maintain 'the Royalty of Man.' + +So the poem proceeds, till he appeals to King Alfred, and finally to +Caledonia: + + Alfred! on thy starry throne, + Surrounded by the tuneful choir, + The bards that erst have struck the patriotic lyre, + And rous'd the freeborn Briton's soul of fire, + No more thy England own! + Dare injured nations form the great design, + To make detested tyrants bleed? + Thy England execrates the glorious deed! + Beneath her hostile banners waving, + Every pang of honour braving, + England, in thunder calls, 'The tyrant's cause is mine!' + That hour accurst how did the fiends rejoice, + And hell, through all her confines, raise the exulting voice! + That hour which saw the generous English name + Linkt with such damned deeds of everlasting shame! + + Thee, Caledonia! thy wild heaths among, + Fam'd for the martial deed, the heaven-taught song, + To thee I turn with swimming eyes; + Where is that soul of Freedom fled? + Immingled with the mighty dead, + Beneath that hallow'd turf where Wallace lies! + Hear it not, Wallace! in thy bed of death. + Ye babbling winds! in silence sweep, + Disturb not ye the hero's sleep, + Nor give the coward secret breath. + Is this the ancient Caledonian form, + Firm as the rock, resistless as the storm? + +He loved to stir the liberty-loving spirit of his beloved Caledonia, so to +her sons he makes the final appeal in his great ode. He wrote in a similar +strain in the Prologue written for his friend Woods, the actor: + + O Thou dread Power! whose empire-giving hand + Has oft been stretched to shield the honoured land! + Strong may she glow with all her ancient fire! + May every son be worthy of his sire! + Firm may she rise with generous disdain + At Tyranny's, or direr Pleasure's, chain; + Still self-dependent in her native shore, + Bold may she brave grim Danger's loudest roar, + Till fate the curtain drop on worlds to be no more. + +He reached the highest degree of patriotic fervour, and his clearest call, +not only to Scotsmen, but to all true men, to be ready to do their duty +for justice and liberty, in 'Bruce's Address at Bannockburn.' + +In a letter to the Earl of Buchan, 1794, enclosing a copy of this poem, he +wrote: 'Independent of my enthusiasm as a Scotsman, I have rarely met with +anything in history which interests my feelings as a man equal with the +story of Bannockburn. On the one hand a cruel, but able, usurper, leading +on the finest army in Europe, to extinguish the last spark of freedom +among a greatly daring and greatly injured people; on the other hand, the +desperate relics of a gallant nation, devoting themselves to rescue their +bleeding country or perish with her. Liberty! thou art a prize truly and +indeed invaluable, for never canst thou be too dearly bought.' + + Scots, wha hae wi' Wallace bled, + Scots, wham Bruce has aften led, + Welcome to your gory bed, + Or to Victorie! + Now's the day and now's the hour; + See the front o' battle lour! + See approach proud Edward's power-- + Chains and slaverie! + + Wha will be a traitor knave? + Wha can fill a coward's grave? + Wha sae base as be a slave? + Let him turn and flee! + Wha for Scotland's King and Law, + Freedom's sword will strongly draw, + Free-Man stand, or Free-Man fa'? + Let him follow me! + + By Oppression's woes and pains! + By your Sons in servile chains! + We will drain our dearest veins, + But they _shall_ be free! + Lay the proud Usurpers low! + Tyrants fall in every foe! + Liberty's in every blow! + Let us Do--or Die. + + 'So may God ever defend the cause of Truth and Liberty as he did + that day. + + 'ROBERT BURNS.' + +Because he was so outspoken in regard to democracy, some men assumed he +was not a loyal man. The truth is, that he always loved his country, but +he ardently desired to improve the conditions of the great body of his +countrymen. Complaints were made about his disloyalty to the Excise +commissioners under whom he worked. These complaints were investigated, +and Burns was found to be a loyal man. + +When the call came from the Government for volunteers, Burns joined the +Dumfries Volunteers. In his great song composed for these volunteers he +strongly expresses his loyalty, both to his country and to his king, in +the following quotations: + + We'll ne'er permit a foreign foe + On British ground to rally. + + Be Britain still to Britain true, + Amang oursels united; + For never but by British hands + Maun British wrangs be righted. must + + Who will not sing 'God save the King,' + Shall hang as high's the steeple! + But while we sing 'God save the King,' + We'll ne'er forget the people. + +To Robert Graham of Fintry, 1792, he wrote: 'To the British Constitution +on revolution principles, next after my God, I am most devoutly +attached.' + +Again, a month later, he wrote to Mr Graham: 'I never uttered any +invectives against the King. His private worth it is altogether impossible +that such a man as I can appreciate; but in his public capacity I always +revered, and always will, with the soundest loyalty, revere the Monarch of +Great Britain as (to speak in Masonic) the sacred Keystone of our Royal +Arch Constitution. As to reform principles, I look upon the British +Constitution, as settled at the Revolution, to be the most glorious +Constitution on earth, or that perhaps the wit of man can frame. + + * * * * * + +'I never dictated to, corresponded with, or had the least connection with, +any political association whatever--except that when the magistrates and +principal inhabitants of Dumfries met to declare their attachment to the +Constitution, and their abhorrence of riot.' + +He had strong desires to effect many reforms in public life, but he was an +intelligent believer in the British Constitution, and had no faith in any +method of achieving reforms in the Empire except by constitutional +measures. He was a radical reformer with a grand mental balance-wheel; and +such reformers make the best type of citizens, ardent reformers with cool +heads and unselfish hearts. + +Carlyle strangely misunderstood the spirit of democracy in Burns, although +he justly wrote, long after the poet's death: 'He appears not only as a +true British poet, but as one of the most considerable British men of the +eighteenth century.' + +What were the achievements, in addition to his poetic power, that made +Burns 'one of the most considerable men of the eighteenth century?' Mainly +the work he did to develop in the souls of men a consciousness of +fundamental principles of democracy, and higher ideals of vital religion; +yet Carlyle does not approve of his efforts to reform either social or +religious conditions. As the centuries pass, the work of Burns for +Religion, Democracy, and Brotherhood will be recognised as his greatest +work for humanity. + +Carlyle's belief was that Burns wrote about the wrongs of the oppressed +because he could not become rich. In that belief he was clearly in error. +The love of freedom, justice, and independence was a basic passion in the +character of Burns. The anxiety of Burns regarding money was not for +himself, but for his family in case he should die. Several times he +referred to this in letters to his most intimate friends. + + + + +CHAPTER VI. + +BURNS AND BROTHERHOOD. + + +In the third letter Burns wrote Alison Begbie, the first woman he asked to +marry him, he said: 'I grasp every creature in the arms of Universal +Benevolence, and equally participate in the pleasures of the happy, and +sympathise with the miseries of the unfortunate.' + +This statement of one of the fundamental principles which guided him +during his whole life is a profound interpretation of the teachings of +Christ in regard to the attitude that each individual should have, must +have, in order that brotherhood may be established on the earth. He taught +universal benevolence and vital sympathy _with_--not _for_--humanity; not +merely when sorrows and afflictions bring dark clouds to hearts, but in +times of happiness and rejoicing; affectionate sympathy, unostentatious +sympathy, co-operative sympathy that stimulates helpfulness and +hopefulness; sympathy that produces activity of the divine in the human +heart and mind, and leads to brotherhood. + +The amazing fact is, not that Burns wrote such fundamental Christian +philosophy in a love-letter, but that a youth of twenty-one could think it +and express it so perfectly. + +To Clarinda he wrote, 1787: 'Lord! why was I born to see misery which I +cannot relieve?' + +Again, in 1788, he wrote to her: 'Give me to feel "another's woe," and +continue with me that dear-loved friend that feels with mine.' + +To Mrs Walter Riddell he wrote, 1793: 'Of all the qualities we assign to +the Author and Director of Nature, by far the most enviable is to be able +"to wipe away all tears from all eyes." O what insignificant, sordid +wretches are they, however chance may have loaded them with wealth, who go +to their graves, to their magnificent mausoleums, with hardly the +consciousness of having made one poor, honest heart happy.' + +In 'A Winter Night,' the great poem of universal sympathy, he says: + + Affliction's sons are brothers in distress; + A brother to relieve, how exquisite the bliss. + +He closes the poem with four great lines: + + But deep this truth impressed my mind-- + Thro' all His works abroad, + The heart benevolent and kind + The most resembles God. + +In the same poem he paints the characters who lack loving sympathy, and +whose lives and attitudes towards their fellow-men separate men, and break +the ties that should unite all men, and thus prevent the development of +the spirit of brotherhood. After describing the fierceness of the storm +and expressing his heartfelt sympathy for the cattle, the sheep, the +birds, and even with destructive animals such as prey on hen-roosts or +defenceless lambs, his mind was filled with a plaintive strain, as he +thought of the bitterness of man to his brother man, and he proceeds: + + Blow, blow, ye winds, with heavier gust! + And freeze, thou bitter-biting frost! + Descend, ye chilly, smothering snows! + Not all your rage, as now united, shows + More hard unkindness, unrelenting, + Vengeful malice unrepenting, + Than heaven-illumined man on brother man bestows. + +The depth and universality of his sympathy is shown in 'To a Mouse,' after +he had destroyed its nest while ploughing: + + I'm truly sorry man's dominion + Has broken Nature's social union, + An' justifies that ill opinion + Which makes thee startle + At me, thy poor earth-born companion, + An' fellow-mortal! + +In his 'Epistle to Davie,' a brother poet, he emphasises the value of true +sympathy, that should bind all hearts, must yet bind all hearts in +universal brotherhood, when he says: + + All hail! ye tender feelings dear! + The smile of love, the friendly tear, + The sympathetic glow! + Long since, this world's thorny ways + Had numbered out my weary days, + Had it not been for you. + +In his 'Epistle to Robert Graham of Fintry,' after describing the thrifty +but selfishly prudent, 'who feel by reason and who give by rule,' and +expressing regret that 'the friendly e'er should want a friend,' he +writes: + + But come ye, who the godlike pleasure know, + Heaven's attribute distinguished--to bestow! + Whose arms of love would grasp the human race. + +In the opinion of Burns, they are the ideal men and women who best +understood, and most perfectly practised, the teaching of Christ. + +In one of his epistles to his friend Lapraik he says: + + For thus the royal mandate ran, + When first the human race began: + The social, friendly, honest man, + Whate'er he be-- + 'Tis _he_ fulfils great Nature's plan, + And none but he. + +The influence of any act on society, on the brotherhood of man as a whole, +was the supreme test of Burns to distinguish between goodness and evil. + +To Dr Moore, of London, he said: 'Whatsoever is not detrimental to +society, and is of positive enjoyment, is of God, the giver of all good +things, and ought to be received and enjoyed by His creatures with +thankful delight.' + +To Clarinda he wrote: 'Thou Almighty Author of peace, and goodness, and +love! Do thou give me the social heart that kindly tastes of every man's +cup! Is it a draught of joy? Warm and open my heart to share it with +cordial, unenvying rejoicing! Is it the bitter potion of sorrow? Melt my +heart with sincerely sympathetic woe! Above all, do Thou give me the manly +mind, that resolutely exemplifies in life and manners those sentiments +which I would wish to be thought to possess.' + +In 'On the Seas and Far Away' he says: + + Peace, thy olive wand extend, + And bid wild war his ravage end; + Man with brother man to meet, + And as a brother kindly greet. + +In the 'Tree of Liberty' he says, if we had plenty of the trees of Liberty +growing throughout the whole world: + + Like brothers in a common cause + We'd on each other smile, man; + And equal rights and equal laws + Wad gladden ev'ry isle, man. + +To Clarinda, when he presented a pair of wine-glasses--a perfectly proper +gift to a lady in the opinion of his time--he gave her at the same time a +poem, in which he said: + + And fill them high with generous juice, + As generous as your mind; + And pledge them to the generous toast, + 'The whole of human kind!' + +In his 'Epistle to John Lapraik,' after describing those whose lives do +not help men towards brotherhood, he describes those who are true to the +great ideal: + + But ye whom social pleasure charms, + Whose hearts the tide of kindness warms, + Who hold your being on the terms, + 'Each aid the others,' + Come to my bowl, come to my arms, + My friends, my brothers. + +Burns gives each man the true test of the influence of his life for the +promotion of true brotherhood in the short line, 'Each aid the others.' +That line is the supreme test of duty, and is the highest interpretation +of Christ's commandment to His disciples, and through them to all men, +'Love one another, as I have loved you.' Vital love means vital +helpfulness. + +Dickens gives the same great message as Burns when, in describing Little +Dorritt, he says: 'She was something different from the rest, and she was +that something for the rest.' This is probably the shortest sentence ever +written that conveys so clearly the two great revelations of Christ: +Individuality and Brotherhood. + +There are some who dislike the expression 'Come to my bowl.' They should +test Burns by the accepted standards of his time, not by the standards of +our time. The bowl was the symbol of true comradeship in castle and cot, +in the manse and in the layman's home, in the time of Burns. + +No other writer has interpreted Christ's revelations of Democracy and +Brotherhood so clearly and so fully as Robert Burns. He sums up the whole +matter of man's relationship to man in 'A Man's a Man for a' That,' in the +last verse: + + Then let us pray that come it may-- + As come it will for a' that-- + That sense and worth, o'er a' the earth, + Shall bear the gree, an' a' that. pre-eminence + For a' that, an' a' that, + It's coming yet, for a' that, + That man to man the world o'er, + Shall brothers be for a' that. + +He revealed his supreme purpose in 'A Revolutionary Lyric': + + In virtue trained, enlightened youth + Will love each fellow-creature; + And future years shall prove the truth-- + That man is good by nature. + + The golden age will then revive; + Each man will love his brother; + In harmony we all shall live, + And share the earth together. + +While the so-called religious teachers of the time of Burns were dividing +men into creeds based on petty theological distinctions, Burns was +interpreting for humanity the highest teachings of Christ: Democracy based +on recognition of the value of the individual soul, and Brotherhood as the +natural fruit of true democracy. + + + + +CHAPTER VII. + +BURNS A REVEALER OF PURE LOVE. + + +Many people yet believe that Burns was a universal and inconstant lover. +He really did not love many women. He loved deeply, but he had not a great +many really serious experiences of love. He loved Nellie Kirkpatrick when +he was fifteen, and Peggy Thomson when he was seventeen. He says his love +of Nellie made him a poet. There is no other experience that will kindle +the strongest element in a human soul during the adolescent period so +fully, and so permanently, as genuine love. Love will not make all young +people poets, but it will kindle with its most developing glow whatever is +the strongest natural power in each individual soul. Parents should foster +such love in young people during the adolescent period, instead of +ridiculing it, as is too often done. God may not mean that the love is to +be permanent, but there is no other agency that can be so productive at +the time of adolescence as love that is reverenced by parents who, by due +reverence, sympathy, and comradeship, help love to do its best work. + +These two adolescent loves did their work in developing Burns, but they +were not loves of maturity. From seventeen till he was twenty-one he was +not really in love. Then he met, and deeply and reverently loved, Alison +Begbie. She was a servant girl of charm, sweetness, and dignity, in a home +not far from Lochlea farm. He wrote three poems to her: 'The Lass o' +Cessnock Banks,' 'Peggy Alison,' and 'Mary Morrison.' He reversed her name +for the second title, because it possessed neither the elements of metre +nor of rhyme. He gave his third poem to her the title 'Mary Morrison' to +make it conform to the same metre as 'Peggy Alison.' There was a Mary +Morrison who was nine years of age when Burns wrote 'Mary Morrison.' She +is buried in Mauchline Churchyard, and on her tombstone it is stated that +she was 'the Mary Morrison of Burns.' His brother Gilbert knew better. He +said the poem was written to the lady to whom 'Peggy Alison' was written. +It is impossible to believe that Burns would write 'Mary Morrison' to a +child only nine years old. + +Burns wrote five love-letters to Alison Begbie. Beautiful and reverent +letters they were, too. In the fourth, he asked her to become his wife. In +Chapter III. it has been explained that he was too shy, even at +twenty-two, to ask the woman whom he loved to marry him when he was with +her. This does not indicate that he had a new love each week, as many yet +believe. Miss Begbie refused to marry him, and his reply should win him +the respect of every reasonable man or woman who reads it. It is the +dignified and reverent outpouring of a loving heart, held in control by a +well-balanced and considerate mind. + +Although Burns had no lover from seventeen to twenty-one years of age, he +wrote love-songs during those years, but even his mother could not tell +the name of any young woman who kindled his muse during these four years. +Neither could the other members of his family. + +He wrote one poem, 'My Nannie O,' during this period. He first wrote for +the first line: + + Beyond the hills where Stinchar flows. + +He did not like the word 'Stinchar,' so he changed it to 'Lugar,' a much +more euphonious word. He had no lover named 'Nannie.' Lugar and Stinchar +were several miles apart. He was really writing about love, not the love +of any one woman, during those four years; and he was writing about other +great subjects more than about love, mainly religious and ethical ideals. + +From the age of twenty-two he was for three years without a lover. At +twenty-five he met Jean Armour, then eighteen. Jean spoke first to the +respectfully shy man. At the annual dance on Fair night in Mauchline, +Burns was one of the young men who were present. His dog, Luath, who loved +him, and whom he loved in return, traced his master upstairs to the dance +hall. Of course the dance was interrupted when Luath got on the floor and +found his master. Burns kindly led the dog out, and as he was going he +said, 'I wish I could find a lassie to loe me as well as my dog.' A short +time afterwards Burns was going along a street in Mauchline, and was +passing Jean Armour without speaking to her, because he had not been +introduced to her. She was at the village pump getting water to sprinkle +her clothes on the village green, and as he was passing her she asked, +'Hae you found a lassie yet to loe you as well as your dog?' Burns then +stopped and conversed with her. She was a handsome, bright young woman. +Their acquaintance soon developed a strong love between them, and resulted +in a test of the real manhood of the character of Burns. When he realised +that Jean was to become a mother, he did not hesitate as to his duty. He +gave her a legal certificate of marriage, signed by himself and regularly +witnessed, which was as valid as a marriage certificate of a clergyman or +a magistrate in Scottish law. + +Jean's father compelled her to destroy, or let him destroy, the +certificate. This, and her father's threatened legal prosecution, nearly +upset the mind of Burns. He undoubtedly loved Jean Armour. In a letter +written at the time to David Brice, a friend in Glasgow, he wrote: 'Never +man loved, or rather adored, a woman more than I did her; and, to confess +a truth between you and me, I do still love her to distraction after +all.... May Almighty God forgive her ingratitude and perjury to me, as I +from my very soul forgive her; and may His grace be with her, and bless +her in all her future life.' + +He had arranged to leave Scotland for Jamaica to escape from his mental +torture, when two things came into his life: Mary Campbell, and the +suggestion that he should publish his poems. The first filled his heart, +the second gave him the best tonic for his mind--deeply and joyously +interesting occupation. + +Mary Campbell, 'Highland Mary,' he had met when she was a nursemaid in the +home of his friend Gavin Hamilton. Meeting her again, when she was a +servant in Montgomery Castle, he became acquainted with her, and they soon +loved each other. It is not remarkable that Burns should love Mary +Campbell, because she was a winsome, quiet, refined young woman, and his +heart was desolate at the loss of Jean Armour. He, at the time he made +love to Mary, had no hope of reconciliation with Jean. The greater his +love for Jean had been, and still was, the greater his need was for +another love to fill his heart, and he found a pure and satisfying lover +in Mary. Their love was deep and short, lasting only about two months. Two +busy months they were, as Burns was preparing his poems for the Kilmarnock +edition, till he and Mary agreed to be married. They parted for the last +time on 14th May 1785. The day was Sunday. They spent the afternoon in the +fine park of Montgomery Castle, through which the Fail River runs for a +mile and a half. In the evening they went out of the grounds about half a +mile to Failford, a little village at the junction of the Fail with the +Ayr. The Fail runs parallel to the Ayr, and in the opposite direction +after leaving the castle grounds, until it reaches Failford. There it +meets a solid rock formation, which compels it to turn squarely to the +right and flow into the Ayr, about three hundred yards away. At a narrow +place where the Fail had cut a passage through the soft rock on its way to +the Ayr, Burns and Highland Mary parted. He stood on one side of the river +and Mary on the other, and after they had exchanged Bibles, they made +their vows of intention to marry, he holding one side of an open Bible and +she the other side. Mary went home to prepare for her marriage, but a +relative in Greenock fell ill with malignant fever, and Mary went to nurse +him, and caught the fever herself and died. + +The poems he wrote to her and about her made her a renowned character. +When in 1919 a shipbuilding company at Greenock, after a four years' +struggle, finally purchased the church and churchyard in which Mary was +buried, with the intention of removing the bodies to another place, the +British Parliament passed an Act providing that her monument must stand +forever over her grave, where it had always stood.[4] Though she held a +humble position, the beautiful poems of her lover gave her an honoured +place in the hearts of millions of people all over the world. + +Burns did not go to Jamaica, although he had secured a berth on a ship to +take him to that beautiful island. Calls came to him just in time to +publish an edition of his poems in Edinburgh. He answered the calls, +startled and delighted Edinburgh society, published his poems, and met +Clarinda. + +Mrs M'Lehose was a cultured and charming grass-widow. She had been courted +and married by a wealthy young man in Glasgow when she was only seventeen +years of age. Though a lady of the highest character, on the advice of +relatives and friends she left her husband. He then went to Jamaica. + +Burns and Mrs M'Lehose mutually admired each other when they met, and +their friendship quickly developed into affection. Under the names of +Sylvander and Clarinda they conducted a love correspondence which will +probably always remain the finest love correspondence of the ages. +Clarinda was a religious and cultured woman; Burns was a religious and +cultured man, so their letters of love are on a high plane. Clarinda wrote +very good poems as well as good prose, and Burns wrote some of his best +poems to Clarinda. His parting song to Clarinda is, in the opinion of many +literary men, the greatest love-song of its kind ever written. Those who +study the Clarinda correspondence will find not only love, but many +interesting philosophical discussions regarding religion and human life. + +Thus ends the record of his real loves, notwithstanding the outrageous +misstatements that his loves extended, according to one writer, to nearly +four hundred. He had just four deep and serious loves, not counting the +two deep and transforming affections of his adolescent period for Nellie +Kirkpatrick and Peggy Thomson. He loved four women: Alison Begbie, Jean +Armour, Mary Campbell, and Mrs M'Lehose. At the age of twenty-one he loved +Alison Begbie, and, when twenty-two, he asked her to marry him. She +declined his proposal. He was too shy to propose to her when he was with +her. Get this undoubted fact into your consciousness, and think about it +fairly and reasonably, and it will help you to get a truer vision of the +real Burns. Read the proposal and his subsequent letter on pages 51-55, +and your mind should form juster conceptions of Burns as a lover and as a +man. You will find it harder to be misled by the foolish or the malicious +misrepresentations that have too long passed as facts concerning him as a +lover. + +From twenty-two to twenty-five he had no lover; then he loved and married +Jean Armour. No act of his prevented that marriage-contract remaining in +force. When her father forced the destruction of the contract, and much +against his will, and in defiance of the love of his heart, he found that +he had lost his wife beyond any reasonable hope of reconciliation and +reunion, and was therefore free to love another, he loved Mary Campbell, +and honourably proposed marriage to her. She accepted his offer, but died +soon after. He was untrue to no one when he took Clarinda into his heart. +Of course he could not ask her to marry him, as she was already married. + +The first three women he loved after he reached the age of twenty-one +years were Alison Begbie, Jean Armour, and Mary Campbell. The first +refused his offer; he married the second, and was forced into freedom by +her father; the third accepted his offer of marriage, but died before they +could be married. The fourth woman whom he loved loved him, but could not +marry him, a fact recognised by both of them. There is not a shadow of +evidence of inconstancy or unfaithfulness on his part in the eight years +during which he loved the four women--the only four he did love after he +became a man. + +It may be answered that Burns was not loyal to Jean Armour because he +loved Mary Campbell and Clarinda after he was married to Jean. Burns +absolutely believed that his marriage to Jean was annulled by the burning +of the marriage certificate. He would not have pledged matrimony with Mary +Campbell if he had known that Jean was still his wife. When Mary died, and +he found Jean's father was willing that he might again marry Jean, he did +marry her in Gavin Hamilton's home. In writing to Clarinda he forgot +himself for a moment and spoke disrespectfully of Jean, but his prompt and +honourable action in marrying her soon after showed him to be a true man. + +It should ever be remembered that Burns was in no sense a fickle lover. To +each of the three women whom he loved, his love was reverent and true. He +had a reverent affection for Alison Begbie after she refused him; he loved +Jean Armour after she allowed their marriage-certificate to be destroyed; +and he loved Mary Campbell, not only till she died, but to the end of his +life. The fact that he sat out in the stackyard on Ellisland farm through +the long moonlit night, with tears flowing down his cheeks, on the third +anniversary of her death, and wrote 'To Mary in Heaven,' proves the depth +and permanency of his love. + +In 'My Eppie Adair' he says: + + By love and by beauty, by law and by duty, + I swear to be true to my Eppie Adair. + +In these lines Burns truly defines his own type of love. + +It is true that Miss Margaret Chalmers told the poet Campbell, after Burns +died, that he had asked her to marry him. His letters to her are letters +of deep friendship--reverent friendship--not love. It is true that the +last poem he ever wrote was written to Margaret Chalmers, and that in it +he said: + + Full well thou knowest I love thee, dear. + +But it must be remembered that Burns had been married to Jean and living +happily with her for eight years, so the love of this line was not the +love that is expected to lead to marriage, but an expression of reverent +affection. The whole tenor of this last poem of his life indicates that +he thought her feeling for him was cooling, and his deep affectionate +friendship urged him to plead with her for a continuance of their +long-existing and quite unusual relationship. + +Many people will doubtless say, 'What about Chloris?' Chloris was his name +for Jean Lorimer, the daughter of a friend of his who dwelt near him when +he lived on Ellisland farm after his second marriage to Jean Armour. +Chloris was a sweet singer and player, who frequently visited Mrs Burns, +and who sang for Burns, sometimes, with Mrs Burns the grand old Scottish +airs that had long been sung to words that were not pure, and to which he +was writing new and pure words nearly every day. A number of these songs +were addressed to Chloris, but in a book of his poems presented to Miss +Lorimer he states clearly that the love he appeared to be expressing for +her was an assumed, or, as he called it, a 'fictitious,' and not a real +love. + +When Burns had earned five hundred pounds by the sale of the Edinburgh +edition of his poems, he decided 'that he had the responsibility for the +temporal and possibly the eternal welfare of a dearly loved +fellow-creature;' so again giving proof of his honest manhood and +recognising his plain duty, he married Jean Armour a second time, in the +home of his dear friend Gavin Hamilton. Of the first three women whom he +loved one refused him, one died after their sacred engagement, and the +third he married twice. The fourth and last woman that he loved could not +marry. + +Any one of the first three would have made him a good wife, but no one +could have been more considerate or more faithful than the one he married. + +Could any reasonable man believe that if Burns had really loved other +women, as he loved Alison Begbie, Jean Armour, Mary Campbell, and Mrs +M'Lehose, the names of the other women would not have been known by the +world? He never tried to hide his love. He wrote songs of love with other +names attached to them, used for variety. In a letter to a friend he +regretted the use of 'Chloris' in several of his Ellisland and Dumfries +poems, and to her directly he said they were 'fictitious' or assumed +expressions of love. Notwithstanding the foolish or malicious statements +that Burns had many lovers, he had but four real loves. One would have +been his limit if the first had accepted him and lived as long as he did. + +It has been said that 'the love of Burns was the love of the flesh.' It +is worth while to examine the love-songs of Burns to learn what elements +of thought and feeling dominated his mind and heart. He wrote two hundred +and fifty love-songs, and only three or four contain indelicate +references; even these were not considered improper in his time. + +What were the themes of his love-songs? What were the symbols that he used +to typify love? There is no beauty or delight in Nature on earth or sky +that he did not use as a symbol of true love. He saw God through Nature as +few men ever saw Him, and he therefore naturally used the beauty and +sweetness and glory of Nature to help to reveal the beauty and sweetness +and glory of love, the element of the Divine that thrilled him with the +deepest joy and the highest reverence. + +In his first poem, written when he was fifteen, describing his +fourteen-year-old sweetheart, he says: + + A bonnie lass, I will confess, + Is pleasant to the e'e; + But without some better qualities, + She's no a lass for me. + + * * * * + + But it's innocence and modesty + That polishes the dart. + + 'Tis this in Nelly pleases me, + 'Tis this enchants my soul; + For absolutely in my breast + She reigns without control. + +Of Peggy Thomson, his second love, he wrote: + + Not vernal showers to budding flowers, + Not autumn to the farmer, + So dear can be as thou to me, + My fair, my lovely charmer. + +Of Alison Begbie he wrote in 'The Lass o' Cessnock Banks': + + But it's not her air, her form, her face, + Tho' matching beauty's fabled queen; + 'Tis the mind that shines in ev'ry grace, + And chiefly in her rogueish een. + +In 'Young Peggy Blooms' he describes her: + + Young Peggy blooms our bonniest lass, + Her blush is like the morning, + The rosy dawn, the springing grass + With early gems adorning. + Her eyes outshine the radiant beams + That gild the passing shower, + And glitter o'er the crystal streams, + And cheer each fresh'ning flower. + +In 'Will Ye Go to the Indies, My Mary?' he says: + + O sweet grows the lime and the orange, + And the apple o' the pine; + But a' the charms o' the Indies + Can never equal thine. + +The following are emblems of beauty in the 'Lass o' Ballochmyle': + + On every blade the pearls hang. + + Her look was like the morning's eye, + Her air like Nature's vernal smile. + + Fair is the morn in flowery May, + And sweet is night in autumn mild. + +Describing 'My Nannie O' he says: + + Her face is fair, her heart is true; + As spotless as she's bonnie, O; + The opening gowan, wat wi' dew, daisy + Nae purer is than Nannie O. + +In 'The Birks [birches] of Aberfeldy' he speaks to his lover of 'Summer +blinking on flowery braes' and 'Playing o'er the crystal streamlets;' and +the 'Blythe singing o' the little birdies' and 'The braes o'erhung wi' +fragrant woods' and 'The hoary cliffs crowned wi' flowers;' and 'The +streamlet pouring over a waterfall.' Love and Nature were united in his +heart. + +In 'Blythe was She' he describes the lady by saying she was like beautiful +things: + + Her looks were like a flower in May. + + Her smile was like a simmer morn; + + Her bonnie face it was as meek + As any lamb upon a lea; + +and the 'ev'ning sun.' + +Her step was + + As light's a bird upon a thorn. + +He wrote 'O' a' the Airts the Wind can Blaw' about Jean Armour after they +were married, while he was building their home on Ellisland. He says in +this exquisite song: + + By day and night my fancy's flight + Is ever wi' my Jean. + + I see her in the dewy flowers, + I see her sweet and fair; + I hear her in the tunefu' birds, + I hear her charm the air: + There's not a bonnie flower that springs + By fountain, shaw, or green; woodland + There's not a bonnie bird that sings, + But minds me o' my Jean. + +To Jean he wrote again: + + It is na, Jean, thy bonnie face, + Nor shape that I admire; + Although thy beauty and thy grace + Might weel awake desire. + Something in ilka part o' thee + To praise, to love, I find; + But dear as is thy form to me, + Still dearer is thy mind. + +In 'Delia--an Ode,' he uses the 'fair face of orient day,' and 'the tints +of the opening rose' to suggest her beauty, and 'the lark's wild warbled +lay' and the 'sweet sound of the tinkling rill' to suggest the sweetness +of her voice. + +In 'I Gaed a Waefu' Gate Yestreen' he says: + + She talked, she smiled, my heart she wiled; + She charmed my _soul_, I wist na how. + +It was the soul of Burns that responded to love. Neither Alison Begbie nor +Mary Campbell excelled in beauty, and no one acquainted with their high +character could have had the temerity to suggest that love for them was +'the love of the flesh.' His beautiful poems to Jean Armour place his love +for her on a high plane. He was a man of strong passion, but passion was +not the source of his love. + +In 'Aye sae Bonnie, Blythe and Gay' he says: + + She's aye sae neat, sae trim, sae light, the graces round her hover, + Ae look deprived me o' my heart, and I became her lover + +'Ilka bird sang o' its love' he makes Miss Kennedy say in 'The Banks o' +Doon.' As the birds ever sang love to Burns, he naturally makes them sing +love to all hearts. + +In 'The Bonnie Wee Thing' he gives high qualifications for love kindling: + + Wit, and grace, and love, and beauty + In ae constellation shine; + To adore thee is my duty, + Goddess o' this soul o' mine. + +In 'The Charms of Lovely Davies' he says: + + Each eye it cheers when she appears, + Like Phoebus in the morning, + When past the shower, and ev'ry flower + The garden is adorning. + +The last three poems from which quotations have been made were written +about two ladies whose lovers had been untrue to them: the first about +Miss Kennedy, a member of one of the leading Ayrshire families; the other +two about Miss Davies, a relative of the Glenriddell family. + +In a letter to Miss Davies he said: + +'Woman is the blood-royal of life; let there be slight degrees of +precedency among them, but let them all be sacred. Whether this last +sentiment be right or wrong, I am not accountable; it is an original +component feature of my mind.' + +Burns was not in love with either Miss Kennedy or Miss Davies, but he +explains the writing of the songs to Miss Davies, in a letter enclosing +'Bonnie Wee Thing,' by saying, 'When I meet a person of my own heart I +positively can no more desist from rhyming on impulse than an Æolian harp +can refuse its tones to the streaming air.' + +One of his most beautiful poems is 'The Posie,' which he planned to pull +for his 'Ain dear May.' + + The primrose I will pu', the firstling o' the year, + And I will pu' the pink, the emblem o' my dear, + For she's the pink o' womankind, and blooms without a peer. + + I'll pu' the budding rose, when Phoebus peeps in view, + For it's like a baumy kiss o' her sweet, bonnie mou'; + The hyacinth's for constancy, wi' its unchanging blue. + + The lily it is pure, and the lily it is fair, + And in her lovely bosom I'll place the lily there; + The daisy's for simplicity and unaffected air. + + The woodbine I will pu', when the e'ening star is near, + And the diamond draps o' dew shall be her een sae clear; + The violet's for modesty, which weel she fa's to wear. + + I'll tie the posie round wi' the silken band o' luve, + And I'll place it in her breast, and I'll swear by a' above + That to my latest draught o' life the band shall ne'er remove, + And this will be a posie to my ain dear May. + +In 'Lovely Polly Stewart' he says: + + O lovely Polly Stewart, + O charming Polly Stewart, + There's ne'er a flower that blooms in May + That's half so fair as thou art. + + The flower it blaws, it fades, it fa's, + And art can ne'er renew it; + But worth and truth, eternal youth + Will gie to Polly Stewart. + +In 'Thou Fair Eliza' he says: + + Not the bee upon the blossom, + In the pride o' sinny noon; + Not the little sporting fairy, + All beneath the simmer moon; + Not the minstrel, in the moment + Fancy lightens in his e'e, + Kens the pleasure, feels the rapture, + That thy presence gies to me. + +In 'My Bonie Bell' he writes: + + The smiling spring comes in rejoicing, + The surly winter grimly flies; + Now crystal clear are the falling waters, + And bonie blue are the sunny skies. + Fresh o'er the mountains breaks forth the morning, + The evening gilds the ocean's swell; + All creatures joy in the sun's returning, + And I rejoice in my Bonie Bell. + +'Sweet Afton' was suggested by the following: 'I charge you, O ye +daughters of Jerusalem, that ye stir not, nor awaken my love--my dove, my +undefiled! The flowers appear on the earth, the time of the singing of +birds is come, and the voice of the turtle is heard in the land.' + +In descriptive power and in fond and reverent love no poem of Burns, or +any other writer, surpasses Sweet Afton. Authorities have been divided in +regard to the person who was the Mary of Sweet Afton. Currie and Lockhart +declined to accept the statement of Gilbert Burns that it was Highland +Mary. Chambers and Douglas, the most illuminating and reliable of the +early biographers of Burns, agree with Gilbert. One of Mrs Dunlop's +daughters stated that she heard Burns himself say that Mary Campbell was +the woman whose name he used to represent the lover for whom he asked such +reverent consideration. He had no lover at any period of his life on the +Afton. He had but one lover named Mary, and she stirred him to a degree of +reverence that toned the music of his love to the end of his life. Mary +Campbell was alive to Burns in a truly realistic sense when he wrote the +sacred poem 'Sweet Afton.' + +In 'O were my Love yon Lilac Fair' he assumes that his love might be + + A lilac fair, + Wi' purpling blossoms in the spring, + And I a bird to shelter there, + When wearied on my little wing. + +In the second verse he says: + + O gin my love were yon red rose if + That grows upon the castle wa'; + And I mysel' a drop o' dew, + Into her bonie breast to fa'! + +Could imagination kindle more pure ideals to reveal love than these? In +'Bonie Jean--A Ballad' he gives two delightful pictures of love: + + As in the bosom of the stream + The moonbeam dwells at dewy e'en; + So trembling, pure, was tender love + Within the breast of Bonie Jean. + + * * * * * + + The sun was sinking in the west, + The birds sang sweet in ilka grove; every + His cheek to hers he fondly laid, + And whispered thus his tale of love. + +In 'Phillis the Fair' he writes: + + While larks, with little wing, fann'd the pure air, + Tasting the breathing spring, forth did I fare; + Gay the sun's golden eye + Peep'd o'er the mountains high; + Such thy morn! did I cry, Phillis the fair. + + In each bird's careless song glad did I share; + While yon wild-flow'rs among, chance led me there! + Sweet to the op'ning day, + Rosebuds bent the dewy spray; + Such thy bloom! did I say, Phillis the fair. + +In 'By Allan Stream' he describes the glories of Nature, but gives them +second place to the joys of love: + + The haunt o' spring's the primrose-brae, + The summer joys the flocks to follow; + How cheery thro' her short'ning day + Is autumn in her weeds o' yellow; + But can they melt the glowing heart, + Or chain the soul in speechless pleasure? + Or thro' each nerve the rapture dart, + Like meeting her, our bosom's treasure? + +In 'Phillis, the Queen o' the Fair' he uses many beautiful things to +illustrate her charms: + + The daisy amused my fond fancy, + So artless, so simple, so wild: + Thou emblem, said I, o' my Phillis-- + For she is Simplicity's child. + + The rosebud's the blush o' my charmer, + Her sweet, balmy lip when 'tis prest: + How fair and how pure is the lily! + But fairer and purer her breast. + + Yon knot of gay flowers in the arbour, + They ne'er wi' my Phillis can vie: + Her breath is the breath of the woodbine, + Its dew-drop o' diamond her eye. + + Her voice is the song o' the morning, + That wakes thro' the green-spreading grove, + When Phoebus peeps over the mountains + On music, and pleasure, and love. + + But beauty, how frail and how fleeting! + The bloom of a fine summer's day; + While worth, in the mind o' my Phillis, + Will flourish without a decay. + +In 'My Love is like a Red, Red Rose' he uses exquisite symbolism: + + My luve is like a red, red rose + That's newly sprung in June; + My luve is like a melodie + That's sweetly play'd in tune. + + As fair art thou, my bonie lass, + So deep in luve am I; + And I will luve thee still, my dear, + Till a' the seas gang dry. + +In the pastoral song, 'Behold, my Love, how Green the Groves,' he says in +the last verse: + + These wild-wood flowers I've pu'd to deck + That spotless breast o' thine; + The courtier's gems may witness love, + But never love like mine. + +In the dialogue song 'Philly and Willy,' + + _He says_, + As songsters of the early spring + Are ilka day more sweet to hear, each + So ilka day to me mair dear + And charming is my Philly. + + _She replies_, + As on the brier the budding rose + Still richer breathes and fairer blows, + So in my tender bosom grows + The love I bear my Willy. + +In 'O Bonnie was yon Rosy Brier' he says: + + O bonnie was yon rosy brier + That blooms so far frae haunt o' man; + And bonnie she, and ah, how dear! + It shaded frae the e'ening sun. + + Yon rosebuds in the morning dew, + How pure amang the leaves sae green; + But purer was the lover's vow + They witnessed in their shade yestreen. + + All in its rude and prickly bower, + That crimson rose, how sweet and fair. + But love is far a sweeter flower, + Amid life's thorny path o' care. + +In 'A Health to Ane I Loe Dear'--one of his most perfect love-songs--he +says: + + Thou art sweet as the smile when fond lovers meet, + And soft as their parting tear. + + * * * * * + + 'Tis sweeter for thee despairing + Than aught in the world beside. + +In 'My Peggy's Charms,' describing Miss Margaret Chalmers, Burns confines +himself mainly to her mental and spiritual charms. This was clearly a +distinctive characteristic of nearly the whole of his love-songs. No other +man ever wrote so many pure songs without suggestion of the flesh as did +Robert Burns. + + My Peggy's face, my Peggy's form, + The frost of hermit age might warm; + My Peggy's worth, my Peggy's mind, + Might charm the first of human kind. + + I love my Peggy's angel air, + Her face so truly, heavenly fair. + Her native grace, so void of art; + But I adore my Peggy's heart. + + The tender thrill, the pitying tear, + The generous purpose, nobly dear; + The gentle look that rage disarms-- + These are all immortal charms. + +In his 'Epistle to Davie--A Brother Poet' Burns, after detailing the many +hardships and sorrows of the poor, forgets the hardships, and recalls his +blessings: + + There's a' the pleasures o' the heart, + The lover and the frien'; + Ye hae your Meg, your dearest part, + And I my darling Jean. + + It warms me, it charms me, + To mention but her name; + It heats me, it beets me, kindles + And sets me a' on flame. + + O all ye powers who rule above! + O Thou whose very self art love! + Thou know'st my words sincere! + The life-blood streaming through my heart, + Or my more dear immortal part + Is not more fondly dear! + When heart-corroding care and grief + Deprive my soul of rest, + Her dear idea brings relief + And solace to my breast. + Thou Being, All-Seeing, + O hear my fervent prayer; + Still take her, and make her + Thy most peculiar care. + +Three years after the death of Highland Mary, Burns remained out in the +stackyard on Ellisland farm and composed 'To Mary in Heaven.' Nothing +could more strikingly prove the sincerity, the permanence, the purity, and +the sacredness of the white-souled love of Burns than this poem: + + Thou ling'ring star, with less'ning ray, + That lov'st to greet the early morn, + Again thou usher'st in the day + My Mary from my soul was torn. + O Mary! dear departed shade! + Where is thy place of blissful rest? + See'st thou thy lover lowly laid? + Hear'st thou the groans that rend his breast? + + That sacred hour can I forget? + Can I forget that hallow'd grove + Where, by the winding Ayr, we met + To live one day of parting love? + Eternity can not efface + Those records dear of transports past; + Thy image at our last embrace; + Ah! little thought we 'twas our last! + + Ayr, gurgling, kiss'd his pebbled shore, + O'erhung with wild-woods, thickening green; + The fragrant birch and hawthorn hoar + Twined amorous round the raptured scene: + The flowers sprang wanton to be prest, + The birds sang love on every spray; + Till too, too soon, the glowing west, + Proclaimed the speed of wingèd day. + + Still o'er these scenes my mem'ry wakes, + And fondly broods with miser-care; + Time but th' impression stronger makes, + As streams their channels deeper wear. + My Mary, dear departed shade! + Where is thy place of blissful rest? + See'st thou thy lover lowly laid? + Hear'st thou the groans that rend his breast? + +The general themes of this sacred poem, written three years after Mary +Campbell's death, are the preponderating themes of his love-songs. No +love-songs ever written have so little of even embracing and kissing as +the love-songs of Burns, except the sonnets of Mrs Browning. + +It is worthy of note that Mary Campbell was not a beauty--her attractions +were kindness, honesty, and unselfishness; yet, though happily married +himself, he loved her, three years after her death, as profoundly as when +they parted on the Fail, more than three years before he wrote the poem. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII. + +BURNS A PHILOSOPHER. + + +The fine training by their father developed the minds of both Robert and +Gilbert Burns as original, independent thinkers, chiefly in regard to +religious, ethical, and social problems. Professor Dugald Stewart, of +Edinburgh University, expressed the opinion that 'the mind of Burns was so +strong and clear that he might have taken high rank as a thinker in any +department of human thought; probably attaining as high rank in any other +department as he achieved as a poet.' The quotations given from his +writings in the preceding pages prove that he was a philosopher of unusual +power in regard to Religion, Democracy, and Brotherhood. + +Lockhart said, speaking of the ranking of Burns as a thinker, compared +with the best trained minds in Edinburgh: 'Even the stateliest of these +philosophers had enough to do to maintain the attitude of equality when +brought into contact with Burns's gigantic understanding.' + +Many of his poems are ornamented and increased in value by flashes of +philosophic thought. His 'Epistle to a Young Friend' is a series of +philosophical statements for human guidance. + + Ye'll find mankind an unco squad, strange + And muckle they may grieve ye, much + + I'll no say men are villains a'; + The real hardened wicked, + Wha hae nae check but human law, + Are to a few restricket; restricted + + But, och! mankind are unco weak, very + An' little to be trusted; + If self the wavering balance shake + It's rarely right adjusted. + +He takes a kindly view, that men as a whole are not so bad as pessimists +would have us believe; that there are comparatively few that have no +respect for the Divine Law, and are kept in check only by the fear of +human law; but mourns because most men yet think more of self than of +their neighbours, to whom they may be of service, and sees that, where our +relations with our fellow-men are not satisfactorily balanced, the +destroyer of harmony is universally selfishness in one form or another. + + The fear o' Hell's a hangman's whip + To haud the wretch in order. + +Even yet this is advanced philosophy, that fear, being a negative motive, +cannot kindle human power or lead men to higher growth. So far as it can +influence the human soul, its effect must be to depress it. Not only the +fear of hell, but fear of anything, is an agency of evil. Some day a +better word than fear will be used to express the proper attitude of human +souls towards God. + + But where you feel your honour grip + Let that aye be your border. + +What you think of yourself matters more to you than what others think of +you. Let honour and conscience be your guide, and go not beyond the limits +they prescribe. Stop at the slightest warning honour gives, + + And resolutely keep its laws, + Uncaring consequences. + +In regard to religious matters, he gave his young friend sage advice: + + The great Creator to revere + Must sure become the creature; + But still the preaching cant forbear, + And ev'n the rigid feature. + +The soul's attitude to the Creator is a determining factor in deciding its +happiness and growth. Reverence should not mean solemnity and awe. +Reverence based on dread blights the soul and dwarfs it. True reverence +reaches its highest when its source is joy; then it becomes productive of +character--constructively transforming character. The formalism of +'preaching cant' robs religion of its natural attractiveness, especially +to younger people; the 'rigid feature' turns those who would enjoy +religion from association with those who claim to be Christians, and yet, +especially when they speak about religion, look like melancholy and +miserable criminals whose final appeal for pardon has been refused. +Burns's philosophy would lift the shadows of frightfulness from religion +and let its joyousness be revealed. + + An Atheist's laugh's a poor exchange + For Deity offended. + + A correspondence fixed wi' heaven + Is sure a noble anchor. + +To Burns, the relationship of the soul to God was of first importance. He +cared little for man's formalisms, but personal connection with a loving +Father he regarded as the supreme source of happiness. Only a reverent +and philosophic mind would think of prayer as 'a correspondence with +heaven.' + +Burns holds a high rank as a profound philosopher of human life, of human +growth, and of human consciousness of the Divine, as the vital centre of +human power. + +Burns was a philosopher in his recognition that productive work is +essential to human happiness and progress. + +In 'The Twa Dogs' he makes Cæsar say: + + But human bodies are sic fools, + For a' their colleges and schools, + That when nae real ills perplex them, + They mak enow themselves to vex them; + An' ay the less they hae to sturt them, trouble + In like proportion less will hurt them. + + * * * * * + + But gentleman, and ladies warst, + Wi' ev'n-down want o' wark are curst. + +Burns had real sympathy for the idle rich. He saw that idleness leads to +many evils, and that probably the worst evils, those that produce most +unhappiness, are those that result from neglecting to use, or misusing, +powers that, if wisely used, would produce comfort and happiness for +ourselves as well as for others. He believed that every man and woman +would be happier if engaged in some productive occupation, and that those +who do not use their hands to produce for themselves and their fellows are +'curst wi' want o' wark.' + +This belief is based on an old and very profound philosophy, that is not +even yet understood as widely and as fully as it should be: the philosophy +first expounded by Plato, and afterwards by Goethe and Ruskin, that 'all +evil springs from unused, or misused, good.' Whatever element is highest +in our lives will degrade us most if misused. The best in the lives of the +idle sours and causes deterioration instead of development of character, +and breeds discontent and unhappiness, so that days are 'insipid, dull and +tasteless,' and nights are 'unquiet, lang and restless.' + +Burns showed that he understood this revealing philosophy in 'The Vision.' +In this great poem he assumes that Coila, the genius of Kyle, his native +district in Ayrshire, appeared to him in a vision, and revealed a clear +understanding of the epoch events of his past life and their influence on +his development, and gave him advice to guide him for the future. In one +verse he says: + + I saw thy pulse's maddening play + Wild send thee pleasure's devious way, + Misled by fancy's meteor-ray, + By passion driven; + But yet the light that led astray + Was light from heaven. + +He was attacked and criticised severely for the statement contained in the +last two lines. The statement is but philosophic truth that his critics +did not understand. Fancy and passion are elements of power given from +heaven. Properly used they become important elements in human happiness +and development. Improperly used they produce unhappiness and degradation. + +Burns understood clearly the philosophic basis of modern education, the +importance of developing the individuality, or selfhood, or special power +of each child. The poem he wrote to his friend Robert Graham of Fintry, +beginning: + + When Nature her great masterpiece designed + And framed her last, best work, the human mind, + Her eye intent on all the mazy plan, + She formed of various parts the various man, + +is a philosophical description of how Nature produced various types of +men, giving to each mind special powers and aptitudes. The thought of the +poem is the basis of all modern educational thought: the value of the +individuality of each child, and the importance of developing it. + +He expresses very beautifully the philosophy of the ephemeral nature of +certain forms of pleasure in eight lines of 'Tam o' Shanter': + + But pleasures are like poppies spread, + You seize the flower, its bloom is shed; + Or as the snowfall in the river, + A moment white, then melts forever; + Or like the borealis race, + That flit e'er you can point their place; + Or like the rainbow's lovely form, + Evanishing amid the storm. + +Burns understood the philosophy of the simple life in the development of +character and happiness. + +In 'The Cotter's Saturday Night,' after dilating on the glories of simple, +reverent religion, as compared with 'Religion's Pride,' + + In all the pomp of method and of art, + When men display to congregations wide + Devotion's every grace except the heart, + +he prays for the young people of Scotland-- + + Long may thy hardy sons of rustic toil + Be blest with health, and peace, and sweet content; + And O! may Heaven their simple lives prevent + From luxury's contagion, weak and vile! + Then, howe'er crowns and coronets be rent, + A virtuous populace may rise the while, + And stand a wall of fire around their much-loved isle. + +He understood the value of simplicity in life as well as in religion, and +expressed it in admirable form. + +'The Address to the Unco Guid' has a kindly philosophic sympathy running +like a stream of light through it; the profound sympathy of the Master who +searched for the one stray lamb, and who suggested that he who was without +sin should cast the first stone. The last verse especially contains a +sublime human philosophy, that if studied till understood, and then +practised, would work a greatly needed change in the attitude of the rest +of humanity towards the so-called wayward. It is one of the strange +anomalies of life that, generally, professing Christian women have in the +past been the last to come with Christian sympathy of an affectionate, and +sisterly, and respectful quality to take an erring sister in their arms to +try to prove that she still possessed their esteem, and to rekindle faith +in her heart. + +His poem to Mrs Dunlop on 'New Year's Day, 1790;' 'A Man's a Man for a' +That;' 'A Winter Night;' 'Sketch in Verse;' and 'Verses written in +Friar's Carse Hermitage,' all show him to have been a philosophic student +of human nature. + +A few quotations from letters to his friends will show his philosophical +attitude to general matters, as the quotations from his letters showed the +clearness and trueness of his philosophy regarding religion, democracy, +and brotherhood. + +Burns saw man's duty to his fellows and to himself in this life. + +In a letter to Robert Ainslie, Edinburgh, 1788, he wrote: 'I have no +objection to prefer prodigality to avarice, in some few instances; but I +appeal to your observation, if you have not met, and often met, with the +same disingenuousness, the same hollow-hearted insincerity, and +disintegrative depravity of principle, in the hackneyed victims of +profusion, as in the unfeeling children of parsimony. I have every +possible reverence for the much-talked-of world beyond the grave, and I +wish that which piety believes, and virtue deserves, may be all matter of +fact. But in all things belonging to, and terminating in, the present +scene of existence, man has serious business on hand. Whether a man shall +shake hands with welcome in the distinguished elevation of respect, or +shrink from contempt in the abject corner of insignificance; whether he +shall wanton under the tropic of plenty, or at least enjoy himself in the +comfortable latitudes of easy convenience, or starve in the arctic circle +of poverty; whether he shall rise in the manly consciousness of a +self-approving mind, or sink beneath a galling load of regret and +remorse--these are alternatives of the last moment.' + +Since the time of Burns men and women, both in the churches and out of +them, have learned to set more store on the importance of living truly on +the earth, and have ceased to a large extent to think only of a life to +come after death. Men and women are now trying in increasing numbers to +make it more heavenly here. + +Burns taught a sound philosophy of contentment as a basis for happiness. + +He wrote to Mr Ainslie in 1789: 'You need not doubt that I find several +very unpleasant and disagreeable circumstances in my business [that of a +gauger], but I am tired with and disgusted at the language of complaint at +the evils of life. Human existence in the most favourable situations does +not abound with pleasures, and has its inconveniences and ills; +capricious, foolish man mistakes these inconveniences and ills, as if they +were the peculiar property of his own particular situation; and hence +that eternal fickleness, that love of change, which has ruined, and daily +does ruin, many a fine fellow, as well as many a blockhead; and is almost +without exception a constant source of disappointment and misery. So far +from being dissatisfied with my present lot, I earnestly pray the Great +Disposer of events that it may never be worse, and I think I can lay my +hand on my heart and say "I shall be content."' + +Good, sound philosophy of contentment! Not the contentment that does not +try to improve life's conditions, but the wise contentment that recognises +the best in present conditions, instead of foolishly resenting what it +cannot change. + +Burns taught the philosophy of good citizenship. + +In 1789 he wrote to Mr Ainslie: 'If the relations we stand in to King, +country, kindred, and friends be anything but the visionary fancies of +dreaming metaphysicians; if religion, virtue, magnanimity, generosity, +humanity, and justice be aught but empty sounds; then the man who may be +said to live only for others, for the beloved, honourable female whose +tender, faithful embrace endears life, and for the helpless little +innocents who are to be the men and women, the worshippers of his God, +the subjects of his King, and the support, nay the very vital existence, +of his country in the ensuing age, is the type of truest manhood.' + +This quotation from a letter written to a warm, personal friend from whom +he was not seeking any favours gives an insight into a rational mind loyal +to God, loyal to his king, loyal to his country, and lovingly loyal to his +wife and family. + +In a letter to the Right Rev. Dr Geddes, a Roman Catholic Bishop resident +in Edinburgh, a very kind friend to Burns, he wrote, 1789: 'I am conscious +that wherever I am, you do me the honour to interest yourself in my +welfare. It gives me pleasure to inform you that I am here at last [at +Ellisland], stationary in the serious business of life, and have now not +only the retired leisure, but the hearty inclination to attend to those +great and important questions: What I am? Where I am? For what I am +destined? Thus with a rational aim and method in life, you may easily +guess, my reverend and much honoured friend, that my characteristical +trade is not forgotten; I am, if possible, more than ever an enthusiast to +the Muses. I am determined to study Man and Nature, and in that view, +incessantly to try if the ripening and corrections of years can enable me +to produce something worth preserving.' + +Bishop Gillis, a Roman Catholic Bishop who lived more than sixty years +after the death of Burns, said, in reference to the letter from which this +quotation was made: 'If any man, after perusing this letter, will still +say that the mind of Burns was beyond the reach of religious influence, +or, in other words, that he was a scoffer at revelation, that man need not +be reasoned with, as his own mind must be hopelessly beyond the reach of +argument.' + +In a letter to his friend Cunningham he wrote, 1789: 'What strange beings +we are! Since we have a portion of conscious existence equally capable of +enjoying pleasure, happiness, and rapture, or of suffering pain, +wretchedness, and misery, it is surely worthy of inquiry whether there be +not such a thing as a science of life; whether method, economy, and +fertility of expedients be not applicable to enjoyment, and whether there +be not a want of dexterity in pleasure which renders our little scantling +of happiness still less; and a profuseness and intoxication in bliss which +leads to satiety, disgust, and self-abhorrence. + +'There is not a doubt but that health, talents, character, decent +competency, respectable friends, are real, substantial blessings; and yet +do we not daily see those who enjoy many, or all, of these good things, +and _notwithstanding_ contrive to be as unhappy as others to whose lot few +of them have fallen? I believe one great source of this mistake or +misconduct is owing to a certain stimulus, with us called ambition, which +goads us up the hill of life--not as we ascend other eminences, for the +laudable curiosity of viewing an extended landscape, but rather for the +dishonest pride of looking down on others of our fellow-creatures, +seemingly diminutive in other stations, &c.' + +His philosophy clearly recognised the evils of unduly centring our minds +and hearts on pleasure, and thus not only robbing ourselves of +development, and humanity of the advantage of the many things we might do +in our overtime devoted to pleasure, but destroying our interest in the +things that were intended to give us happiness. + +He also recognised fully the evils of selfish ambition which aims at +attaining higher positions than others; which climbs, not to get into +purer air to see more widely our true relationships to our fellow-men, but +for the degrading satisfaction of being able to look down with a +hardening pride that separates humanity into groups instead of uniting all +men in brotherhood. A man whose heart and mind are engrossed by base +material aims cannot grow truly, and he loses the advantages that should +have come to him from the elements of blessing he possesses by misusing +them for selfish ends. + +In another letter he wrote: 'All my fears and cares are of this world; if +there is another, an honest man has nothing to fear from it. I hate a man +that wishes to be a Deist; but, I fear, every fair, unprejudiced inquirer +must in some degree be a sceptic. It is not that there are any very +staggering arguments against the immortality of man, but, like +electricity, phlogiston, &c., the subject is so involved in darkness that +we want data to go upon.' + +His philosophy left him no fears for what comes after death. He had deep +faith in the justice of God. 'I believe,' he said, 'that God perfectly +understands the being He has made.' Believing this, and believing also +that God is just, he feared not the future. Burns, as he said to Mrs +Dunlop, was 'in his idle moments sometimes a little sceptical.' But they +were only moments. He knew there were problems he could not solve, and so, +as he wrote to Dr Candlish, 'he was glad to grasp revealed religion.' A +thoughtful man requires more faith in revealed religion than a man who +does not really think, but only thinks he is thinking, when other people's +thoughts are running through his head. Burns needed strong faith, and he +had it even about religious matters he could not explain. 'The necessities +of my own heart,' as he wrote to Mrs Dunlop, 'gave the lie to my cold +philosophisings.' His 'Ode to Mrs Dunlop on New Year's Day, 1790,' said: + + The voice of Nature loudly cries, + And many a message from the skies, + That something in us never dies. + +He accepted by faith the 'messages from the skies,' and in his soul +harmonised the messages with the 'Voice of Nature,' even though his +philosophic mind searched for proof of problems he could not solve. + +In a letter to Peter Hill, 1790, he wrote: 'Mankind are by nature +benevolent creatures, except in a few scoundrelly instances. I do not +think that avarice for the good things we chance to have is born with us; +but we are placed here among so much nakedness and hunger and poverty and +want, that we are under a damning necessity of studying selfishness in +order that we may EXIST. Still there are in every age a few souls that all +the wants and woes of life cannot debase into selfishness, or even give +the necessary alloy of caution and prudence. If ever I am in danger of +vanity, it is when I contemplate myself on this side of my disposition and +character. God knows I am no saint; I have a whole host of follies and +sins to answer for, but if I could (and I believe I do, as far as I can), +I would 'wipe away all tears from all eyes.' + +Burns was not self-righteous. He moralises in this quotation not as one of +the 'unco guid,' but as a man on what he thought was one of life's most +perplexing problems, poverty. He saw the problem more keenly than most men +see it yet. It was not the poverty of Burns himself that, as Carlyle +believed, made him write and work for freedom and justice for the +labouring-classes. It is quite true, however, that one of his reasons for +pleading for democracy was the poverty among the peasantry of his time. He +saw the injustice of conditions, and admitted in his poem to Davie, a +brother poet, that + + It's hardly in a body's power + To keep at times from being sour, + To see how things are shared. + +Burns recommended the philosophy of right, not expediency in public as +well as private matters. + +He wrote a letter to Mrs Dunlop in 1790, in which he said: 'I believe, in +my conscience, such ideas as, "my country; her independence; her honour; +the illustrious names that mark the history of my native land," &c.--I +believe these, among your _men of the world_; men who, in fact, guide, for +the most part, and govern our world, are looked on as so many +modifications of wrong-headedness. They knew the use of bawling out such +terms to rouse or lead the Rabble; but for their own private use, with +almost all the _able statesmen_ that ever existed, or now exist, when they +talk of right and wrong, they only mean proper and improper; and their +measure of conduct is not what they ought, but _what they dare_. For the +truth of this, I shall not ransack the history of nations, but appeal to +one of the ablest judges of men, and himself one of the ablest men that +ever lived--the celebrated Earl of Chesterfield. In fact a man that could +thoroughly control his vices, whenever they interfered with his interest, +and who could completely put on the appearance of every virtue as often as +it suited his purposes, is, on the Stanhopian plan, _the perfect man_, a +man to lead nations. But are great abilities, complete without a flaw, and +polished without a blemish, the standard of human excellence? This is +certainly not the staunch opinion of _men of the world_; but I call on +honour, virtue, and worth to give the Stygian doctrine a loud negative! +However, this must be allowed, that, if you abstract from man the idea of +an existence beyond the grave, then the true measure of human conduct is +_proper and improper_; virtue and vice, as dispositions of the heart, are, +in that case, of scarcely the same import and value to the world at large +as harmony and discord in the modifications of sound; and a delicate sense +of honour, like a nice ear for music, though it may sometimes give the +possessor an ecstasy unknown to the coarser organs of the herd, yet, +considering the harsh gratings and inharmonic jars in this ill-tuned state +of being, it is odds but the individual would be as happy, and certainly +would be as much respected by the true judges of society, as it would then +stand, without either a good ear or a good heart.... + +'Mackenzie has been called "the Addison of the Scots," and, in my opinion, +Addison would not be hurt at the comparison. If he has not Addison's +exquisite humour, he as certainly outdoes him in the tender and the +pathetic. His _Man of Feeling_--but I am not counsel-learned in the laws +of criticism--I estimate as the first performance of the kind I ever saw. +From what book, moral or even pious, will the susceptible young mind +receive impressions more congenial to humanity and kindness, generosity +and benevolence--in short, more of all that ennobles the soul to herself, +or endears her to others, than from the simple, affecting tale of poor +Harley? + +'Still, with all my admiration of Mackenzie's writings, I do not know if +they are the fittest reading for a young man who is about to set out, as +the phrase is, to make his way into life. Do you not think, Madam, that +among the few favoured of heaven in the structure of their minds (for such +there certainly are) there may be a purity, a tenderness, a dignity, and +elegance of soul, which are of no use, nay, in some degree absolutely +disqualifying, for the truly important business of making a man's way into +life?' + +Burns understood the underlying philosophy of sensitiveness. + +In a letter to Miss Craik, 1790, he wrote: 'There is not among the +martyrologies ever penned so rueful a narrative as the lives of the poets. +In the comparative view of wretches, the criterion is not what they are +doomed to suffer, but how they are formed to bear. Take a being of our +kind, give him a stronger imagination and a more delicate sensibility, +which between them will ever engender a more ungovernable set of passions +than are the usual lot of man; implant in him an irresistible impulse to +some idle vagary, such as arranging wild flowers in fantastical nosegays, +tracing the grasshopper to his haunt by his chirping song, watching the +frisks of the little minnows in the sunny pool, or hunting after the +intrigues of wanton butterflies--in short, send him adrift after some +pursuit which shall eternally mislead him from the paths of lucre, and yet +curse him with a keener relish than any man living for the pleasures that +lucre can purchase; lastly, fill up the measure of his woes by bestowing +on him a spurning sense of his own dignity, and you have created a wight +nearly as miserable as a poet. To you, Madam, I need not recount the fairy +pleasures the Muse bestows to counterbalance this catalogue of evils. +Bewitching poesy is like bewitching woman: she has in all ages been +accused of misleading mankind from the counsels of wisdom and the paths of +prudence, involving them in difficulties, baiting them with poverty, +branding them with infamy, and plunging them in the whirling vortex of +ruin; yet, where is the man but must own that all our happiness on earth +is not worth the name--that even the holy hermit's solitary prospect of +paradisaical bliss is but the glitter of a northern sun rising over a +frozen region, compared with the many pleasures, the nameless raptures +that we owe to the lovely Queen of the heart of Man!' + +He based the last two lines in his 'Poem on Sensibility' on this +philosophy: + + Chords that vibrate sweetest pleasure, + Thrill the deepest notes of woe. + +His 'Parting Song to Clarinda' reveals in the four lines, said by Sir +Walter Scott 'to contain the essence of a thousand love-tales,' how +deepest love may bring darkest sorrow: + + Had we never loved sae kindly, + Had we never loved sae blindly, + Never met--or never parted, + We had ne'er been broken-hearted. + +In a letter to Crawford Tait, Esq., Edinburgh, 1790, requesting a +sympathetic interest on behalf of a young man from Ayrshire, he says: 'I +shall give you my friend's character in two words: as to his head, he has +talents enough, and more than enough, for common life; as to his heart, +when Nature had kneaded the kindly clay that composes it, she said, "I can +no more." + +'You, my good Sir, were born under kinder stars; but your fraternal +sympathy, I well know, can enter into the feelings of the young man who +goes into life with the laudable ambition to _do_ something, and to _be_ +something among his fellow-creatures; but whom the consciousness of +friendless obscurity presses to the earth, and wounds to the soul! + +'Even the fairest of his virtues are against him. That independent spirit, +and that ingenuous modesty--qualities inseparable from a noble mind--are, +with the million, circumstances not a little disqualifying. What pleasure +is in the power of the fortunate and the happy, by their notice and +patronage, to brighten the countenance and glad the heart of such +depressed youth! I am not so angry with mankind for their deaf economy of +the purse--the goods of this world cannot be divided without being +lessened--but why be a niggard of that which bestows bliss on a +fellow-creature, yet takes nothing from our own means of enjoyment? We +wrap ourselves up in the cloak of our better-fortune and turn away our +eyes, lest the wants and woes of our brother-mortals should disturb the +selfish apathy of our souls.' + +Burns was a deep character student, and he was able to adjust the balance +fairly when weighing the characteristics that count for success in public +life, in business, and in private life. He always recommended honesty, and +always admired that independent spirit and that ingenuous modesty +inseparable from a noble mind. Much as he admired them, however, he +clearly understood that these admirable qualities might prevent the +perfect development of a soul if they made a man morbidly sensitive, or +interfered in any way with his faith in himself. + +Speaking of 'independence and sensibility,' the same qualities he +discussed in the letter quoted (to Mr Crawford Tait), he says in a letter +to Peter Hill, Edinburgh, 1791, addressing poverty: 'By thee the man of +sentiment, whose heart flows with independence, and melts with +sensibility, inly pines under the neglect or writhes in bitterness of soul +under the contumely of arrogant, unfeeling wealth.' + +Burns taught the just philosophy of gratitude to God. + +In a letter to Dr Moore, of London, he wrote, 1791: 'Whatsoever is not +detrimental to society, and is of positive enjoyment, is of God, the +Giver of all good things, and ought to be received and enjoyed by His +creatures with thankful delight.' + +We cannot yet estimate the philosophic vision of Burns. It will grow +clearer as century follows century. Carlyle said of him: 'We see that in +this man was the gentleness, the trembling pity of a woman, with the deep +earnestness, the force, and passionate ardour of a hero. Tears lie in him, +and a consuming fire, as lightning lurks in the drop of the summer +clouds.' + +So much for his heart; what says Carlyle about his mind? + +'Burns never studied philosophy.... Nevertheless, sufficient indication, +if no proof sufficient, remains for us in his works; we discern the brawny +movements of a gigantic though untutored strength; and can understand how, +in conversation, his quick, sure insight into men and things may, as aught +else about him, have amazed the best thinkers of his time and country. + +'But, unless we mistake, the intellectual gift of Burns is fine as well as +strong. The more delicate relations of things could not well have escaped +his eye, for they were intimately present to his heart. The logic of the +senate and the forum is indispensable, but not all-sufficient; nay, +perhaps the highest truth is that which will most certainly elude it, for +this logic works by words, and "the highest," it has been said, "cannot be +expressed in words." We are not without tokens of an openness for this +higher truth also, a keen though uncultivated sense for it having existed +in Burns. Mr Stewart, it will be remembered, wondered that Burns had +formed some distinct conception of the doctrine of Association. We rather +think that far subtler things than the doctrine of Association had from of +old been familiar to him.' + +Carlyle's last statement is correct. He admits the great essential truth +that Burns was a subtle philosopher. What a pity that such a man as +Carlyle should have thought it necessary to say that Burns 'never studied +philosophy.' The statement is incorrect, but, if it had been correct, why +make it? and why call his mental strength 'untutored,' and his 'keen sense +of the highest philosophy' 'uncultivated'? + +Did any other philosopher of the time of Burns in the universities reveal +a more profound philosophy of human life, and make so many applications of +it, as Robert Burns revealed in the quotations in this chapter, and in +the chapters on Democracy, Brotherhood, and Love? + +Burns was a philosopher, an independent thinker, whose thought is more +highly appreciated now than it was in the time of Carlyle. + +In a letter to Mrs Graham, 1791, he wrote: 'I was born a poor dog; and +however I may occasionally pick a better bone than I used to do, I know I +must live and die poor. But I will indulge the flattering faith that my +poetry will considerably outlive my poverty; and without any fustian +affectation of spirit, I can promise and affirm that it must be no +ordinary craving of the latter that shall ever make me do anything +injurious to the honest fame of the former. Whatever may be my +failings--for failings are a part of human nature--may they ever be those +of a generous heart and an independent mind.' + +Speaking of the moral character of Burns, Carlyle is wise and just. He +says: 'We are far from regarding him as guilty before the world, as +guiltier than the average; nay, from doubting that he is less guilty than +one of ten thousand tried at a tribunal far more rigid than that where the +Plebiscite of common civic reputations are pronounced, he has seemed to us +less worthy of blame than of pity and wonder. But the world is habitually +unjust in its judgments of such men; unjust on many grounds, of which +this one may be stated as the substance; it decides, like a court of law, +by dead statutes; and not positively, but negatively, less on what is done +right than on what is or is not done wrong.... What Burns did under his +circumstances, and what he forbore to do, alike fill us with astonishment +at the natural strength and worth of his character.' + +Burns was naturally a student gifted with a great mind. His splendid mind +was trained to act logically by his remarkable father, and quickened and +illuminated by his great teacher John Murdoch. He was a great philosopher, +not merely because he read Locke's 'Essay on the Human Understanding' when +a boy, but because during his short life he read with joyous interest many +books of a philosophical character, and what is of infinitely greater +importance, he interpreted all he read with an independent mind, and +related all truth as he understood it to human life. He could discuss even +the principles of Spinoza, and 'venture into the daring path Spinoza +trod.' Yet, as he told Dr Candlish, of Edinburgh, he merely 'ventured in' +to test Spinoza's philosophy, which he soon found to be inadequate to the +true development of the human soul, and therefore he 'was glad to grasp +revealed religion.' Not merely as a great poetic genius, but as a profound +philosophic teacher of religion, democracy, and brotherhood--the most +essentially vital elements related to the highest development of the souls +of men and women--will the real Robert Burns become known as he is more +justly and more deeply studied. + + + + +CHAPTER IX. + +THE DEVELOPMENT OF BURNS. + + +BORN 1759--DIED 1796. + +_6 Years Old._ + +At six years of age he was sent to a school in a little home near Alloway +Mill for a few months. Then the school was closed, and William Burns, his +father, and a few neighbours engaged a remarkably fine teacher named John +Murdoch to teach their children. + + +_7 Years Old._ + +When Burns was seven years old his father moved to Mount Oliphant farm, +about two miles from Alloway. Robert continued to attend Murdoch's school. + + +_8 Years Old._ + +He continued to attend Murdoch's school. + + +_9 Years Old._ + +Murdoch, his beloved teacher, left Alloway. He had not only been the +teacher of Burns, but had lent the boy books, among them being _The Life +of Hannibal_. Burns said this book 'was the earliest I recollect taking +any pleasure in.' Murdoch presented him with an English grammar and a book +translated from the French, named _The School for Love_. His imagination +during this period was kindled by many legends, ghost stories, tales, and +songs told and sung by an old lady, Betty Davidson, who lived in the +family home. + + +_10 Years Old._ + +Read and studied with his father, discussing freely the merits of the +books read. + + +_11 Years Old._ + +He studied, and continued to study with enthusiasm, English grammar, and +had become an unusually excellent scholar for his age in English. His +father regularly taught his family after Murdoch left Alloway. A deep and +lasting impression was made on Robert's mind during this year by a +_Collection of Letters_, written by the leading authors of Queen Anne's +reign. + + +_12 Years Old._ + +Worked on the farm, and read with his father at night. Wrote many letters +to imaginary correspondents. + + +_13 Years Old._ + +He was sent for a few weeks to a school in Dalrymple to learn penmanship. +John Murdoch was appointed teacher in the High School at Ayr. He became +again a visitor to the Burns' home, in which he was a most welcome guest. +He presented Pope's works to Robert. During this year Burns continued an +imaginary correspondence with many people, and began to form a style +moulded by the Letters of the great prose-writers of Queen Anne's time. + + +_14 Years Old._ + +Boarded with Murdoch in Ayr for a few weeks, to devote himself to a deeper +study of English. Studied French a little, and gave a little attention to +Latin. The best influence of his brief period with Murdoch was the +kindling of his vision with higher ideals of life, his relationship to his +fellow-men, and his duty to God. + + +_15 Years Old._ + +Began to take his place as an independent thinker with men, and surprised +them by his wide knowledge and his unusual powers of expression and +impression. Took his share in reaping the grain on the farm, and fell in +love with his harvest mate, Nellie Kirkpatrick, who bound and shocked, or +stooked, what he reaped. She was a good-looking girl of fourteen, who sang +well. Burns said her love made him a poet. He composed his first poem, +'Handsome Nell,' as a tribute to her. His love for her undoubtedly kindled +him at the centre of his power, as a true love that is respectfully +treated by parents always does for a youth during the adolescent period. + + +_16 Years Old._ + +He laboured hard on the farm, but was worried by his father's poverty, by +the poorness of the soil of Mount Oliphant farm, and especially by the +harsh and over-bearing manner in which his father was treated by the +landlord's agent. Hard labour and possibly insufficient nourishment for a +youth growing rapidly, coupled with his humiliation at the conduct of the +agent, and his sorrowful sympathy, affected his health. He became +depressed and moody, and suffered from headaches and palpitation of the +heart. He had become acquainted with a few respectable women in Ayr, one +of whom lent him the _Spectator_ and Pope's _Homer_. These he read and +digested with a growing interest, and used with rapidly developing power. + + +_17 Years Old._ + +Was sent to the school of Hugh Rodger at Kirkoswald to learn mathematics, +especially mensuration and surveying. He enjoyed the work and made rapid +progress. He formed a friendship with William Niven, who went to the same +school; and in order to develop his powers as an independent thinker and a +public speaker, he and Willie organised a debating society of two, which +met in formal debate once a week. This developed his intellectual powers +more than the study of mathematics. His school-days in Kirkoswald came to +a sudden ending when he met Peggy Thomson, who lived next to the school. +His second adolescent love came unexpectedly, and with great force. He +says Peggy Thomson's charms 'Overset his trigonometry, and set him off at +a tangent from his studies.' He tried to study, but at the end of the week +gave it all up and went home. + +His schoolmaster learned about the debates between him and Willie Niven, +and determined to put an end to such waste of time from the study of +mathematics. He charged Niven one day with the crime of debating, and +demanded the subject for the next debate. Willie told him the subject for +to-morrow was, 'Resolved that a great general is of more use to the world +than a good merchant.' 'Nonsense,' thundered the teacher; 'everybody ought +to know that a general is of far more importance to the world than a +merchant.' Burns promptly said to the teacher, 'You take the general's +side, and I will take the merchant's side, and let us see.' + +Burns spoke with such wide information, such fine reasoning and such +splendid eloquence, that he soon had the boys cheering him wildly. This +annoyed the master, and he became so angry that he dismissed the school +for the day. + +Even at the early age of seventeen he had few rivals as a public speaker +and debater. He took lessons in a dancing-school at Tarbolton, when he +returned from Kirkoswald, to improve his social manners. During this year +he read Thomson's works, Shenstone's works, a _Select Collection of +English Songs_, Allan Ramsay's works, Hervey's _Meditations_, and some of +Shakespeare's plays. + + +_18 Years Old._ + +The family moved to Lochlea farm, about four miles from Mauchline. Up to +this time he had been an awkward and bashful youth. He began now to be +more at ease with the opposite sex after he had been introduced to them. +He had no real lover, however, between 17 and 21. + + +_19 Years Old._ + +About this time he made a plan for a tragedy. He never finished it, and +preserved only a fragment, beginning, 'All devil as I am.' + + +_20 Years Old._ + +A year of work, reading, and visions that were but the bases of higher +visions yet to come. + + +_21 Years Old._ + +He, with his brother Gilbert and five other young men, founded a debating +club in an upstairs room of a private house in Tarbolton. He read +persistently; held a book in his left hand at meals; and usually carried a +book with him while walking. About this time he began to be known as a +critic of the preaching and practices of the 'Auld Licht' preachers, and +enjoyed shocking those who were, in his judgment, not vital, but only +professing, Christians, who did nothing to prove the genuineness of their +religion. In this year his heart was kindled by the first love of his +manhood. + + +_22 Years Old._ + +He read Sterne's works, Macpherson's Ossian, and Mackenzie's _The Man of +the World_ and _Man of Feeling_. He said 'he valued the last book more +than any other book, except the Bible.' His mind turned to religious +subjects very definitely at this period. He developed a deep and reverent +affection for Alison Begbie, who was a servant on a farm not far from +Lochlea farm. The farm was on Cessnock Water. He wrote three poems to her: +'The Lass of Cessnock Banks,' 'Peggy Alison,' and 'Mary Morrison.' His +letters to her reveal the two great dominant elements in his mind and +heart at that time: a deep and respectful love, and some of the highest +ideals of vital religion. + +In this year love again stirred him to write poetry. He said it became 'a +darling walk for his mind.' 'Winter--a Dirge' belongs to this period. + + +_23 Years Old._ + +This was an eventful year. Alison Begbie had declined his offer of +marriage. Had she married him and lived he would have had but one love +after maturity. He ventured into business in Irvine. He says his partner +'was a scoundrel of the first water, who made money by the mystery of +thieving.' Their shop was burned, and he found himself not worth a +sixpence. He read two novels, _Pamela_, and _Ferdinand, Count Fathom_, and +_Fergusson's Poems_, which filled him with a deeper determination to write +poetry. He wrote several religious poems this year. + + +_24 Years Old._ + +He became a Freemason in Tarbolton, and devoted a good deal of time to the +order. He did not write much poetry. His mind was occupied by religious +matters, and he had an impression that his life was not going to last very +long. This idea haunted him for two or three years after his maturity. He +contemplated death as a rest, but he continued to store his mind and think +independently. Dr Mackenzie, who attended his father on his death-bed +towards the end of the year, wrote, 'that on his first visit he found +Gilbert and his father friendly and cordial, but Robert silent and +uncompanionable, till he began discussing a medical subject, when Robert +promptly joined in the discussion, and showed an unexpected and remarkable +understanding of the subject.' During this year he wrote 'My Father was a +Farmer' and 'The Death and Dying Words of Poor Mailie.' + + +_25 Years Old._ + +His father died in February, leaving the family very poor. Robert and +Gilbert rented Mossgiel farm, about two miles from Mauchline, and the +family moved there. Robert determined to be a scientific farmer. He read +the best books he could get on agriculture; but bad seed, bad weather, and +late harvest left the brothers only half an average crop. He continued to +work on the farm, but evidently began to realise more clearly the kindling +call to poetry as the special work of his life. During the next twelve +years he produced a continuous out-pouring of wonderful poems, although +about half of the twelve years he worked as a farmer on Mossgiel and +Ellisland farms, and most of the rest of the time worked hard as a gauger, +riding two hundred miles each week in the performance of his duties. In +this year he wrote 'The Rigs of Barley,' composed in August; 'My Nannie +O,' 'Green Grow the Rashes,' 'Man was Made to Mourn,' 'The Twa Herds,' and +the 'Epitaph on My Ever Honoured Father.' In this year he met Jean +Armour, and soon loved her. + + +_26 Years Old._ + +He wrote many poems during this year, the most important being 'Epistle to +Davie, a Brother Poet,' 'Holy Willie's Prayer,' 'Death and Doctor +Hornbook,' three long 'Epistles to John Lapraik,' 'Epistle to William +Simpson,' 'Epistle to John Goldie,' 'Rantin', Rovin' Robin,' 'Epistle to +Rev. John M'Math,' 'Second Epistle to Davie,' 'Farewell to Ballochmyle,' +'Hallowe'en,' 'To a Mouse,' 'The Jolly Beggars,' 'The Cotter's Saturday +Night,' 'Address to the Deil,' and 'The Auld Farmer's New-Year Morning +Salutation to his Auld Mare Maggie.' + + +_27 Years Old._ + +This was an eventful and productive year for Burns. Quickly following each +other came 'The Twa Dogs,' 'The Author's Earnest Cry and Prayer,' 'The +Ordination,' 'Epistle to James Smith,' 'The Vision,' 'Address to the Unco +Guid,' 'The Holy Fair,' 'To a Mountain Daisy,' 'To Ruin,' 'Despondency: an +Ode,' 'Epistle to a Young Friend,' 'Nature's Law,' 'The Brigs of Ayr,' 'O +Thou Dread Power!' 'Farewell Song to the Banks of Ayr,' 'Lines on Meeting +Lord Daer,' 'Masonic Song,' 'Tam Samson's Elegy,' 'A Winter Night,' 'Yon +Wild Mossy Mountains,' 'Address to Edinburgh,' and 'Address to a Haggis,' +with love-songs and many minor pieces. + +Burns had given Jean Armour a certificate of marriage, and he nearly lost +his mental balance when, at her father's order, she consented to have it +burned. Fortunately for him two things aided in preserving his balance: +the publication of the Kilmarnock edition of his poems, and his love for +Mary Campbell, 'Highland Mary.' No man ever needed a love, deep and true, +to save him more than Burns did. He believed Jean was lost to him for +ever. He was not a faithless but a needy lover when he found a responsive +heart in Highland Mary. They made their marriage vows on the Fail, Sunday, +14th May 1786. Mary went home to prepare for marriage, but caught a fever +and died. Burns went to Edinburgh later in the year to publish a second +edition of his poems, as the first edition had been so well received. In +Edinburgh he was the hero of the highest and most thoroughly educated +classes. He wrote several fine poems to Mary Campbell. + + +_28 Years Old._ + +Three thousand copies of his poems were published in April in Edinburgh, +netting him over five hundred pounds. He made two triumphal tours--the +Border Tour and the Highland Tour. As Mary Campbell was dead, his love was +kindled by Clarinda, Mrs M'Lehose, with whom he conducted an intensive +love correspondence, and to whom he wrote several beautiful love-songs. As +she was a married woman who was separated from her husband, Burns could +not marry her. In this year he wrote the 'Inscription for the Headstone of +Fergusson,' 'Epistle to Mrs Scott,' 'The Bonnie Moor Hen,' 'On the Death +of John M'Leod,' 'Elegy on the Death of James Hunter Blair,' 'The Humble +Petition of Bruar Water,' 'Lines on the Fall of Fyers,' 'Castle Gordon,' +'On Scaring Some Waterfowl,' 'A Rosebud by My Early Walk,' 'The Banks of +Devon,' 'The Young Highland Rover,' 'Birthday Ode,' and many short pieces +and love-songs, among them 'The Birks of Aberfeldy.' + + +_29 Years Old._ + +Rented Ellisland farm, on the Nith, near Dumfries. Married Jean Armour +(second marriage to her) in April, and left her in Mauchline till he +could build a home for her on Ellisland, which was ready in December. +Building his new home, stocking and managing the farm, and riding fifty +miles occasionally to his Jean, made his year so busy that he wrote little +poetry, but exquisite love-songs. The estate of Glenriddell, owned in the +time of Burns by Robert Riddell, bordered on Ellisland farm. Robert +Riddell was a fine type of Scottish gentleman, and Burns and he became +warm friends. Among the best poems of this year, not love-songs, are +'Verses written in Friar's Carse Hermitage,' 'Epistle to Robert Graham of +Fintry,' 'The Day Returns,' 'A Mother's Lament,' 'The Fall of the Leaf,' +'Auld Lang Syne,' 'The Poet's Progress,' 'Elegy on the Year 1788,' and +'Epistle to James Tennant.' + + +_30 Years Old._ + +Wrote many love-songs for Johnson's Scots Musical Museum, though busily +engaged in farming, and, in addition, a new Psalm for the Chapel of +Kilmarnock; a sketch in verse to Right Hon. C. J. Fox, 'The Wounded Hare,' +'The Banks of Nith,' 'John Anderson my Joe,' 'The Kirk of Scotland's +Alarm,' 'Caledonia,' 'The Battle of Sherramuir,' 'The Braes o' +Killiecrankie,' 'Farewell to the Highlands,' 'To Mary in Heaven,' 'Epistle +to Dr Blacklock,' and 'New Year's Day, 1790.' + + +_31 Years Old._ + +Found his farm 'a ruinous affair.' Accepted a position as an exciseman at +fifty pounds a year. Had to ride two hundred miles each week. Continued +writing love-songs for Johnson's Museum (without pay), and wrote in +addition, 'Tam o' Shanter,' 'Lament of Mary Queen of Scots,' and 'The +Banks of Doon.' + + +_32 Years Old._ + +Continued to write love-songs, among the most beautiful being 'Sweet +Afton' and 'Parting Song to Clarinda.' In addition, wrote 'Lament for +James, Earl of Glencairn,' 'On Glenriddell's Fox Breaking his Chain,' +'Poem on Pastoral Poetry,' 'Verses on the Destruction of the Woods near +Drumlanrig,' 'Second Epistle to Robert Graham of Fintry,' 'The Song of +Death,' and 'Poem on Sensibility.' + + +_33 Years Old._ + +Wrote many love-songs, among them 'The Lea Rig' and 'Highland Mary.' His +other poems were mainly election ballads. His love-songs were now written +mainly for Thomson's _National Songs and Melodies_. He still refused pay +for his songs. + + +_34 Years Old._ + +Still, notwithstanding his very busy life, he sent a continuous stream of +songs to Edinburgh. Other poems of the year were 'Sonnet Written on the +Author's Birthday,' 'Lord Gregory,' and 'Scots, wha hae wi' Wallace bled.' +In this year he moved to the house in which he died, and in which Jean +died thirty-eight years afterwards. + + +_35 Years Old._ + +In this year Burns, to supplement 'Scots, wha hae' (the greatest +bugle-song of freedom), wrote two grand poems on Liberty: 'The Ode to +Liberty' and 'The Tree of Liberty;' and 'Contented Wi' Little and Cantie +Wi' Mair.' In this year he declined an offer from the London _Morning +Chronicle_ to become a regular contributor to that paper. + + +_36 Years Old._ + +Love-songs, and election ballads in favour of his friend Mr Heron, were +his most numerous poems this year. In addition to other minor pieces he +wrote a fine poem to his friend, Alexander Cunningham, 'Does Haughty Gaul +Invasion Threat,' and the most triumphant combined interpretation of +democracy and brotherhood ever written, 'A Man's a Man for a' That.' + + +_37 Years Old._ + +Early in the year his health gave way, and he died, 21st July 1796. Though +apparently a strong man, it is reasonable to believe that he had a +constitutional tendency towards consumption. His father died from this +dread disease, and his grandmother (his mother's mother) died at +thirty-five from the same cause. Burns inherited his physical and +intellectual powers mainly from his mother. Both by heredity and +contagion, therefore, he was made susceptible to influences that develop +consumption. He continued to write poetry, chiefly love-songs, during his +illness. His last poem was written, nine days before his death, to Miss +Margaret Chalmers, for whom he had a reverent affection. + +No reference has been made in this sketch of his development to the prose +written each year. Five hundred and thirty-four of his letters have been +published. They are written in a stately style, and most of them contain +philosophic discussions of religion, ethics, or democracy. + +A shy, sensitive, retiring boy; a deep-thinking, persistently studying, +eloquent, still shy youth; a brilliant reasoner, a thinker ranking with +leaders in his neighbourhood, meeting each on equal terms, and easily +proving his superiority by his remarkable knowledge of each man's special +subject of study, and by his still more remarkable powers of independent +thinking and clear revelation of his thought in his young manhood, but +still at twenty-two too shy to propose to the first lover of his maturity; +always a reverent lover of Nature, whose mind saw God in beauty, in +dawn-gleam and eve-glow, in tree and flower, in river and mountain; he +studied, thought, and expressed his thoughts in exquisite poetry, and, +according to those who knew him best, in still richer and more captivating +conversation, until at twenty-seven he stood in the midst of the most +learned professors of Scotland and outclassed them all. No single +professor of the galaxy of culture in which he stood, modest and +dignified, could have spoken so wisely, so profoundly, so easily, and +with such graceful manner and charming eloquence on _so many subjects_ as +did Burns. + +It is a marvel that grows greater the more we try to understand it, that a +boy who left school when he was nine years old, and, except for a few +weeks, did not go to school again; and who, from nine years of age to his +thirty-second year, was a steady farm-worker, with the exception of a +brief interval during which he was engaged publishing his poems; and was a +gauger from thirty-two to thirty-six, should have been able to write so +much immortal poetry and so much instructive prose in such a short time. + +One of the most interesting of all the pictures of the lives of the +world's literary leaders is the picture of Robert Burns, after a day of +toil on the farm, walking from Mossgiel farm, when his evening meal was +over, two miles to his favourite seat in the woods on Ballochmyle estate, +and sitting there on the high bank of the Ayr in the long Scottish +gloaming, and often on in the moonlight, 'shut in with God,' revealing in +sublime form the visions that thrilled his soul. During the last few years +of his life he walked from his home to Lincluden Abbey ruins on his +favourite path beside the winding Nith to spend his gloaming hours alone, +and composed there some of his masterpieces. + +Short was his life, but he lives on in the hearts of succeeding +generations. He lives on, too, in his permanent influence on religion, +freedom, and brotherhood. + + +THE END. + + +Edinburgh: Printed by W. & R. Chambers, Limited. + + + + +Footnotes: + +[1] Dr Moore was the father of Sir John Moore, the British general who was +killed at Corunna in the Peninsular War. + +[2] Her name was spelled Alison or Elison. + +[3] One of John Murdoch's quotations used as a headline to be copied in +his copy-book. + +[4] The lovers of Burns afterwards got permission to remove the monument +and remains of Highland Mary to a more suitable location. + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Real Robert Burns, by J. L. 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L. Hughes. + </title> + + <style type="text/css"> + + p {margin-top: .75em; text-align: justify; margin-bottom: .75em;} + + body {margin-left: 12%; margin-right: 12%;} + + .pagenum {position: absolute; left: 92%; font-size: smaller; text-align: right; font-style: normal;} + + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 {text-align: center; clear: both;} + + hr {width: 33%; margin-top: 2em; margin-bottom: 2em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; clear: both;} + + table {margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;} + + .giant {font-size: 200%} + .huge {font-size: 150%} + + .blockquot {margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 10%;} + .poem {margin-left:15%;} + + .right {text-align: right;} + .center {text-align: center;} + .hang {margin-left: 2em; text-indent: -2em;} + + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + .smcaplc {text-transform: lowercase; font-variant: small-caps;} + + a:link {color:#0000ff; text-decoration:none} + a:visited {color:#6633cc; text-decoration:none} + + .spacer {padding-left: 1em; padding-right: 1em;} + .spacer2 {padding-left: 2em; padding-right: 2em;} + + </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Real Robert Burns, by J. L. Hughes + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Real Robert Burns + +Author: J. L. Hughes + +Release Date: February 17, 2011 [EBook #35299] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE REAL ROBERT BURNS *** + + + + +Produced by The Online Distributed Proofreading Team at +https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images +generously made available by The Internet Archive.) + + + + + + +</pre> + + + +<h1>THE REAL ROBERT BURNS</h1> + +<p> </p><p> </p> + +<p class="center"><span class="giant">THE REAL ROBERT BURNS</span></p> +<p> </p> +<p class="center">BY<br /> +<span class="huge">J. L. HUGHES, LL.D.</span><br /> +Author of ‘Dickens as an Educator,’ &c.</p> +<p> </p> +<p class="center">LONDON: 38 Soho Square, W.1<br /> +W. & R. CHAMBERS, LIMITED<br /><br /> +EDINBURGH: 339 High Street<br /> +THE RYERSON PRESS<br /><br /> +TORONTO: Corner Queen and John Streets</p> + +<p> </p><p> </p> + +<p class="center">Printed in Great Britain.<br /> +<span class="smcap">W. & R. Chambers, Ltd., London</span> and <span class="smcap">Edinburgh</span>.</p> + + +<p> </p><p> </p> +<hr style="width: 50%;" /> +<h2>CONTENTS.</h2> + +<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="5" summary="table"> +<tr><td align="right"><small>CHAPTER</small></td><td> </td><td align="right"><small>PAGE</small></td></tr> +<tr><td> </td><td><span class="smcap">Foreword</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_7">7</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_I">I.</a></td><td><span class="smcap">The True Values of Biography</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_9">9</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_II">II.</a></td><td><span class="smcap">The Educational Advantages of Burns</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_17">17</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_III">III.</a></td><td><span class="smcap">The Characteristics of Burns</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_35">35</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_IV">IV.</a></td><td><span class="smcap">Burns was a Religious Man</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_63">63</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_V">V.</a></td><td><span class="smcap">Burns the Democrat</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_99">99</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_VI">VI.</a></td><td><span class="smcap">Burns and Brotherhood</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_126">126</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_VII">VII.</a></td><td><span class="smcap">Burns a Revealer of Pure Love</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_135">135</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_VIII">VIII.</a></td><td><span class="smcap">Burns a Philosopher</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_167">167</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_IX">IX.</a></td><td><span class="smcap">The Development of Burns</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_197">197</a></td></tr></table> + + +<p> </p><p> </p> +<hr style="width: 50%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span></p> +<h2>FOREWORD.</h2> + +<p>The writer of the following pages learned years ago to reverence the +memories of Burns and Dickens. Frequently hearing one or the other +attacked from platform or pulpit, and believing both to be great +interpreters of the highest things taught by Christ, as the basis of the +development of humanity towards the Divine, he resolved that some day he +would try to help the world to understand correctly the work of these two +great men. His book, <i>Dickens as an Educator</i>, has helped to give a new +conception of Dickens, as an educational pioneer and as a philosopher. The +purpose of this book is to show that Burns was well educated, and that +both in his poems and in his letters he was an unsurpassed exponent of the +highest human ideals yet expressed of religion—democracy based on the +value of the individual soul, brotherhood, love, and the philosophy of +human life.</p> + +<p>The writer believes that gossiping in regard to the weakness of the living +is indecent and degrading, but that it is pardonable as compared with the +debasing practice of gossiping about the weaknesses of the dead. Those who +can wallow in the muck of degraded biographers are only a degree less +wicked than the biographers themselves, who sin against the dead, and sin +against the living by providing debasing matter for them to read.</p> + +<p>The evidence to prove the positions claimed to be true in this book is +mainly taken from the poems and letters of Burns himself. Some may doubt +the sincerity of Burns. Carlyle had no doubt about his sincerity or his +honesty. He says of the popularity<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span> of Burns: ‘The grounds of so singular +and wide a popularity, which extends, in a literal sense, from the palace +to the hut, and over all regions where the English tongue is spoken, are +well worth inquiring into. After every just deduction, it seems to imply +some rare excellence in these works. What is that excellence? To answer +this question will not lead us far. The excellence of Burns is, indeed, +among the rarest, whether in poetry or in prose, but, at the same time, it +is plain and easily recognised—<i>his sincerity, his indisputable air of +truth</i>.’</p> + +<p>Speaking of the moral character of Burns, Carlyle said: ‘We are far from +regarding him as guilty before the world, as guiltier than the average; +nay, from doubting that <i>he is less guilty than one of ten thousand</i>.... +What he <i>did</i> under such circumstances, and what he <i>forbore to do</i>, alike +fill us with astonishment at the <i>natural strength and worth of his +character</i>.’</p> + +<p>Shakespeare says in <i>Hamlet</i>: ‘Ay, sir, to be honest, as this world goes, +is to be one man picked out of ten thousand.’ Carlyle chose Burns as one +of ten thousand.</p> + +<p>These quotations should help two classes of men: the ‘unco guid,’ who +believe evil stories, most of which had no real foundation; and those +professed lovers of Burns who love him for his weaknesses. The real Robert +Burns was not weak enough to suit either of these two classes. ‘Less +guilty than one in ten thousand’ is a high standard.</p> + +<p>To do something to help all men and women to a juster understanding of the +real Robert Burns is the aim of the writer. Let us learn, and ever +remember, that he was a reverent writer about religion, a clear +interpreter of Christ’s teaching of democracy and brotherhood, a profound +philosopher, and the author of the purest love-songs ever written.</p> + + +<p> </p><p> </p> +<hr style="width: 50%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span></p> +<p class="center"><span class="giant">THE REAL ROBERT BURNS.</span></p> +<p> </p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_I" id="CHAPTER_I"></a>CHAPTER I.</h2> +<h3><span class="smcap">The True Values of Biography.</span></h3> + +<p>A man’s biography should relate the story of his development in power, and +his achievements for his fellow-men. Biography can justify itself only in +two ways: by revealing the agencies and experiences that formed a man’s +character and aided in the growth of his highest powers; and by relating +the things he achieved for humanity, and the processes by which he +achieved them.</p> + +<p>Only the good in the lives of great men should be recorded in biographies. +To relate the evil men do, or describe their weaknesses, is not only +objectionable, it is in every way execrable. It degrades those who write +it and those who read it. Biography should not be mainly a story; it +should be a revelation, not of evil, but of good. It should unfold and +impress the value of the visions of the great man whose biography is being +written,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span> and his success in revealing his high visions to his fellow-men. +It should tell the things he achieved or produced to make the world +better; the things that aid in the growth of humanity towards the divine. +The biographer who tells of evils is, from thoughtlessness or malevolence, +a mischievous enemy of mankind.</p> + +<p>No man’s memory was ever more unjustly dealt with than the memory of +Robert Burns. His first editor published many poems that Burns said on his +death-bed should be allowed ‘to sink into oblivion,’ and told all of +weakness that he could learn in order that he might be regarded as just. +He considered justice to himself of more consequence than justice to +Burns, or to humanity. His only claim to be remembered is the fact that he +prepared the poems of Burns for publication, and wrote his biography. It +is much to be regretted that he had not higher ideals of what a biography +should be, not merely for the memory of the man about whom it is written, +but for its influence in enlightening and uplifting those who read it. +Biographers should reveal not weaknesses, but the things achieved for God +and humanity.</p> + +<p>Carlyle, writing of the biographers of Burns, says: ‘His former +biographers have done<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span> something, no doubt, but by no means a great deal, +to assist us. Dr Currie and Mr Walker, the principal of these writers, +have both, we think, mistaken one important thing: their own and the +world’s true relation to the author, and the style in which it became such +men to think and to speak of such a man. Dr Currie loved the poet truly, +more perhaps than he avowed to his readers, or even to himself; yet he +everywhere introduces him with a certain patronising, apologetic air, as +if the polite public might think it strange and half unwarrantable that +he, a man of science, a scholar and a gentleman, should do such honour to +a rustic. In all this, however, we readily admit that his fault was not +want of love, but weakness of faith; and regret that the first and kindest +of all our poet’s biographers should not have seen farther, or believed +more boldly what he saw. Mr Walker offends more deeply in the same kind, +and both err alike in presenting us with a detached catalogue of his +attributes, virtues, and vices, <i>instead of a delineation of the resulting +character as a living unity</i>.’</p> + +<p>The biographers of Robert Burns criticised reputed defects of his—defects +common among men of all classes and all professions in his time—but +failed to give him credit for<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span> his revelations of divine wisdom. They +bemoaned his lack of religion—though he was a reverently religious +man—instead of telling the simple truth that he was the greatest +religious reformer of his time in any part of the world. They said he was +not a Christian because he did not perform certain ceremonies required by +the churches, when freer and less bigoted men would have told the real +fact, that he was one of the world’s greatest interpreters of Christ’s +highest ideals—democracy and brotherhood. He still holds that high rank. +They related idle gossip about his vanity and other trivial stories, +instead of being content with proclaiming him the greatest genius of his +time in the comprehensiveness of his visions, and in the scope of his +powers. Some of them tried to prove that he was not a loyal man; they +should have revealed him as the giant leader of men in making them +conscious of the value of liberty and of the right of every man to its +fullest enjoyment.</p> + +<p>The oft-repeated charge of disloyalty was disproved when the charge was +made during the life of Burns, but the false accusation has been accepted +as a fact by many people to the present time. Fortunately the records of +the Dumfries Volunteers have been discovered<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span> recently, and Mr William +Will has published them in a book entitled <i>Robert Burns as a Volunteer</i>. +They prove most conclusively that Burns was a truly loyal man. When the +Provost of Dumfries called a meeting of the citizens of Dumfries to +consider the need of establishing a company of Volunteers Burns attended +the meeting, and was chosen as a member of a small committee to write to +the king asking permission to form a company. When permission was granted +by the king, Burns joined the company on the night when it was first +organised, and sat up most of the night composing ‘The Dumfries +Volunteers,’ the most inspiring poem of its kind ever written. It did more +to arouse the people of Scotland and England to put down the bolshevism of +the time than any other loyal propaganda.</p> + +<p>The minutes of the Volunteer Company in Dumfries give a perfect answer to +the basest slander ever made against Burns—that he had sunk so low as a +hopelessly vile drunkard the respectable people of Dumfries would not +associate with him; that he was ostracised by the community at large. Yet +this ‘ostracised man’ was chosen by the best citizens of Dumfries as one +of the committee to write to King George, and was elected as a member<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span> of +the committee to manage the company. This slander was so generally +accepted in Carlyle’s time that even Carlyle himself wrote that Burns did +not die too soon, as he had lost the respect of his fellow-men, and had +lost also the power to write. His first statement is proved to have no +true foundation by the record of the Dumfries Volunteer Company, and the +second by the fact that Burns wrote the greatest poem ever written by any +man to interpret Christ’s highest visions, democracy and brotherhood, ‘A +Man’s a Man for a’ That,’ the year before he died, and ‘The Dumfries +Volunteers.’ The second year before his death he wrote ‘The Tree of +Liberty’ and ‘The Ode to Liberty,’ and the third year before he died he +wrote the clarion call to fight in defence of freedom, ‘Scots, wha hae.’ +These poems have no equals in any literature of their kind. During the +same three years of his life he wrote one hundred and seventeen other fine +songs and sent them to Edinburgh for publication, the last one on the +ninth day before his death. It should be remembered, too, that Burns had +to ride two hundred miles each week in the discharge of his duty to the +government; and that after the organisation of the Volunteer Company he +had to drill four hours each week, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span> attend the meetings of the company +committee. The minutes of the company show he was never fined for absence.</p> + +<p>The last meeting he attended before his fatal illness was called to +prepare a letter of gratitude to God for preserving the life of the king +when the London bolshevistic mob tried to kill him on his way to the House +of Commons. Assisting to prepare this letter to the king was the last +public act of Burns.</p> + +<p>Had his weaknesses been tenfold what they were, his biographers should +have said nothing about them, for in spite of his human weakness he had +divine power to reveal to all men Christ’s teachings—democracy and +brotherhood, based on the value of the individual soul. He was also the +greatest poet of religion, ethics, and love; and he holds a high place +among the loving interpreters of Nature.</p> + +<p>To relate facts in his life to account for the development of his powers, +so that he was able to be so great a revealer of the highest things in the +lives of men and women, should have been the work of his biographers.</p> + +<p>It is worthy of note that Wordsworth wrote to the publishers of the +biography of Burns in regard to the true attitude of a biographer. He +objected to recording imputed failings, and expressed indignation at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span> Dr +Currie for devoting so much attention to the infirmities of Burns.</p> + +<p>Chambers and Douglas were in most respects better than his other early +biographers. The Rev. Lauchlan MacLean Watt, of Edinburgh, wrote for the +Nation’s Library in 1914 the sanest, truest book yet written about Burns.</p> + + +<p> </p><p> </p> +<hr style="width: 50%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_II" id="CHAPTER_II"></a>CHAPTER II.</h2> +<h3><span class="smcap">The Educational Advantages of Burns.</span></h3> + +<p>Many people still speak of Burns as an ‘uneducated man.’ Although a +farmer, he was in reality a well-educated man. He was not a finished +scholar in the accepted sense of the universities, but both in his poetry +and in his unusually forceful and polished prose he was superior to most +of the university men of his time. He had read many books, the best books +that his intelligent father could buy, or that he could borrow from +friends or from libraries. In addition to school-books, he names the +following among those books read in his youth and young manhood—<i>The +Spectator</i>, Pope’s Works, Shakespeare, Works on Agriculture, <i>The +Pantheon</i>, Locke’s <i>Essay on the Human Understanding</i>, Stackhouse’s +<i>History of the Bible</i>, Justice’s <i>British Gardener</i>, Boyle Lectures, +Allan Ramsay’s Works, Doctor Taylor’s <i>Doctrine of Original Sin</i>, <i>A +Select Collection of English Songs</i>, Hervey’s <i>Meditations</i>, Thomson’s +Works, Shenstone’s Works, <i>The Letters by the Wits of Queen Anne’s +Reign</i>,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span> Sterne’s <i>Tristram Shandy</i>, Mackenzie’s <i>The Man of Feeling</i>, +Macpherson’s <i>Ossian</i>, two volumes of <i>Pamela</i>, and one novel by Smollett, +<i>Ferdinand, Count Fathom</i>. In addition to these he had read some French +and some Latin books, guided by one of the greatest teachers of his time, +John Murdoch, who was so great that when he established a private school +in London his fame spread to France, and some leading young men, notably +Talleyrand, came to receive his training and inspiration.</p> + +<p>William Burns read regularly at night to his two sons, Robert and Gilbert, +and after the reading the three fellow-students discussed the matter that +had been read, each from his own individual standpoint. As the boys grew +older they read books during their meals, so earnest were they in their +desire to become acquainted with the best thought of the world’s leaders, +so far as it was available. David Sillar has stated that Robert generally +carried a book with him when he was alone, that he might read and think. +When Robert settled at Ellisland he aroused an interest among the people +of the district, and succeeded in establishing a circulating library.</p> + +<p>His father, though a labourer, was supremely desirous that his family +should be educated<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span> and thoughtful. This desire prompted him to become a +farmer, that he might keep his family at home. He was an independent +thinker himself, and by example and experience he trained his sons to love +reading and to think independently. Robert never thought he was thinking +when he let other people’s thoughts run through his mind.</p> + +<p>The result of the reading and thinking which their father led Robert and +Gilbert to do was most gratifying. The influence on Robert’s mind must be +recognised. He became not only a great writer in prose and in poetry, but +a great orator as well. He stood modestly, but conscious of his power, and +proved his superiority both in conversation and impromptu oratory to the +leading university men of his time in Edinburgh. Gilbert, too, became an +original thinker and a writer of clear and forceful English. In a long +letter to Dr Currie he discussed very profoundly and very independently +some deep psychological ideas in excellent language. Few men of his time +could have written more thoughtfully or more definitely. As illustrations +of Robert’s learning, as well as of his independent thought in relating +the books he read to each other and to human life, two instances are worth +recording. First, in a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span> letter +to Dr Moore,<small><a name="f1.1" id="f1.1" href="#f1">[1]</a></small> of London, an author of +some distinction, who had sent him a copy of one of his books, Burns said, +1790: ‘You were pleased to express a wish for my opinion of your work, +which so flattered me that nothing less would serve my overweening fancy +than a formal criticism on the book. In fact, I have gravely planned a +comparative view of you, Fielding, Richardson, and Smollett in your +different qualities and merits as novel writers. This, I own, betrays my +ridiculous vanity, and I may probably never bring the business to bear, +but I am fond of the spirit young Elihu shows in the Book of Job—“And I +said, I will also declare my opinion.”’</p> + +<p>To Mrs Dunlop he wrote, 1788: ‘Dryden’s <i>Virgil</i> has delighted me. I do +not know whether the critics will agree with me, but the <i>Georgics</i> are to +me by far the best of Virgil. It is indeed a species of writing entirely +new to me, and has filled my head with a thousand fancies of emulation.... +I own I am disappointed in the <i>Æneid</i>. Faultless correctness may please, +and does highly please, the letter critic; but to that awful character I +have not the most distant pretensions. I do<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span> not know whether I do not +hazard my pretensions to be a critic of any kind, when I say that I think +Virgil, in many instances, a servile copier of Homer. If I had the +<i>Odyssey</i> by me, I could parallel many passages where Virgil has evidently +copied, but by no means improved, Homer. Nor can I think there is anything +of this owing to the translators; for from everything I have seen of +Dryden, I think him in genius and fluency of language Pope’s Master.’</p> + +<p>But a small percentage of university graduates of his time could have +written independent criticisms, wise or otherwise, of Homer and Virgil, or +even of English writers, as clearly as Burns did. They could have told +what the opinions of other people were in regard to Homer and Virgil; they +could have told what they had been told. Burns had been trained to think +by his father, and to express his own thoughts about the books he read; +they had merely been informed. The advantage in real education was greatly +in favour of Burns. Their memories had been stored with opinions of +others; his mind had been trained to read carefully, to relate the +thoughts of others to life, to decide as to their wisdom, and to think +independently himself. His education from books was somewhat<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span> limited, but +the development of his mind that came from discussions of the value of the +matter read was vital, and helped him to relate himself to men, to nature +around him, to the universe, and to God.</p> + +<p>In schools Burns had not a very extended experience. When six years old he +was sent to a small school beside the mill on the Doon at Alloway. His +teacher gave up the school soon after Burns began to attend it. Mr Burns +secured the co-operation of several of his neighbours, and they engaged a +young man named Murdoch to teach their children, agreeing to take him in +turn as their guest, and to pay him a small salary. The fact that John +Murdoch formed a high estimate of Mr Burns is a proof of the ability and +sincerity of the father of the poet.</p> + +<p>When Burns was seven years old his father removed to Mount Oliphant farm, +but Robert continued to attend the school of Mr Murdoch, about two miles +away, in Alloway. The books used were a spelling-book, the New Testament, +the Bible, Mason’s <i>Collection of Prose and Verse</i>, and Fisher’s <i>English +Grammar</i>.</p> + +<p>Mr Murdoch gave up his Alloway school when Burns was nine years old. After +that time the teacher of his sons was their father.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span> He taught them +arithmetic, and bought them Salmon’s <i>Geographical Grammar</i>, Derham’s +<i>Physico- and Astro-Theology</i>, Hay’s <i>Wisdom of God in the Creation</i>, and +the <i>History of the Reigns of James I. and Charles I. of England</i>. Robert, +when eleven years old, showed a deep interest in the study of grammar and +language, and ‘excelled as a critic in substantives, verbs, and +participles.’ In his twelfth year he was kindled in his patriotic spirit +by the <i>Life of Sir William Wallace</i>. Wallace remained a hero to him +throughout his life. In his thirty-fifth year he wrote the grandest call +to the defence of liberty ever written, beginning:</p> + +<p class="poem">Scots, wha hae wi’ Wallace bled.</p> + +<p>In his eleventh year, which seemed to be a kindling epoch in his mind, his +mother’s brother gave him a collection of <i>Letters by the Wits of Queen +Anne’s Reign</i>. He read them over and over again, greatly delighted by both +their contents and their literary style. They had a distinct influence in +forming his own prose style, as during his twelfth year he conducted an +imaginary correspondence of quite an extensive character and in a stately +style.</p> + +<p>When he was thirteen the greatest kindler of his early powers, John +Murdoch, became<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span> teacher of English in the Ayr High School. Robert was +sent to board with him to study grammar and composition. He received +instruction from Murdoch in French and in Latin. He continued the study of +French in the evenings at home, as he had obtained a French dictionary and +a French grammar.</p> + +<p>His formal education, so far as it became an element in the cultivation of +his mind and the development of his supreme powers, ended with the few +weeks spent with John Murdoch in Ayr. They were epoch weeks to Burns; +transforming weeks, because of the increased range of his learning, but +made infinitely more richly transforming by the revelation of new visions +of life, and by the culture gained by association with a man of rare +ability and supreme kindling power, such as John Murdoch undoubtedly +possessed. A genius like Burns, living with a great teacher like Murdoch, +could in a month get many of the new revelations, the new visions, and the +strong impulses that should come into a growing soul as the result of a +university course.</p> + +<p>Burns, in his seventeenth year, was sent to Kirkoswald to study +mensuration and surveying. He intended to become a surveyor. Peggy Thomson +lived next door to the school he attended. He met Peggy, loved<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span> her madly, +and found it impossible to study longer. He afterwards wrote two beautiful +poems to her. His school life for a brief period in Kirkoswald had little +influence in the development of his power, except for the organisation of +a debating society composed of a companion, William Niven, and himself. +They met weekly to hold debates, and these debates were greatly enjoyed by +Burns. His practice in debating societies afterwards organised by him in +Tarbolton and in Mauchline not only developed in him his unusual +oratorical ability, but at the same time gave him mental training of vital +importance. Impromptu speaking surpasses any other known educational +process in developing the human mind. However, Burns could neither study +for Hugh Rodger nor debate with William Niven after he fell in love with +Peggy Thomson, so, after a sleepless week, he went home.</p> + +<p>Some may wonder, when they learn that for a time Burns took more interest +in studying Euclid’s <i>Elements of Geometry</i> than in any other department +of study in his home under his father’s guidance. When the Rev. Archibald +Alison sent him his book, <i>Essays on the Principles of Taste</i>, Burns +thanked him, and in his letter said: ‘In short, sir,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span> except Euclid’s +<i>Elements of Geometry</i>, which I made a shift to unravel by my father’s +fireside in the winter evenings of the first season I held the plough, I +never read a book which gave me such a quantum of information, and added +so much to my stock of ideas, as your <i>Essays on the Principles of +Taste</i>.’</p> + +<p>Burns evidently studied geometry at the time his mind was ripe for new +development by that special study. All children and young people would be +fortunate if they could be guided to the special study capable of arousing +their deepest interest, and therefore capable of promoting their highest +development, at the special period of their mental growth when that +particular study will awaken their deepest and most productive interest.</p> + +<p>Robert’s mind appears to have had a splendid power of adaptation to the +books and studies which his father secured for his sons. Gilbert says: +‘Robert read all these with an avidity and industry scarcely to be +equalled; and no book was so voluminous as to slacken his industry, or so +antiquated as to damp his researches.’ Dr Moore wrote to Burns in 1787: ‘I +know very well you have a mind capable of attaining knowledge by a shorter +process than is commonly used, and I am<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span> certain you are capable of making +better use of it, when attained, than is generally done.’</p> + +<p>This makes it easier to understand why Burns had a mind so well stored +with so many kinds of knowledge; and knowledge classified by himself, and +related to life, so well that he could use it readily when he required to +do so. The university men in Edinburgh marvelled more at the vastness of +his stores of different kinds of knowledge, when he met them with +dignified calmness, than they did because of his wonderful gifts of poetic +genius. Douglas says of Burns in Edinburgh: ‘Burns did not fail to mix by +times with the eminent men of letters and philosophy, who then shed lustre +on the name of Scotland.’</p> + +<p>Lockhart wrote: ‘Burns’s poetry might have procured him access to these +circles; but it was the extraordinary resources he displayed in +conversation, the strong sagacity of his observations on life and manners, +the splendour of his wit, and the glowing energy of his eloquence, that +made him the serious object of admiration among these practised masters of +the arts of talk. Even the stateliest of these philosophers had enough to +do to maintain the attitude of equality when brought into contact with +Burns’s gigantic<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span> understanding; and every one of them whose impressions +on the subject have been recorded agrees in pronouncing his conversation +to have been the most remarkable thing about him.’</p> + +<p>Speaking of this, Chambers properly says: ‘We are thus left to understand +that the best of Burns has not been, and was not of a nature to be, +transmitted to posterity.’ Why was Burns, though a ploughman, able to meet +a galaxy of leaders in different spheres of learning, and culture, and +philosophy, and outshine any of them in his own special department? The +answer is simple. He had two great teachers to kindle him and guide him in +the development of his remarkable natural powers: his father, William +Burns, and his teacher and friend, John Murdoch.</p> + +<p>His father made it certain that he would possess a wide range of knowledge +of the best available books on religious, ethical, and philosophical +subjects—philosophy of science and philosophy of the mind; and, better +than that, he trained him definitely by nightly practice to digest, and +expound, and relate, and even dare to disbelieve, the opinions expressed +in the books he read. In nightly discussions with his father and Gilbert +his mind became keen and broad, and he became self-reliant.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span> He had not +merely stored knowledge in his mind, he had wrought the knowledge into his +being, as an element of his growing power. Like great players of chess who +sometimes meet several opposing players of eminence at the same time and +vanquish them all at one period of play, Burns could meet the leaders of +many departments of progress, culture, and philosophy at the same time, +and stand calm and serene in glory with each leader on the crest of his +own special mountain of knowledge.</p> + +<p>From John Murdoch he received the inspiration of a vital comradeship, a +fine training in English language—grammar, and a good introduction to +literature—and visions of higher relationships to his fellow-men and to +God.</p> + +<p>However, great as Murdoch was as a kindler and a teacher, the education of +Robert Burns was mainly due to his remarkable father. Alexander Smith, in +his memoir of Burns, which Douglas claimed to be ‘the finest biography of +its extent ever written,’ speaking of William Burns, says: ‘In his whole +mental build and training he was superior to the people by whom he was +surrounded. He had forefathers he could look back to; he had family +traditions which he<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span> kept sacred. Hard-headed, industrious, religious, +somewhat austere, he ruled his house with a despotism which affection and +respect on the part of the ruled made light and easy. To the blood of the +Burnses a love of knowledge was native, as valour in the old times was +native to the blood of the Douglases.’</p> + +<p>John Murdoch wrote of William Burns: ‘Although I cannot do justice to the +character of this worthy man, yet you will perceive from what I have +written <i>what kind of person had the principal part in the education of +the poet</i>. He spoke the English language with more propriety, both with +respect to diction and pronunciation, than any man I ever knew with no +greater advantages; this had a very good effect on the boys, who talk and +reason like men much sooner than their neighbours.’</p> + +<p>These two quotations help us to understand William Burns as a great +teacher of his sons, and his daughters, too, although he did not deem it +quite so important to educate his daughters as his sons. It is perfectly +clear that the paternal despotism spoken of by Mr Smith, which indeed was +supposed to be necessary one hundred and fifty years ago, was not the +reason why his boys so early talked and reasoned like men. William<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span> Burns +was the elderly friend of his sons, not a despot, when he trained them to +love reading, and much better to speak freely their individual opinions +about what they read. This naturally led his sons to speak like men early +and fearlessly. Despotism on the part of the father would have had +directly the opposite effect.</p> + +<p>Gilbert Burns sums up his father’s estimate of early education and good +training when he says: ‘My father laboured hard, and lived with the most +rigid economy, that he might be able to keep his children at home, thereby +having an opportunity of watching the progress of our young minds and +forming in them early habits of piety and virtue; and from this motive +alone did he engage in farming, the source of all his difficulties and +distresses.’</p> + +<p>Robert, after his father’s death, wrote to his cousin, and said his father +was ‘the best of friends, and the ablest of instructors.’</p> + +<p>In the sketch of his life sent to Dr Moore, of London, he wrote: ‘My +father, after many years of wanderings and sojournings, picked up a pretty +large quantity of observation and experience, to which I am indebted for +most of my pretensions to wisdom.’</p> + +<p>An important element in the education of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span> Burns was his love of Nature. +His mind was specially susceptible to development by Nature in any of its +forms of beauty or of majesty. A friend who was his guide through the +grounds of Athole House, when he was making his tour through the +Highlands, in a letter to Mr Alex. Cunningham, wrote: ‘I had often, like +others, experienced the pleasures which arise from the sublime or elegant +landscape, but I never saw those feelings so intense as in Burns.’</p> + +<p>Burns was born and spent his early life and young manhood in a district +whose beauty has few equals anywhere. Its rivers—Ayr, Doon, Afton, Lugar, +Fail, and Cessnock; all, except Afton, within easy walking distance of his +homes in Ayrshire—with their beautifully wooded banks, were, in a very +definite way, transforming agencies in the growth of his mind, and +therefore most important elements in his highest education. The ‘winding +Nith,’ which flowed within a few yards of the home he built on Ellisland +farm, around the promontory on which stand the ruins of Lincluden Abbey, +and on through Dumfries, continued during the last few years of his life +the educational work of the rivers of his native Ayrshire.</p> + +<p>The mind of Burns was brought into unity<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span> with spiritual ideals through +the influence of Nature more productively than by any other agency. He +walked in the gloaming, according to his own statement, by the riverside +or in woodland paths when he was composing his poems. While residing in +Dumfries he had a favourite walk up the Nith to Lincluden Abbey, amid +whose ruins he sat in the gloaming, and on moonlight nights often till +midnight, recording the visions that came to him in that sacred +environment of wooded river and linn (waterfall).</p> + +<p>There was much similarity between the most vital educational development +of Burns and of Mrs Browning. In <i>Aurora Leigh</i>, the record of her own +growth, she describes her true education, although not her actual life’s +history. Aurora loses her mother in her fifth year, and lives with her +father for nine great years near Florence; she says:</p> + +<p class="poem">So nine full years our days were hid with God<br /> +Among His mountains. I was just thirteen,<br /> +Still growing like a plant from unseen roots<br /> +In tongue-tied springs; and suddenly awoke<br /> +To full life, and life’s needs and agonies,<br /> +With an intense, strong, struggling heart beside<br /> +A stone-dead father. Life struck sharp on death<br /> +Makes awful lightning.</p> + +<p>Her years till thirteen are spent mainly in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span> her father’s fine library +reading what she most loved of the treasuries of the world. Her own +statement of her father’s educational guidance is:</p> + +<p class="poem">My father taught me what he had learnt the best<br /> +Before he died, and left me—grief and love;<br /> +And seeing we had books among the hills,<br /> +Strong words of counselling souls, confederate<br /> +With vocal pines and waters, out of books<br /> +He taught me all the ignorance of men,<br /> +And how God laughs in heaven when any man<br /> +Says, ‘Here I’m learned; this I understand;<br /> +In that I’m never caught at fault or doubt.’</p> + +<p>Like Burns she reads good books with joyous interest; like Burns she has a +father deeply interested in her education who teaches her vital things; +and like Burns she loves to learn from the ‘vocal pines and waters,’ and +finds her richest revelations for her mind ‘with God among His mountains.’</p> + +<p>The hills of Ayrshire, the rivers, and the river-glens, whose sides are +covered with beautiful trees, were to Burns kindlers of high ideals, and +revealers of God.</p> + + +<p> </p><p> </p> +<hr style="width: 50%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_III" id="CHAPTER_III"></a>CHAPTER III.</h2> +<h3><span class="smcap">The Characteristics of Burns.</span></h3> + +<p>He was a truly independent democrat. The love of liberty was the basic +element of his character. His fundamental philosophy he expressed in the +unanswered and unanswerable questions:</p> + +<p class="poem">Why should ae man better fare,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And a’ men brothers?</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 8em;"><i>Epistle to Dr Blacklock.</i></span></p> + +<p class="poem">If I’m designed yon lordling’s slave,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">By Nature’s law designed,</span><br /> +Why was an independent wish<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">E’er planted in my mind?</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 8em;"><i>Man was Made to Mourn.</i></span></p> + +<p>To the Right Hon. John Francis Erskine he wrote: ‘The partiality of my +countrymen has brought me forward as a man of genius, and has given me a +character to support. In the Poet I have avowed manly and independent +sentiments, which I trust will be found in the Man.’</p> + +<p>Referring to the fact that his father’s family rented land from the +‘famous, noble Keiths,’ and had the honour of sharing their fate—their +estates were forfeited because they took<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> part in the rebellion of +1715—he says: ‘Those who dare welcome Ruin and shake hands with Infamy, +for what they believe sincerely to be the cause of their God and their +King, are—as Mark Antony in Shakespeare says of Brutus and +Cassius—“Honourable men.”’</p> + +<p>Though his father was not born in 1715, he undoubtedly got from his family +the principles of independence and the love of liberty which he afterwards +taught to his sons, and which Robert propagated with so much zeal.</p> + +<p>In a letter to Mrs Dunlop he wrote: ‘Light be the turf upon his breast who +taught, “Reverence thyself.”’</p> + +<p>To Lord Glencairn, after expressing his gratitude, he said: ‘My gratitude +is not selfish design—that I disdain; it is not dodging after the heel of +greatness—that is an offering you disdain. It is a feeling of the same +kind with my devotion.’</p> + +<p>In many of his letters he expresses the same sentiments. In his Epistle to +his young friend, Andrew Aiken, he advises him, among other things,</p> + +<p class="poem">To gather gear by every wile<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">That’s justified by honor;</span><br /> +Not for to hide it in a hedge,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Nor for a train attendant;</span><br /> +But for the glorious privilege<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Of being independent.</span></p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span>In a letter to Mr William Dunbar, dealing with his consciousness of his +responsibility for his children, he wrote, 1790: ‘I know the value of +independence; and since I cannot give my sons an independent fortune, I +shall give them an independent line of life.’</p> + +<p>Writing to Mrs Dunlop about his son—her god-son—Burns said: ‘I am myself +delighted with the manly swell of his little chest, and a certain +miniature dignity in the carriage of the head, and the glance of his fine +black eye, which promise the undaunted gallantry of an independent mind.’</p> + +<p>In ‘A Man’s a Man for a’ That’ he says:</p> + +<p class="poem">Ye see yon birkie, ca’d ‘a lord,’<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Wha struts, and stares, and a’ that;</span><br /> +Tho’ hundreds worship at his word,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">He’s but a coof for a’ that.<span class="spacer2"> </span><span class="spacer"> </span>blockhead</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">For a’ that, and a’ that,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">His ribband, star, and a’ that,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">The man o’ independent mind</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">He looks and laughs at a’ that.</span></p> + +<p>In the same great poem he crystallises a fundamental truth in the immortal +couplet:</p> + +<p class="poem">The rank is but the guinea stamp,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The man’s the gowd for a’ that.<span class="spacer2"> </span><span class="spacer"> </span>gold</span></p> + +<p>To Mrs Dunlop he wrote in 1787: ‘I trust I have too much pride for +servility, and too little prudence for selfishness.’</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span>To Mrs M’Lehose he wrote in 1788: ‘The dignifying and dignified +consciousness of an honest man, and the well-grounded trust in approving +heaven, are two most substantial foundations of happiness.’</p> + +<p>To Mrs Dunlop he wrote in 1788: ‘Two of my adored household gods are +independence of spirit and integrity of soul.’</p> + +<p>To Mrs Graham he wrote in 1791: ‘May my failings ever be those of a +generous heart and an independent mind.’</p> + +<p>To John Francis Erskine he wrote in 1793: ‘My independent British mind +oppression might bend, but could not subdue.’</p> + +<p>In the ‘Vision’ the message he says he received from Coila, the genius of +Kyle, the part of Ayrshire in which he was born, was:</p> + +<p class="poem">Preserve the dignity of Man, with soul erect.</p> + +<p>Burns has been criticised for meddling with what his critics called +politics. The highest messages Christ gave to the world were the value of +the individual soul, and brotherhood based on the unity of developed +individual souls. His highest messages were understood by Burns more +clearly than by any one else during his time, and Burns was too great a +man to be untrue to his greatest visions. His poems are still among the +best interpretations<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span> of Christ’s ideals of democracy and brotherhood.</p> + +<p>The supreme aim of Burns was to secure for all men and women freedom from +the unnatural restrictions of class or custom, so that each individual +might have equal opportunity for the development of his highest element of +power, his individuality, or self-hood—really the image of God in each. +God gave him the vision of the ideal: ‘Why should ae man better fare, and +a’ men brothers?’ and he tried to reveal the great vision to the world to +kindle the hearts of men.</p> + +<p>Burns was a devoted son, and a loving, considerate, respectful, and +generous brother. After his father died, Robert wrote to his cousin: ‘On +the 13th current I lost the best of fathers. Though, to be sure, we have +had long warning of the impending stroke, still the feelings of nature +claim their part, and I cannot recollect the tender endearments and +paternal lessons of the best of friends and the ablest of instructors +without feeling what, perhaps, the calmer dictates of reason would partly +condemn.</p> + +<p>‘I hope my father’s friends in your country will not let their connection +in this place die with him. For my part, I shall ever with pleasure—with +pride—acknowledge my <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span>connection with those who were allied by the ties +of blood and friendship to a man whose memory I shall ever honour and +revere.’</p> + +<p>On the stone above his father’s grave in Alloway Kirkyard are engraved the +words Burns wrote as his father’s epitaph:</p> + +<p class="poem">O ye, whose cheek the tear of pity stains,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Draw near with pious reverence and attend!</span><br /> +Here lies the loving husband’s dear remains,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The tender father, and the gen’rous friend;</span><br /> +The pitying heart that felt for human woe;<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The dauntless heart that feared no human pride;</span><br /> +The friend of man—to vice alone a foe;<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">For ev’n his failings leaned to virtue’s side.</span></p> + +<p>John Murdoch warmly approved of this epitaph of his former pupil and +friend Robert. He wrote: ‘I have often wished, for the good of mankind, +that it were as customary to honour and perpetuate the memory of those who +excel in moral rectitude, as it is to extol what are called heroic +actions.’</p> + +<p>When Burns found that the Edinburgh edition of his poems had brought him +about five hundred pounds, he loaned Gilbert one hundred and fifty pounds +to assist him to get out of debt, in order that his mother and sisters +might be placed in a position of security and greater happiness. In a +letter to Robert Graham of Fintry, explaining the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span> circumstances that led +him to accept the position of an exciseman, he first explains that +Ellisland farm, which he rented, was in the last stage of worn-out poverty +when he got possession of it, and that it would take some time before it +would pay the rent. Then he says: ‘I might have had cash to supply the +deficiencies of these hungry years; but I have a younger brother and three +sisters on a farm in Ayrshire, and it took all my surplus over what I +thought necessary for my farming capital to save not only the comfort, but +the very existence, of that fireside circle from impending destruction.’</p> + +<p>He helped with sympathy, advice, and material support a younger brother +who lived in England. His true attitude towards his own wife and family is +shown in his ‘Epistle to Dr Blacklock’:</p> + +<p class="poem">To make a happy fireside clime<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">For weans and wife,</span><br /> +Is the true pathos and sublime<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Of human life.</span></p> + +<p>The greatest dread of his later years was that he might not be able to +provide for his family in case of his death.</p> + +<p>Burns was an upright, honest man. To the mother of the Earl of Glencairn +he wrote: ‘I would much rather have it said<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span> that my profession borrowed +credit from me, than that I borrowed credit from my profession.’</p> + +<p>To James Hamilton, of Glasgow, he wrote: ‘Among some distressful +emergencies that I have experienced in life, I have ever laid it down as +my foundation of comfort—that he who has lived the life of an honest man +has by no means lived in vain.’</p> + +<p>To Sir John Whitefoord he wrote in 1787: ‘Reverence to God and integrity +to my fellow-creatures I hope I shall ever preserve.’</p> + +<p>In a letter to John M’Murdo in 1793 he wrote: ‘To no man, whatever his +station in life, have I ever paid a compliment at the expense of truth.’</p> + +<p>In ‘Lines written in Friar’s Carse’ he wrote:</p> + +<p class="poem">Keep the name of Man in mind,<br /> +And dishonour not your kind.</p> + +<p>To Robert Ainslie he wrote: ‘It is much to be a great character as a +lawyer, but beyond comparison more to be a great character as a man.’</p> + +<p>To Andrew Aiken, in his ‘Epistle to a Young Friend,’ he wrote:</p> + +<p class="poem">Where you feel your honour grip,<br /> +Let that aye be your border.</p> + +<p>In ‘A Man’s a Man for a’ That’ he expresses<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span> his faith in righteousness as +a fundamental element in character, where he says:</p> + +<p class="poem">The honest man, tho’ e’er sae poor,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Is king o’ men for a’ that.</span></p> + +<p>Burns had a sympathetic heart that overflowed with kindness for his +fellow-men, and even for animals, domestic and wild. In a letter to the +Rev. G. H. Baird in 1791 he said: ‘I am fain to do any good that occurs in +my very limited power to a fellow-creature, just for the selfish purpose +of clearing a little the vista of retrospection.’</p> + +<p>It was the big heart of Burns that directed the writing of the first part +of that sentence, and his modesty that led to the expression of the second +part. The joy of remembering a good deed was never his chief reason for +doing it. In a ‘Tragic Fragment’ he wrote:</p> + +<p class="poem">With sincere though unavailing sighs<br /> +I view the helpless children of distress.</p> + +<p>A number of stories have been preserved to prove that while Burns was +strict and stern in dealing with smugglers, and others who made a practice +of breaking the law by illegally selling strong drink without licence, he +was tenderly kind and protective to poor women who had little stores of +refreshments to sell to their friends on fair and market days.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span>Professor Gillespie related that he overheard Burns say to a poor woman of +Thornhill one fair-day as she stood at her door: ‘Kate, are you mad? Don’t +you know that the Supervisor and I will be in upon you in the course of +forty minutes? Good-bye t’ye at present.’</p> + +<p>His friendly hint saved a poor widow from a heavy fine of several pounds, +while the annual loss to the revenue would be only a few shillings.</p> + +<p>He was ordered to look into the case of another old woman, suspected of +selling home-brewed ale without licence. When she knew his errand she +said: ‘Mercy on us! are ye an exciseman? God help me, man! Ye’ll surely no +inform on a puir auld body like me, as I hae nae other means o’ leevin’ +than sellin’ my drap o’ home-brewed to decent folk that come to Holywood +Kirk.’</p> + +<p>Burns patted her on the shoulder and said: ‘Janet, Janet, sin awa’, and +I’ll protect ye.’</p> + +<p>In ‘A Winter Night’ Burns reveals a deep and genuine sympathy with the +outlying cattle, the poor sheep hiding from the storm, the wee helpless +birds, and even for the fox and the wolf; and mourns because the pitiless +tempest beats on them.</p> + +<p>Carlyle says of ‘A Winter Night’ that ‘it<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span> is worth seven homilies on +mercy, for it is the voice of Mercy herself. Burns indeed lives in +sympathy; his soul rushes into all the realms of being; nothing that has +existence can be indifferent to him.’</p> + +<p>The auld farmer’s ‘New Year Morning Salutation to his Auld Mare, Maggie,’ +reveals a profound and affectionate sympathy more tender than the pity he +felt for the animals and birds that suffered from the winter storm. It is +based on long years of friendly association in co-operative achievement. +From the New Year’s wish at the beginning, to the end, where he assures +her that she is no less deserving now than she was</p> + +<p class="poem">That day ye pranced wi’ muckle pride<br /> +When ye bure hame my bonnie bride;<br /> +And sweet and gracefu’ she did ride<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">Wi’ maiden air!</span></p> + +<p>and tells her that he has a heapet feed of oats laid by for her, and will +also tether her on a reserved ridge of fine pasture, where she may have +plenty to eat and a comfortable place on which to rest; each verse is full +of pleasant memories.</p> + +<p>His kindly sympathy is as appreciative as if she had been a human being +instead of a mare.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span>‘Poor Mailie’s Elegy’ is a natural expression of sorrow +in the heart—the great, loving heart of Burns—for the death of the pet lamb. He says:</p> + +<p class="poem">He’s lost a friend and neighbour dear<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">In Mailie dead.</span><br /> +Thro’ a’ the toun she trotted by him;<br /> +A lang half-mile she could descry him;<br /> +Wi’ kindly bleat, when she did spy him,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">She ran wi’ speed;</span><br /> +A friend mair faithfu’ ne’er cam nigh him,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">Than Mailie dead.</span></p> + +<p>So in the pathos and emotion shown for the mouse whose home his plough +destroyed at the approach of winter; for the wounded hare that limped past +him; for the starving thrush with which he offered to share his last +crust; and for the scared water-fowl that flew from him, when he regretted +that they had reason to do so on account of man’s treatment of them, he +gives ample evidence of the warmth of the glow of his sympathy.</p> + +<p>One of the most prominent characteristics of Burns was loyalty to his +native land. One of his earliest dreams, when he was a boy, was a hope +that some day he might be able to do something that would bring honour to +Scotland. In his Epistle to Mrs Scott of Wauchope-House he says:</p> + +<p class="poem"><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span> +I mind it weel, in early date,<br /> +When I was beardless, young, and blate,<span class="spacer2"> </span>bashful<br /> +<span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><br /> +When first amang the yellow corn<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">A man I reckoned was,</span><br /> +<span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><br /> +E’en then a wish (I mind its power),<br /> +A wish that to my latest hour<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Shall strongly heave my breast;</span><br /> +That I for poor auld Scotland’s sake<br /> +Some usefu’ plan or book could make,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Or sing a sang at least.</span><br /> +The rough burr-thistle, spreading wide<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Amang the bearded bear,<span class="spacer2"> </span><span class="spacer2"> </span>barley</span><br /> +I turned the weeder-clips aside<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And spared the symbol dear:</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">No nation, no station,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">My envy e’er could raise;</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">A Scot still, but blot still,<span class="spacer2"> </span><span class="spacer2"> </span>without</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">I knew nae higher praise.</span></p> + +<p>The boy who had such a reverent feeling in his heart for the thistle, the +symbol of his native land, that he did not like to cut it, continued +throughout his life to have a reverence for the land itself, and tried to +honour it in every possible way.</p> + +<p>He did make the book and sing the songs that brought more lasting glory to +Scotland than any other work done by any other man or combination of men +in his time.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span>He wrote more than two hundred and fifty love-songs, and he refused to +accept a shilling for them, though he needed money very badly. Many of his +love-songs were the direct out-pouring of his heart, the overflow of his +love for Nellie Kirkpatrick and Peggy Thomson, the girl lovers of his +boyhood; and for Alison Begbie, Jean Armour, Mary Campbell, and Mrs +M’Lehose; but most of his love-songs were ‘fictitious,’ as he said they +were in the inscription on the copy of his works presented to Jean +Lorimer, the Chloris of his Ellisland and Dumfries period. They were +written mainly to provide pure language and thought for fine melodies of +Scotland composed long before his time; but the words of the songs that +were sung to them were indelicate. He wrote his unequalled songs for +Scotland’s sake, and by doing so he gave to Scotland the gift of the +sweetest love-songs ever written. But for these sacred songs his patriotic +spirit resented the idea of acceptance of material reward. No higher +revelation of genuine patriotism was ever shown than this.</p> + +<p>Burns was a sensitive and very shy man. He is commonly supposed to have +been just the opposite. He was brought up in a home at Mount Oliphant +where he rarely associated with other people. Months sometimes passed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span> +without an evening spent in any other way than in reading and discussions +of the matter read by his father, Gilbert, and himself; so in boyhood and +early youth he was reserved. When he began to go out among other young men +his comparatively developed mind, his very unusual stores of +knowledge—not merely stored, but classified and related—and his +extraordinary power of eloquence made him at once a leader and a +favourite, so he soon overcame his reserve and shyness with young men. It +was not so with young women. He had been trained to wait for introductions +to them. He was walking past Jean Armour, when she was at the town pump at +Mauchline getting water to sprinkle the clothes on the bleaching-green, +without speaking to her, and she spoke to him, recalling a remark she +heard him make at the annual dance on the evening of the fair. He was +twenty-five, and she was eighteen. He would have passed close to her in +respectful silence if she had not spoken.</p> + +<p>Sir Walter Scott wrote: ‘I was told, but did not observe it, that his +address to females was extremely deferential.’</p> + +<p>Scott did not mean to suggest a doubt about what he was told, but just to +intimate that he had not had opportunity to observe the fact. Scott met +Burns only once in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span> company, and Scott was a boy at the time.</p> + +<p>He dearly and reverently loved Alison Begbie when he was twenty-one. She +was the first woman whom he asked to become his wife. She was a servant in +a farm-house on the banks of Cessnock Water, in the neighbourhood of +Lochlea farm. He was twenty-two when he asked her to marry him, and he was +so shy, even at that age, that he could not propose when he was with her. +She did not accept his offer. Few women of his acquaintance would have +refused to accept his written proposal. Probably none of them—not even +Alison Begbie—would have refused him if he had been able to overcome his +shyness, and had proposed in person instead of by letter.</p> + +<p>He wrote five letters to Alison Begbie, and definitely asked her to marry +him in the fourth letter. In the first he said: ‘I am a stranger in these +matters, as I assure you that you are the first woman to whom I ever made +such a declaration, so I declare I am at a loss how to proceed. I have +more than once come into your company with a resolution to say what I have +just now told you; but my resolution always failed me, and even now my +heart trembles for the consequence of what I have said.’</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span>The following copies of the letter containing his proposal (the fourth), +and of his reply to her refusal, if read carefully, should reveal several +admirable characteristics of Burns.</p> + +<div class="blockquot"> +<p class="right"><span class="smcap">‘Lochlea, 1781.</span></p> + +<p>‘<span class="smcap">My Dear E.</span>,<small><a name="f2.1" id="f2.1" href="#f2">[2]</a></small>—I have often thought it a peculiarly unlucky +circumstance in love that, though in every other situation in life, +telling the truth is not only the safest, but actually by far the +easiest way of proceeding, a Lover is never under greater difficulty +in acting, or more puzzled for expression, than when his passion is +sincere, and his intentions are honourable. I do not think that it is +very difficult for a person of ordinary capacity to talk of love and +fondness which are not felt, and to make vows of constancy and +fidelity which are never intended to be performed, if he be villain +enough to practise such detestable conduct; but to a man whose heart +glows with the principles of integrity and truth, and who sincerely +loves a woman of amiable person, uncommon refinement of sentiment, +and purity of manners—to such a one in such circumstances I can +assure you, my Dear, from my own feelings at this present moment, +<i>Courtship</i> is a task indeed.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span>There is such a number of foreboding fears, and distrustful anxieties +crowd into my mind when I am in your company, or when I sit down to +write to you, that what to speak or what to write I am altogether at +a loss.</p> + +<p>‘There is one rule which I have hitherto practised, and which I shall +invariably keep with you, and that is, honestly to tell you the plain +truth. There is something so mean and unmanly in the arts of +dissimulation and falsehood, that I am surprised they can be used by +any one in so noble, so generous a passion as Virtuous Love. No, my +dear E., I shall never endeavour to gain your favour by such +detestable practices. If you will be so good and so generous as to +admit me for your partner, your companion, your bosom friend through +life, there is nothing on this side of eternity shall give me greater +transport; but I shall never think of purchasing your hand by any +arts unworthy of a man, and, I will add, of a Christian. There is one +thing, my Dear, which I earnestly request of you, and it is this: +that you would soon either put an end to my hopes by a peremptory +refusal, or cure me of my fears by a generous consent.</p> + +<p>‘It would oblige me much if you would send me a line or two when +convenient. I shall only add further, that if a behaviour<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span> regulated +(though perhaps but very imperfectly) by the rules of Honour and +Virtue, if a heart devoted to love and esteem you, and an earnest +endeavour to promote your happiness; if these are qualities you would +wish in a friend, in a husband, I hope you shall ever find them in +your real friend and sincere lover.’</p></div> + +<p>After her refusal he wrote:</p> + +<div class="blockquot"> +<p class="right">‘<span class="smcap">Lochlea</span>, 1781.</p> + +<p>‘I ought in good manners to have acknowledged the receipt of your +letter before this time, but my heart was so shocked with the +contents of it, that I can scarcely yet collect my thoughts so as to +write to you on the subject. I will not attempt to describe what I +felt on receiving your letter. I read it over and over, again and +again, and though it was in the politest language of refusal, still +it was peremptory; you “were very sorry you could not make me a +return, but you wish me—what without you I can never obtain—you +wish me all kinds of happiness.” It would be weak and unmanly to say +that without you I never can be happy; but sure I am, that sharing +life with you would have given it a relish that, wanting you, I can +never taste.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span>‘Your uncommon personal advantages, and your superior good sense, do +not so much strike me; these possibly in a few instances may be met +with in others; but that amiable goodness, that tender, feminine +softness, that endearing sweetness of disposition, with all the +charming offspring of a warm, feeling heart—these I never again +expect to meet with in such a degree in this world. All these +charming qualities, heightened by an education much beyond anything I +have ever met with in any woman I ever dared to approach, have made +an impression on my heart that I do not think the world can ever +efface. My imagination had fondly flattered itself with a wish—I +dare not say it ever reached a hope—that possibly I might one day +call you mine. I had formed the most delightful images, and my fancy +fondly brooded over them; but now I am wretched for the loss of what +I really had no right to expect. I must now think no more of you as a +mistress, still I presume to ask to be admitted as a friend. As such +I wish to be allowed to wait on you, and as I expect to remove in a +few days a little farther off, and you, I suppose, will perhaps soon +leave this place, I wish to see you or hear from you soon; and if an +expression should perhaps escape me rather too warm for friendship, +I<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span> hope you will pardon it in, my dear Miss —— (pardon me the dear +expression for once),</p> + +<p class="right">‘R. B.’</p></div> + +<p>Those who say that these letters ‘have an air of taskwork and constraint +about them’ should remember that Burns formed the style of his +letter-writing when but a boy from a book containing the letters of +leaders of Queen Anne’s time, which was given to him by his uncle. His own +letters on all subjects are written in a dignified style. It is worth +noting that Motherwell, who criticised the style of the letters, says of +them: ‘They are, in fact, the only sensible love-letters we have ever +seen.’</p> + +<p>Though naturally a very shy man, he grew to be happier as his powers +developed. In his teens and young manhood he had fits bordering on +despondency. But he passed through them and became more buoyant in spirit, +and, though poor, was contented.</p> + +<p>In ‘My Nannie O’ he wrote:</p> + +<p class="poem">Come weel, come woe, I care na by,<br /> +I’ll tak what Heaven will sen’ me.</p> + +<p>In ‘It is na, Jean, thy Bonnie Face,’ he said:</p> + +<p class="poem">Content am I if Heaven shall give<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">But happiness to thee.</span></p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span>This shows that consideration for others was one of his sources of +happiness.</p> + +<p>In his ‘Epistle to James Smith’ he wrote:</p> + +<p class="poem">Truce with peevish, poor complaining!<br /> +Is Fortune’s fickle Luna waning?<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2.5em;">E’en let her gang!</span><br /> +Beneath what light she has remaining<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2.5em;">Let’s sing our sang.</span></p> + +<p>Dr John M’Kenzie of Mauchline, in 1810, thirteen years after the death of +Burns, described a visit made to see his father when he was ill. In it he +says: ‘Gilbert, in the first interview I had with him at Lochlea, was +frank, modest, well-informed, and communicative. The poet seemed distant, +suspicious, and without any wish to interest or please. He kept himself +very silent in a dark corner of the room; and before he took any part in +the conversation, I frequently detected him scrutinising me during my +conversation with his father and brother.</p> + +<p>‘But afterwards, when the conversation, which was on a medical subject, +had taken the turn he wished, he began to engage in it, displaying a +dexterity of reasoning, an ingenuity of reflection, and a familiarity with +topics apparently beyond his reach, by which his visitor was no less +gratified than astonished.’</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span>Burns lived next door to Dr M’Kenzie after he was married the second time +to Jean Armour. They were great friends. Burns wrote a masonic poem to +him, and called him ‘Common-sense’ in ‘The Holy Fair.’</p> + +<p>In the letter from which the above quotation is made, Dr M’Kenzie says +Robert took his characteristics mainly from his mother, and that Gilbert +resembled his father.</p> + +<p>Burns looked like his mother, and inherited his temperamental +characteristics mainly from her.</p> + +<p>Burns had a definitely religious tendency as one of his strong +characteristics when he was a child. In the sketch of his life that he +wrote to Dr Moore, of London, when he was twenty-eight years old, he says +that as a boy he possessed ‘an enthusiastic idiot-piety. I say idiot-piety +because I was then a child.’</p> + +<p>He wrote several religious poems while living on Lochlea farm and on +Mossgiel farm. ‘The Cotter’s Saturday Night’ was written at Mossgiel.</p> + +<p>Throughout his life his religious tendency was one of his characteristics. +This will be considered more fully in the chapter on ‘Burns’s Great Work +for Religion.’</p> + +<p>Burns was the warm, personal friend of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span> best people in every district +in or near which he lived. He must have been a good man who could count +among his friends such men and women as the following: Lord Glencairn, Mrs +Dunlop, the Earl of Eglintoun, Dr Moore, Dr M’Kenzie, Gavin Hamilton, Hon. +Henry Erskine, the Duchess of Gordon, Right Rev. Bishop Geddes, Robert +Graham of Fintry, Robert Riddell, Robert Aiken, the Earl of Buchan, Prof. +Dugald Stewart, Dr Candlish, Sir John Whitefoord, John Murdoch, Dr +Blacklock, Dr Hugh Blair, Alex. Cunningham, Rev. Archibald Alison, Sir +John Sinclair, Rev. John M’Math, and the best ministers of the ‘New +Licht,’ or progressive class; the leading professors in Edinburgh +University, and the leading schoolmasters in his neighbourhood. In fact, +he was loved and respected by leaders of all classes except the ‘Auld +Licht’ preachers. He lives on and becomes more popular as he becomes +better known.</p> + +<p>His one characteristic that would most fully represent him and his work +for God and humanity is his propelling tendency to be a reformer of +conditions. He accepted no existing conditions as good enough. He saw +quickly and clearly the defects of conditions as they existed, and he +never hesitated to attack any evil that he could help to <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span>overthrow. He +saw that individual freedom and pure religion were vital and essential +elements of human progress and happiness. He saw with unerring vision the +lack of freedom and of vital religion in the lives of the people; so to +make all men free, to give all children equal opportunity to develop the +best in their souls, and to purify religion from superstition, hypocrisy, +bigotry, and kindred evils that were blighting it, became his highest +purposes.</p> + +<p>What was the character of Burns in the estimation of the leading people of +his own time? On replying to a request that he would use his influence in +favour of Burns for an appointment Sir John Whitefoord wrote: ‘Your +character as a man, as well as a poet, entitles you, I think, to the +assistance of every inhabitant of Ayrshire.’</p> + +<p>Sir John owned the Ballochmyle estate near Mauchline, and was one of the +leading country gentlemen of Ayrshire in his time.</p> + +<p>Mr Archibald Prentice, editor of the <i>Manchester Times</i>, was the son of a +prominent man who lived about half-way between Mauchline and Edinburgh, at +Covington, in Lanarkshire. Mr Prentice, senior, was a great admirer of +Burns, as were leaders everywhere. Mr Archibald Prentice, writing about +his father’s affectionate respect for Burns, said;<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span> ‘My father, though a +strictly moral and religious man himself, always maintained that the +virtues of the poet greatly predominated over his faults. I once heard him +exclaim with hot wrath, when somebody was quoting from an apologist, +“What! do <i>they</i> apologise for <i>him</i>! One half of his good, and all his +bad divided among a score of them, would make them a’ better men!”</p> + +<p>‘In the year 1809 I resided for a short time in Ayrshire, in the +hospitable house of my father’s friend Reid, and surveyed with a strong +interest such visitors as had known Burns. I soon learned how to +anticipate their representations of his character. The men of strong minds +and strong feelings were invariable in their expressions of admiration; +but the <i>prosy</i>, consequential <i>bodies</i> all disliked him as exceedingly +dictatorial. The men whose religion was based on intellect and high moral +sentiment all thought well of him; but the mere professors [of religion] +“with their three-mile prayers and half-mile graces” denounced him as +worse than an infidel.’</p> + +<p>The progress of religious reformers has always been a thorny one. The +Master, Christ Himself, was crucified by the ‘Auld Lichts’ of His time, +and they stoned Stephen to death. So, through the centuries <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span>unprogressive +theologians have persecuted and often murdered the religious reformers, +who saw the evils in theology, and wished to remove them from the creeds +that blighted men’s souls. They burned Latimer in England; and Luther in +Germany was saved by the action of his friends by shutting him in Wartburg +Castle for protection. Religious reformers in the time of Burns were not +burned or stoned to death, but they were persecuted and prosecuted before +the Church Courts by men who did not approve of their higher visions of +truth. Burns himself was regarded as unorthodox, but his creed is much +more in harmony with the religious thought of to-day than it was with the +creed of the ‘Auld Licht’ preachers. One of the marvels of human +development through the ages has been that the bigoted theologians of each +succeeding century resented the attempts of men with clearer vision to +reform their creeds.</p> + +<p>Men who truly believe in God cannot believe that any creed made by men can +be infallible; they should know that from generation to generation +humanity consciously grows towards the Divine, and that as they climb they +see in the clearer spiritual air new visions of higher meaning in regard +to life and to vital religion, revealing to each man new<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span> conceptions of +his duty to God and to his fellow-men.</p> + +<p>Lovers of Burns reverence his memory because he was so great and so wise a +reformer, and did so much to make men truly free, and to make religion a +more vitally uplifting agency in the hearts of men.</p> + + +<p> </p><p> </p> +<hr style="width: 50%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IV" id="CHAPTER_IV"></a>CHAPTER IV.</h2> +<h3><span class="smcap">Burns was a Religious Man.</span></h3> + +<p>‘Burns a religious man!’ scoffers exclaim. ‘He was a drunkard.’ Burns was +a moderate drinker compared with most of the ministers of his time. If +drinking whisky was a disqualification for religious character in the time +of Burns, a large proportion of the ministers of his time were +disqualified. Burns should not, in all fairness, be judged by the +standards of our time. More than fifty years after Burns died it was +customary for even Methodist ministers in Canada, when visiting the +members of their churches, to accept a little whisky punch as an evidence +of good fellowship and comradeship. This custom persisted in Scotland and +England for more than a century after Burns died, and in many places it +exists still. In a letter to Mr William Cruickshank in 1788 he said: ‘I +have fought my way severely through the savage hospitality of this +country—the object of all hosts being to send every guest to bed drunk if +they can.’</p> + +<p>Burns was not speaking of hotel-keepers,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span> but of homes of people of high +respectability. He wrote in 1793: ‘Taverns I have totally abandoned, but +it is the private parties in the family way among the hard-drinking +gentlemen of the country that do me the mischief.’</p> + +<p>He did occasionally go to the Globe Tavern in Dumfries after 1793, when +the guest of visitors who came to Dumfries solely for the purpose of +meeting him and having the honour of entertaining him.</p> + +<p>In his short life of Burns, Alexander Smith says: ‘If he drank hard, it +was in an age when hard drinking was fashionable. If he sinned in this +respect, he sinned in company with English Prime Ministers, Scotch Lords +of Session, grave dignitaries of the Church in both countries, and +thousands of ordinary blockheads who went to their graves in the odour of +sanctity, and whose epitaphs are a catalogue of all the virtues.’</p> + +<p>Burns spoke with all sincerity, in a letter to his friend Samuel Clark of +Dumfries, when he wrote: ‘Some of our folks about the Excise office, +Edinburgh, had, and perhaps still have, conceived a prejudice against me +as being a drunken, dissipated character. I might be all this, you know, +and yet be an honest fellow; but you know that <i>I am an honest fellow</i>, +and am nothing of this.’ His superiors in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span> Excise department gave him +a high record for accuracy and honesty in his work.</p> + +<p>Other objectors say: ‘He could not be religious, because he attacked +religion.’ This statement is not correct. He attacked the evils that in +his time robbed religion of its vital power, but never religion. Emerson +says: ‘Not Luther, not Latimer, struck stronger blows against false +theology than did the poet Burns.’</p> + +<p>To Clarinda, Burns wrote: ‘I hate the superstition of a fanatic, but I +love the religion of a man.’</p> + +<p>In his poem ‘The Tree of Liberty’ he lays the blame of the terrible +degradation of the French peasantry on</p> + +<p class="poem">Superstition’s wicked brood.</p> + +<p>In his ‘Epistle to John Goudie’ he speaks of</p> + +<p class="poem">Poor gapin’, glowrin’ superstition.</p> + +<p>He attacked superstition, but not religion.</p> + +<p>He attacked hypocrisy, and true men are grateful to him because he did so.</p> + +<p>In his ‘Epistle to Rev. John M’Math,’ the ‘New Licht’ minister of +Tarbolton, Burns says:</p> + +<p class="poem">God knows I’m not the thing I should be,<br /> +Nor am I ev’n the thing I could be;<br /> +But twenty times I rather would be<br /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 3em;">An atheist clean,</span><br /> +Than under gospel colours hid be<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Just for a screen.</span></p> + +<p>He ridiculed hypocrisy, and we are grateful to him for doing so. Nothing +more contemptible than a religious hypocrite can be made of a being +created in the image of God. Hypocrisy is not religion.</p> + +<p>He attacked bigotry, one of the most savage monsters that ever tried to +block the way of Christ’s highest teaching, the brotherhood of man. No +phenomenal religious absurdity is more incomprehensible than the idea that +Christianity can be promoted by the multiplication of religious +denominations; especially when, as in the time of Burns, and long after +his time, leaders of so-called Christian denominations refused to have +fellowship with each other, or to unite on a common platform in working +for the promotion of Christian ideals. How trivial the formalisms of +theologians seem that kept men apart whom Christ desired to become +co-operative and loving brothers, working harmoniously together for the +achievement of the great visions he revealed!</p> + +<p>He wrote to Clarinda, 1788: ‘I hate the very idea of a controversial +divinity; and I firmly believe that every upright, honest man, of whatever +sect, will be accepted of the Deity.’</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span>In his ‘Epistle to John Goudie’ Burns calls bigotry</p> + +<p class="poem">Sour bigotry on its last legs.</p> + +<p>He wrote this in 1785, and much more than a century later bigotry is still +on its legs, but it is tottering to its final overthrow. Burns attacked +bigotry, but not religion.</p> + +<p>He attacked the doctrine of predestination, as taught in his time, a most +soul-dwarfing doctrine, calculated to rob humanity of motives to stimulate +it to greater and nobler efforts to achieve for God. He makes Holy Willie +say he deserved damnation five thousand years before he was born. Few +people now regard predestination as an element in vital religion.</p> + +<p>He attacked one of the most horribly blasphemous doctrines ever preached, +but preached in the time of Burns, and long after:</p> + +<p class="poem">That God sends ane to heaven and ten to hell<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">For His ain glory.</span></p> + +<p>He puts this impious doctrine into the mouth of Holy Willie. More than +half a century after the time of Burns, preachers in the presence of +mothers of their dead babies taught that the babes could not go to heaven +because they were too young to be ‘believers in Christ;’ and being unable +to account for<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span> their statements logically, would say, ‘God did these +things for His own glory.’ Burns attacked such horrible teaching, but in +doing so he was not attacking religion.</p> + +<p>Burns did not believe in the use of the fear of hell as a means of +promoting true religion. There is no soul-kindling power in fear. Fear is +one of the most powerful agencies of evil in preventing the conscious +development of the soul, and of the faith that each soul should have in +God as the source of power, in Christ as the revealer of individual power, +and in himself as God’s partner. Fear is a negative agency that appeals to +the weaker side of character. Humanity will not be able to make the rapid +progress towards the Divine that it should make until fear ceases to be a +motive in the minds of men, women, and children. In his great ‘Epistle to +a Young Friend’ Burns says:</p> + +<p class="poem">The fear o’ hell’s a hangman’s whip<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">To haud the <i>wretch</i> in order.<span class="spacer2"> </span>keep</span></p> + +<p>Burns proved himself to be a philosopher when he attacked the common plan +of using fear o’ hell to make men religious. This was not attacking +religion.</p> + +<p>The Rev. L. MacLean Watt says: ‘While the professional Christians of +Scotland were<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span> fighting about Hell, the humble hearts by the lowly +firesides, with the open book before them, were enriched by the knowledge +of heaven; and while the hypocrites in holy places were scourging those +who were in their power with the thorns of Christ, there were cotters in +their kitchens that had found the healing and the balm of the warm blood +of a Redeemer who died on Calvary for <i>a wider world</i> than theologians +seemed to know.’</p> + +<p>Speaking further of the theologians of the time of Burns the Rev. Mr Watt +says: ‘Their idea of God was shaped in fashion like themselves—merciless, +remorseless, hating, and hateful; His only passion seeming to their narrow +souls to be damnation and torture of the wretched, lost, and wandering. +Their preachers loved to picture the souls of the condemned swathed in +batches lying in eternal anguish of a most real blazing hell as punishment +for some small offence, or as having been outcast from grace through the +wanton exercise of divine prerogatives. To commend such a God for worship +were like praising and complimenting the cruel child who, for sport, spent +a whole day plucking the limbs and wings from the palpitating body of some +poor, helpless insect. It was a false and blasphemous insult to the human +intelligence.’</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span>Burns had the good fortune to be a cotter, trained by a father who was a +remarkably able man, a great teacher, and a reverently religious man of +very advanced ideals; and it took a century or more of theological +evolution to bring the religious teaching of the world up to the standards +of belief of the Ayrshire cotter.</p> + +<p>He attacked the doctrine of Faith without Works. In a letter to Gavin +Hamilton, one of the leading men of the town of Mauchline, a warm, +personal friend of the poet, and an advanced thinker among ‘New Licht’ +laymen, he wrote in a humorous but really profound way: ‘I understand you +are in the habit of intimacy with that Boanerges of Gospel powers, Father +Auld. Be earnest with him that he will wrestle in prayer for you that you +may see the vanity of vanities in trusting to, even practising, the carnal +moral works of charity, humanity, and generosity; things which you +practised so flagrantly that it was evident you delighted in them, +neglecting, or perhaps profanely despising, the wholesome doctrine of +<i>faith without works</i>, the only hope of salvation.’</p> + +<p>Burns did not say a word against faith in Christ, or love for Christ, or +reverence for the teaching of Christ. So true a Christian as Dean Stanley +said Burns was a ‘wise religious<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span> teacher.’ Burns deplored the fact that +the love of Christ—the highest revelation of love ever given to the +world—should be limited to saving the individual believer from eternal +punishment. That was degrading the highest love into selfishness. Burns +pleaded for loving service for humanity, and for Christ’s highest +revelation, brotherhood, as evidence of vital Christian-hood; not merely +‘sound believing.’ This was not attacking religion. He attacked the men +who attacked other men, like Gavin Hamilton among laymen, and Rev. Dr +M’Gill of Ayr among ministers, because they had advanced ideas regarding +religion.</p> + +<p>He attacked the gloom and awful Sunday solemnity of those who professed to +be religious. The world owes him a debt of gratitude for helping to remove +the shadows of religious gloom from human lives. In his poem ‘A +Dedication,’ addressed to Gavin Hamilton, he advises him ironically, in +order that he may be acceptable to Daddy Auld and others of the ‘Auld +Licht’ creed, to</p> + +<p class="poem">Learn three-mile pray’rs an’ half-mile graces,<br /> +Wi’ weel-spread looves, an’ lang, wry faces; palms<br /> +Grunt up a solemn, lengthened groan,<br /> +And damn a’ parties [religious] but your own;<br /> +I’ll warrant then you’re nae deceiver,<br /> +A steady, sturdy, staunch believer.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span>If true religion means anything vitally hopeful to a man, it should mean +what Burns said it meant to him in a letter to Mrs Dunlop: ‘My dearest +enjoyment.’</p> + +<p>In his wise poem, ‘Epistle to a Young Friend,’ he says:</p> + +<p class="poem">But still the preaching cant forbear,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And ev’n the rigid feature.</span></p> + +<p>He attacked the ‘unco guid,’ who delighted to tell how good they were +themselves, and how many were the weaknesses and evil-doings of their +neighbours. He had no more respect for the self-righteous than Christ had. +The fact that he attacked and exposed them, and spoke kindly and +reasonably to them, in his great ‘Address to the Unco Guid,’ is an +evidence that in this respect at any rate he was a true Christian. One of +the most comprehensively Christian doctrines ever written is the verse:</p> + +<p class="poem">Who made the heart, ’tis He alone<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Decidedly can try us;</span><br /> +He knows each heart—its various tone,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Each spring—its various bias.</span><br /> +<br /> +Then at the balance let’s be mute,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">We never can adjust it;</span><br /> +What’s done we partly may compute,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">But know not what’s resisted.</span></p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span>There is sound philosophy in the first verse of the poem addressed to the +unco guid:</p> + +<p class="poem">The rigid righteous is a fool,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The rigid wise another.</span></p> + +<p>He often advised the ‘douce folks’ to be considerate of those who had +greater temptations than they knew; and advised them to try to help them +to overcome their temptations, and with Christian comradeship win their +admiration and sympathetic co-operation in some department of achieving +good.</p> + +<p>In the time of Burns nothing would have surprised a wayward man or woman +more than to have received genuine sympathy and respectful comradeship +from members of the Church, the institution that claimed to represent +Christ, who told the story of the one stray lamb, and the story of the +prodigal son; the Great Teacher who said, ‘Let him that is without sin +cast the first stone.’</p> + +<p>Burns attacked superstition, hypocrisy, bigotry, predestination (taught in +its most repellent form in the time of Burns), the equally repellent +doctrine that ‘God sends men to hell for His own glory;’ fear of hell as a +basis of religious life; faith without works; religious gloom; and the +spirit of the unco guid. He helped to free religion from these evils more<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span> +than any other man of his time did; but that was just the opposite to +attacking religion.</p> + +<p>In the ‘Holy Fair’ and ‘The Twa Herds’ he criticised with biting sarcasm +certain things connected with religion in his time, from which it is now +happily free. But he did not attack religion. The Rev. L. MacLean Watt, +when summing up the great work Burns did for true religion, especially in +‘The Holy Fair,’ ‘The Twa Herds,’ and ‘Holy Willie’s Prayer,’ says: ‘It +was in consequence of this ecclesiastical contact that he was, ere long, +involved in a bitter and incessant warfare with the mediæval shadows of +ultra-Calvinism, which laid upon the people the bondage of a rigid +predestinarianism, the terrible result of which in parochial religion was, +that it became a commonplace in the matter of conduct that it did not +matter what you did so long as you believed certain hard and fast tenets +dealing with the purpose of God and the future of the human soul. This +could not but inevitably lead to the observation of grave discrepancies +between creed and conduct; and the setting up of the greatest hypocrisies, +veiled in the cloak of religiousness, that yet, with searching eye of +judgment, sat testing the conduct of better men. Burns was one of the +better men.’</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span>His own attitude towards true religion is shown in his ‘Epistle to the +Rev. John M’Math,’ a progressive Presbyterian minister in Tarbolton. In it +he says:</p> + +<p class="poem">All hail, Religion! maid divine!<br /> +Pardon a muse sae mean as mine,<br /> +Who in her rough, imperfect line<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Thus daurs to name thee;</span><br /> +To stigmatise <i>false friends</i> of thine<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Can ne’er defame thee.</span></p> + +<p>He stigmatised false friends of religion, but not religion itself.</p> + +<p>There are some who yet say ‘Burns could not have been a religious man, +because he was a sceptic.’ Burns was an independent thinker. His mind did +not accept dogmas or creeds without investigation. In his father’s fine +school he was not trained to think he was thinking, when he was merely +allowing the ideas of others to run through his head on the path of +memory. Burns was not trained to believe that he believed, but to think +till he believed; and to accept in the realm beyond his power to reason +great fundamental principles that supplied the conscious needs of his own +heart, as those principles are revealed in the Bible.</p> + +<p>In a letter to Mrs Dunlop he wrote: ‘I am a very sincere believer in the +Bible; but I am<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span> drawn by the conviction of a man, not by the halter of an +ass.’</p> + +<p>To Mrs Dunlop he wrote, 1788: ‘My idle reasonings sometimes made me a +little sceptical, but the necessities of my own heart always gave the cold +philosophisings the lie.’</p> + +<p>To Mr Peter Stuart he wrote, referring to the poet Fergusson, 1789: ‘Poor +Fergusson! If there be a life beyond the grave, which I trust there is; +and if there be a good God presiding over all Nature, which I am sure +there is—thou art now enjoying existence in a glorious world, where worth +of the heart alone is the distinction of man.’</p> + +<p>To Mrs Dunlop, to whom more than to any other person he revealed the +depths of his heart, he wrote again, 1789: ‘In vain would we reason and +pretend to doubt. I have myself done so to a very daring pitch; but when I +reflected that I was opposing the most ardent wishes, and the most darling +hopes of good men, and flying in the face of all human belief, in all +ages, I was shocked at my own conduct.’</p> + +<p>To Robert Aiken he wrote, 1786: ‘Though sceptical in some points of our +current belief, yet I think I have every evidence for the reality of a +life beyond the stinted bourne of our present existence.’</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span>To Dr Candlish, of Edinburgh, he wrote, 1787: ‘Despising old women’s +stories, I ventured into the daring path Spinoza trod, but my experience +with the weakness, not the strength, of human power <i>made me glad to grasp +revealed religion</i>.’</p> + +<p>To Clarinda he wrote, 1788: ‘The Supreme Being has put the immediate +administration of all this for wise and good ends known to Himself into +the hands of Jesus Christ, a great personage whose relation to Him we +cannot comprehend, but whose relation to us is that of a Guide and +Saviour.’</p> + +<p>In his epistle to his young friend Andrew Aiken, he sums up in two lines +his attitude to scepticism:</p> + +<p class="poem">An atheist’s laugh’s a poor exchange<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">For Deity offended.</span></p> + +<p>The men who believe most profoundly are those who honestly doubted in +early life, but who naturally loved truth, and sought it with hopeful +minds till they found it. Burns was not a sceptic. He was a reverently +religious man. No man could have written ‘The Cotter’s Saturday Night’ who +was not a reverently religious man. His father, from the earliest years, +when his children were old enough to understand them, began to teach<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span> them +fundamental religious principles. They took root deeply in Robert’s mind. +William Burns preferred not to use the ‘Shorter Catechism,’ so he wrote a +special catechism for his own family. It is a remarkable production for a +man in his position in life. It deals with vitally fundamental principles, +and shows a clear understanding of the Bible.</p> + +<p>Burns wrote several short religious poems in his early young manhood, +probably his twenty-second and twenty-third years, showing that his mind +was deeply impressed by the majesty, justice, and love of God. Two of +these poems are paraphrases of the Psalms.</p> + +<p>The fact that religion was one of the most important elements of his +thought and life is amply proved by the five letters he wrote to Alison +Begbie in his twenty-first and twenty-second years—even before he wrote +his early religious poems. Love-letters though they were, they related +nearly as much to religion as to love. Some people have tried to say +irreverently smart things about the absurdity of writing about religion in +letters to his loved one. Both the religion and the love of his letters to +the first woman he ever asked to marry him are too sacred to provoke +ridicule in the minds of men with proper reverence for either religion or +love. No one can <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span>carefully read these five letters without having a +deeper respect for Burns, the young gentleman who loved so deeply that he +regarded love worthy to be placed in association with religion. Religion +was the subject that had been given first place in his life and thought by +the teaching and the life of his father, who had meant infinitely more to +him than most fathers ever mean to their sons.</p> + +<p>In his epistle to Andrew Aiken he recommends, in the last verse but one, +two things of vast importance ‘when on life we’re tempest-driv’n’: first,</p> + +<p class="poem">A conscience but a canker.<span class="spacer2"> </span>without</p> + +<p>Second,</p> + +<p class="poem">A correspondence fixed wi’ Heaven<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Is sure a noble anchor.</span></p> + +<p>Many people read the last couplet without consciously thinking what a +correspondence fixed with Heaven means. Clearly it may have three +meanings: prayer, communion in spirit with the Divine, and similarity to +or harmony with the divine spirit.</p> + +<p>Burns had family worship in his home every day to the end of his life when +he was not absent, and though some scoffers may smile, he was earnest and +sincere in trying to conduct for himself and for his family a +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span>‘correspondence fixed with heaven’ in a spirit of communion with the +Divine Father. He had other altars for communion with God in addition to +his home. He composed his poems in the gloaming after his day’s work, in +favourite spots in the deep woods, where he was ‘hid with God’ alone. God +revealed Himself to Burns in the woods and by the sides of his sacred +rivers more fully than in any other places. One of the most sacred shrines +in Scotland is the great root under one of the mighty beeches of the fine +park on Ballochmyle estate, on which Burns sat so often to compose his +poems in the long Scottish twilights, and later on in the moonlight, when +he lived on Mossgiel farm. Then next night, at his desk over the stable at +Mossgiel, he would rewrite them and improve their form.</p> + +<p>No man but a religious man would have written, in his ‘Epistle to a Young +Friend,’ as Burns did to Andrew Aiken:</p> + +<p class="poem">The great Creator to revere<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Must sure become the creature.</span></p> + +<p>When in Irvine, in his twenty-third year, he wrote a letter to his father. +As usual, he wrote not of trivial matters, but of the great realities of +time and eternity. Among other serious things he wrote: ‘My principal, +and,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span> indeed, my only pleasurable, employment is looking backwards and +forwards in a moral and religious way.’ In the same letter he wrote:</p> + +<p class="poem">The soul, uneasy and confined, at home<br /> +Rests and expatiates in a life to come.<small><a name="f3.1" id="f3.1" href="#f3">[3]</a></small></p> + +<p>Burns follows this quotation by saying to his father: ‘It is for this +reason that I am more pleased with the 15th, 16th, and 17th verses of the +7th Chapter of Revelation than with any ten times as many verses in the +whole Bible, and would not exchange the noble enthusiasm with which they +inspire me for all that the world has to offer.’</p> + +<p>His imagination enabled him to see clearly the glories of joy, and +service, and association, and reward, in the heavenly paradise, as +revealed in those triumphant verses.</p> + +<p>To Mrs Dunlop he wrote, 1788: ‘Religion, my honoured Madam, has not only +been all my life my chief dependence, but my dearest enjoyment.... An +irreligious poet would be a monster.’</p> + +<p>In his ‘Grace before Eating’ he reveals his gratitude and conscious +dependence on God:</p> + +<p class="poem">O Thou, who kindly dost provide<br /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 1em;">For every creature’s want!</span><br /> +We bless Thee, God of Nature wide,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">For all Thy goodness lent.</span></p> + +<p>In ‘Winter: a Dirge’ he says, in reverent submission to God’s will:</p> + +<p class="poem">Thou Power supreme, whose mighty scheme<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Those woes of mine fulfil,</span><br /> +Here firm I rest, they must be best,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Because they are Thy Will.</span></p> + +<p>In a poem to Clarinda he wrote, recognising the blessing of Gods universal +presence, not in awe so much as in joy:</p> + +<p class="poem">God is ever present, ever felt,<br /> +In the void waste, as in the city full;<br /> +And where He vital breathes, there must be joy!</p> + +<p>In the ‘Cotter’s Saturday Night’ he teaches absolute faith in God, and +indicates man’s true relationship to the Divine Father:</p> + +<p class="poem"><span style="margin-left: 2em;">Lest in temptation’s path ye gang astray,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Implore His counsel and assisting might:</span><br /> +They never sought in vain, that sought the Lord aright.</p> + +<p>Writing in condemnation of a miserably selfish miser, he said:</p> + +<p class="poem">See these hands, ne’er stretched to save,<br /> +Hands that took, but never gave;<br /> +Keeper of Mammon’s iron chest,<br /> +Lo, there she goes, unpitied and unblest;<br /> +She goes, but not to realms of everlasting rest.<br /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span><br /> +And are they of no more avail,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Ten thousand glittering pounds a year?</span><br /> +In other worlds can Mammon fail,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Omnipotent as he is here?</span><br /> +O, bitter mockery of the pompous bier,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">While down the wretched Vital Part is driven!</span><br /> +The cave-lodged beggar, with a conscience clear,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Expires in rags, unknown, and goes to heaven.</span></p> + +<p>The philosophy of his mind, and the affectionate sympathy of his heart +made Burns believe that unselfish service for our fellow-men should be one +of the manifestations of true religion.</p> + +<p>In the fine poem he wrote to Mrs Dunlop on New Year’s Day, 1790, he says:</p> + +<p class="poem">A few days may, a few years must,<br /> +Repose us in the silent dust.<br /> +Then is it wise to damp our bliss?<br /> +Yes—all such reasonings are amiss!<br /> +The voice of Nature loudly cries,<br /> +And many a message from the skies,<br /> +That something in us never dies;<br /> +That on this frail, uncertain state<br /> +Hang matters of eternal weight;<br /> +That future life in worlds unknown<br /> +Must take its hue from this alone;<br /> +Whether as heavenly glory bright,<br /> +Or dark as Misery’s woeful night.<br /> +Let us the important Now employ,<br /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span>And live as those who never die.<br /> +Since, then, my honoured first of friends,<br /> +On this poor living all depends.</p> + +<p>Any honest man who reads those lines must admit that Burns was a man of +deep religious thought and feeling.</p> + +<p>Mrs Dunlop, to whom he wrote so many letters, was one of the leading women +of Scotland in her time. She was a woman of great wisdom and deep +religious character. Like the other great people who knew Burns, she was +his friend. Many of his clearest expressions of his religious opinions are +contained in his letters to her. In a letter to her on New Year’s morning, +1789, he said: ‘I have some favourite flowers in Spring, among which are +the mountain-daisy, the hare-bell, the foxglove, the wild brier-rose, the +budding birk [birch], and the hoary hawthorn, that I view and hang over +with particular delight. I never hear the loud, solitary whistle of the +curlew in the Summer noon, or the wild, mixing cadence of a troop of +grey-plover in an Autumnal morning, without feeling an elevation of soul +like the enthusiasm of Devotion or Poetry. Tell me, my dear friend, to +what can this be owing? Are we a piece of machinery that, like the Æolian +harp, passive, takes the impression of the passing accident? Or do these +workings<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span> argue something within us above the trodden clod? I own myself +partial to these proofs of those awful and important realities—a God that +made all things—man’s immaterial and immortal nature—and a world of weal +or woe beyond death and the grave—these proofs that we deduct by dint of +our own powers of observation. However respectable Individuals in all ages +have been, I have ever looked on Mankind in the lump to be nothing better +than a foolish, head-strong, credulous, unthinking Mob; and their +universal belief has ever had extremely little weight with me. Still, I am +a very sincere believer in the Bible.’</p> + +<p>In September 1789 he wrote to Mrs Dunlop: ‘Religion, my dear friend, is +true comfort! A strong persuasion in a future state of existence; a +proposition so obviously probable, that, setting revelation aside, every +nation and people, so far as investigation has reached, for at least four +thousand years, have, in some mode or other, firmly believed it.’</p> + +<p>To Mrs Dunlop, in 1792, he wrote: ‘I am so convinced that an unshaken +faith in the doctrines of religion is not only necessary by making us +better men, but also by making us happier men, that I shall take every +care that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span> your little god-son [his son], and every creature that shall +call me father, shall be taught them.’</p> + +<p>One of his most beautiful religious letters was written to Alexander +Cunningham, of Edinburgh, in 1794: ‘Still there are two pillars that bear +us up amid the wreck of misfortune and misery. The <i>one</i> is composed of +the different modifications of a certain noble, stubborn something in man, +known by the names of courage, fortitude, magnanimity. The <i>other</i> is made +up of those feelings and sentiments which, however the sceptic may deny +them, or the enthusiast may disfigure them, are yet, I am convinced, +original and component parts of the human soul; those <i>senses of the +mind</i>, if I may be allowed the expression, which connect us with and link +us to, those awful, obscure realities—an all-powerful and equally +beneficent God, and a world to come, beyond death and the grave. The first +gives the nerve of combat, while a ray of hope beams on the field; the +last pours the balm of comfort into the wounds which time can never cure.</p> + +<p>‘I do not remember, my dear Cunningham, that you and I ever talked on the +subject of religion at all. I know some who laugh at it, as the trick of +the crafty <span class="smcaplc">FEW</span>, to lead the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span> +undiscerning <span class="smcaplc">MANY</span>; or at most as an uncertain +obscurity, which mankind can never know anything of, and with which they +are fools if they give themselves much to do. Nor would I quarrel with a +man for his irreligion, any more than I would for his want of a musical +ear. I would regret that he was shut out from what, to me and to others, +were such superlative sources of enjoyment. It is in this point of view, +and for this reason, that I will deeply imbue the mind of every child of +mine with religion. If my son should happen to be a man of feeling, +sentiment, and taste, I shall thus add largely to his enjoyments. Let me +flatter myself that this sweet little fellow, who is just now running +about my desk, will be a man of a melting, ardent, glowing heart; and an +imagination, delighted with the painter and rapt with the poet. Let me +figure him wandering out in a sweet evening, to inhale the balmy gales, +and enjoy the glowing luxuriance of the spring; himself the while in the +blooming youth of life. He looks abroad on all Nature, and thro’ Nature up +to Nature’s God; his soul, by swift delighting degrees, is rapt above this +sublunary sphere, until he can be silent no longer, and bursts out into +the glorious enthusiasm of Thomson:</p> + +<p class="poem"><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span> +‘“These, as they change, Almighty Father—these<br /> +Are but the varied God; the rolling year<br /> +Is full of thee.”</p> + +<p>‘and so on, in all the spirit and ardour of that charming hymn.</p> + +<p>‘These are no ideal pleasures; they are real delights; and I ask what of +the delights among the sons of men are superior, not to say equal, to +them? And they have this precious, vast addition, that conscious Virtue +stamps them for her own, and lays hold on them to bring herself into the +presence of a witnessing, judging, and approving God.’</p> + +<p>In 1788 he wrote to Clarinda: ‘My definition of worth is short: truth and +humanity respecting our fellow-creatures; reverence and humility in the +presence of that Being, my Creator and Preserver, and who, I have every +reason to believe, will be my judge.’</p> + +<p>Again to Clarinda he wrote in 1788: ‘He who is our Author and Preserver, +and will one day be our Judge, must be—not for His sake in the way of +duty, but from the natural impulse of our hearts—the object of our +reverential awe and grateful adoration. He is almighty and all-bounteous; +we are weak and dependent; hence prayer and every other sort of devotion. +“He is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span> to +everlasting life;” consequently it must be in every one’s power to embrace +His offer of everlasting life; otherwise He could not in justice condemn +those who did not.’</p> + +<p>Again in 1788 he wrote to Clarinda: ‘In proportion as we are wrung with +grief, or distracted with anxiety, the ideas of a Compassionate Deity, an +Almighty Protector, are doubly dear.’</p> + +<p>To Mrs Dunlop, in 1795, a year and a half before he died, he wrote: ‘I +have nothing to say to any one as to which sect he belongs to, or what +creed he believes; but I look on the man who is firmly persuaded of +Infinite Wisdom and Goodness superintending and directing every +circumstance that can happen in his lot—I felicitate such a man as having +a solid foundation for his mental enjoyment; a firm prop and stay in the +hour of difficulty, trouble, and distress; and a never-failing anchor of +hope when he looks beyond the grave.’</p> + +<p>This quotation emphasises his lifelong faith in God, and his belief in his +own immortality. It also shows his perfect freedom from bigotry, and the +broadness of his creed.</p> + +<p>In his first ‘Commonplace Book’ he wrote: ‘The grand end of Human being is +to cultivate an intercourse with that Being to whom we owe life, with +every enjoyment that renders<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span> life delightful; and to maintain an +integritive conduct towards our fellow-creatures; that by so forming Piety +and Virtue into habit, we may be fit members for that society of the +Pious, and the Good, which reason and revelation teach us to expect beyond +the grave.’</p> + +<p>There are no truly good men who will yield to the temptation to speak +sneeringly of any man who fails in his life to reach his highest ideals. +The little-minded men who may sneer at Burns, when they read this +quotation written in his youth, should read his ‘Address to the Unco Guid’ +over and over, till they get a glimmering comprehension of its meaning. +Whatever the puny minds may be focussed on in the life of Burns, they +should be ‘mute at the balance.’ They should remember that Burns did more +than any man of his time for true religion, and that to the end of his +life his mind and heart overflowed with the same faith and gratitude to +God that he almost continuously expressed throughout his life.</p> + +<p>A final quotation from the letters of Burns about religion may fittingly +be taken from a letter to Robert Aiken, written in 1786: ‘O thou unknown +Power! Thou Almighty God who hast lighted up Reason in my<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span> breast, and +blessed me with immortality! I have frequently wandered from that order +and regularity necessary for the perfection of Thy works, yet Thou hast +never left me nor forsaken me.’</p> + +<p>Burns was a reverently religious man. Dean Stanley said: ‘Burns was a wise +religious teacher.’ Principal Rainy objected to Dean Stanley’s view +because ‘Burns had never become a member of a church on profession of +Faith in Christ.’ Professor Rainy either did not remember, or had never +realised, that Burns had done more to reveal Christ’s highest +teachings—the value of the individual soul, and brotherhood—than any +other man in the church, or out of it, in Scotland in his time; and also +did more to make religion free from false theology and dwarfing practices, +than any other man of his time, or of any other time in Scotland.</p> + +<p>Rev. L. MacLean Watt, of Edinburgh, in his most admirable book on Burns, +answers Principal Rainy’s objections with supreme ability, as the +following quotations amply prove: ‘Because a man does not categorically +declare his belief in Christ, as that belief is formulated in existing +dogmatic statements of theological authority, it does not mean that he +abhors that belief; nor even though<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span> he withhold himself from explicitly +uttering that confession of the Christian faith, does it preclude him from +being a religious teacher. A man may have an enormous influence as a +religious teacher, and yet never have made a formal statement of +Christianity, nor signed a Christian creed.’—‘The measure of a man’s +faithfulness to the better side of his nature is not to be gauged by the +depth of his fall, but the height to which he rises.... Burns was, +unfortunately, confronted by a narrow and self-righteous set, who were +enslaved to doctrine and dogma, rather than to the practice of the +Christian life with charity and humanity of spirit, part and parcel of a +system of petty tyrannies and mean oppressions, the exercise of which made +for exile from the fold, because of the spiritual conceit and sectarian +humbug which created such characters as “Holy Willie,” and the “Unco +Guid,” with the superior airs of religious security from which they looked +down on all besides.’</p> + +<p>We should test neither the terrible theologians of his time—those men who +attacked Burns and called him irreligious, because he had a clear vision +of a higher, holier religion than the one they preached—nor Burns himself +by the conditions of our own time.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span> It is unjust both to Burns and to his +enemies to do so.</p> + +<p>A comparison of the religious principles of the best Christians in the +world nearly a century and a half after his time will show, however, that +the creed of the present is more—much more—like the creed of Burns than +the creed of the dreadful theologians of his time. The creed of the +religious leaders a century hence will be still more like the creed of +Robert Burns than is the creed of to-day.</p> + +<p>The following creed is taken from the letters of Burns, expressed in his +own language, except the last article, which is found in longer form in +many of his letters, and more nearly in ‘The Hermit,’ in which he says:</p> + +<p class="poem">Let me, O Lord! from life retire,<br /> +Unknown each guilty, worldly fire,<br /> +Remorse’s throb, or loose desire;<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">And when I die</span><br /> +Let me in this belief expire—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">To God I fly.</span></p> + +<p class="center"><br />THE CREED OF ROBERT BURNS.</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p class="hang">1. Religion should be a simple business, as it equally concerns the +ignorant and the learned, the poor and the rich.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span></p> + +<p class="hang">2. There is a great and incomprehensible Being to whom I owe my existence.</p> + +<p class="hang">3. The Creator perfectly understands the being He has made.</p> + +<p class="hang">4. There is a real and eternal distinction between vice and virtue.</p> + +<p class="hang">5. There must be a retributive scene of existence beyond the grave.</p> + +<p class="hang">6. From the sublimity, the excellence, and the purity of His +doctrines and precepts, I believe Jesus Christ came from God.</p> + +<p class="hang">7. Whatever is done to mitigate the woes, or increase the happiness of humanity, is goodness.</p> + +<p class="hang">8. Whatever injures society or any member of it is iniquity.</p> + +<p class="hang">9. I believe in the immaterial and immortal nature of man.</p> + +<p class="hang">10. I believe in eternal life with God.</p></div> + +<p>Carlyle expressed regret that ‘Burns became involved in the religious +quarrels of his district.’ This statement proves that Carlyle failed fully +to comprehend the religious character of Burns. His chivalrous nature was +partly responsible for his entering the battle waged by the ‘Auld Lichts’ +against his dear friend the Rev. Dr M’Gill of Ayr and Gavin Hamilton of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span> +Mauchline; but his chief reason was his innate determination to free +religion from the evils taught and practised in the name of religion in +his time. He had the soul of a reformer, and the two leading elements in +his soul were Religion and Liberty for the individual. It would have +robbed the world of one of the greatest steps in human progress towards +the Divine made in the eighteenth century, if Burns had failed to be true +to the greatest things in his mind and heart.</p> + +<p>Carlyle had clearly not studied the religious elements in either the poems +or the letters of Burns, or he could not have written his comparison +between Burns and Locke, Milton, and Cervantes, who did in poverty and +unusual difficulties grand work. He asks: ‘What, then, had these men which +Burns wanted? Two things; both which, it seems to us, are indispensable +for such men. They had a true religious principle of morals, and a single, +not a double, aim in their activity. They were not self-seekers and +self-worshippers; but seekers and worshippers of something far better than +self. Not personal enjoyment was their object; but a high heroic idea of +Religion, of Patriotism, of Heavenly Wisdom in one form or the other form +ever hovered before them.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span>It passes understanding to comprehend how Carlyle could regard Burns as a +‘selfish’ man, or a man with ‘a double aim’—that is, two conflicting and +opposing aims that he wasted his power in trying to harmonise.</p> + +<p>Burns had three great aims: Purer Religion, a just Democracy, and closer +Brotherhood; but these aims are in perfect harmony.</p> + +<p>Carlyle ends the contrast between Burns and his model trio—Locke, Milton, +and Cervantes—by saying of Burns: ‘He has no religion; in the shallow +age, where his days were cast, Religion was not discriminated from the New +and Old Light <i>forms</i> of Religion; and was, with these, becoming obsolete +in the minds of men.’</p> + +<p>‘The heart not of a mere hot-blooded, popular verse-monger, or poetical +<i>Restaurateur</i>, but of a true poet and singer, worthy of the old religions +heroic, had been given him, and he fell in an age, not of heroism and +religion, but of scepticism, selfishness, and triviality, when true +nobleness was little understood, and its place supplied by a hollow, +dissocial, altogether barren and unfruitful principle of Pride.’</p> + +<p>In a just comparison between Burns and the three named by Carlyle, Burns +will need no apologists. Burns, directly in opposition<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span> to the statement +of Carlyle, was more vitally religious and less selfish than any of them. +When twenty-one years of age he said, in one of his beautiful love-letters +to Alison Begbie: ‘I grasp every creature in the arms of universal +benevolence, and equally participate in the pleasures of the happy, and +sympathise with the miseries of the unfortunate.’ This alone proves that +Burns was one of the least selfish men who ever lived.</p> + +<p>As an heroic teacher of vital religion Burns was infinitely greater than +any other man of his time, and has been much more influential since his +time in promoting Christ’s ideals than the men named by Carlyle. He was a +fearless hero, and so meets the requirements specified by Carlyle, +because, when he recognised the evils connected with religion in his time, +when true religion was, to use Carlyle’s words, ‘becoming obsolete,’ he +valiantly attacked them, hoping to enable his fellow-men to see the vision +of true religion which his father had given him by his life and teaching.</p> + +<p>There was absolutely no justification for calling Burns a mere +verse-monger. To write such a wild nightmare dream about Scotland’s +greatest and most self-less poet was unworthy of one of Scotland’s leading +prose-writers.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span>It seems almost ludicrous to take notice of the assertion that Burns had +not a high ideal of patriotism, as compared with the three ideal men of +Carlyle—Burns, whose love for Scotland was a sacred feeling, a holy fire +that never ceased to burn. This criticism needs no answer now.</p> + + +<p> </p><p> </p> +<hr style="width: 50%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_V" id="CHAPTER_V"></a>CHAPTER V.</h2> +<h3><span class="smcap">Burns the Democrat.</span></h3> + +<p>No man ever comprehended Christ’s ideals regarding democracy more fully +than did Burns. Christ based His teaching of the need of human liberty on +His revelation of the value of the individual soul. Burns clearly +understood Christ’s ideals regarding individual freedom, and faithfully +followed Him.</p> + +<p>The message of Coila in ‘The Vision’ to Burns was:</p> + +<p class="poem">Preserve the dignity of man<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">With soul erect.</span></p> + +<p>This was the central thought in the work of Burns regarding the freedom of +all mankind: freedom from oppression by other men; freedom from the +bondage imposed on the peasant and the labouring man by customs organised +by so-called ‘higher classes’; freedom from the hardship and sorrow of +poverty; freedom for each child to grow under proper conditions of +nourishment, of physical development, and of educational training.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span>His whole nature was stirred to dignified indignation and resentment by +class distinctions among men and women who were all created in the image +of God, and who, in accordance with the teaching of Christ, should be +brothers. He despised class distinctions which were made by man, whether +the distinctions were made on the basis of rank or wealth. He was ashamed +of the toadies who reverenced a lord merely because he chanced to be born +a lord, and pitied those who accepted without protest inferiority to men +of wealth. He was so true a democrat that he freely and respectfully +recognised the worth of members of the aristocracy or of the wealthy class +whose ability and high character made them worthy of respect; but he held +in contempt those who assumed superiority simply because of rank or gold.</p> + +<p>One of his most brilliant poems is ‘A Man’s a Man for a’ That.’ In it he +gives comprehensive expression to his opinions, based on the fundamental +principle,</p> + +<p class="poem">The honest man, though e’er sae poor,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Is King o’ men for a’ that.</span><br /> +<br /> +Is there for honesty poverty,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">That hangs his head an’ a’ that?</span><br /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span><br /> +The coward-slave, we pass him by;<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">We dare be poor for a’ that.</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">For a’ that, an’ a’ that,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">Our toils obscure, an’ a’ that;</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">The rank is but the guinea stamp,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">The man’s the gowd for a’ that.<span class="spacer2"> </span>gold</span><br /> +<br /> +Ye see yon birkie, ca’d a lord,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Wha struts, and stares, an’ a’ that;</span><br /> +Tho’ hundreds worship at his word,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">He’s but a coof for a’ that:<span class="spacer2"> </span><span class="spacer2"> </span>blockhead</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">For a’ that, an’ a’ that,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">His ribband, star, an’ a’ that;</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">The man of independent mind</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">He looks and laughs at a’ that.</span><br /> +<br /> +A prince can mak a belted knight,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">A marquis, duke, an’ a’ that;</span><br /> +But an honest man’s aboon his might,<span class="spacer2"> </span><span class="spacer"> </span>above<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Gude faith he maunna fa’ that.<span class="spacer"> </span><span class="spacer2"> </span>must not try</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">For a’ that, an’ a’ that,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">Their dignities an’ a’ that,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">The pith o’ sense, an’ pride o’ worth,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">Are higher ranks than a’ that.</span></p> + +<p>Labouring man on farm or in factory, this is your charter. Let this be +your creed. Sing this great democratic hymn at your gatherings—ay, sing +it in your homes with your children, and each time you sing it, it<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span> should +kindle some new light in your soul that will bring you new vision of the +greatest fact in connection with human life and duty, that you are alive +to be God’s partner, and that while you remain honest, and unselfishly +consider the rights of others, as fully as you consider your own, you are +entitled to stand with kings, because you are an honest man.</p> + +<p>The discussion between Cæsar the aristocratic dog and Luath the cotter’s +dog is a fair representation of class conditions in Scotland in the time +of Burns. Cæsar describes the laird’s riches, his idleness, his rackèd +rents, and the compulsory services required from the poor tenants; dilates +on the wastefulness in connection with the meals even of the servants in +the homes of the great; and expresses surprise that poor folks could exist +under their trying conditions.</p> + +<p>Luath admits that sometimes the strain on the cotter was very severe: +digging ditches, building dykes with dirty stones, baring a quarry, ‘an’ +sic like,’ as a means of sustaining a lot of ragged children with nothing +but his hand labour. He acknowledges that, when ill or out of work, it +sometimes seems hopeless; but, after all, though past his comprehension, +the poor folks are<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span> wonderfully contented, and stately men and clever +women are brought up in their homes.</p> + +<p>Cæsar then expatiates on the contemptuous way the poor are ‘huffed, and +cuffed, and disrespecket.’ He especially sympathises with the poor on +account of the way tenants are treated by the laird’s agents on +rent-day—compelled to submit to their insolence, while they swear and +threaten to seize their property; and concludes that poor folks must be +very wretched.</p> + +<p>Luath replies that, after all, they are not so wretched as he thinks; that +their dearest enjoyments are in their wives and thriving children; that +they often forget their private cares and discuss the affairs of kirk and +state; that Hallowe’en and Christmas celebrations give them grand +opportunities for happiness that make them forget their hardships and +sorrows, and that during these festivals the old folks are so cheery and +the young ones are so frolicsome that he ‘for joy has barket wi’ them!’ +Still, he admits that it is owre true what Cæsar says, and that many +decent, honest folk ‘are riven out, baith root and branch, some rascal’s +pridefu’ greed to quench.’</p> + +<p>Cæsar then describes the reckless way in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span> which the money received from +the poor cotters was wasted at operas, plays, mortgaging, gambling, +masquerading, or taking trips to Calais, Vienna, Versailles, Madrid, or +Italy; and finally to Germany, to some resort where their dissipations may +be overcome by drinking muddy German water.</p> + +<p>Luath is surprised to learn that the money for which the cotters have +toiled so hard should be spent so wastefully; and wishes the gentry would +stay at home and take interest in the sports of their own country, as it +would be so much better for all: laird, tenant, and cotter. He closes by +saying that many of the lairds are not ill-hearted fellows, and asks Cæsar +if there is not a great deal of true pleasure in the lives of the rich.</p> + +<p>Cæsar replies:</p> + +<p class="poem">Lord, man, were ye but whyles where I am,<br /> +The gentles ye wad ne’er envy them.</p> + +<p>Admitting that they need not starve or work hard through winter’s cold or +summer’s heat, or suffer in old age from working all day in the wet, he +says:</p> + +<p class="poem">But human bodies are sic fools,<br /> +For a’ their colleges and schools,<br /> +That when nae real ills perplex them,<br /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span>They mak enow themsels to vex them;<br /> +An’ aye the less they hae to sturt them,<br /> +In like proportion less will hurt them.<br /> +<br /> +A country fellow at the pleugh,<br /> +His acres till’d, he’s right eneugh;<br /> +A country girl at her wheel,<br /> +Her dizzens dune, she’s unco weel;<br /> +But gentlemen, and ladies warst,<br /> +Wi’ ev’n-down want o’ wark are curst.<br /> +They loiter, lounging, lank and lazy;<br /> +Tho’ deil-haet ails them, yet uneasy;<br /> +Their days insipid, dull, an’ tasteless;<br /> +Their nights unquiet, lang, and restless.<br /> +An’ even their sports, their balls and races,<br /> +Their galloping through public places,<br /> +There’s sic parade, sic pomp an’ art,<br /> +The joy can scarcely reach the heart.<br /> +<br /> +The ladies arm-in-arm in clusters,<br /> +As great and gracious a’ as sisters;<br /> +But hear their absent thoughts o’ ither,<br /> +They’re a’ run deils and jads thegither.<br /> +Whyles, ower the wee bit cup an’ plaitie,<br /> +They sip the scandal-potion pretty;<br /> +Or lee-lang nights, wi’ crabbet leuks,<br /> +Pore ower the devil’s pictured beuks;<span class="spacer2"> </span>cards<br /> +Stake on a chance a farmer’s stackyard,<br /> +An’ cheat like ony unhanged blackguard.<br /> +There’s some exceptions, man an’ woman;<br /> +But this is gentry’s life in common.</p> + +<p>Burns was a philosopher, and he knew such conditions were wrong, and that +they should<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span> not be allowed to last. They are better, after more than a +century, since Burns became the champion of the poor; but the great +problem, ‘Why should ae man better fare, and a’ men brothers?’ is not +properly answered yet. The wisest among the aristocracy know this, and +admit it, and sincerely hope that the inevitable evolution to juster +conditions and relationships may be brought about by constitutional means, +and not by revolution.</p> + +<p>Professor Dugald Stewart, of Edinburgh University, wrote: ‘I recollect +once he told me, when I was admiring a distant prospect in one of our +morning walks, that the sight of so many smoking cottages gave a pleasure +to his mind none could understand who had not witnessed, like himself, the +happiness and the worth which they contained.’</p> + +<p>It was not the unhappiness of the peasantry that stirred the democratic +heart of Burns. It was ‘man’s inhumanity’ to his fellow-men; the +assumption of those belonging to the so-called upper classes that they had +a divine right to hold higher positions than the common people, and that +the poorer people should be contented in the ‘station to which God had +called them,’ that led Burns to write so ably in favour of democracy. He +recognised<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span> no human right to establish stations to which people were +called, and in which they should remain, in spite of their right to fill +any positions for which they had proved their fitness. He could not be so +irreverent or so unreasonable as to believe God could establish the +conditions found all around him, so he claimed the right of every child to +full opportunity for its best development, and to rise honourably to any +position to which it could attain.</p> + +<p>In a letter to Miss Margaret Chalmers, 1788, he wrote: ‘What signify the +silly, idle gewgaws of wealth, or the idle trumpery of greatness? When +fellow-partakers of the same nature fear the same God, have the same +benevolence of heart, the same nobleness of soul, the same detestation of +everything dishonest, and the same scorn at everything unworthy—in the +name of common-sense, are they not equals?’</p> + +<p>To Mrs Dunlop he wrote in 1788: ‘There are few circumstances, relating to +the unequal distribution of good things of this life, that give me more +vexation (I mean in what I see around me) than the importance the opulent +bestow on their trifling family affairs, compared with the very same +things on the contracted scale of the cottage. Last afternoon<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span> I had the +honour to spend an hour or two at a good woman’s fireside, where the +planks that composed the floor were decorated with a splendid carpet, and +the gay table sparkled with silver and china. ’Tis now about term-day [a +regular time twice a year was fixed for hiring servants], and there has +been a revolution among those creatures [servants], who, though in +appearance partakers, and equally noble partakers, of the same nature as +Madame, are from time to time—their nerves, sinews, their health, +strength, wisdom, experience, genius, time, nay, a good part of their very +thoughts—sold for months and years, not only to the necessities but the +caprices of the important few. We talked of the insignificant creatures; +nay, notwithstanding their general stupidity and rascality, did some of +the poor devils the honour to commend them. But light be the turf upon his +breast who taught “Reverence thyself!” We looked down on the unpolished +wretches, their impertinent wives, and clouterly brats, as the lordly bull +does on the little, dirty anthill, whose puny inhabitants he crushes in +the carelessness of his ramble, or tosses in the air in the wantonness of +his pride.’</p> + +<p>Such experiences added fuel to the divine purpose in his mind to free a +large portion of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span> his fellow-countrymen from the bonds that had been bound +on their bodies and souls by long years of class presumption and heartless +tyranny, which, till Burns attacked them, had grown more unjust and +contemptuous as generation succeeded generation.</p> + +<p>Burns’s reverence for real manhood, a basic principle of true democratic +spirit, is shown in the closing verse of his ‘Elegy on Captain Matthew +Henderson’:</p> + +<p class="poem">Go to your sculptured tombs, ye Great,<br /> +In a’ the tinsel trash o’ state!<br /> +But by thy honest turf I’ll wait,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">Thou man of worth!</span><br /> +And weep the ae best fellow’s fate<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">E’er lay in earth.</span></p> + +<p>To John Francis Erskine he wrote, 1793: ‘Burns was a poor man from birth +and an exciseman from necessity; but—I will say it—the sterling of his +honest worth no poverty could debase, and his independent British mind +oppression might bend, but could not subdue.... Can I look tamely on and +see any machination to wrest from them the birthright of my boys—the +little, independent Britons, in whose veins runs my own blood?... Does +any man tell me that my full efforts can be of no service, and that it +does not belong to my humble station to meddle<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span> with the concerns of a +nation? I can tell him that it is on such individuals as I that a nation +has to rest, both for the hand of support and the eye of intelligence. The +uninformed Mob may swell a Nation’s bulk, and the titled, tinsel, courtly +throng may be its feathered ornament; but the number of those who are +elevated enough in life to reason and reflect, yet low enough to keep +clear of the venal contagion of a court—these are a nation’s strength.’</p> + +<p>He wrote the letter, from which this is an extract, because some +super-loyalists were trying to undermine his reputation on account of his +independence of spirit and his democratic principles, with a view to +having him removed from the paltry position he held as an Excise officer.</p> + +<p>He was proudly, sensitively independent. He inherited his temperamental +characteristics from his mother. He was happier defending others than +working for himself. Writing to the Earl of Eglintoun, he said: ‘Mercenary +servility, I trust, I shall ever have as much honest pride as to detest.’</p> + +<p>Writing to Mr Francis Grose, F.S.A., in 1790, about Professor Dugald +Stewart, he said: ‘Mr Stewart’s principal characteristic is your favourite +feature—that sterling <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span>independence of mind which, though every man’s +right, so few men have the courage to claim, and fewer still the +magnanimity to support.’</p> + +<p>In 1795, the year before his death, he wrote three poems favourable to the +election of Mr Heron, the Whig candidate. In the first poem he said:</p> + +<p class="poem">The independent commoner<br /> +Shall be the man for a’ that.</p> + +<p>Mrs Riddell, writing of Burns after his death, said: ‘His features were +stamped with the hardy character of independence.’</p> + +<p>He was a democrat whose democracy was based on the rock of independence +and a character that ‘preserved the dignity of man with soul erect.’</p> + +<p>Burns saw both sides of the ideal of freedom. He hated tyrants, and he +despised those who tamely submitted to tyranny. The inscription on the +Altar to Independence, erected by Mr Heron at Kerroughtree, written by +Burns, reads:</p> + +<p class="poem">Thou of an independent mind,<br /> +With soul resolv’d, with soul resign’d;<br /> +Prepar’d Power’s proudest frown to brave,<br /> +Who wilt not be, nor have a slave;<br /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span>Virtue alone who dost revere,<br /> +Thy own reproach alone dost fear—<br /> +Approach this shrine, and worship here.</p> + +<p>The man of whom Burns approved was ‘one who wilt not <i>be</i> nor <i>have</i> a +slave.’</p> + +<p>In ‘Lines Inscribed in a Lady’s Pocket Almanac’ he says:</p> + +<p class="poem">Deal Freedom’s sacred treasures free as air,<br /> +Till Slave and Despot be but things that were.</p> + +<p>In the ‘Lines on the Commemoration of Rodney’s Victory’ he wrote:</p> + +<p class="poem">Be Anarchy cursed, and be Tyranny damned;<span class="spacer2"> </span>condemned<br /> +And who would to Liberty e’er be disloyal<br /> +May his son be a hangman—and he his first trial.</p> + +<p>Burns was a philosopher whose mind had been trained to look at both sides +of a question, and estimate truly their relationships to each other. Even +in one of his beautiful poems to his wife, written after he was married, +‘I Hae a Wife o’ My Ain,’ he wrote:</p> + +<p class="poem">I am naebody’s lord,<br /> +I’ll be slave to naebody.</p> + +<p>While Burns was an intense lover of freedom, he had no sympathy with those +who would overturn constituted authority. He wished to achieve the freedom +of the people, but to achieve it by constitutional means. He was a +national volunteer in Dumfries,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span> and he composed a fine patriotic song for +the corps to sing. He revealed his balanced mind in the following lines in +that song:</p> + +<p class="poem">The wretch that would a tyrant own,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And the wretch, his true-born brother,</span><br /> +Who would set the mob aboon the throne,<span class="spacer2"> </span><span class="spacer"> </span>above<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">May they be damned together.</span></p> + +<p>Burns had as little respect for a king who was a tyrant, as he had for a +tyrant in any other situation in life; but he clearly saw the wicked folly +of allowing mob-rule to be substituted for constitutional authority.</p> + +<p>In the Prologue written to be spoken by an actor on his benefit night, +Burns wrote:</p> + +<p class="poem">No hundred-headed Riot here we meet<br /> +With decency and law beneath his feet;<br /> +Nor Insolence assumes fair Freedom’s name.</p> + +<p>Here, again, he records the dominant ideal of his mind through life; but +at the same time he utters a warning against ignorant and wild theorists, +who, in their madness, would overthrow civilisation.</p> + +<p>He overflows again on his favourite theme in the ‘Lines on the +Commemoration of Rodney’s Victory,’ when he was proposing toasts:</p> + +<p class="poem"><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span> +The next in succession I’ll give you’s the King!<br /> +Whoe’er would betray him, on high may he swing!<br /> +And here’s the grand fabric, the free Constitution,<br /> +As built on the base of our great Revolution.</p> + +<p>The love of liberty grew stronger in his heart and in his mind as he grew +older. In his songs, and in his letters, he frequently moralised on +independence of character and the value of liberty. In a letter to the +<i>Morning Chronicle</i> he said, 1795: ‘I am a Briton, and must be interested +in the cause of liberty.’</p> + +<p>To Patrick Miller he sent a copy of his poems in 1793, accompanied by a +letter expressing gratitude for his kindness and appreciation of him ‘as a +patriot who in a venal, sliding age stands forth the champion of the +liberties of my country.’</p> + +<p>In his love-song, ‘Their Groves o’ Sweet Myrtle,’ he compares the boasted +glories of tropical lands with the beauty of his beloved Scotland, and +boasts in pride of the charms of the</p> + +<p class="poem"><span style="margin-left: 5.5em;">Lone glen o’ green breckan,<span class="spacer2"> </span>ferns</span><br /> +Wi’ the burn stealing under the lang yellow broom,</p> + +<p>and of the sweetness of</p> + +<p class="poem"><span style="margin-left: 5.5em;">Yon humble broom bowers,</span><br /> +Where the blue-bell and gowan lurk, lowly, unseen.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span>He cannot close the song, however, without claiming that beautiful as are +the ‘sweet-scented woodlands’ of these foreign countries, they are, after +all, ‘the haunt of the tyrant and slave,’ and that</p> + +<p class="poem">The slave’s spicy forests, and gold-bubbling fountains,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The brave Caledonian views wi’ disdain;</span><br /> +He wanders as free as the winds of his mountains.</p> + +<p>Burns celebrated the success of the French Revolution in a poem entitled +‘The Tree of Liberty.’ His heart bled for the peasantry of France, whom +the aristocrats had treated so contemptuously, and with such lack of +consideration, and cruelty. He rejoiced in the overthrow of their +oppressors, and the establishment of a republican form of government. In +this poem he gives credit to Lafayette, the great Frenchman who had gone +to assist the people of the United States in their brave struggle to get +free. He asks blessings on the head of the noble man, Lafayette, in the +verse:</p> + +<p class="poem">My blessings aye attend the chiel<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Wha pitied Gallia’s slaves, man,</span><br /> +And staw a branch, spite o’ the deil,<span class="spacer2"> </span><span class="spacer2"> </span>stole<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Frae yont the western waves, man.</span><br /> +Fair Virtue watered it wi’ care,<br /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 1em;">And now she sees wi’ pride, man,</span><br /> +How weel it buds and blossoms there,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Its branches spreading wide, man.</span><br /> +<span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><br /> +A wicked crew syne, on a time,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Did tak a solemn aith, man,<span class="spacer2"> </span><span class="spacer2"> </span><span class="spacer"> </span>oath</span><br /> +It ne’er should flourish to its prime,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">I wat they pledged their faith, man.</span><br /> +Awa they gaed, wi’ mock parade,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Like beagles hunting game, man,</span><br /> +But soon grew weary o’ the trade,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And wished they’d stayed at hame, man.</span><br /> +<br /> +Fair Freedom, standing by the tree,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Her sons did loudly ca’, man;</span><br /> +She sang a song o’ liberty,<span class="spacer2"> </span><span class="spacer2"> </span><span class="spacer"> </span>Marseillaise<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Which pleased them ane and a’, man.</span><br /> +By her inspired, the new-born race<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Soon drew the avenging steel, man;</span><br /> +The hirelings ran—her friends gied chase<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And banged the despot weel, man.</span><br /> +<span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><br /> +Wi’ plenty o’ sic trees, I trow,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The warld would live at peace, man;</span><br /> +The sword would help to mak’ a plough;<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The din o’ war wad cease, man.</span></p> + +<p>The greatest poem Burns wrote to rejoice at the victorious progress of +humanity towards freedom was his ‘Ode to Liberty,’ written to express his +supreme gratification at the success of the people of the United States in +their struggle for independence from England.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span> He wrote it, as he wrote +most of his poems during his life in Dumfries, in the moonlight in +Lincluden Abbey ruins, on the Nith River, just outside of Dumfries. He +introduces the ode in a poem named ‘A Vision.’</p> + +<p>He tells that, at midnight, while in the ruins, he saw in the roofless +tower of the abbey, a vision:</p> + +<p class="poem">By heedless chance I turned my eyes,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And, by the moonbeam, shook to see</span><br /> +A stern and stalwart ghaist arise,<span class="spacer2"> </span><span class="spacer2"> </span>ghost<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Attired as minstrels wont to be.</span><br /> +<br /> +Had I a statue been o’ stane,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">His daring look had daunted me;</span><br /> +And on his bonnet graved was plain,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The sacred posy, ‘Libertie.’</span><br /> +<br /> +And frae his harp sic strains did flow<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Might rouse the slumbering dead to hear;</span><br /> +But oh! it was a tale of woe,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">As ever met a Briton’s ear!</span></p> + +<p>The ghost tells the story of the tyranny England exercised over the people +of the United States, and of the breaking of the tyrant’s chains. Burns +had no more respect for despotism by an English king than he had for the +despotism of a tyrant in any other land. He knew the people of the +American colonies were right. England’s greatest<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span> statesman, Pitt, had +said so, when the colonists, driven to desperation, rebelled; so the +ghost’s revelation should be to a liberty-loving Briton’s ear ‘a tale of +woe.’</p> + +<p>The ode begins:</p> + +<p class="poem">No Spartan tube, no Attic shell,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">No lyre Æolian I awake;</span><br /> +’Tis liberty’s bold note I swell;<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Thy harp, Columbia, let me take!</span><br /> +See gathering thousands, while I sing,<br /> +A broken chain exultant bring,<br /> +And dash it in the tyrant’s face,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And dare him to his very beard,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And tell him he no more is feared—</span><br /> +No more the despot of Columbia’s race!<br /> +A tyrant’s proudest insults braved,<br /> +They shout—a People freed! They hail an Empire saved.<br /> +<span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><br /> +But come, ye sons of Liberty,<br /> +Columbia’s offspring, brave and free.<br /> +In danger’s hour still flaming in the van,<br /> +Ye know and dare maintain ‘the Royalty of Man.’</p> + +<p>So the poem proceeds, till he appeals to King Alfred, and finally to +Caledonia:</p> + +<p class="poem">Alfred! on thy starry throne,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Surrounded by the tuneful choir,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The bards that erst have struck the patriotic lyre,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And rous’d the freeborn Briton’s soul of fire,</span><br /> +No more thy England own!<br /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span>Dare injured nations form the great design,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">To make detested tyrants bleed?</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Thy England execrates the glorious deed!</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Beneath her hostile banners waving,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Every pang of honour braving,</span><br /> +England, in thunder calls, ‘The tyrant’s cause is mine!’<br /> +That hour accurst how did the fiends rejoice,<br /> +And hell, through all her confines, raise the exulting voice!<br /> +That hour which saw the generous English name<br /> +Linkt with such damned deeds of everlasting shame!<br /> +<br /> +Thee, Caledonia! thy wild heaths among,<br /> +Fam’d for the martial deed, the heaven-taught song,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">To thee I turn with swimming eyes;</span><br /> +Where is that soul of Freedom fled?<br /> +Immingled with the mighty dead,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Beneath that hallow’d turf where Wallace lies!</span><br /> +Hear it not, Wallace! in thy bed of death.<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Ye babbling winds! in silence sweep,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Disturb not ye the hero’s sleep,</span><br /> +Nor give the coward secret breath.<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Is this the ancient Caledonian form,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Firm as the rock, resistless as the storm?</span></p> + +<p>He loved to stir the liberty-loving spirit of his beloved Caledonia, so to +her sons he makes the final appeal in his great ode. He wrote in a similar +strain in the Prologue written for his friend Woods, the actor:</p> + +<p class="poem"><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">O Thou dread Power! whose empire-giving hand</span><br /> +Has oft been stretched to shield the honoured land!<br /> +Strong may she glow with all her ancient fire!<br /> +May every son be worthy of his sire!<br /> +Firm may she rise with generous disdain<br /> +At Tyranny’s, or direr Pleasure’s, chain;<br /> +Still self-dependent in her native shore,<br /> +Bold may she brave grim Danger’s loudest roar,<br /> +Till fate the curtain drop on worlds to be no more.</p> + +<p>He reached the highest degree of patriotic fervour, and his clearest call, +not only to Scotsmen, but to all true men, to be ready to do their duty +for justice and liberty, in ‘Bruce’s Address at Bannockburn.’</p> + +<p>In a letter to the Earl of Buchan, 1794, enclosing a copy of this poem, he +wrote: ‘Independent of my enthusiasm as a Scotsman, I have rarely met with +anything in history which interests my feelings as a man equal with the +story of Bannockburn. On the one hand a cruel, but able, usurper, leading +on the finest army in Europe, to extinguish the last spark of freedom +among a greatly daring and greatly injured people; on the other hand, the +desperate relics of a gallant nation, devoting themselves to rescue their +bleeding country or perish with her. Liberty! thou art a prize truly and +indeed invaluable, for never canst thou be too dearly bought.’</p> + +<p class="poem"><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span> +Scots, wha hae wi’ Wallace bled,<br /> +Scots, wham Bruce has aften led,<br /> +Welcome to your gory bed,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Or to Victorie!</span><br /> +Now’s the day and now’s the hour;<br /> +See the front o’ battle lour!<br /> +See approach proud Edward’s power—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Chains and slaverie!</span><br /> +<br /> +Wha will be a traitor knave?<br /> +Wha can fill a coward’s grave?<br /> +Wha sae base as be a slave?<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Let him turn and flee!</span><br /> +Wha for Scotland’s King and Law,<br /> +Freedom’s sword will strongly draw,<br /> +Free-Man stand, or Free-Man fa’?<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Let him follow me!</span><br /> +<br /> +By Oppression’s woes and pains!<br /> +By your Sons in servile chains!<br /> +We will drain our dearest veins,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">But they <i>shall</i> be free!</span><br /> +Lay the proud Usurpers low!<br /> +Tyrants fall in every foe!<br /> +Liberty’s in every blow!<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Let us Do—or Die.</span></p> + +<p class="poem"><span style="margin-left: -4em;">‘So may God ever defend the cause of Truth and Liberty as he did that day.</span></p> + +<p class="poem">‘<span class="smcap">Robert Burns.</span>’</p> + +<p>Because he was so outspoken in regard to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span> democracy, some men assumed he +was not a loyal man. The truth is, that he always loved his country, but +he ardently desired to improve the conditions of the great body of his +countrymen. Complaints were made about his disloyalty to the Excise +commissioners under whom he worked. These complaints were investigated, +and Burns was found to be a loyal man.</p> + +<p>When the call came from the Government for volunteers, Burns joined the +Dumfries Volunteers. In his great song composed for these volunteers he +strongly expresses his loyalty, both to his country and to his king, in +the following quotations:</p> + +<p class="poem">We’ll ne’er permit a foreign foe<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">On British ground to rally.</span><br /> +<br /> +Be Britain still to Britain true,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Amang oursels united;</span><br /> +For never but by British hands<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Maun British wrangs be righted.<span class="spacer2"> </span>must</span><br /> +<br /> +Who will not sing ‘God save the King,’<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Shall hang as high’s the steeple!</span><br /> +But while we sing ‘God save the King,’<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">We’ll ne’er forget the people.</span></p> + +<p>To Robert Graham of Fintry, 1792, he wrote: ‘To the British Constitution +on <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span>revolution principles, next after my God, I am most devoutly +attached.’</p> + +<p>Again, a month later, he wrote to Mr Graham: ‘I never uttered any +invectives against the King. His private worth it is altogether impossible +that such a man as I can appreciate; but in his public capacity I always +revered, and always will, with the soundest loyalty, revere the Monarch of +Great Britain as (to speak in Masonic) the sacred Keystone of our Royal +Arch Constitution. As to reform principles, I look upon the British +Constitution, as settled at the Revolution, to be the most glorious +Constitution on earth, or that perhaps the wit of man can frame.</p> + +<p class="center"><strong><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span></strong></p> + +<p>‘I never dictated to, corresponded with, or had the least connection with, +any political association whatever—except that when the magistrates and +principal inhabitants of Dumfries met to declare their attachment to the +Constitution, and their abhorrence of riot.’</p> + +<p>He had strong desires to effect many reforms in public life, but he was an +intelligent believer in the British Constitution, and had no faith in any +method of achieving reforms in the Empire except by constitutional<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span> +measures. He was a radical reformer with a grand mental balance-wheel; and +such reformers make the best type of citizens, ardent reformers with cool +heads and unselfish hearts.</p> + +<p>Carlyle strangely misunderstood the spirit of democracy in Burns, although +he justly wrote, long after the poet’s death: ‘He appears not only as a +true British poet, but as one of the most considerable British men of the +eighteenth century.’</p> + +<p>What were the achievements, in addition to his poetic power, that made +Burns ‘one of the most considerable men of the eighteenth century?’ Mainly +the work he did to develop in the souls of men a consciousness of +fundamental principles of democracy, and higher ideals of vital religion; +yet Carlyle does not approve of his efforts to reform either social or +religious conditions. As the centuries pass, the work of Burns for +Religion, Democracy, and Brotherhood will be recognised as his greatest +work for humanity.</p> + +<p>Carlyle’s belief was that Burns wrote about the wrongs of the oppressed +because he could not become rich. In that belief he was clearly in error. +The love of freedom, justice, and independence was a basic passion in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span> +character of Burns. The anxiety of Burns regarding money was not for +himself, but for his family in case he should die. Several times he +referred to this in letters to his most intimate friends.</p> + + +<p> </p><p> </p> +<hr style="width: 50%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VI" id="CHAPTER_VI"></a>CHAPTER VI.</h2> +<h3><span class="smcap">Burns and Brotherhood.</span></h3> + +<p>In the third letter Burns wrote Alison Begbie, the first woman he asked to +marry him, he said: ‘I grasp every creature in the arms of Universal +Benevolence, and equally participate in the pleasures of the happy, and +sympathise with the miseries of the unfortunate.’</p> + +<p>This statement of one of the fundamental principles which guided him +during his whole life is a profound interpretation of the teachings of +Christ in regard to the attitude that each individual should have, must +have, in order that brotherhood may be established on the earth. He taught +universal benevolence and vital sympathy <i>with</i>—not <i>for</i>—humanity; not +merely when sorrows and afflictions bring dark clouds to hearts, but in +times of happiness and rejoicing; affectionate sympathy, unostentatious +sympathy, co-operative sympathy that stimulates helpfulness and +hopefulness; sympathy that produces activity of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span> the divine in the human +heart and mind, and leads to brotherhood.</p> + +<p>The amazing fact is, not that Burns wrote such fundamental Christian +philosophy in a love-letter, but that a youth of twenty-one could think it +and express it so perfectly.</p> + +<p>To Clarinda he wrote, 1787: ‘Lord! why was I born to see misery which I +cannot relieve?’</p> + +<p>Again, in 1788, he wrote to her: ‘Give me to feel “another’s woe,” and +continue with me that dear-loved friend that feels with mine.’</p> + +<p>To Mrs Walter Riddell he wrote, 1793: ‘Of all the qualities we assign to +the Author and Director of Nature, by far the most enviable is to be able +“to wipe away all tears from all eyes.” O what insignificant, sordid +wretches are they, however chance may have loaded them with wealth, who go +to their graves, to their magnificent mausoleums, with hardly the +consciousness of having made one poor, honest heart happy.’</p> + +<p>In ‘A Winter Night,’ the great poem of universal sympathy, he says:</p> + +<p class="poem">Affliction’s sons are brothers in distress;<br /> +A brother to relieve, how exquisite the bliss.</p> + +<p>He closes the poem with four great lines:</p> + +<p class="poem"><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span> +But deep this truth impressed my mind—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Thro’ all His works abroad,</span><br /> +The heart benevolent and kind<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The most resembles God.</span></p> + +<p>In the same poem he paints the characters who lack loving sympathy, and +whose lives and attitudes towards their fellow-men separate men, and break +the ties that should unite all men, and thus prevent the development of +the spirit of brotherhood. After describing the fierceness of the storm +and expressing his heartfelt sympathy for the cattle, the sheep, the +birds, and even with destructive animals such as prey on hen-roosts or +defenceless lambs, his mind was filled with a plaintive strain, as he +thought of the bitterness of man to his brother man, and he proceeds:</p> + +<p class="poem"><span style="margin-left: 1em;">Blow, blow, ye winds, with heavier gust!</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And freeze, thou bitter-biting frost!</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Descend, ye chilly, smothering snows!</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Not all your rage, as now united, shows</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">More hard unkindness, unrelenting,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Vengeful malice unrepenting,</span><br /> +Than heaven-illumined man on brother man bestows.</p> + +<p>The depth and universality of his sympathy is shown in ‘To a Mouse,’ after +he had destroyed its nest while ploughing:</p> + +<p class="poem"><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span> +I’m truly sorry man’s dominion<br /> +Has broken Nature’s social union,<br /> +An’ justifies that ill opinion<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Which makes thee startle</span><br /> +At me, thy poor earth-born companion,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">An’ fellow-mortal!</span></p> + +<p>In his ‘Epistle to Davie,’ a brother poet, he emphasises the value of true +sympathy, that should bind all hearts, must yet bind all hearts in +universal brotherhood, when he says:</p> + +<p class="poem">All hail! ye tender feelings dear!<br /> +The smile of love, the friendly tear,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">The sympathetic glow!</span><br /> +Long since, this world’s thorny ways<br /> +Had numbered out my weary days,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Had it not been for you.</span></p> + +<p>In his ‘Epistle to Robert Graham of Fintry,’ after describing the thrifty +but selfishly prudent, ‘who feel by reason and who give by rule,’ and +expressing regret that ‘the friendly e’er should want a friend,’ he +writes:</p> + +<p class="poem">But come ye, who the godlike pleasure know,<br /> +Heaven’s attribute distinguished—to bestow!<br /> +Whose arms of love would grasp the human race.</p> + +<p>In the opinion of Burns, they are the ideal men and women who best +understood, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span> most perfectly practised, the teaching of Christ.</p> + +<p>In one of his epistles to his friend Lapraik he says:</p> + +<p class="poem">For thus the royal mandate ran,<br /> +When first the human race began:<br /> +The social, friendly, honest man,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Whate’er he be—</span><br /> +’Tis <i>he</i> fulfils great Nature’s plan,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">And none but he.</span></p> + +<p>The influence of any act on society, on the brotherhood of man as a whole, +was the supreme test of Burns to distinguish between goodness and evil.</p> + +<p>To Dr Moore, of London, he said: ‘Whatsoever is not detrimental to +society, and is of positive enjoyment, is of God, the giver of all good +things, and ought to be received and enjoyed by His creatures with +thankful delight.’</p> + +<p>To Clarinda he wrote: ‘Thou Almighty Author of peace, and goodness, and +love! Do thou give me the social heart that kindly tastes of every man’s +cup! Is it a draught of joy? Warm and open my heart to share it with +cordial, unenvying rejoicing! Is it the bitter potion of sorrow? Melt my +heart with sincerely sympathetic woe! Above all, do Thou give me the manly +mind, that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span> resolutely exemplifies in life and manners those sentiments +which I would wish to be thought to possess.’</p> + +<p>In ‘On the Seas and Far Away’ he says:</p> + +<p class="poem">Peace, thy olive wand extend,<br /> +And bid wild war his ravage end;<br /> +Man with brother man to meet,<br /> +And as a brother kindly greet.</p> + +<p>In the ‘Tree of Liberty’ he says, if we had plenty of the trees of Liberty +growing throughout the whole world:</p> + +<p class="poem">Like brothers in a common cause<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">We’d on each other smile, man;</span><br /> +And equal rights and equal laws<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Wad gladden ev’ry isle, man.</span></p> + +<p>To Clarinda, when he presented a pair of wine-glasses—a perfectly proper +gift to a lady in the opinion of his time—he gave her at the same time a +poem, in which he said:</p> + +<p class="poem">And fill them high with generous juice,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">As generous as your mind;</span><br /> +And pledge them to the generous toast,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">‘The whole of human kind!’</span></p> + +<p>In his ‘Epistle to John Lapraik,’ after describing those whose lives do +not help men towards brotherhood, he describes those who are true to the +great ideal:</p> + +<p class="poem"><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span> +But ye whom social pleasure charms,<br /> +Whose hearts the tide of kindness warms,<br /> +Who hold your being on the terms,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">‘Each aid the others,’</span><br /> +Come to my bowl, come to my arms,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">My friends, my brothers.</span></p> + +<p>Burns gives each man the true test of the influence of his life for the +promotion of true brotherhood in the short line, ‘Each aid the others.’ +That line is the supreme test of duty, and is the highest interpretation +of Christ’s commandment to His disciples, and through them to all men, +‘Love one another, as I have loved you.’ Vital love means vital +helpfulness.</p> + +<p>Dickens gives the same great message as Burns when, in describing Little +Dorritt, he says: ‘She was something different from the rest, and she was +that something for the rest.’ This is probably the shortest sentence ever +written that conveys so clearly the two great revelations of Christ: +Individuality and Brotherhood.</p> + +<p>There are some who dislike the expression ‘Come to my bowl.’ They should +test Burns by the accepted standards of his time, not by the standards of +our time. The bowl was the symbol of true comradeship in castle and cot, +in the manse and in the layman’s home, in the time of Burns.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span>No other writer has interpreted Christ’s revelations of Democracy and +Brotherhood so clearly and so fully as Robert Burns. He sums up the whole +matter of man’s relationship to man in ‘A Man’s a Man for a’ That,’ in the +last verse:</p> + +<p class="poem">Then let us pray that come it may—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">As come it will for a’ that—</span><br /> +That sense and worth, o’er a’ the earth,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Shall bear the gree, an’ a’ that.<span class="spacer2"> </span>pre-eminence</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">For a’ that, an’ a’ that,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">It’s coming yet, for a’ that,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">That man to man the world o’er,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Shall brothers be for a’ that.</span></p> + +<p>He revealed his supreme purpose in ‘A Revolutionary Lyric’:</p> + +<p class="poem">In virtue trained, enlightened youth<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Will love each fellow-creature;</span><br /> +And future years shall prove the truth—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">That man is good by nature.</span><br /> +<br /> +The golden age will then revive;<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Each man will love his brother;</span><br /> +In harmony we all shall live,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And share the earth together.</span></p> + +<p>While the so-called religious teachers of the time of Burns were dividing +men into creeds based on petty theological distinctions, Burns<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span> was +interpreting for humanity the highest teachings of Christ: Democracy based +on recognition of the value of the individual soul, and Brotherhood as the +natural fruit of true democracy.</p> + + +<p> </p><p> </p> +<hr style="width: 50%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VII" id="CHAPTER_VII"></a>CHAPTER VII.</h2> +<h3><span class="smcap">Burns a Revealer of Pure Love.</span></h3> + +<p>Many people yet believe that Burns was a universal and inconstant lover. +He really did not love many women. He loved deeply, but he had not a great +many really serious experiences of love. He loved Nellie Kirkpatrick when +he was fifteen, and Peggy Thomson when he was seventeen. He says his love +of Nellie made him a poet. There is no other experience that will kindle +the strongest element in a human soul during the adolescent period so +fully, and so permanently, as genuine love. Love will not make all young +people poets, but it will kindle with its most developing glow whatever is +the strongest natural power in each individual soul. Parents should foster +such love in young people during the adolescent period, instead of +ridiculing it, as is too often done. God may not mean that the love is to +be permanent, but there is no other agency that can be so productive at +the time of adolescence as love that is reverenced by<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span> parents who, by due +reverence, sympathy, and comradeship, help love to do its best work.</p> + +<p>These two adolescent loves did their work in developing Burns, but they +were not loves of maturity. From seventeen till he was twenty-one he was +not really in love. Then he met, and deeply and reverently loved, Alison +Begbie. She was a servant girl of charm, sweetness, and dignity, in a home +not far from Lochlea farm. He wrote three poems to her: ‘The Lass o’ +Cessnock Banks,’ ‘Peggy Alison,’ and ‘Mary Morrison.’ He reversed her name +for the second title, because it possessed neither the elements of metre +nor of rhyme. He gave his third poem to her the title ‘Mary Morrison’ to +make it conform to the same metre as ‘Peggy Alison.’ There was a Mary +Morrison who was nine years of age when Burns wrote ‘Mary Morrison.’ She +is buried in Mauchline Churchyard, and on her tombstone it is stated that +she was ‘the Mary Morrison of Burns.’ His brother Gilbert knew better. He +said the poem was written to the lady to whom ‘Peggy Alison’ was written. +It is impossible to believe that Burns would write ‘Mary Morrison’ to a +child only nine years old.</p> + +<p>Burns wrote five love-letters to Alison Begbie.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span> Beautiful and reverent +letters they were, too. In the fourth, he asked her to become his wife. In +Chapter III. it has been explained that he was too shy, even at +twenty-two, to ask the woman whom he loved to marry him when he was with +her. This does not indicate that he had a new love each week, as many yet +believe. Miss Begbie refused to marry him, and his reply should win him +the respect of every reasonable man or woman who reads it. It is the +dignified and reverent outpouring of a loving heart, held in control by a +well-balanced and considerate mind.</p> + +<p>Although Burns had no lover from seventeen to twenty-one years of age, he +wrote love-songs during those years, but even his mother could not tell +the name of any young woman who kindled his muse during these four years. +Neither could the other members of his family.</p> + +<p>He wrote one poem, ‘My Nannie O,’ during this period. He first wrote for +the first line:</p> + +<p class="poem">Beyond the hills where Stinchar flows.</p> + +<p>He did not like the word ‘Stinchar,’ so he changed it to ‘Lugar,’ a much +more euphonious word. He had no lover named ‘Nannie.’<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span> Lugar and Stinchar +were several miles apart. He was really writing about love, not the love +of any one woman, during those four years; and he was writing about other +great subjects more than about love, mainly religious and ethical ideals.</p> + +<p>From the age of twenty-two he was for three years without a lover. At +twenty-five he met Jean Armour, then eighteen. Jean spoke first to the +respectfully shy man. At the annual dance on Fair night in Mauchline, +Burns was one of the young men who were present. His dog, Luath, who loved +him, and whom he loved in return, traced his master upstairs to the dance +hall. Of course the dance was interrupted when Luath got on the floor and +found his master. Burns kindly led the dog out, and as he was going he +said, ‘I wish I could find a lassie to loe me as well as my dog.’ A short +time afterwards Burns was going along a street in Mauchline, and was +passing Jean Armour without speaking to her, because he had not been +introduced to her. She was at the village pump getting water to sprinkle +her clothes on the village green, and as he was passing her she asked, +‘Hae you found a lassie yet to loe you as well as your dog?’ Burns then +stopped and conversed with her. She was a handsome,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span> bright young woman. +Their acquaintance soon developed a strong love between them, and resulted +in a test of the real manhood of the character of Burns. When he realised +that Jean was to become a mother, he did not hesitate as to his duty. He +gave her a legal certificate of marriage, signed by himself and regularly +witnessed, which was as valid as a marriage certificate of a clergyman or +a magistrate in Scottish law.</p> + +<p>Jean’s father compelled her to destroy, or let him destroy, the +certificate. This, and her father’s threatened legal prosecution, nearly +upset the mind of Burns. He undoubtedly loved Jean Armour. In a letter +written at the time to David Brice, a friend in Glasgow, he wrote: ‘Never +man loved, or rather adored, a woman more than I did her; and, to confess +a truth between you and me, I do still love her to distraction after +all.... May Almighty God forgive her ingratitude and perjury to me, as I +from my very soul forgive her; and may His grace be with her, and bless +her in all her future life.’</p> + +<p>He had arranged to leave Scotland for Jamaica to escape from his mental +torture, when two things came into his life: Mary Campbell, and the +suggestion that he should<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span> publish his poems. The first filled his heart, +the second gave him the best tonic for his mind—deeply and joyously +interesting occupation.</p> + +<p>Mary Campbell, ‘Highland Mary,’ he had met when she was a nursemaid in the +home of his friend Gavin Hamilton. Meeting her again, when she was a +servant in Montgomery Castle, he became acquainted with her, and they soon +loved each other. It is not remarkable that Burns should love Mary +Campbell, because she was a winsome, quiet, refined young woman, and his +heart was desolate at the loss of Jean Armour. He, at the time he made +love to Mary, had no hope of reconciliation with Jean. The greater his +love for Jean had been, and still was, the greater his need was for +another love to fill his heart, and he found a pure and satisfying lover +in Mary. Their love was deep and short, lasting only about two months. Two +busy months they were, as Burns was preparing his poems for the Kilmarnock +edition, till he and Mary agreed to be married. They parted for the last +time on 14th May 1785. The day was Sunday. They spent the afternoon in the +fine park of Montgomery Castle, through which the Fail River runs for a +mile and a half. In the evening they went out of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span> grounds about half a +mile to Failford, a little village at the junction of the Fail with the +Ayr. The Fail runs parallel to the Ayr, and in the opposite direction +after leaving the castle grounds, until it reaches Failford. There it +meets a solid rock formation, which compels it to turn squarely to the +right and flow into the Ayr, about three hundred yards away. At a narrow +place where the Fail had cut a passage through the soft rock on its way to +the Ayr, Burns and Highland Mary parted. He stood on one side of the river +and Mary on the other, and after they had exchanged Bibles, they made +their vows of intention to marry, he holding one side of an open Bible and +she the other side. Mary went home to prepare for her marriage, but a +relative in Greenock fell ill with malignant fever, and Mary went to nurse +him, and caught the fever herself and died.</p> + +<p>The poems he wrote to her and about her made her a renowned character. +When in 1919 a shipbuilding company at Greenock, after a four years’ +struggle, finally purchased the church and churchyard in which Mary was +buried, with the intention of removing the bodies to another place, the +British Parliament passed an Act providing that her monument must stand +forever over her grave,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span> where +it had always stood.<small><a name="f4.1" id="f4.1" href="#f4">[4]</a></small> Though she held a +humble position, the beautiful poems of her lover gave her an honoured +place in the hearts of millions of people all over the world.</p> + +<p>Burns did not go to Jamaica, although he had secured a berth on a ship to +take him to that beautiful island. Calls came to him just in time to +publish an edition of his poems in Edinburgh. He answered the calls, +startled and delighted Edinburgh society, published his poems, and met +Clarinda.</p> + +<p>Mrs M’Lehose was a cultured and charming grass-widow. She had been courted +and married by a wealthy young man in Glasgow when she was only seventeen +years of age. Though a lady of the highest character, on the advice of +relatives and friends she left her husband. He then went to Jamaica.</p> + +<p>Burns and Mrs M’Lehose mutually admired each other when they met, and +their friendship quickly developed into affection. Under the names of +Sylvander and Clarinda they conducted a love correspondence which will +probably always remain the finest love correspondence of the ages. +Clarinda was a religious and cultured woman; Burns was a religious<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span> and +cultured man, so their letters of love are on a high plane. Clarinda wrote +very good poems as well as good prose, and Burns wrote some of his best +poems to Clarinda. His parting song to Clarinda is, in the opinion of many +literary men, the greatest love-song of its kind ever written. Those who +study the Clarinda correspondence will find not only love, but many +interesting philosophical discussions regarding religion and human life.</p> + +<p>Thus ends the record of his real loves, notwithstanding the outrageous +misstatements that his loves extended, according to one writer, to nearly +four hundred. He had just four deep and serious loves, not counting the +two deep and transforming affections of his adolescent period for Nellie +Kirkpatrick and Peggy Thomson. He loved four women: Alison Begbie, Jean +Armour, Mary Campbell, and Mrs M’Lehose. At the age of twenty-one he loved +Alison Begbie, and, when twenty-two, he asked her to marry him. She +declined his proposal. He was too shy to propose to her when he was with +her. Get this undoubted fact into your consciousness, and think about it +fairly and reasonably, and it will help you to get a truer vision of the +real Burns. Read the proposal and his subsequent letter on pages 51-55, +and your mind<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span> should form juster conceptions of Burns as a lover and as a +man. You will find it harder to be misled by the foolish or the malicious +misrepresentations that have too long passed as facts concerning him as a +lover.</p> + +<p>From twenty-two to twenty-five he had no lover; then he loved and married +Jean Armour. No act of his prevented that marriage-contract remaining in +force. When her father forced the destruction of the contract, and much +against his will, and in defiance of the love of his heart, he found that +he had lost his wife beyond any reasonable hope of reconciliation and +reunion, and was therefore free to love another, he loved Mary Campbell, +and honourably proposed marriage to her. She accepted his offer, but died +soon after. He was untrue to no one when he took Clarinda into his heart. +Of course he could not ask her to marry him, as she was already married.</p> + +<p>The first three women he loved after he reached the age of twenty-one +years were Alison Begbie, Jean Armour, and Mary Campbell. The first +refused his offer; he married the second, and was forced into freedom by +her father; the third accepted his offer of marriage, but died before they +could be married. The fourth woman whom he loved<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span> loved him, but could not +marry him, a fact recognised by both of them. There is not a shadow of +evidence of inconstancy or unfaithfulness on his part in the eight years +during which he loved the four women—the only four he did love after he +became a man.</p> + +<p>It may be answered that Burns was not loyal to Jean Armour because he +loved Mary Campbell and Clarinda after he was married to Jean. Burns +absolutely believed that his marriage to Jean was annulled by the burning +of the marriage certificate. He would not have pledged matrimony with Mary +Campbell if he had known that Jean was still his wife. When Mary died, and +he found Jean’s father was willing that he might again marry Jean, he did +marry her in Gavin Hamilton’s home. In writing to Clarinda he forgot +himself for a moment and spoke disrespectfully of Jean, but his prompt and +honourable action in marrying her soon after showed him to be a true man.</p> + +<p>It should ever be remembered that Burns was in no sense a fickle lover. To +each of the three women whom he loved, his love was reverent and true. He +had a reverent affection for Alison Begbie after she refused him; he loved +Jean Armour after she allowed their marriage-certificate to be destroyed; +and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span> he loved Mary Campbell, not only till she died, but to the end of his +life. The fact that he sat out in the stackyard on Ellisland farm through +the long moonlit night, with tears flowing down his cheeks, on the third +anniversary of her death, and wrote ‘To Mary in Heaven,’ proves the depth +and permanency of his love.</p> + +<p>In ‘My Eppie Adair’ he says:</p> + +<p class="poem">By love and by beauty, by law and by duty,<br /> +I swear to be true to my Eppie Adair.</p> + +<p>In these lines Burns truly defines his own type of love.</p> + +<p>It is true that Miss Margaret Chalmers told the poet Campbell, after Burns +died, that he had asked her to marry him. His letters to her are letters +of deep friendship—reverent friendship—not love. It is true that the +last poem he ever wrote was written to Margaret Chalmers, and that in it +he said:</p> + +<p class="poem">Full well thou knowest I love thee, dear.</p> + +<p>But it must be remembered that Burns had been married to Jean and living +happily with her for eight years, so the love of this line was not the +love that is expected to lead to marriage, but an expression of reverent +affection. The whole tenor of this last poem<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span> of his life indicates that +he thought her feeling for him was cooling, and his deep affectionate +friendship urged him to plead with her for a continuance of their +long-existing and quite unusual relationship.</p> + +<p>Many people will doubtless say, ‘What about Chloris?’ Chloris was his name +for Jean Lorimer, the daughter of a friend of his who dwelt near him when +he lived on Ellisland farm after his second marriage to Jean Armour. +Chloris was a sweet singer and player, who frequently visited Mrs Burns, +and who sang for Burns, sometimes, with Mrs Burns the grand old Scottish +airs that had long been sung to words that were not pure, and to which he +was writing new and pure words nearly every day. A number of these songs +were addressed to Chloris, but in a book of his poems presented to Miss +Lorimer he states clearly that the love he appeared to be expressing for +her was an assumed, or, as he called it, a ‘fictitious,’ and not a real +love.</p> + +<p>When Burns had earned five hundred pounds by the sale of the Edinburgh +edition of his poems, he decided ‘that he had the responsibility for the +temporal and possibly the eternal welfare of a dearly loved +fellow-creature;’ so again giving proof of his honest manhood and +recognising his plain duty, he<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span> married Jean Armour a second time, in the +home of his dear friend Gavin Hamilton. Of the first three women whom he +loved one refused him, one died after their sacred engagement, and the +third he married twice. The fourth and last woman that he loved could not +marry.</p> + +<p>Any one of the first three would have made him a good wife, but no one +could have been more considerate or more faithful than the one he married.</p> + +<p>Could any reasonable man believe that if Burns had really loved other +women, as he loved Alison Begbie, Jean Armour, Mary Campbell, and Mrs +M’Lehose, the names of the other women would not have been known by the +world? He never tried to hide his love. He wrote songs of love with other +names attached to them, used for variety. In a letter to a friend he +regretted the use of ‘Chloris’ in several of his Ellisland and Dumfries +poems, and to her directly he said they were ‘fictitious’ or assumed +expressions of love. Notwithstanding the foolish or malicious statements +that Burns had many lovers, he had but four real loves. One would have +been his limit if the first had accepted him and lived as long as he did.</p> + +<p>It has been said that ‘the love of Burns<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span> was the love of the flesh.’ It +is worth while to examine the love-songs of Burns to learn what elements +of thought and feeling dominated his mind and heart. He wrote two hundred +and fifty love-songs, and only three or four contain indelicate +references; even these were not considered improper in his time.</p> + +<p>What were the themes of his love-songs? What were the symbols that he used +to typify love? There is no beauty or delight in Nature on earth or sky +that he did not use as a symbol of true love. He saw God through Nature as +few men ever saw Him, and he therefore naturally used the beauty and +sweetness and glory of Nature to help to reveal the beauty and sweetness +and glory of love, the element of the Divine that thrilled him with the +deepest joy and the highest reverence.</p> + +<p>In his first poem, written when he was fifteen, describing his +fourteen-year-old sweetheart, he says:</p> + +<p class="poem">A bonnie lass, I will confess,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Is pleasant to the e’e;</span><br /> +But without some better qualities,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">She’s no a lass for me.</span><br /> +<span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><br /> +But it’s innocence and modesty<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">That polishes the dart.</span><br /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span><br /> +’Tis this in Nelly pleases me,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">’Tis this enchants my soul;</span><br /> +For absolutely in my breast<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">She reigns without control.</span></p> + +<p>Of Peggy Thomson, his second love, he wrote:</p> + +<p class="poem">Not vernal showers to budding flowers,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Not autumn to the farmer,</span><br /> +So dear can be as thou to me,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">My fair, my lovely charmer.</span></p> + +<p>Of Alison Begbie he wrote in ‘The Lass o’ Cessnock Banks’:</p> + +<p class="poem">But it’s not her air, her form, her face,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Tho’ matching beauty’s fabled queen;</span><br /> +’Tis the mind that shines in ev’ry grace,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And chiefly in her rogueish een.</span></p> + +<p>In ‘Young Peggy Blooms’ he describes her:</p> + +<p class="poem">Young Peggy blooms our bonniest lass,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Her blush is like the morning,</span><br /> +The rosy dawn, the springing grass<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">With early gems adorning.</span><br /> +Her eyes outshine the radiant beams<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">That gild the passing shower,</span><br /> +And glitter o’er the crystal streams,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And cheer each fresh’ning flower.</span></p> + +<p>In ‘Will Ye Go to the Indies, My Mary?’ he says:</p> + +<p class="poem"><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span> +O sweet grows the lime and the orange,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And the apple o’ the pine;</span><br /> +But a’ the charms o’ the Indies<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Can never equal thine.</span></p> + +<p>The following are emblems of beauty in the ‘Lass o’ Ballochmyle’:</p> + +<p class="poem">On every blade the pearls hang.<br /> +<br /> +Her look was like the morning’s eye,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Her air like Nature’s vernal smile.</span><br /> +<br /> +Fair is the morn in flowery May,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And sweet is night in autumn mild.</span></p> + +<p>Describing ‘My Nannie O’ he says:</p> + +<p class="poem">Her face is fair, her heart is true;<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">As spotless as she’s bonnie, O;</span><br /> +The opening gowan, wat wi’ dew,<span class="spacer2"> </span>daisy<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Nae purer is than Nannie O.</span></p> + +<p>In ‘The Birks [birches] of Aberfeldy’ he speaks to his lover of ‘Summer +blinking on flowery braes’ and ‘Playing o’er the crystal streamlets;’ and +the ‘Blythe singing o’ the little birdies’ and ‘The braes o’erhung wi’ +fragrant woods’ and ‘The hoary cliffs crowned wi’ flowers;’ and ‘The +streamlet pouring over a waterfall.’ Love and Nature were united in his +heart.</p> + +<p>In ‘Blythe was She’ he describes the lady by saying she was like beautiful +things:</p> + +<p class="poem"><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span> +Her looks were like a flower in May.<br /> +<br /> +Her smile was like a simmer morn;<br /> +<br /> +Her bonnie face it was as meek<br /> +As any lamb upon a lea;</p> + +<p>and the ‘ev’ning sun.’</p> + +<p>Her step was</p> + +<p class="poem">As light’s a bird upon a thorn.</p> + +<p>He wrote ‘O’ a’ the Airts the Wind can Blaw’ about Jean Armour after they +were married, while he was building their home on Ellisland. He says in +this exquisite song:</p> + +<p class="poem">By day and night my fancy’s flight<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Is ever wi’ my Jean.</span><br /> +<br /> +I see her in the dewy flowers,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">I see her sweet and fair;</span><br /> +I hear her in the tunefu’ birds,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">I hear her charm the air:</span><br /> +There’s not a bonnie flower that springs<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">By fountain, shaw, or green;<span class="spacer2"> </span><span class="spacer"> </span>woodland</span><br /> +There’s not a bonnie bird that sings,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">But minds me o’ my Jean.</span></p> + +<p>To Jean he wrote again:</p> + +<p class="poem">It is na, Jean, thy bonnie face,<br /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 1em;">Nor shape that I admire;</span><br /> +Although thy beauty and thy grace<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Might weel awake desire.</span><br /> +Something in ilka part o’ thee<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">To praise, to love, I find;</span><br /> +But dear as is thy form to me,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Still dearer is thy mind.</span></p> + +<p>In ‘Delia—an Ode,’ he uses the ‘fair face of orient day,’ and ‘the tints +of the opening rose’ to suggest her beauty, and ‘the lark’s wild warbled +lay’ and the ‘sweet sound of the tinkling rill’ to suggest the sweetness +of her voice.</p> + +<p>In ‘I Gaed a Waefu’ Gate Yestreen’ he says:</p> + +<p class="poem">She talked, she smiled, my heart she wiled;<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">She charmed my <i>soul</i>, I wist na how.</span></p> + +<p>It was the soul of Burns that responded to love. Neither Alison Begbie nor +Mary Campbell excelled in beauty, and no one acquainted with their high +character could have had the temerity to suggest that love for them was +‘the love of the flesh.’ His beautiful poems to Jean Armour place his love +for her on a high plane. He was a man of strong passion, but passion was +not the source of his love.</p> + +<p>In ‘Aye sae Bonnie, Blythe and Gay’ he says:</p> + +<p class="poem"><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span> +She’s aye sae neat, sae trim, sae light, the graces round her hover,<br /> +Ae look deprived me o’ my heart, and I became her lover</p> + +<p>‘Ilka bird sang o’ its love’ he makes Miss Kennedy say in ‘The Banks o’ +Doon.’ As the birds ever sang love to Burns, he naturally makes them sing +love to all hearts.</p> + +<p>In ‘The Bonnie Wee Thing’ he gives high qualifications for love kindling:</p> + +<p class="poem">Wit, and grace, and love, and beauty<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">In ae constellation shine;</span><br /> +To adore thee is my duty,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Goddess o’ this soul o’ mine.</span></p> + +<p>In ‘The Charms of Lovely Davies’ he says:</p> + +<p class="poem">Each eye it cheers when she appears,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Like Phœbus in the morning,</span><br /> +When past the shower, and ev’ry flower<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The garden is adorning.</span></p> + +<p>The last three poems from which quotations have been made were written +about two ladies whose lovers had been untrue to them: the first about +Miss Kennedy, a member of one of the leading Ayrshire families; the other +two about Miss Davies, a relative of the Glenriddell family.</p> + +<p>In a letter to Miss Davies he said:</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span>‘Woman is the blood-royal of life; let there be slight degrees of +precedency among them, but let them all be sacred. Whether this last +sentiment be right or wrong, I am not accountable; it is an original +component feature of my mind.’</p> + +<p>Burns was not in love with either Miss Kennedy or Miss Davies, but he +explains the writing of the songs to Miss Davies, in a letter enclosing +‘Bonnie Wee Thing,’ by saying, ‘When I meet a person of my own heart I +positively can no more desist from rhyming on impulse than an Æolian harp +can refuse its tones to the streaming air.’</p> + +<p>One of his most beautiful poems is ‘The Posie,’ which he planned to pull +for his ‘Ain dear May.’</p> + +<p class="poem">The primrose I will pu’, the firstling o’ the year,<br /> +And I will pu’ the pink, the emblem o’ my dear,<br /> +For she’s the pink o’ womankind, and blooms without a peer.<br /> +<br /> +I’ll pu’ the budding rose, when Phœbus peeps in view,<br /> +For it’s like a baumy kiss o’ her sweet, bonnie mou’;<br /> +The hyacinth’s for constancy, wi’ its unchanging blue.<br /> +<br /> +The lily it is pure, and the lily it is fair,<br /> +And in her lovely bosom I’ll place the lily there;<br /> +The daisy’s for simplicity and unaffected air.<br /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a></span><br /> +The woodbine I will pu’, when the e’ening star is near,<br /> +And the diamond draps o’ dew shall be her een sae clear;<br /> +The violet’s for modesty, which weel she fa’s to wear.<br /> +<br /> +I’ll tie the posie round wi’ the silken band o’ luve,<br /> +And I’ll place it in her breast, and I’ll swear by a’ above<br /> +That to my latest draught o’ life the band shall ne’er remove,<br /> +And this will be a posie to my ain dear May.</p> + +<p>In ‘Lovely Polly Stewart’ he says:</p> + +<p class="poem">O lovely Polly Stewart,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">O charming Polly Stewart,</span><br /> +There’s ne’er a flower that blooms in May<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">That’s half so fair as thou art.</span><br /> +<br /> +The flower it blaws, it fades, it fa’s,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And art can ne’er renew it;</span><br /> +But worth and truth, eternal youth<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Will gie to Polly Stewart.</span></p> + +<p>In ‘Thou Fair Eliza’ he says:</p> + +<p class="poem">Not the bee upon the blossom,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">In the pride o’ sinny noon;</span><br /> +Not the little sporting fairy,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">All beneath the simmer moon;</span><br /> +Not the minstrel, in the moment<br /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 1em;">Fancy lightens in his e’e,</span><br /> +Kens the pleasure, feels the rapture,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">That thy presence gies to me.</span></p> + +<p>In ‘My Bonie Bell’ he writes:</p> + +<p class="poem">The smiling spring comes in rejoicing,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The surly winter grimly flies;</span><br /> +Now crystal clear are the falling waters,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And bonie blue are the sunny skies.</span><br /> +Fresh o’er the mountains breaks forth the morning,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The evening gilds the ocean’s swell;</span><br /> +All creatures joy in the sun’s returning,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And I rejoice in my Bonie Bell.</span></p> + +<p>‘Sweet Afton’ was suggested by the following: ‘I charge you, O ye +daughters of Jerusalem, that ye stir not, nor awaken my love—my dove, my +undefiled! The flowers appear on the earth, the time of the singing of +birds is come, and the voice of the turtle is heard in the land.’</p> + +<p>In descriptive power and in fond and reverent love no poem of Burns, or +any other writer, surpasses Sweet Afton. Authorities have been divided in +regard to the person who was the Mary of Sweet Afton. Currie and Lockhart +declined to accept the statement of Gilbert Burns that it was Highland +Mary. Chambers and Douglas, the most illuminating and reliable of the +early biographers of Burns, agree with Gilbert. One<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span> of Mrs Dunlop’s +daughters stated that she heard Burns himself say that Mary Campbell was +the woman whose name he used to represent the lover for whom he asked such +reverent consideration. He had no lover at any period of his life on the +Afton. He had but one lover named Mary, and she stirred him to a degree of +reverence that toned the music of his love to the end of his life. Mary +Campbell was alive to Burns in a truly realistic sense when he wrote the +sacred poem ‘Sweet Afton.’</p> + +<p>In ‘O were my Love yon Lilac Fair’ he assumes that his love might be</p> + +<p class="poem"><span style="margin-left: 8em;">A lilac fair,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Wi’ purpling blossoms in the spring,</span><br /> +And I a bird to shelter there,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">When wearied on my little wing.</span></p> + +<p>In the second verse he says:</p> + +<p class="poem">O gin my love were yon red rose<span class="spacer2"> </span>if<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">That grows upon the castle wa’;</span><br /> +And I mysel’ a drop o’ dew,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Into her bonie breast to fa’!</span></p> + +<p>Could imagination kindle more pure ideals to reveal love than these? In +‘Bonie Jean—A Ballad’ he gives two delightful pictures of love:</p> + +<p class="poem"><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span> +As in the bosom of the stream<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The moonbeam dwells at dewy e’en;</span><br /> +So trembling, pure, was tender love<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Within the breast of Bonie Jean.</span><br /> +<span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><br /> +The sun was sinking in the west,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The birds sang sweet in ilka grove;<span class="spacer2"> </span>every</span><br /> +His cheek to hers he fondly laid,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And whispered thus his tale of love.</span></p> + +<p>In ‘Phillis the Fair’ he writes:</p> + +<p class="poem">While larks, with little wing, fann’d the pure air,<br /> +Tasting the breathing spring, forth did I fare;<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Gay the sun’s golden eye</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Peep’d o’er the mountains high;</span><br /> +Such thy morn! did I cry, Phillis the fair.<br /> +<br /> +In each bird’s careless song glad did I share;<br /> +While yon wild-flow’rs among, chance led me there!<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Sweet to the op’ning day,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Rosebuds bent the dewy spray;</span><br /> +Such thy bloom! did I say, Phillis the fair.</p> + +<p>In ‘By Allan Stream’ he describes the glories of Nature, but gives them +second place to the joys of love:</p> + +<p class="poem">The haunt o’ spring’s the primrose-brae,<br /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 1em;">The summer joys the flocks to follow;</span><br /> +How cheery thro’ her short’ning day<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Is autumn in her weeds o’ yellow;</span><br /> +But can they melt the glowing heart,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Or chain the soul in speechless pleasure?</span><br /> +Or thro’ each nerve the rapture dart,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Like meeting her, our bosom’s treasure?</span></p> + +<p>In ‘Phillis, the Queen o’ the Fair’ he uses many beautiful things to +illustrate her charms:</p> + +<p class="poem">The daisy amused my fond fancy,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">So artless, so simple, so wild:</span><br /> +Thou emblem, said I, o’ my Phillis—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">For she is Simplicity’s child.</span><br /> +<br /> +The rosebud’s the blush o’ my charmer,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Her sweet, balmy lip when ’tis prest:</span><br /> +How fair and how pure is the lily!<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">But fairer and purer her breast.</span><br /> +<br /> +Yon knot of gay flowers in the arbour,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">They ne’er wi’ my Phillis can vie:</span><br /> +Her breath is the breath of the woodbine,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Its dew-drop o’ diamond her eye.</span><br /> +<br /> +Her voice is the song o’ the morning,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">That wakes thro’ the green-spreading grove,</span><br /> +When Phœbus peeps over the mountains<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">On music, and pleasure, and love.</span><br /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span><br /> +But beauty, how frail and how fleeting!<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The bloom of a fine summer’s day;</span><br /> +While worth, in the mind o’ my Phillis,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Will flourish without a decay.</span></p> + +<p>In ‘My Love is like a Red, Red Rose’ he uses exquisite symbolism:</p> + +<p class="poem">My luve is like a red, red rose<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">That’s newly sprung in June;</span><br /> +My luve is like a melodie<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">That’s sweetly play’d in tune.</span><br /> +<br /> +As fair art thou, my bonie lass,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">So deep in luve am I;</span><br /> +And I will luve thee still, my dear,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Till a’ the seas gang dry.</span></p> + +<p>In the pastoral song, ‘Behold, my Love, how Green the Groves,’ he says in +the last verse:</p> + +<p class="poem">These wild-wood flowers I’ve pu’d to deck<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">That spotless breast o’ thine;</span><br /> +The courtier’s gems may witness love,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">But never love like mine.</span></p> + +<p>In the dialogue song ‘Philly and Willy,’</p> + +<p class="poem"><i>He says</i>,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">As songsters of the early spring</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">Are ilka day more sweet to hear,<span class="spacer2"> </span>each</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">So ilka day to me mair dear</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 5em;">And charming is my Philly.</span><br /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span><br /> +<i>She replies</i>,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">As on the brier the budding rose</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">Still richer breathes and fairer blows,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">So in my tender bosom grows</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 5em;">The love I bear my Willy.</span></p> + +<p>In ‘O Bonnie was yon Rosy Brier’ he says:</p> + +<p class="poem">O bonnie was yon rosy brier<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">That blooms so far frae haunt o’ man;</span><br /> +And bonnie she, and ah, how dear!<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">It shaded frae the e’ening sun.</span><br /> +<br /> +Yon rosebuds in the morning dew,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">How pure amang the leaves sae green;</span><br /> +But purer was the lover’s vow<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">They witnessed in their shade yestreen.</span><br /> +<br /> +All in its rude and prickly bower,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">That crimson rose, how sweet and fair.</span><br /> +But love is far a sweeter flower,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Amid life’s thorny path o’ care.</span></p> + +<p>In ‘A Health to Ane I Loe Dear’—one of his most perfect love-songs—he +says:</p> + +<p class="poem">Thou art sweet as the smile when fond lovers meet,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">And soft as their parting tear.</span><br /> +<span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><br /> +’Tis sweeter for thee despairing<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Than aught in the world beside.</span></p> + +<p>In ‘My Peggy’s Charms,’ describing Miss<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span> Margaret Chalmers, Burns confines +himself mainly to her mental and spiritual charms. This was clearly a +distinctive characteristic of nearly the whole of his love-songs. No other +man ever wrote so many pure songs without suggestion of the flesh as did +Robert Burns.</p> + +<p class="poem">My Peggy’s face, my Peggy’s form,<br /> +The frost of hermit age might warm;<br /> +My Peggy’s worth, my Peggy’s mind,<br /> +Might charm the first of human kind.<br /> +<br /> +I love my Peggy’s angel air,<br /> +Her face so truly, heavenly fair.<br /> +Her native grace, so void of art;<br /> +But I adore my Peggy’s heart.<br /> +<br /> +The tender thrill, the pitying tear,<br /> +The generous purpose, nobly dear;<br /> +The gentle look that rage disarms—<br /> +These are all immortal charms.</p> + +<p>In his ‘Epistle to Davie—A Brother Poet’ Burns, after detailing the many +hardships and sorrows of the poor, forgets the hardships, and recalls his +blessings:</p> + +<p class="poem">There’s a’ the pleasures o’ the heart,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The lover and the frien’;</span><br /> +Ye hae your Meg, your dearest part,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And I my darling Jean.</span><br /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span><br /> +It warms me, it charms me,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">To mention but her name;</span><br /> +It heats me, it beets me,<span class="spacer2"> </span><span class="spacer2"> </span>kindles<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And sets me a’ on flame.</span><br /> +<br /> +O all ye powers who rule above!<br /> +O Thou whose very self art love!<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Thou know’st my words sincere!</span><br /> +The life-blood streaming through my heart,<br /> +Or my more dear immortal part<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Is not more fondly dear!</span><br /> +When heart-corroding care and grief<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Deprive my soul of rest,</span><br /> +Her dear idea brings relief<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And solace to my breast.</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Thou Being, All-Seeing,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">O hear my fervent prayer;</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Still take her, and make her</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Thy most peculiar care.</span></p> + +<p>Three years after the death of Highland Mary, Burns remained out in the +stackyard on Ellisland farm and composed ‘To Mary in Heaven.’ Nothing +could more strikingly prove the sincerity, the permanence, the purity, and +the sacredness of the white-souled love of Burns than this poem:</p> + +<p class="poem">Thou ling’ring star, with less’ning ray,<br /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 1em;">That lov’st to greet the early morn,</span><br /> +Again thou usher’st in the day<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">My Mary from my soul was torn.</span><br /> +O Mary! dear departed shade!<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Where is thy place of blissful rest?</span><br /> +See’st thou thy lover lowly laid?<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Hear’st thou the groans that rend his breast?</span><br /> +<br /> +That sacred hour can I forget?<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Can I forget that hallow’d grove</span><br /> +Where, by the winding Ayr, we met<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">To live one day of parting love?</span><br /> +Eternity can not efface<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Those records dear of transports past;</span><br /> +Thy image at our last embrace;<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Ah! little thought we ’twas our last!</span><br /> +<br /> +Ayr, gurgling, kiss’d his pebbled shore,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">O’erhung with wild-woods, thickening green;</span><br /> +The fragrant birch and hawthorn hoar<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Twined amorous round the raptured scene:</span><br /> +The flowers sprang wanton to be prest,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The birds sang love on every spray;</span><br /> +Till too, too soon, the glowing west,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Proclaimed the speed of wingèd day.</span><br /> +<br /> +Still o’er these scenes my mem’ry wakes,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And fondly broods with miser-care;</span><br /> +Time but th’ impression stronger makes,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">As streams their channels deeper wear.</span><br /> +My Mary, dear departed shade!<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Where is thy place of blissful rest?</span><br /> +See’st thou thy lover lowly laid?<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Hear’st thou the groans that rend his breast?</span></p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span>The general themes of this sacred poem, written three years after Mary +Campbell’s death, are the preponderating themes of his love-songs. No +love-songs ever written have so little of even embracing and kissing as +the love-songs of Burns, except the sonnets of Mrs Browning.</p> + +<p>It is worthy of note that Mary Campbell was not a beauty—her attractions +were kindness, honesty, and unselfishness; yet, though happily married +himself, he loved her, three years after her death, as profoundly as when +they parted on the Fail, more than three years before he wrote the poem.</p> + + +<p> </p><p> </p> +<hr style="width: 50%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VIII" id="CHAPTER_VIII"></a>CHAPTER VIII.</h2> +<h3><span class="smcap">Burns a Philosopher.</span></h3> + +<p>The fine training by their father developed the minds of both Robert and +Gilbert Burns as original, independent thinkers, chiefly in regard to +religious, ethical, and social problems. Professor Dugald Stewart, of +Edinburgh University, expressed the opinion that ‘the mind of Burns was so +strong and clear that he might have taken high rank as a thinker in any +department of human thought; probably attaining as high rank in any other +department as he achieved as a poet.’ The quotations given from his +writings in the preceding pages prove that he was a philosopher of unusual +power in regard to Religion, Democracy, and Brotherhood.</p> + +<p>Lockhart said, speaking of the ranking of Burns as a thinker, compared +with the best trained minds in Edinburgh: ‘Even the stateliest of these +philosophers had enough to do to maintain the attitude of equality when +brought into contact with Burns’s gigantic understanding.’</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span>Many of his poems are ornamented and increased in value by flashes of +philosophic thought. His ‘Epistle to a Young Friend’ is a series of +philosophical statements for human guidance.</p> + +<p class="poem">Ye’ll find mankind an unco squad,<span class="spacer2"> </span>strange<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And muckle they may grieve ye,<span class="spacer2"> </span>much</span><br /> +<br /> +I’ll no say men are villains a’;<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The real hardened wicked,</span><br /> +Wha hae nae check but human law,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Are to a few restricket;<span class="spacer2"> </span><span class="spacer"> </span>restricted</span><br /> +<br /> +But, och! mankind are unco weak,<span class="spacer2"> </span>very<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">An’ little to be trusted;</span><br /> +If self the wavering balance shake<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">It’s rarely right adjusted.</span></p> + +<p>He takes a kindly view, that men as a whole are not so bad as pessimists +would have us believe; that there are comparatively few that have no +respect for the Divine Law, and are kept in check only by the fear of +human law; but mourns because most men yet think more of self than of +their neighbours, to whom they may be of service, and sees that, where our +relations with our fellow-men are not satisfactorily balanced, the +destroyer of harmony is universally selfishness in one form or another.</p> + +<p class="poem"><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span> +The fear o’ Hell’s a hangman’s whip<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">To haud the wretch in order.</span></p> + +<p>Even yet this is advanced philosophy, that fear, being a negative motive, +cannot kindle human power or lead men to higher growth. So far as it can +influence the human soul, its effect must be to depress it. Not only the +fear of hell, but fear of anything, is an agency of evil. Some day a +better word than fear will be used to express the proper attitude of human +souls towards God.</p> + +<p class="poem">But where you feel your honour grip<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Let that aye be your border.</span></p> + +<p>What you think of yourself matters more to you than what others think of +you. Let honour and conscience be your guide, and go not beyond the limits +they prescribe. Stop at the slightest warning honour gives,</p> + +<p class="poem">And resolutely keep its laws,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Uncaring consequences.</span></p> + +<p>In regard to religious matters, he gave his young friend sage advice:</p> + +<p class="poem">The great Creator to revere<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Must sure become the creature;</span><br /> +But still the preaching cant forbear,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And ev’n the rigid feature.</span></p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span>The soul’s attitude to the Creator is a determining factor in deciding its +happiness and growth. Reverence should not mean solemnity and awe. +Reverence based on dread blights the soul and dwarfs it. True reverence +reaches its highest when its source is joy; then it becomes productive of +character—constructively transforming character. The formalism of +‘preaching cant’ robs religion of its natural attractiveness, especially +to younger people; the ‘rigid feature’ turns those who would enjoy +religion from association with those who claim to be Christians, and yet, +especially when they speak about religion, look like melancholy and +miserable criminals whose final appeal for pardon has been refused. +Burns’s philosophy would lift the shadows of frightfulness from religion +and let its joyousness be revealed.</p> + +<p class="poem">An Atheist’s laugh’s a poor exchange<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">For Deity offended.</span><br /> +<br /> +A correspondence fixed wi’ heaven<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Is sure a noble anchor.</span></p> + +<p>To Burns, the relationship of the soul to God was of first importance. He +cared little for man’s formalisms, but personal connection with a loving +Father he regarded as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span> the supreme source of happiness. Only a reverent +and philosophic mind would think of prayer as ‘a correspondence with +heaven.’</p> + +<p>Burns holds a high rank as a profound philosopher of human life, of human +growth, and of human consciousness of the Divine, as the vital centre of +human power.</p> + +<p>Burns was a philosopher in his recognition that productive work is +essential to human happiness and progress.</p> + +<p>In ‘The Twa Dogs’ he makes Cæsar say:</p> + +<p class="poem">But human bodies are sic fools,<br /> +For a’ their colleges and schools,<br /> +That when nae real ills perplex them,<br /> +They mak enow themselves to vex them;<br /> +An’ ay the less they hae to sturt them,<span class="spacer2"> </span>trouble<br /> +In like proportion less will hurt them.<br /> +<span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><span class="spacer">·</span><br /> +But gentleman, and ladies warst,<br /> +Wi’ ev’n-down want o’ wark are curst.</p> + +<p>Burns had real sympathy for the idle rich. He saw that idleness leads to +many evils, and that probably the worst evils, those that produce most +unhappiness, are those that result from neglecting to use, or misusing, +powers that, if wisely used, would produce comfort and happiness for +ourselves as well as for others.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span> He believed that every man and woman +would be happier if engaged in some productive occupation, and that those +who do not use their hands to produce for themselves and their fellows are +‘curst wi’ want o’ wark.’</p> + +<p>This belief is based on an old and very profound philosophy, that is not +even yet understood as widely and as fully as it should be: the philosophy +first expounded by Plato, and afterwards by Goethe and Ruskin, that ‘all +evil springs from unused, or misused, good.’ Whatever element is highest +in our lives will degrade us most if misused. The best in the lives of the +idle sours and causes deterioration instead of development of character, +and breeds discontent and unhappiness, so that days are ‘insipid, dull and +tasteless,’ and nights are ‘unquiet, lang and restless.’</p> + +<p>Burns showed that he understood this revealing philosophy in ‘The Vision.’ +In this great poem he assumes that Coila, the genius of Kyle, his native +district in Ayrshire, appeared to him in a vision, and revealed a clear +understanding of the epoch events of his past life and their influence on +his development, and gave him advice to guide him for the future. In one +verse he says:</p> + +<p class="poem"><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span> +I saw thy pulse’s maddening play<br /> +Wild send thee pleasure’s devious way,<br /> +Misled by fancy’s meteor-ray,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2.5em;">By passion driven;</span><br /> +But yet the light that led astray<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2.5em;">Was light from heaven.</span></p> + +<p>He was attacked and criticised severely for the statement contained in the +last two lines. The statement is but philosophic truth that his critics +did not understand. Fancy and passion are elements of power given from +heaven. Properly used they become important elements in human happiness +and development. Improperly used they produce unhappiness and degradation.</p> + +<p>Burns understood clearly the philosophic basis of modern education, the +importance of developing the individuality, or selfhood, or special power +of each child. The poem he wrote to his friend Robert Graham of Fintry, +beginning:</p> + +<p class="poem">When Nature her great masterpiece designed<br /> +And framed her last, best work, the human mind,<br /> +Her eye intent on all the mazy plan,<br /> +She formed of various parts the various man,</p> + +<p>is a philosophical description of how Nature produced various types of +men, giving to each mind special powers and aptitudes.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span> The thought of the +poem is the basis of all modern educational thought: the value of the +individuality of each child, and the importance of developing it.</p> + +<p>He expresses very beautifully the philosophy of the ephemeral nature of +certain forms of pleasure in eight lines of ‘Tam o’ Shanter’:</p> + +<p class="poem">But pleasures are like poppies spread,<br /> +You seize the flower, its bloom is shed;<br /> +Or as the snowfall in the river,<br /> +A moment white, then melts forever;<br /> +Or like the borealis race,<br /> +That flit e’er you can point their place;<br /> +Or like the rainbow’s lovely form,<br /> +Evanishing amid the storm.</p> + +<p>Burns understood the philosophy of the simple life in the development of +character and happiness.</p> + +<p>In ‘The Cotter’s Saturday Night,’ after dilating on the glories of simple, +reverent religion, as compared with ‘Religion’s Pride,’</p> + +<p class="poem"><span style="margin-left: 1em;">In all the pomp of method and of art,</span><br /> +When men display to congregations wide<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Devotion’s every grace except the heart,</span></p> + +<p>he prays for the young people of Scotland—</p> + +<p class="poem">Long may thy hardy sons of rustic toil<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Be blest with health, and peace, and sweet content;</span><br /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span>And O! may Heaven their simple lives prevent<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">From luxury’s contagion, weak and vile!</span><br /> +Then, howe’er crowns and coronets be rent,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">A virtuous populace may rise the while,</span><br /> +And stand a wall of fire around their much-loved isle.</p> + +<p>He understood the value of simplicity in life as well as in religion, and +expressed it in admirable form.</p> + +<p>‘The Address to the Unco Guid’ has a kindly philosophic sympathy running +like a stream of light through it; the profound sympathy of the Master who +searched for the one stray lamb, and who suggested that he who was without +sin should cast the first stone. The last verse especially contains a +sublime human philosophy, that if studied till understood, and then +practised, would work a greatly needed change in the attitude of the rest +of humanity towards the so-called wayward. It is one of the strange +anomalies of life that, generally, professing Christian women have in the +past been the last to come with Christian sympathy of an affectionate, and +sisterly, and respectful quality to take an erring sister in their arms to +try to prove that she still possessed their esteem, and to rekindle faith +in her heart.</p> + +<p>His poem to Mrs Dunlop on ‘New Year’s Day, 1790;‘ ’A Man’s a Man for a’ +That;’ ‘A Winter Night;’ ‘Sketch in Verse;’ and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</a></span> +‘Verses written in Friar’s Carse Hermitage,’ all show him to have been a philosophic student of human nature.</p> + +<p>A few quotations from letters to his friends will show his philosophical +attitude to general matters, as the quotations from his letters showed the +clearness and trueness of his philosophy regarding religion, democracy, +and brotherhood.</p> + +<p>Burns saw man’s duty to his fellows and to himself in this life.</p> + +<p>In a letter to Robert Ainslie, Edinburgh, 1788, he wrote: ‘I have no +objection to prefer prodigality to avarice, in some few instances; but I +appeal to your observation, if you have not met, and often met, with the +same disingenuousness, the same hollow-hearted insincerity, and +disintegrative depravity of principle, in the hackneyed victims of +profusion, as in the unfeeling children of parsimony. I have every +possible reverence for the much-talked-of world beyond the grave, and I +wish that which piety believes, and virtue deserves, may be all matter of +fact. But in all things belonging to, and terminating in, the present +scene of existence, man has serious business on hand. Whether a man shall +shake hands with welcome in the distinguished elevation of respect, or +shrink from contempt in the abject corner of <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span>insignificance; whether he +shall wanton under the tropic of plenty, or at least enjoy himself in the +comfortable latitudes of easy convenience, or starve in the arctic circle +of poverty; whether he shall rise in the manly consciousness of a +self-approving mind, or sink beneath a galling load of regret and +remorse—these are alternatives of the last moment.’</p> + +<p>Since the time of Burns men and women, both in the churches and out of +them, have learned to set more store on the importance of living truly on +the earth, and have ceased to a large extent to think only of a life to +come after death. Men and women are now trying in increasing numbers to +make it more heavenly here.</p> + +<p>Burns taught a sound philosophy of contentment as a basis for happiness.</p> + +<p>He wrote to Mr Ainslie in 1789: ‘You need not doubt that I find several +very unpleasant and disagreeable circumstances in my business [that of a +gauger], but I am tired with and disgusted at the language of complaint at +the evils of life. Human existence in the most favourable situations does +not abound with pleasures, and has its inconveniences and ills; +capricious, foolish man mistakes these inconveniences and ills, as if they +were the peculiar property of his own<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</a></span> particular situation; and hence +that eternal fickleness, that love of change, which has ruined, and daily +does ruin, many a fine fellow, as well as many a blockhead; and is almost +without exception a constant source of disappointment and misery. So far +from being dissatisfied with my present lot, I earnestly pray the Great +Disposer of events that it may never be worse, and I think I can lay my +hand on my heart and say “I shall be content.”’</p> + +<p>Good, sound philosophy of contentment! Not the contentment that does not +try to improve life’s conditions, but the wise contentment that recognises +the best in present conditions, instead of foolishly resenting what it +cannot change.</p> + +<p>Burns taught the philosophy of good citizenship.</p> + +<p>In 1789 he wrote to Mr Ainslie: ‘If the relations we stand in to King, +country, kindred, and friends be anything but the visionary fancies of +dreaming metaphysicians; if religion, virtue, magnanimity, generosity, +humanity, and justice be aught but empty sounds; then the man who may be +said to live only for others, for the beloved, honourable female whose +tender, faithful embrace endears life, and for the helpless little +innocents who are to be<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</a></span> the men and women, the worshippers of his God, +the subjects of his King, and the support, nay the very vital existence, +of his country in the ensuing age, is the type of truest manhood.’</p> + +<p>This quotation from a letter written to a warm, personal friend from whom +he was not seeking any favours gives an insight into a rational mind loyal +to God, loyal to his king, loyal to his country, and lovingly loyal to his +wife and family.</p> + +<p>In a letter to the Right Rev. Dr Geddes, a Roman Catholic Bishop resident +in Edinburgh, a very kind friend to Burns, he wrote, 1789: ‘I am conscious +that wherever I am, you do me the honour to interest yourself in my +welfare. It gives me pleasure to inform you that I am here at last [at +Ellisland], stationary in the serious business of life, and have now not +only the retired leisure, but the hearty inclination to attend to those +great and important questions: What I am? Where I am? For what I am +destined? Thus with a rational aim and method in life, you may easily +guess, my reverend and much honoured friend, that my characteristical +trade is not forgotten; I am, if possible, more than ever an enthusiast to +the Muses. I am determined to study Man and Nature, and in that view, +incessantly<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</a></span> to try if the ripening and corrections of years can enable me +to produce something worth preserving.’</p> + +<p>Bishop Gillis, a Roman Catholic Bishop who lived more than sixty years +after the death of Burns, said, in reference to the letter from which this +quotation was made: ‘If any man, after perusing this letter, will still +say that the mind of Burns was beyond the reach of religious influence, +or, in other words, that he was a scoffer at revelation, that man need not +be reasoned with, as his own mind must be hopelessly beyond the reach of +argument.’</p> + +<p>In a letter to his friend Cunningham he wrote, 1789: ‘What strange beings +we are! Since we have a portion of conscious existence equally capable of +enjoying pleasure, happiness, and rapture, or of suffering pain, +wretchedness, and misery, it is surely worthy of inquiry whether there be +not such a thing as a science of life; whether method, economy, and +fertility of expedients be not applicable to enjoyment, and whether there +be not a want of dexterity in pleasure which renders our little scantling +of happiness still less; and a profuseness and intoxication in bliss which +leads to satiety, disgust, and self-abhorrence.</p> + +<p>‘There is not a doubt but that health,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span> talents, character, decent +competency, respectable friends, are real, substantial blessings; and yet +do we not daily see those who enjoy many, or all, of these good things, +and <i>notwithstanding</i> contrive to be as unhappy as others to whose lot few +of them have fallen? I believe one great source of this mistake or +misconduct is owing to a certain stimulus, with us called ambition, which +goads us up the hill of life—not as we ascend other eminences, for the +laudable curiosity of viewing an extended landscape, but rather for the +dishonest pride of looking down on others of our fellow-creatures, +seemingly diminutive in other stations, &c.’</p> + +<p>His philosophy clearly recognised the evils of unduly centring our minds +and hearts on pleasure, and thus not only robbing ourselves of +development, and humanity of the advantage of the many things we might do +in our overtime devoted to pleasure, but destroying our interest in the +things that were intended to give us happiness.</p> + +<p>He also recognised fully the evils of selfish ambition which aims at +attaining higher positions than others; which climbs, not to get into +purer air to see more widely our true relationships to our fellow-men, but +for the degrading satisfaction of being able to look<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span> down with a +hardening pride that separates humanity into groups instead of uniting all +men in brotherhood. A man whose heart and mind are engrossed by base +material aims cannot grow truly, and he loses the advantages that should +have come to him from the elements of blessing he possesses by misusing +them for selfish ends.</p> + +<p>In another letter he wrote: ‘All my fears and cares are of this world; if +there is another, an honest man has nothing to fear from it. I hate a man +that wishes to be a Deist; but, I fear, every fair, unprejudiced inquirer +must in some degree be a sceptic. It is not that there are any very +staggering arguments against the immortality of man, but, like +electricity, phlogiston, &c., the subject is so involved in darkness that +we want data to go upon.’</p> + +<p>His philosophy left him no fears for what comes after death. He had deep +faith in the justice of God. ‘I believe,’ he said, ‘that God perfectly +understands the being He has made.’ Believing this, and believing also +that God is just, he feared not the future. Burns, as he said to Mrs +Dunlop, was ‘in his idle moments sometimes a little sceptical.’ But they +were only moments. He knew there were problems he could not solve, and so, +as he wrote<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span> to Dr Candlish, ‘he was glad to grasp revealed religion.’ A +thoughtful man requires more faith in revealed religion than a man who +does not really think, but only thinks he is thinking, when other people’s +thoughts are running through his head. Burns needed strong faith, and he +had it even about religious matters he could not explain. ‘The necessities +of my own heart,’ as he wrote to Mrs Dunlop, ‘gave the lie to my cold +philosophisings.’ His ‘Ode to Mrs Dunlop on New Year’s Day, 1790,’ said:</p> + +<p class="poem">The voice of Nature loudly cries,<br /> +And many a message from the skies,<br /> +That something in us never dies.</p> + +<p>He accepted by faith the ‘messages from the skies,’ and in his soul +harmonised the messages with the ‘Voice of Nature,’ even though his +philosophic mind searched for proof of problems he could not solve.</p> + +<p>In a letter to Peter Hill, 1790, he wrote: ‘Mankind are by nature +benevolent creatures, except in a few scoundrelly instances. I do not +think that avarice for the good things we chance to have is born with us; +but we are placed here among so much nakedness and hunger and poverty and +want, that we are under a damning necessity of studying <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span>selfishness in +order that we may <span class="smcaplc">EXIST</span>. Still there are in every age a few souls that all +the wants and woes of life cannot debase into selfishness, or even give +the necessary alloy of caution and prudence. If ever I am in danger of +vanity, it is when I contemplate myself on this side of my disposition and +character. God knows I am no saint; I have a whole host of follies and +sins to answer for, but if I could (and I believe I do, as far as I can), +I would ‘wipe away all tears from all eyes.’</p> + +<p>Burns was not self-righteous. He moralises in this quotation not as one of +the ‘unco guid,’ but as a man on what he thought was one of life’s most +perplexing problems, poverty. He saw the problem more keenly than most men +see it yet. It was not the poverty of Burns himself that, as Carlyle +believed, made him write and work for freedom and justice for the +labouring-classes. It is quite true, however, that one of his reasons for +pleading for democracy was the poverty among the peasantry of his time. He +saw the injustice of conditions, and admitted in his poem to Davie, a +brother poet, that</p> + +<p class="poem">It’s hardly in a body’s power<br /> +To keep at times from being sour,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">To see how things are shared.</span></p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</a></span>Burns recommended the philosophy of right, not expediency in public as +well as private matters.</p> + +<p>He wrote a letter to Mrs Dunlop in 1790, in which he said: ‘I believe, in +my conscience, such ideas as, “my country; her independence; her honour; +the illustrious names that mark the history of my native land,” &c.—I +believe these, among your <i>men of the world</i>; men who, in fact, guide, for +the most part, and govern our world, are looked on as so many +modifications of wrong-headedness. They knew the use of bawling out such +terms to rouse or lead the Rabble; but for their own private use, with +almost all the <i>able statesmen</i> that ever existed, or now exist, when they +talk of right and wrong, they only mean proper and improper; and their +measure of conduct is not what they ought, but <i>what they dare</i>. For the +truth of this, I shall not ransack the history of nations, but appeal to +one of the ablest judges of men, and himself one of the ablest men that +ever lived—the celebrated Earl of Chesterfield. In fact a man that could +thoroughly control his vices, whenever they interfered with his interest, +and who could completely put on the appearance of every virtue as often as +it suited his purposes, is, on the Stanhopian plan, <i>the perfect man</i>, a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</a></span> +man to lead nations. But are great abilities, complete without a flaw, and +polished without a blemish, the standard of human excellence? This is +certainly not the staunch opinion of <i>men of the world</i>; but I call on +honour, virtue, and worth to give the Stygian doctrine a loud negative! +However, this must be allowed, that, if you abstract from man the idea of +an existence beyond the grave, then the true measure of human conduct is +<i>proper and improper</i>; virtue and vice, as dispositions of the heart, are, +in that case, of scarcely the same import and value to the world at large +as harmony and discord in the modifications of sound; and a delicate sense +of honour, like a nice ear for music, though it may sometimes give the +possessor an ecstasy unknown to the coarser organs of the herd, yet, +considering the harsh gratings and inharmonic jars in this ill-tuned state +of being, it is odds but the individual would be as happy, and certainly +would be as much respected by the true judges of society, as it would then +stand, without either a good ear or a good heart....</p> + +<p>‘Mackenzie has been called “the Addison of the Scots,” and, in my opinion, +Addison would not be hurt at the comparison. If he has not Addison’s +exquisite humour, he as certainly outdoes him in the tender and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[Pg 187]</a></span> the +pathetic. His <i>Man of Feeling</i>—but I am not counsel-learned in the laws +of criticism—I estimate as the first performance of the kind I ever saw. +From what book, moral or even pious, will the susceptible young mind +receive impressions more congenial to humanity and kindness, generosity +and benevolence—in short, more of all that ennobles the soul to herself, +or endears her to others, than from the simple, affecting tale of poor +Harley?</p> + +<p>‘Still, with all my admiration of Mackenzie’s writings, I do not know if +they are the fittest reading for a young man who is about to set out, as +the phrase is, to make his way into life. Do you not think, Madam, that +among the few favoured of heaven in the structure of their minds (for such +there certainly are) there may be a purity, a tenderness, a dignity, and +elegance of soul, which are of no use, nay, in some degree absolutely +disqualifying, for the truly important business of making a man’s way into +life?’</p> + +<p>Burns understood the underlying philosophy of sensitiveness.</p> + +<p>In a letter to Miss Craik, 1790, he wrote: ‘There is not among the +martyrologies ever penned so rueful a narrative as the lives of the poets. +In the comparative view of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[Pg 188]</a></span> wretches, the criterion is not what they are +doomed to suffer, but how they are formed to bear. Take a being of our +kind, give him a stronger imagination and a more delicate sensibility, +which between them will ever engender a more ungovernable set of passions +than are the usual lot of man; implant in him an irresistible impulse to +some idle vagary, such as arranging wild flowers in fantastical nosegays, +tracing the grasshopper to his haunt by his chirping song, watching the +frisks of the little minnows in the sunny pool, or hunting after the +intrigues of wanton butterflies—in short, send him adrift after some +pursuit which shall eternally mislead him from the paths of lucre, and yet +curse him with a keener relish than any man living for the pleasures that +lucre can purchase; lastly, fill up the measure of his woes by bestowing +on him a spurning sense of his own dignity, and you have created a wight +nearly as miserable as a poet. To you, Madam, I need not recount the fairy +pleasures the Muse bestows to counterbalance this catalogue of evils. +Bewitching poesy is like bewitching woman: she has in all ages been +accused of misleading mankind from the counsels of wisdom and the paths of +prudence, involving them in difficulties, baiting them with poverty, +branding<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</a></span> them with infamy, and plunging them in the whirling vortex of +ruin; yet, where is the man but must own that all our happiness on earth +is not worth the name—that even the holy hermit’s solitary prospect of +paradisaical bliss is but the glitter of a northern sun rising over a +frozen region, compared with the many pleasures, the nameless raptures +that we owe to the lovely Queen of the heart of Man!’</p> + +<p>He based the last two lines in his ‘Poem on Sensibility’ on this +philosophy:</p> + +<p class="poem">Chords that vibrate sweetest pleasure,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Thrill the deepest notes of woe.</span></p> + +<p>His ‘Parting Song to Clarinda’ reveals in the four lines, said by Sir +Walter Scott ‘to contain the essence of a thousand love-tales,’ how +deepest love may bring darkest sorrow:</p> + +<p class="poem">Had we never loved sae kindly,<br /> +Had we never loved sae blindly,<br /> +Never met—or never parted,<br /> +We had ne’er been broken-hearted.</p> + +<p>In a letter to Crawford Tait, Esq., Edinburgh, 1790, requesting a +sympathetic interest on behalf of a young man from Ayrshire, he says: ‘I +shall give you my friend’s character in two words: as to his head, he has +talents<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span> enough, and more than enough, for common life; as to his heart, +when Nature had kneaded the kindly clay that composes it, she said, “I can +no more.”</p> + +<p>‘You, my good Sir, were born under kinder stars; but your fraternal +sympathy, I well know, can enter into the feelings of the young man who +goes into life with the laudable ambition to <i>do</i> something, and to <i>be</i> +something among his fellow-creatures; but whom the consciousness of +friendless obscurity presses to the earth, and wounds to the soul!</p> + +<p>‘Even the fairest of his virtues are against him. That independent spirit, +and that ingenuous modesty—qualities inseparable from a noble mind—are, +with the million, circumstances not a little disqualifying. What pleasure +is in the power of the fortunate and the happy, by their notice and +patronage, to brighten the countenance and glad the heart of such +depressed youth! I am not so angry with mankind for their deaf economy of +the purse—the goods of this world cannot be divided without being +lessened—but why be a niggard of that which bestows bliss on a +fellow-creature, yet takes nothing from our own means of enjoyment? We +wrap ourselves up in the cloak of our better-fortune and turn away our +eyes, lest the wants and woes<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</a></span> of our brother-mortals should disturb the +selfish apathy of our souls.’</p> + +<p>Burns was a deep character student, and he was able to adjust the balance +fairly when weighing the characteristics that count for success in public +life, in business, and in private life. He always recommended honesty, and +always admired that independent spirit and that ingenuous modesty +inseparable from a noble mind. Much as he admired them, however, he +clearly understood that these admirable qualities might prevent the +perfect development of a soul if they made a man morbidly sensitive, or +interfered in any way with his faith in himself.</p> + +<p>Speaking of ‘independence and sensibility,’ the same qualities he +discussed in the letter quoted (to Mr Crawford Tait), he says in a letter +to Peter Hill, Edinburgh, 1791, addressing poverty: ‘By thee the man of +sentiment, whose heart flows with independence, and melts with +sensibility, inly pines under the neglect or writhes in bitterness of soul +under the contumely of arrogant, unfeeling wealth.’</p> + +<p>Burns taught the just philosophy of gratitude to God.</p> + +<p>In a letter to Dr Moore, of London, he wrote, 1791: ‘Whatsoever is not +detrimental<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</a></span> to society, and is of positive enjoyment, is of God, the +Giver of all good things, and ought to be received and enjoyed by His +creatures with thankful delight.’</p> + +<p>We cannot yet estimate the philosophic vision of Burns. It will grow +clearer as century follows century. Carlyle said of him: ‘We see that in +this man was the gentleness, the trembling pity of a woman, with the deep +earnestness, the force, and passionate ardour of a hero. Tears lie in him, +and a consuming fire, as lightning lurks in the drop of the summer +clouds.’</p> + +<p>So much for his heart; what says Carlyle about his mind?</p> + +<p>‘Burns never studied philosophy.... Nevertheless, sufficient indication, +if no proof sufficient, remains for us in his works; we discern the brawny +movements of a gigantic though untutored strength; and can understand how, +in conversation, his quick, sure insight into men and things may, as aught +else about him, have amazed the best thinkers of his time and country.</p> + +<p>‘But, unless we mistake, the intellectual gift of Burns is fine as well as +strong. The more delicate relations of things could not well have escaped +his eye, for they were intimately present to his heart. The logic of the +senate<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</a></span> and the forum is indispensable, but not all-sufficient; nay, +perhaps the highest truth is that which will most certainly elude it, for +this logic works by words, and “the highest,” it has been said, “cannot be +expressed in words.” We are not without tokens of an openness for this +higher truth also, a keen though uncultivated sense for it having existed +in Burns. Mr Stewart, it will be remembered, wondered that Burns had +formed some distinct conception of the doctrine of Association. We rather +think that far subtler things than the doctrine of Association had from of +old been familiar to him.’</p> + +<p>Carlyle’s last statement is correct. He admits the great essential truth +that Burns was a subtle philosopher. What a pity that such a man as +Carlyle should have thought it necessary to say that Burns ‘never studied +philosophy.’ The statement is incorrect, but, if it had been correct, why +make it? and why call his mental strength ‘untutored,’ and his ‘keen sense +of the highest philosophy’ ‘uncultivated’?</p> + +<p>Did any other philosopher of the time of Burns in the universities reveal +a more profound philosophy of human life, and make so many applications of +it, as Robert Burns revealed in the quotations in this chapter, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</a></span> in +the chapters on Democracy, Brotherhood, and Love?</p> + +<p>Burns was a philosopher, an independent thinker, whose thought is more +highly appreciated now than it was in the time of Carlyle.</p> + +<p>In a letter to Mrs Graham, 1791, he wrote: ‘I was born a poor dog; and +however I may occasionally pick a better bone than I used to do, I know I +must live and die poor. But I will indulge the flattering faith that my +poetry will considerably outlive my poverty; and without any fustian +affectation of spirit, I can promise and affirm that it must be no +ordinary craving of the latter that shall ever make me do anything +injurious to the honest fame of the former. Whatever may be my +failings—for failings are a part of human nature—may they ever be those +of a generous heart and an independent mind.’</p> + +<p>Speaking of the moral character of Burns, Carlyle is wise and just. He +says: ‘We are far from regarding him as guilty before the world, as +guiltier than the average; nay, from doubting that he is less guilty than +one of ten thousand tried at a tribunal far more rigid than that where the +Plebiscite of common civic reputations are pronounced, he has seemed to us +less worthy of blame than of pity and wonder. But the world is habitually +unjust<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[Pg 195]</a></span> in its judgments of such men; unjust on many grounds, of which +this one may be stated as the substance; it decides, like a court of law, +by dead statutes; and not positively, but negatively, less on what is done +right than on what is or is not done wrong.... What Burns did under his +circumstances, and what he forbore to do, alike fill us with astonishment +at the natural strength and worth of his character.’</p> + +<p>Burns was naturally a student gifted with a great mind. His splendid mind +was trained to act logically by his remarkable father, and quickened and +illuminated by his great teacher John Murdoch. He was a great philosopher, +not merely because he read Locke’s ‘Essay on the Human Understanding’ when +a boy, but because during his short life he read with joyous interest many +books of a philosophical character, and what is of infinitely greater +importance, he interpreted all he read with an independent mind, and +related all truth as he understood it to human life. He could discuss even +the principles of Spinoza, and ‘venture into the daring path Spinoza +trod.’ Yet, as he told Dr Candlish, of Edinburgh, he merely ‘ventured in’ +to test Spinoza’s philosophy, which he soon found to be inadequate to the +true development of the human soul, and <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[Pg 196]</a></span>therefore he ‘was glad to grasp +revealed religion.’ Not merely as a great poetic genius, but as a profound +philosophic teacher of religion, democracy, and brotherhood—the most +essentially vital elements related to the highest development of the souls +of men and women—will the real Robert Burns become known as he is more +justly and more deeply studied.</p> + + +<p> </p><p> </p> +<hr style="width: 50%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IX" id="CHAPTER_IX"></a>CHAPTER IX.</h2> +<h3><span class="smcap">The Development of Burns.</span></h3> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><span class="huge">BORN 1759—DIED 1796.</span></p> + +<p class="center"><br /><i>6 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>At six years of age he was sent to a school in a little home near Alloway +Mill for a few months. Then the school was closed, and William Burns, his +father, and a few neighbours engaged a remarkably fine teacher named John +Murdoch to teach their children.</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>7 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>When Burns was seven years old his father moved to Mount Oliphant farm, +about two miles from Alloway. Robert continued to attend Murdoch’s school.</p> + + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>8 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>He continued to attend Murdoch’s school.</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>9 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>Murdoch, his beloved teacher, left Alloway. He had not only been the +teacher of Burns,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</a></span> but had lent the boy books, among them being <i>The Life +of Hannibal</i>. Burns said this book ‘was the earliest I recollect taking +any pleasure in.’ Murdoch presented him with an English grammar and a book +translated from the French, named <i>The School for Love</i>. His imagination +during this period was kindled by many legends, ghost stories, tales, and +songs told and sung by an old lady, Betty Davidson, who lived in the +family home.</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>10 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>Read and studied with his father, discussing freely the merits of the +books read.</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>11 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>He studied, and continued to study with enthusiasm, English grammar, and +had become an unusually excellent scholar for his age in English. His +father regularly taught his family after Murdoch left Alloway. A deep and +lasting impression was made on Robert’s mind during this year by a +<i>Collection of Letters</i>, written by the leading authors of Queen Anne’s +reign.</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>12 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>Worked on the farm, and read with his father at night. Wrote many letters +to imaginary correspondents.</p> + +<p> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span></p> +<p class="center"><i>13 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>He was sent for a few weeks to a school in Dalrymple to learn penmanship. +John Murdoch was appointed teacher in the High School at Ayr. He became +again a visitor to the Burns’ home, in which he was a most welcome guest. +He presented Pope’s works to Robert. During this year Burns continued an +imaginary correspondence with many people, and began to form a style +moulded by the Letters of the great prose-writers of Queen Anne’s time.</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>14 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>Boarded with Murdoch in Ayr for a few weeks, to devote himself to a deeper +study of English. Studied French a little, and gave a little attention to +Latin. The best influence of his brief period with Murdoch was the +kindling of his vision with higher ideals of life, his relationship to his +fellow-men, and his duty to God.</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>15 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>Began to take his place as an independent thinker with men, and surprised +them by his wide knowledge and his unusual powers of expression and +impression. Took his share in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[Pg 200]</a></span> reaping the grain on the farm, and fell in +love with his harvest mate, Nellie Kirkpatrick, who bound and shocked, or +stooked, what he reaped. She was a good-looking girl of fourteen, who sang +well. Burns said her love made him a poet. He composed his first poem, +‘Handsome Nell,’ as a tribute to her. His love for her undoubtedly kindled +him at the centre of his power, as a true love that is respectfully +treated by parents always does for a youth during the adolescent period.</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>16 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>He laboured hard on the farm, but was worried by his father’s poverty, by +the poorness of the soil of Mount Oliphant farm, and especially by the +harsh and over-bearing manner in which his father was treated by the +landlord’s agent. Hard labour and possibly insufficient nourishment for a +youth growing rapidly, coupled with his humiliation at the conduct of the +agent, and his sorrowful sympathy, affected his health. He became +depressed and moody, and suffered from headaches and palpitation of the +heart. He had become acquainted with a few respectable women in Ayr, one +of whom lent him the <i>Spectator</i> and Pope’s <i>Homer</i>. These he read<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[Pg 201]</a></span> and +digested with a growing interest, and used with rapidly developing power.</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>17 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>Was sent to the school of Hugh Rodger at Kirkoswald to learn mathematics, +especially mensuration and surveying. He enjoyed the work and made rapid +progress. He formed a friendship with William Niven, who went to the same +school; and in order to develop his powers as an independent thinker and a +public speaker, he and Willie organised a debating society of two, which +met in formal debate once a week. This developed his intellectual powers +more than the study of mathematics. His school-days in Kirkoswald came to +a sudden ending when he met Peggy Thomson, who lived next to the school. +His second adolescent love came unexpectedly, and with great force. He +says Peggy Thomson’s charms ‘Overset his trigonometry, and set him off at +a tangent from his studies.’ He tried to study, but at the end of the week +gave it all up and went home.</p> + +<p>His schoolmaster learned about the debates between him and Willie Niven, +and determined to put an end to such waste of time from the study of +mathematics. He charged Niven one day with the crime of debating, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[Pg 202]</a></span> +demanded the subject for the next debate. Willie told him the subject for +to-morrow was, ‘Resolved that a great general is of more use to the world +than a good merchant.’ ‘Nonsense,’ thundered the teacher; ‘everybody ought +to know that a general is of far more importance to the world than a +merchant.’ Burns promptly said to the teacher, ‘You take the general’s +side, and I will take the merchant’s side, and let us see.’</p> + +<p>Burns spoke with such wide information, such fine reasoning and such +splendid eloquence, that he soon had the boys cheering him wildly. This +annoyed the master, and he became so angry that he dismissed the school +for the day.</p> + +<p>Even at the early age of seventeen he had few rivals as a public speaker +and debater. He took lessons in a dancing-school at Tarbolton, when he +returned from Kirkoswald, to improve his social manners. During this year +he read Thomson’s works, Shenstone’s works, a <i>Select Collection of +English Songs</i>, Allan Ramsay’s works, Hervey’s <i>Meditations</i>, and some of +Shakespeare’s plays.</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>18 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>The family moved to Lochlea farm, about four miles from Mauchline. Up to +this<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[Pg 203]</a></span> time he had been an awkward and bashful youth. He began now to be +more at ease with the opposite sex after he had been introduced to them. +He had no real lover, however, between 17 and 21.</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>19 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>About this time he made a plan for a tragedy. He never finished it, and +preserved only a fragment, beginning, ‘All devil as I am.’</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>20 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>A year of work, reading, and visions that were but the bases of higher +visions yet to come.</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>21 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>He, with his brother Gilbert and five other young men, founded a debating +club in an upstairs room of a private house in Tarbolton. He read +persistently; held a book in his left hand at meals; and usually carried a +book with him while walking. About this time he began to be known as a +critic of the preaching and practices of the ‘Auld Licht’ preachers, and +enjoyed shocking those who were, in his judgment, not vital, but only +professing, Christians, who did nothing to prove the genuineness of their +religion. In this year<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[Pg 204]</a></span> his heart was kindled by the first love of his +manhood.</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>22 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>He read Sterne’s works, Macpherson’s Ossian, and Mackenzie’s <i>The Man of +the World</i> and <i>Man of Feeling</i>. He said ‘he valued the last book more +than any other book, except the Bible.’ His mind turned to religious +subjects very definitely at this period. He developed a deep and reverent +affection for Alison Begbie, who was a servant on a farm not far from +Lochlea farm. The farm was on Cessnock Water. He wrote three poems to her: +‘The Lass of Cessnock Banks,’ ‘Peggy Alison,’ and ‘Mary Morrison.’ His +letters to her reveal the two great dominant elements in his mind and +heart at that time: a deep and respectful love, and some of the highest +ideals of vital religion.</p> + +<p>In this year love again stirred him to write poetry. He said it became ‘a +darling walk for his mind.’ ‘Winter—a Dirge’ belongs to this period.</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>23 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>This was an eventful year. Alison Begbie had declined his offer of +marriage. Had she married him and lived he would have had but one love +after maturity. He ventured into<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[Pg 205]</a></span> business in Irvine. He says his partner +‘was a scoundrel of the first water, who made money by the mystery of +thieving.’ Their shop was burned, and he found himself not worth a +sixpence. He read two novels, <i>Pamela</i>, and <i>Ferdinand, Count Fathom</i>, and +<i>Fergusson’s Poems</i>, which filled him with a deeper determination to write +poetry. He wrote several religious poems this year.</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>24 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>He became a Freemason in Tarbolton, and devoted a good deal of time to the +order. He did not write much poetry. His mind was occupied by religious +matters, and he had an impression that his life was not going to last very +long. This idea haunted him for two or three years after his maturity. He +contemplated death as a rest, but he continued to store his mind and think +independently. Dr Mackenzie, who attended his father on his death-bed +towards the end of the year, wrote, ‘that on his first visit he found +Gilbert and his father friendly and cordial, but Robert silent and +uncompanionable, till he began discussing a medical subject, when Robert +promptly joined in the discussion, and showed an unexpected and remarkable +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[Pg 206]</a></span>understanding of the subject.’ During this year he wrote ‘My Father was a +Farmer’ and ‘The Death and Dying Words of Poor Mailie.’</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>25 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>His father died in February, leaving the family very poor. Robert and +Gilbert rented Mossgiel farm, about two miles from Mauchline, and the +family moved there. Robert determined to be a scientific farmer. He read +the best books he could get on agriculture; but bad seed, bad weather, and +late harvest left the brothers only half an average crop. He continued to +work on the farm, but evidently began to realise more clearly the kindling +call to poetry as the special work of his life. During the next twelve +years he produced a continuous out-pouring of wonderful poems, although +about half of the twelve years he worked as a farmer on Mossgiel and +Ellisland farms, and most of the rest of the time worked hard as a gauger, +riding two hundred miles each week in the performance of his duties. In +this year he wrote ‘The Rigs of Barley,’ composed in August; ‘My Nannie +O,’ ‘Green Grow the Rashes,’ ‘Man was Made to Mourn,’ ‘The Twa Herds,’ and +the ‘Epitaph on My Ever Honoured Father.’ In<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span> this year he met Jean +Armour, and soon loved her.</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>26 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>He wrote many poems during this year, the most important being ‘Epistle to +Davie, a Brother Poet,’ ‘Holy Willie’s Prayer,’ ‘Death and Doctor +Hornbook,’ three long ‘Epistles to John Lapraik,’ ‘Epistle to William +Simpson,’ ‘Epistle to John Goldie,’ ‘Rantin’, Rovin’ Robin,’ ‘Epistle to +Rev. John M’Math,’ ‘Second Epistle to Davie,’ ‘Farewell to Ballochmyle,’ +‘Hallowe’en,’ ‘To a Mouse,’ ‘The Jolly Beggars,’ ‘The Cotter’s Saturday +Night,’ ‘Address to the Deil,’ and ‘The Auld Farmer’s New-Year Morning +Salutation to his Auld Mare Maggie.’</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>27 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>This was an eventful and productive year for Burns. Quickly following each +other came ‘The Twa Dogs,’ ‘The Author’s Earnest Cry and Prayer,’ ‘The +Ordination,’ ‘Epistle to James Smith,’ ‘The Vision,’ ‘Address to the Unco +Guid,’ ‘The Holy Fair,’ ‘To a Mountain Daisy,’ ‘To Ruin,’ ‘Despondency: an +Ode,’ ‘Epistle to a Young Friend,’ ‘Nature’s Law,’ ‘The Brigs of Ayr,’ +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[Pg 208]</a></span> ‘O Thou Dread Power!’ +‘Farewell Song to the Banks of Ayr,’ ‘Lines on Meeting +Lord Daer,’ ‘Masonic Song,’ ‘Tam Samson’s Elegy,’ ‘A Winter Night,’ ‘Yon +Wild Mossy Mountains,’ ‘Address to Edinburgh,’ and ‘Address to a Haggis,’ +with love-songs and many minor pieces.</p> + +<p>Burns had given Jean Armour a certificate of marriage, and he nearly lost +his mental balance when, at her father’s order, she consented to have it +burned. Fortunately for him two things aided in preserving his balance: +the publication of the Kilmarnock edition of his poems, and his love for +Mary Campbell, ‘Highland Mary.’ No man ever needed a love, deep and true, +to save him more than Burns did. He believed Jean was lost to him for +ever. He was not a faithless but a needy lover when he found a responsive +heart in Highland Mary. They made their marriage vows on the Fail, Sunday, +14th May 1786. Mary went home to prepare for marriage, but caught a fever +and died. Burns went to Edinburgh later in the year to publish a second +edition of his poems, as the first edition had been so well received. In +Edinburgh he was the hero of the highest and most thoroughly educated +classes. He wrote several fine poems to Mary Campbell.</p> + +<p> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[Pg 209]</a></span></p> +<p class="center"><i>28 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>Three thousand copies of his poems were published in April in Edinburgh, +netting him over five hundred pounds. He made two triumphal tours—the +Border Tour and the Highland Tour. As Mary Campbell was dead, his love was +kindled by Clarinda, Mrs M’Lehose, with whom he conducted an intensive +love correspondence, and to whom he wrote several beautiful love-songs. As +she was a married woman who was separated from her husband, Burns could +not marry her. In this year he wrote the ‘Inscription for the Headstone of +Fergusson,’ ‘Epistle to Mrs Scott,’ ‘The Bonnie Moor Hen,’ ‘On the Death +of John M’Leod,’ ‘Elegy on the Death of James Hunter Blair,’ ‘The Humble +Petition of Bruar Water,’ ‘Lines on the Fall of Fyers,’ ‘Castle Gordon,’ +‘On Scaring Some Waterfowl,’ ‘A Rosebud by My Early Walk,’ ‘The Banks of +Devon,’ ‘The Young Highland Rover,’ ‘Birthday Ode,’ and many short pieces +and love-songs, among them ‘The Birks of Aberfeldy.’</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>29 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>Rented Ellisland farm, on the Nith, near Dumfries. Married Jean Armour +(second marriage to her) in April, and left her in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[Pg 210]</a></span> Mauchline till he +could build a home for her on Ellisland, which was ready in December. +Building his new home, stocking and managing the farm, and riding fifty +miles occasionally to his Jean, made his year so busy that he wrote little +poetry, but exquisite love-songs. The estate of Glenriddell, owned in the +time of Burns by Robert Riddell, bordered on Ellisland farm. Robert +Riddell was a fine type of Scottish gentleman, and Burns and he became +warm friends. Among the best poems of this year, not love-songs, are +‘Verses written in Friar’s Carse Hermitage,’ ‘Epistle to Robert Graham of +Fintry,’ ‘The Day Returns,’ ‘A Mother’s Lament,’ ‘The Fall of the Leaf,’ +‘Auld Lang Syne,’ ‘The Poet’s Progress,’ ‘Elegy on the Year 1788,’ and +‘Epistle to James Tennant.’</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>30 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>Wrote many love-songs for Johnson’s Scots Musical Museum, though busily +engaged in farming, and, in addition, a new Psalm for the Chapel of +Kilmarnock; a sketch in verse to Right Hon. C. J. Fox, ‘The Wounded Hare,’ +‘The Banks of Nith,’ ‘John Anderson my Joe,’ ‘The Kirk of Scotland’s +Alarm,’ ‘Caledonia,’ ‘The Battle of Sherramuir,’ ‘The Braes +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[Pg 211]</a></span> o’ Killiecrankie,’ +‘Farewell to the Highlands,’ ‘To Mary in Heaven,’ ‘Epistle +to Dr Blacklock,’ and ‘New Year’s Day, 1790.’</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>31 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>Found his farm ‘a ruinous affair.’ Accepted a position as an exciseman at +fifty pounds a year. Had to ride two hundred miles each week. Continued +writing love-songs for Johnson’s Museum (without pay), and wrote in +addition, ‘Tam o’ Shanter,’ ‘Lament of Mary Queen of Scots,’ and ‘The +Banks of Doon.’</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>32 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>Continued to write love-songs, among the most beautiful being ‘Sweet +Afton’ and ‘Parting Song to Clarinda.’ In addition, wrote ‘Lament for +James, Earl of Glencairn,’ ‘On Glenriddell’s Fox Breaking his Chain,’ +‘Poem on Pastoral Poetry,’ ‘Verses on the Destruction of the Woods near +Drumlanrig,’ ‘Second Epistle to Robert Graham of Fintry,’ ‘The Song of +Death,’ and ‘Poem on Sensibility.’</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>33 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>Wrote many love-songs, among them ‘The<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[Pg 212]</a></span> Lea Rig’ and ‘Highland Mary.’ His +other poems were mainly election ballads. His love-songs were now written +mainly for Thomson’s <i>National Songs and Melodies</i>. He still refused pay +for his songs.</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>34 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>Still, notwithstanding his very busy life, he sent a continuous stream of +songs to Edinburgh. Other poems of the year were ‘Sonnet Written on the +Author’s Birthday,’ ‘Lord Gregory,’ and ‘Scots, wha hae wi’ Wallace bled.’ +In this year he moved to the house in which he died, and in which Jean +died thirty-eight years afterwards.</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>35 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>In this year Burns, to supplement ‘Scots, wha hae’ (the greatest +bugle-song of freedom), wrote two grand poems on Liberty: ‘The Ode to +Liberty’ and ‘The Tree of Liberty;’ and ‘Contented Wi’ Little and Cantie +Wi’ Mair.’ In this year he declined an offer from the London <i>Morning +Chronicle</i> to become a regular contributor to that paper.</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>36 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>Love-songs, and election ballads in favour<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[Pg 213]</a></span> of his friend Mr Heron, were +his most numerous poems this year. In addition to other minor pieces he +wrote a fine poem to his friend, Alexander Cunningham, ‘Does Haughty Gaul +Invasion Threat,’ and the most triumphant combined interpretation of +democracy and brotherhood ever written, ‘A Man’s a Man for a’ That.’</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center"><i>37 Years Old.</i></p> + +<p>Early in the year his health gave way, and he died, 21st July 1796. Though +apparently a strong man, it is reasonable to believe that he had a +constitutional tendency towards consumption. His father died from this +dread disease, and his grandmother (his mother’s mother) died at +thirty-five from the same cause. Burns inherited his physical and +intellectual powers mainly from his mother. Both by heredity and +contagion, therefore, he was made susceptible to influences that develop +consumption. He continued to write poetry, chiefly love-songs, during his +illness. His last poem was written, nine days before his death, to Miss +Margaret Chalmers, for whom he had a reverent affection.</p> + +<p>No reference has been made in this sketch of his development to the prose +written each<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[Pg 214]</a></span> year. Five hundred and thirty-four of his letters have been +published. They are written in a stately style, and most of them contain +philosophic discussions of religion, ethics, or democracy.</p> + +<p>A shy, sensitive, retiring boy; a deep-thinking, persistently studying, +eloquent, still shy youth; a brilliant reasoner, a thinker ranking with +leaders in his neighbourhood, meeting each on equal terms, and easily +proving his superiority by his remarkable knowledge of each man’s special +subject of study, and by his still more remarkable powers of independent +thinking and clear revelation of his thought in his young manhood, but +still at twenty-two too shy to propose to the first lover of his maturity; +always a reverent lover of Nature, whose mind saw God in beauty, in +dawn-gleam and eve-glow, in tree and flower, in river and mountain; he +studied, thought, and expressed his thoughts in exquisite poetry, and, +according to those who knew him best, in still richer and more captivating +conversation, until at twenty-seven he stood in the midst of the most +learned professors of Scotland and outclassed them all. No single +professor of the galaxy of culture in which he stood, modest and +dignified, could have spoken so wisely, so profoundly, so easily,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[Pg 215]</a></span> and +with such graceful manner and charming eloquence on <i>so many subjects</i> as +did Burns.</p> + +<p>It is a marvel that grows greater the more we try to understand it, that a +boy who left school when he was nine years old, and, except for a few +weeks, did not go to school again; and who, from nine years of age to his +thirty-second year, was a steady farm-worker, with the exception of a +brief interval during which he was engaged publishing his poems; and was a +gauger from thirty-two to thirty-six, should have been able to write so +much immortal poetry and so much instructive prose in such a short time.</p> + +<p>One of the most interesting of all the pictures of the lives of the +world’s literary leaders is the picture of Robert Burns, after a day of +toil on the farm, walking from Mossgiel farm, when his evening meal was +over, two miles to his favourite seat in the woods on Ballochmyle estate, +and sitting there on the high bank of the Ayr in the long Scottish +gloaming, and often on in the moonlight, ‘shut in with God,’ revealing in +sublime form the visions that thrilled his soul. During the last few years +of his life he walked from his home to Lincluden Abbey ruins on his +favourite path beside the winding Nith to spend his gloaming<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[Pg 216]</a></span> hours alone, +and composed there some of his masterpieces.</p> + +<p>Short was his life, but he lives on in the hearts of succeeding +generations. He lives on, too, in his permanent influence on religion, +freedom, and brotherhood.</p> + + +<p> </p><p> </p> +<p class="center">THE END.</p> + +<p> </p> +<p class="center">Edinburgh:<br />Printed by W. & R. Chambers, Limited.</p> + + +<p> </p><p> </p> +<hr style="width: 50%;" /> +<p><strong>Footnotes:</strong></p> + +<p><a name="f1" id="f1" href="#f1.1">[1]</a> Dr Moore was the father of Sir John Moore, the British general who was killed at Corunna in the Peninsular War.</p> + +<p><a name="f2" id="f2" href="#f2.1">[2]</a> Her name was spelled Alison or Elison.</p> + +<p><a name="f3" id="f3" href="#f3.1">[3]</a> One of John Murdoch’s quotations used as a headline to be copied in his copy-book.</p> + +<p><a name="f4" id="f4" href="#f4.1">[4]</a> The lovers of Burns afterwards got permission to remove the monument and remains of Highland Mary to a more suitable location.</p> + + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Real Robert Burns, by J. L. 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Hughes + +Release Date: February 17, 2011 [EBook #35299] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE REAL ROBERT BURNS *** + + + + +Produced by The Online Distributed Proofreading Team at +https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images +generously made available by The Internet Archive.) + + + + + + + + + +THE REAL ROBERT BURNS + + + + + THE REAL ROBERT BURNS + + + BY J. L. HUGHES, LL.D. + Author of 'Dickens as an Educator,' &c. + + + LONDON: 38 Soho Square, W.1 + W. & R. CHAMBERS, LIMITED + + EDINBURGH: 339 High Street + THE RYERSON PRESS + + TORONTO: Corner Queen and John Streets + + + + + Printed in Great Britain. + W. & R. CHAMBERS, LTD., LONDON and EDINBURGH. + + + + +CONTENTS. + + + CHAPTER PAGE + + FOREWORD 7 + + I. THE TRUE VALUES OF BIOGRAPHY 9 + + II. THE EDUCATIONAL ADVANTAGES OF BURNS 17 + + III. THE CHARACTERISTICS OF BURNS 35 + + IV. BURNS WAS A RELIGIOUS MAN 63 + + V. BURNS THE DEMOCRAT 99 + + VI. BURNS AND BROTHERHOOD 126 + + VII. BURNS A REVEALER OF PURE LOVE 135 + + VIII. BURNS A PHILOSOPHER 167 + + IX. THE DEVELOPMENT OF BURNS 197 + + + + +FOREWORD. + + +The writer of the following pages learned years ago to reverence the +memories of Burns and Dickens. Frequently hearing one or the other +attacked from platform or pulpit, and believing both to be great +interpreters of the highest things taught by Christ, as the basis of the +development of humanity towards the Divine, he resolved that some day he +would try to help the world to understand correctly the work of these two +great men. His book, _Dickens as an Educator_, has helped to give a new +conception of Dickens, as an educational pioneer and as a philosopher. The +purpose of this book is to show that Burns was well educated, and that +both in his poems and in his letters he was an unsurpassed exponent of the +highest human ideals yet expressed of religion--democracy based on the +value of the individual soul, brotherhood, love, and the philosophy of +human life. + +The writer believes that gossiping in regard to the weakness of the living +is indecent and degrading, but that it is pardonable as compared with the +debasing practice of gossiping about the weaknesses of the dead. Those who +can wallow in the muck of degraded biographers are only a degree less +wicked than the biographers themselves, who sin against the dead, and sin +against the living by providing debasing matter for them to read. + +The evidence to prove the positions claimed to be true in this book is +mainly taken from the poems and letters of Burns himself. Some may doubt +the sincerity of Burns. Carlyle had no doubt about his sincerity or his +honesty. He says of the popularity of Burns: 'The grounds of so singular +and wide a popularity, which extends, in a literal sense, from the palace +to the hut, and over all regions where the English tongue is spoken, are +well worth inquiring into. After every just deduction, it seems to imply +some rare excellence in these works. What is that excellence? To answer +this question will not lead us far. The excellence of Burns is, indeed, +among the rarest, whether in poetry or in prose, but, at the same time, it +is plain and easily recognised--_his sincerity, his indisputable air of +truth_.' + +Speaking of the moral character of Burns, Carlyle said: 'We are far from +regarding him as guilty before the world, as guiltier than the average; +nay, from doubting that _he is less guilty than one of ten thousand_.... +What he _did_ under such circumstances, and what he _forbore to do_, alike +fill us with astonishment at the _natural strength and worth of his +character_.' + +Shakespeare says in _Hamlet_: 'Ay, sir, to be honest, as this world goes, +is to be one man picked out of ten thousand.' Carlyle chose Burns as one +of ten thousand. + +These quotations should help two classes of men: the 'unco guid,' who +believe evil stories, most of which had no real foundation; and those +professed lovers of Burns who love him for his weaknesses. The real Robert +Burns was not weak enough to suit either of these two classes. 'Less +guilty than one in ten thousand' is a high standard. + +To do something to help all men and women to a juster understanding of the +real Robert Burns is the aim of the writer. Let us learn, and ever +remember, that he was a reverent writer about religion, a clear +interpreter of Christ's teaching of democracy and brotherhood, a profound +philosopher, and the author of the purest love-songs ever written. + + + + +THE REAL ROBERT BURNS. + + + + +CHAPTER I. + +THE TRUE VALUES OF BIOGRAPHY. + + +A man's biography should relate the story of his development in power, and +his achievements for his fellow-men. Biography can justify itself only in +two ways: by revealing the agencies and experiences that formed a man's +character and aided in the growth of his highest powers; and by relating +the things he achieved for humanity, and the processes by which he +achieved them. + +Only the good in the lives of great men should be recorded in biographies. +To relate the evil men do, or describe their weaknesses, is not only +objectionable, it is in every way execrable. It degrades those who write +it and those who read it. Biography should not be mainly a story; it +should be a revelation, not of evil, but of good. It should unfold and +impress the value of the visions of the great man whose biography is being +written, and his success in revealing his high visions to his fellow-men. +It should tell the things he achieved or produced to make the world +better; the things that aid in the growth of humanity towards the divine. +The biographer who tells of evils is, from thoughtlessness or malevolence, +a mischievous enemy of mankind. + +No man's memory was ever more unjustly dealt with than the memory of +Robert Burns. His first editor published many poems that Burns said on his +death-bed should be allowed 'to sink into oblivion,' and told all of +weakness that he could learn in order that he might be regarded as just. +He considered justice to himself of more consequence than justice to +Burns, or to humanity. His only claim to be remembered is the fact that he +prepared the poems of Burns for publication, and wrote his biography. It +is much to be regretted that he had not higher ideals of what a biography +should be, not merely for the memory of the man about whom it is written, +but for its influence in enlightening and uplifting those who read it. +Biographers should reveal not weaknesses, but the things achieved for God +and humanity. + +Carlyle, writing of the biographers of Burns, says: 'His former +biographers have done something, no doubt, but by no means a great deal, +to assist us. Dr Currie and Mr Walker, the principal of these writers, +have both, we think, mistaken one important thing: their own and the +world's true relation to the author, and the style in which it became such +men to think and to speak of such a man. Dr Currie loved the poet truly, +more perhaps than he avowed to his readers, or even to himself; yet he +everywhere introduces him with a certain patronising, apologetic air, as +if the polite public might think it strange and half unwarrantable that +he, a man of science, a scholar and a gentleman, should do such honour to +a rustic. In all this, however, we readily admit that his fault was not +want of love, but weakness of faith; and regret that the first and kindest +of all our poet's biographers should not have seen farther, or believed +more boldly what he saw. Mr Walker offends more deeply in the same kind, +and both err alike in presenting us with a detached catalogue of his +attributes, virtues, and vices, _instead of a delineation of the resulting +character as a living unity_.' + +The biographers of Robert Burns criticised reputed defects of his--defects +common among men of all classes and all professions in his time--but +failed to give him credit for his revelations of divine wisdom. They +bemoaned his lack of religion--though he was a reverently religious +man--instead of telling the simple truth that he was the greatest +religious reformer of his time in any part of the world. They said he was +not a Christian because he did not perform certain ceremonies required by +the churches, when freer and less bigoted men would have told the real +fact, that he was one of the world's greatest interpreters of Christ's +highest ideals--democracy and brotherhood. He still holds that high rank. +They related idle gossip about his vanity and other trivial stories, +instead of being content with proclaiming him the greatest genius of his +time in the comprehensiveness of his visions, and in the scope of his +powers. Some of them tried to prove that he was not a loyal man; they +should have revealed him as the giant leader of men in making them +conscious of the value of liberty and of the right of every man to its +fullest enjoyment. + +The oft-repeated charge of disloyalty was disproved when the charge was +made during the life of Burns, but the false accusation has been accepted +as a fact by many people to the present time. Fortunately the records of +the Dumfries Volunteers have been discovered recently, and Mr William +Will has published them in a book entitled _Robert Burns as a Volunteer_. +They prove most conclusively that Burns was a truly loyal man. When the +Provost of Dumfries called a meeting of the citizens of Dumfries to +consider the need of establishing a company of Volunteers Burns attended +the meeting, and was chosen as a member of a small committee to write to +the king asking permission to form a company. When permission was granted +by the king, Burns joined the company on the night when it was first +organised, and sat up most of the night composing 'The Dumfries +Volunteers,' the most inspiring poem of its kind ever written. It did more +to arouse the people of Scotland and England to put down the bolshevism of +the time than any other loyal propaganda. + +The minutes of the Volunteer Company in Dumfries give a perfect answer to +the basest slander ever made against Burns--that he had sunk so low as a +hopelessly vile drunkard the respectable people of Dumfries would not +associate with him; that he was ostracised by the community at large. Yet +this 'ostracised man' was chosen by the best citizens of Dumfries as one +of the committee to write to King George, and was elected as a member of +the committee to manage the company. This slander was so generally +accepted in Carlyle's time that even Carlyle himself wrote that Burns did +not die too soon, as he had lost the respect of his fellow-men, and had +lost also the power to write. His first statement is proved to have no +true foundation by the record of the Dumfries Volunteer Company, and the +second by the fact that Burns wrote the greatest poem ever written by any +man to interpret Christ's highest visions, democracy and brotherhood, 'A +Man's a Man for a' That,' the year before he died, and 'The Dumfries +Volunteers.' The second year before his death he wrote 'The Tree of +Liberty' and 'The Ode to Liberty,' and the third year before he died he +wrote the clarion call to fight in defence of freedom, 'Scots, wha hae.' +These poems have no equals in any literature of their kind. During the +same three years of his life he wrote one hundred and seventeen other fine +songs and sent them to Edinburgh for publication, the last one on the +ninth day before his death. It should be remembered, too, that Burns had +to ride two hundred miles each week in the discharge of his duty to the +government; and that after the organisation of the Volunteer Company he +had to drill four hours each week, and attend the meetings of the company +committee. The minutes of the company show he was never fined for absence. + +The last meeting he attended before his fatal illness was called to +prepare a letter of gratitude to God for preserving the life of the king +when the London bolshevistic mob tried to kill him on his way to the House +of Commons. Assisting to prepare this letter to the king was the last +public act of Burns. + +Had his weaknesses been tenfold what they were, his biographers should +have said nothing about them, for in spite of his human weakness he had +divine power to reveal to all men Christ's teachings--democracy and +brotherhood, based on the value of the individual soul. He was also the +greatest poet of religion, ethics, and love; and he holds a high place +among the loving interpreters of Nature. + +To relate facts in his life to account for the development of his powers, +so that he was able to be so great a revealer of the highest things in the +lives of men and women, should have been the work of his biographers. + +It is worthy of note that Wordsworth wrote to the publishers of the +biography of Burns in regard to the true attitude of a biographer. He +objected to recording imputed failings, and expressed indignation at Dr +Currie for devoting so much attention to the infirmities of Burns. + +Chambers and Douglas were in most respects better than his other early +biographers. The Rev. Lauchlan MacLean Watt, of Edinburgh, wrote for the +Nation's Library in 1914 the sanest, truest book yet written about Burns. + + + + +CHAPTER II. + +THE EDUCATIONAL ADVANTAGES OF BURNS. + + +Many people still speak of Burns as an 'uneducated man.' Although a +farmer, he was in reality a well-educated man. He was not a finished +scholar in the accepted sense of the universities, but both in his poetry +and in his unusually forceful and polished prose he was superior to most +of the university men of his time. He had read many books, the best books +that his intelligent father could buy, or that he could borrow from +friends or from libraries. In addition to school-books, he names the +following among those books read in his youth and young manhood--_The +Spectator_, Pope's Works, Shakespeare, Works on Agriculture, _The +Pantheon_, Locke's _Essay on the Human Understanding_, Stackhouse's +_History of the Bible_, Justice's _British Gardener_, Boyle Lectures, +Allan Ramsay's Works, Doctor Taylor's _Doctrine of Original Sin_, _A +Select Collection of English Songs_, Hervey's _Meditations_, Thomson's +Works, Shenstone's Works, _The Letters by the Wits of Queen Anne's +Reign_, Sterne's _Tristram Shandy_, Mackenzie's _The Man of Feeling_, +Macpherson's _Ossian_, two volumes of _Pamela_, and one novel by Smollett, +_Ferdinand, Count Fathom_. In addition to these he had read some French +and some Latin books, guided by one of the greatest teachers of his time, +John Murdoch, who was so great that when he established a private school +in London his fame spread to France, and some leading young men, notably +Talleyrand, came to receive his training and inspiration. + +William Burns read regularly at night to his two sons, Robert and Gilbert, +and after the reading the three fellow-students discussed the matter that +had been read, each from his own individual standpoint. As the boys grew +older they read books during their meals, so earnest were they in their +desire to become acquainted with the best thought of the world's leaders, +so far as it was available. David Sillar has stated that Robert generally +carried a book with him when he was alone, that he might read and think. +When Robert settled at Ellisland he aroused an interest among the people +of the district, and succeeded in establishing a circulating library. + +His father, though a labourer, was supremely desirous that his family +should be educated and thoughtful. This desire prompted him to become a +farmer, that he might keep his family at home. He was an independent +thinker himself, and by example and experience he trained his sons to love +reading and to think independently. Robert never thought he was thinking +when he let other people's thoughts run through his mind. + +The result of the reading and thinking which their father led Robert and +Gilbert to do was most gratifying. The influence on Robert's mind must be +recognised. He became not only a great writer in prose and in poetry, but +a great orator as well. He stood modestly, but conscious of his power, and +proved his superiority both in conversation and impromptu oratory to the +leading university men of his time in Edinburgh. Gilbert, too, became an +original thinker and a writer of clear and forceful English. In a long +letter to Dr Currie he discussed very profoundly and very independently +some deep psychological ideas in excellent language. Few men of his time +could have written more thoughtfully or more definitely. As illustrations +of Robert's learning, as well as of his independent thought in relating +the books he read to each other and to human life, two instances are worth +recording. First, in a letter to Dr Moore,[1] of London, an author of +some distinction, who had sent him a copy of one of his books, Burns said, +1790: 'You were pleased to express a wish for my opinion of your work, +which so flattered me that nothing less would serve my overweening fancy +than a formal criticism on the book. In fact, I have gravely planned a +comparative view of you, Fielding, Richardson, and Smollett in your +different qualities and merits as novel writers. This, I own, betrays my +ridiculous vanity, and I may probably never bring the business to bear, +but I am fond of the spirit young Elihu shows in the Book of Job--"And I +said, I will also declare my opinion."' + +To Mrs Dunlop he wrote, 1788: 'Dryden's _Virgil_ has delighted me. I do +not know whether the critics will agree with me, but the _Georgics_ are to +me by far the best of Virgil. It is indeed a species of writing entirely +new to me, and has filled my head with a thousand fancies of emulation.... +I own I am disappointed in the _AEneid_. Faultless correctness may please, +and does highly please, the letter critic; but to that awful character I +have not the most distant pretensions. I do not know whether I do not +hazard my pretensions to be a critic of any kind, when I say that I think +Virgil, in many instances, a servile copier of Homer. If I had the +_Odyssey_ by me, I could parallel many passages where Virgil has evidently +copied, but by no means improved, Homer. Nor can I think there is anything +of this owing to the translators; for from everything I have seen of +Dryden, I think him in genius and fluency of language Pope's Master.' + +But a small percentage of university graduates of his time could have +written independent criticisms, wise or otherwise, of Homer and Virgil, or +even of English writers, as clearly as Burns did. They could have told +what the opinions of other people were in regard to Homer and Virgil; they +could have told what they had been told. Burns had been trained to think +by his father, and to express his own thoughts about the books he read; +they had merely been informed. The advantage in real education was greatly +in favour of Burns. Their memories had been stored with opinions of +others; his mind had been trained to read carefully, to relate the +thoughts of others to life, to decide as to their wisdom, and to think +independently himself. His education from books was somewhat limited, but +the development of his mind that came from discussions of the value of the +matter read was vital, and helped him to relate himself to men, to nature +around him, to the universe, and to God. + +In schools Burns had not a very extended experience. When six years old he +was sent to a small school beside the mill on the Doon at Alloway. His +teacher gave up the school soon after Burns began to attend it. Mr Burns +secured the co-operation of several of his neighbours, and they engaged a +young man named Murdoch to teach their children, agreeing to take him in +turn as their guest, and to pay him a small salary. The fact that John +Murdoch formed a high estimate of Mr Burns is a proof of the ability and +sincerity of the father of the poet. + +When Burns was seven years old his father removed to Mount Oliphant farm, +but Robert continued to attend the school of Mr Murdoch, about two miles +away, in Alloway. The books used were a spelling-book, the New Testament, +the Bible, Mason's _Collection of Prose and Verse_, and Fisher's _English +Grammar_. + +Mr Murdoch gave up his Alloway school when Burns was nine years old. After +that time the teacher of his sons was their father. He taught them +arithmetic, and bought them Salmon's _Geographical Grammar_, Derham's +_Physico- and Astro-Theology_, Hay's _Wisdom of God in the Creation_, and +the _History of the Reigns of James I. and Charles I. of England_. Robert, +when eleven years old, showed a deep interest in the study of grammar and +language, and 'excelled as a critic in substantives, verbs, and +participles.' In his twelfth year he was kindled in his patriotic spirit +by the _Life of Sir William Wallace_. Wallace remained a hero to him +throughout his life. In his thirty-fifth year he wrote the grandest call +to the defence of liberty ever written, beginning: + + Scots, wha hae wi' Wallace bled. + +In his eleventh year, which seemed to be a kindling epoch in his mind, his +mother's brother gave him a collection of _Letters by the Wits of Queen +Anne's Reign_. He read them over and over again, greatly delighted by both +their contents and their literary style. They had a distinct influence in +forming his own prose style, as during his twelfth year he conducted an +imaginary correspondence of quite an extensive character and in a stately +style. + +When he was thirteen the greatest kindler of his early powers, John +Murdoch, became teacher of English in the Ayr High School. Robert was +sent to board with him to study grammar and composition. He received +instruction from Murdoch in French and in Latin. He continued the study of +French in the evenings at home, as he had obtained a French dictionary and +a French grammar. + +His formal education, so far as it became an element in the cultivation of +his mind and the development of his supreme powers, ended with the few +weeks spent with John Murdoch in Ayr. They were epoch weeks to Burns; +transforming weeks, because of the increased range of his learning, but +made infinitely more richly transforming by the revelation of new visions +of life, and by the culture gained by association with a man of rare +ability and supreme kindling power, such as John Murdoch undoubtedly +possessed. A genius like Burns, living with a great teacher like Murdoch, +could in a month get many of the new revelations, the new visions, and the +strong impulses that should come into a growing soul as the result of a +university course. + +Burns, in his seventeenth year, was sent to Kirkoswald to study +mensuration and surveying. He intended to become a surveyor. Peggy Thomson +lived next door to the school he attended. He met Peggy, loved her madly, +and found it impossible to study longer. He afterwards wrote two beautiful +poems to her. His school life for a brief period in Kirkoswald had little +influence in the development of his power, except for the organisation of +a debating society composed of a companion, William Niven, and himself. +They met weekly to hold debates, and these debates were greatly enjoyed by +Burns. His practice in debating societies afterwards organised by him in +Tarbolton and in Mauchline not only developed in him his unusual +oratorical ability, but at the same time gave him mental training of vital +importance. Impromptu speaking surpasses any other known educational +process in developing the human mind. However, Burns could neither study +for Hugh Rodger nor debate with William Niven after he fell in love with +Peggy Thomson, so, after a sleepless week, he went home. + +Some may wonder, when they learn that for a time Burns took more interest +in studying Euclid's _Elements of Geometry_ than in any other department +of study in his home under his father's guidance. When the Rev. Archibald +Alison sent him his book, _Essays on the Principles of Taste_, Burns +thanked him, and in his letter said: 'In short, sir, except Euclid's +_Elements of Geometry_, which I made a shift to unravel by my father's +fireside in the winter evenings of the first season I held the plough, I +never read a book which gave me such a quantum of information, and added +so much to my stock of ideas, as your _Essays on the Principles of +Taste_.' + +Burns evidently studied geometry at the time his mind was ripe for new +development by that special study. All children and young people would be +fortunate if they could be guided to the special study capable of arousing +their deepest interest, and therefore capable of promoting their highest +development, at the special period of their mental growth when that +particular study will awaken their deepest and most productive interest. + +Robert's mind appears to have had a splendid power of adaptation to the +books and studies which his father secured for his sons. Gilbert says: +'Robert read all these with an avidity and industry scarcely to be +equalled; and no book was so voluminous as to slacken his industry, or so +antiquated as to damp his researches.' Dr Moore wrote to Burns in 1787: 'I +know very well you have a mind capable of attaining knowledge by a shorter +process than is commonly used, and I am certain you are capable of making +better use of it, when attained, than is generally done.' + +This makes it easier to understand why Burns had a mind so well stored +with so many kinds of knowledge; and knowledge classified by himself, and +related to life, so well that he could use it readily when he required to +do so. The university men in Edinburgh marvelled more at the vastness of +his stores of different kinds of knowledge, when he met them with +dignified calmness, than they did because of his wonderful gifts of poetic +genius. Douglas says of Burns in Edinburgh: 'Burns did not fail to mix by +times with the eminent men of letters and philosophy, who then shed lustre +on the name of Scotland.' + +Lockhart wrote: 'Burns's poetry might have procured him access to these +circles; but it was the extraordinary resources he displayed in +conversation, the strong sagacity of his observations on life and manners, +the splendour of his wit, and the glowing energy of his eloquence, that +made him the serious object of admiration among these practised masters of +the arts of talk. Even the stateliest of these philosophers had enough to +do to maintain the attitude of equality when brought into contact with +Burns's gigantic understanding; and every one of them whose impressions +on the subject have been recorded agrees in pronouncing his conversation +to have been the most remarkable thing about him.' + +Speaking of this, Chambers properly says: 'We are thus left to understand +that the best of Burns has not been, and was not of a nature to be, +transmitted to posterity.' Why was Burns, though a ploughman, able to meet +a galaxy of leaders in different spheres of learning, and culture, and +philosophy, and outshine any of them in his own special department? The +answer is simple. He had two great teachers to kindle him and guide him in +the development of his remarkable natural powers: his father, William +Burns, and his teacher and friend, John Murdoch. + +His father made it certain that he would possess a wide range of knowledge +of the best available books on religious, ethical, and philosophical +subjects--philosophy of science and philosophy of the mind; and, better +than that, he trained him definitely by nightly practice to digest, and +expound, and relate, and even dare to disbelieve, the opinions expressed +in the books he read. In nightly discussions with his father and Gilbert +his mind became keen and broad, and he became self-reliant. He had not +merely stored knowledge in his mind, he had wrought the knowledge into his +being, as an element of his growing power. Like great players of chess who +sometimes meet several opposing players of eminence at the same time and +vanquish them all at one period of play, Burns could meet the leaders of +many departments of progress, culture, and philosophy at the same time, +and stand calm and serene in glory with each leader on the crest of his +own special mountain of knowledge. + +From John Murdoch he received the inspiration of a vital comradeship, a +fine training in English language--grammar, and a good introduction to +literature--and visions of higher relationships to his fellow-men and to +God. + +However, great as Murdoch was as a kindler and a teacher, the education of +Robert Burns was mainly due to his remarkable father. Alexander Smith, in +his memoir of Burns, which Douglas claimed to be 'the finest biography of +its extent ever written,' speaking of William Burns, says: 'In his whole +mental build and training he was superior to the people by whom he was +surrounded. He had forefathers he could look back to; he had family +traditions which he kept sacred. Hard-headed, industrious, religious, +somewhat austere, he ruled his house with a despotism which affection and +respect on the part of the ruled made light and easy. To the blood of the +Burnses a love of knowledge was native, as valour in the old times was +native to the blood of the Douglases.' + +John Murdoch wrote of William Burns: 'Although I cannot do justice to the +character of this worthy man, yet you will perceive from what I have +written _what kind of person had the principal part in the education of +the poet_. He spoke the English language with more propriety, both with +respect to diction and pronunciation, than any man I ever knew with no +greater advantages; this had a very good effect on the boys, who talk and +reason like men much sooner than their neighbours.' + +These two quotations help us to understand William Burns as a great +teacher of his sons, and his daughters, too, although he did not deem it +quite so important to educate his daughters as his sons. It is perfectly +clear that the paternal despotism spoken of by Mr Smith, which indeed was +supposed to be necessary one hundred and fifty years ago, was not the +reason why his boys so early talked and reasoned like men. William Burns +was the elderly friend of his sons, not a despot, when he trained them to +love reading, and much better to speak freely their individual opinions +about what they read. This naturally led his sons to speak like men early +and fearlessly. Despotism on the part of the father would have had +directly the opposite effect. + +Gilbert Burns sums up his father's estimate of early education and good +training when he says: 'My father laboured hard, and lived with the most +rigid economy, that he might be able to keep his children at home, thereby +having an opportunity of watching the progress of our young minds and +forming in them early habits of piety and virtue; and from this motive +alone did he engage in farming, the source of all his difficulties and +distresses.' + +Robert, after his father's death, wrote to his cousin, and said his father +was 'the best of friends, and the ablest of instructors.' + +In the sketch of his life sent to Dr Moore, of London, he wrote: 'My +father, after many years of wanderings and sojournings, picked up a pretty +large quantity of observation and experience, to which I am indebted for +most of my pretensions to wisdom.' + +An important element in the education of Burns was his love of Nature. +His mind was specially susceptible to development by Nature in any of its +forms of beauty or of majesty. A friend who was his guide through the +grounds of Athole House, when he was making his tour through the +Highlands, in a letter to Mr Alex. Cunningham, wrote: 'I had often, like +others, experienced the pleasures which arise from the sublime or elegant +landscape, but I never saw those feelings so intense as in Burns.' + +Burns was born and spent his early life and young manhood in a district +whose beauty has few equals anywhere. Its rivers--Ayr, Doon, Afton, Lugar, +Fail, and Cessnock; all, except Afton, within easy walking distance of his +homes in Ayrshire--with their beautifully wooded banks, were, in a very +definite way, transforming agencies in the growth of his mind, and +therefore most important elements in his highest education. The 'winding +Nith,' which flowed within a few yards of the home he built on Ellisland +farm, around the promontory on which stand the ruins of Lincluden Abbey, +and on through Dumfries, continued during the last few years of his life +the educational work of the rivers of his native Ayrshire. + +The mind of Burns was brought into unity with spiritual ideals through +the influence of Nature more productively than by any other agency. He +walked in the gloaming, according to his own statement, by the riverside +or in woodland paths when he was composing his poems. While residing in +Dumfries he had a favourite walk up the Nith to Lincluden Abbey, amid +whose ruins he sat in the gloaming, and on moonlight nights often till +midnight, recording the visions that came to him in that sacred +environment of wooded river and linn (waterfall). + +There was much similarity between the most vital educational development +of Burns and of Mrs Browning. In _Aurora Leigh_, the record of her own +growth, she describes her true education, although not her actual life's +history. Aurora loses her mother in her fifth year, and lives with her +father for nine great years near Florence; she says: + + So nine full years our days were hid with God + Among His mountains. I was just thirteen, + Still growing like a plant from unseen roots + In tongue-tied springs; and suddenly awoke + To full life, and life's needs and agonies, + With an intense, strong, struggling heart beside + A stone-dead father. Life struck sharp on death + Makes awful lightning. + +Her years till thirteen are spent mainly in her father's fine library +reading what she most loved of the treasuries of the world. Her own +statement of her father's educational guidance is: + + My father taught me what he had learnt the best + Before he died, and left me--grief and love; + And seeing we had books among the hills, + Strong words of counselling souls, confederate + With vocal pines and waters, out of books + He taught me all the ignorance of men, + And how God laughs in heaven when any man + Says, 'Here I'm learned; this I understand; + In that I'm never caught at fault or doubt.' + +Like Burns she reads good books with joyous interest; like Burns she has a +father deeply interested in her education who teaches her vital things; +and like Burns she loves to learn from the 'vocal pines and waters,' and +finds her richest revelations for her mind 'with God among His mountains.' + +The hills of Ayrshire, the rivers, and the river-glens, whose sides are +covered with beautiful trees, were to Burns kindlers of high ideals, and +revealers of God. + + + + +CHAPTER III. + +THE CHARACTERISTICS OF BURNS. + + +He was a truly independent democrat. The love of liberty was the basic +element of his character. His fundamental philosophy he expressed in the +unanswered and unanswerable questions: + + Why should ae man better fare, + And a' men brothers? + + _Epistle to Dr Blacklock._ + + If I'm designed yon lordling's slave, + By Nature's law designed, + Why was an independent wish + E'er planted in my mind? + + _Man was Made to Mourn._ + +To the Right Hon. John Francis Erskine he wrote: 'The partiality of my +countrymen has brought me forward as a man of genius, and has given me a +character to support. In the Poet I have avowed manly and independent +sentiments, which I trust will be found in the Man.' + +Referring to the fact that his father's family rented land from the +'famous, noble Keiths,' and had the honour of sharing their fate--their +estates were forfeited because they took part in the rebellion of +1715--he says: 'Those who dare welcome Ruin and shake hands with Infamy, +for what they believe sincerely to be the cause of their God and their +King, are--as Mark Antony in Shakespeare says of Brutus and +Cassius--"Honourable men."' + +Though his father was not born in 1715, he undoubtedly got from his family +the principles of independence and the love of liberty which he afterwards +taught to his sons, and which Robert propagated with so much zeal. + +In a letter to Mrs Dunlop he wrote: 'Light be the turf upon his breast who +taught, "Reverence thyself."' + +To Lord Glencairn, after expressing his gratitude, he said: 'My gratitude +is not selfish design--that I disdain; it is not dodging after the heel of +greatness--that is an offering you disdain. It is a feeling of the same +kind with my devotion.' + +In many of his letters he expresses the same sentiments. In his Epistle to +his young friend, Andrew Aiken, he advises him, among other things, + + To gather gear by every wile + That's justified by honor; + Not for to hide it in a hedge, + Nor for a train attendant; + But for the glorious privilege + Of being independent. + +In a letter to Mr William Dunbar, dealing with his consciousness of his +responsibility for his children, he wrote, 1790: 'I know the value of +independence; and since I cannot give my sons an independent fortune, I +shall give them an independent line of life.' + +Writing to Mrs Dunlop about his son--her god-son--Burns said: 'I am myself +delighted with the manly swell of his little chest, and a certain +miniature dignity in the carriage of the head, and the glance of his fine +black eye, which promise the undaunted gallantry of an independent mind.' + +In 'A Man's a Man for a' That' he says: + + Ye see yon birkie, ca'd 'a lord,' + Wha struts, and stares, and a' that; + Tho' hundreds worship at his word, + He's but a coof for a' that. blockhead + For a' that, and a' that, + His ribband, star, and a' that, + The man o' independent mind + He looks and laughs at a' that. + +In the same great poem he crystallises a fundamental truth in the immortal +couplet: + + The rank is but the guinea stamp, + The man's the gowd for a' that. gold + +To Mrs Dunlop he wrote in 1787: 'I trust I have too much pride for +servility, and too little prudence for selfishness.' + +To Mrs M'Lehose he wrote in 1788: 'The dignifying and dignified +consciousness of an honest man, and the well-grounded trust in approving +heaven, are two most substantial foundations of happiness.' + +To Mrs Dunlop he wrote in 1788: 'Two of my adored household gods are +independence of spirit and integrity of soul.' + +To Mrs Graham he wrote in 1791: 'May my failings ever be those of a +generous heart and an independent mind.' + +To John Francis Erskine he wrote in 1793: 'My independent British mind +oppression might bend, but could not subdue.' + +In the 'Vision' the message he says he received from Coila, the genius of +Kyle, the part of Ayrshire in which he was born, was: + + Preserve the dignity of Man, with soul erect. + +Burns has been criticised for meddling with what his critics called +politics. The highest messages Christ gave to the world were the value of +the individual soul, and brotherhood based on the unity of developed +individual souls. His highest messages were understood by Burns more +clearly than by any one else during his time, and Burns was too great a +man to be untrue to his greatest visions. His poems are still among the +best interpretations of Christ's ideals of democracy and brotherhood. + +The supreme aim of Burns was to secure for all men and women freedom from +the unnatural restrictions of class or custom, so that each individual +might have equal opportunity for the development of his highest element of +power, his individuality, or self-hood--really the image of God in each. +God gave him the vision of the ideal: 'Why should ae man better fare, and +a' men brothers?' and he tried to reveal the great vision to the world to +kindle the hearts of men. + +Burns was a devoted son, and a loving, considerate, respectful, and +generous brother. After his father died, Robert wrote to his cousin: 'On +the 13th current I lost the best of fathers. Though, to be sure, we have +had long warning of the impending stroke, still the feelings of nature +claim their part, and I cannot recollect the tender endearments and +paternal lessons of the best of friends and the ablest of instructors +without feeling what, perhaps, the calmer dictates of reason would partly +condemn. + +'I hope my father's friends in your country will not let their connection +in this place die with him. For my part, I shall ever with pleasure--with +pride--acknowledge my connection with those who were allied by the ties +of blood and friendship to a man whose memory I shall ever honour and +revere.' + +On the stone above his father's grave in Alloway Kirkyard are engraved the +words Burns wrote as his father's epitaph: + + O ye, whose cheek the tear of pity stains, + Draw near with pious reverence and attend! + Here lies the loving husband's dear remains, + The tender father, and the gen'rous friend; + The pitying heart that felt for human woe; + The dauntless heart that feared no human pride; + The friend of man--to vice alone a foe; + For ev'n his failings leaned to virtue's side. + +John Murdoch warmly approved of this epitaph of his former pupil and +friend Robert. He wrote: 'I have often wished, for the good of mankind, +that it were as customary to honour and perpetuate the memory of those who +excel in moral rectitude, as it is to extol what are called heroic +actions.' + +When Burns found that the Edinburgh edition of his poems had brought him +about five hundred pounds, he loaned Gilbert one hundred and fifty pounds +to assist him to get out of debt, in order that his mother and sisters +might be placed in a position of security and greater happiness. In a +letter to Robert Graham of Fintry, explaining the circumstances that led +him to accept the position of an exciseman, he first explains that +Ellisland farm, which he rented, was in the last stage of worn-out poverty +when he got possession of it, and that it would take some time before it +would pay the rent. Then he says: 'I might have had cash to supply the +deficiencies of these hungry years; but I have a younger brother and three +sisters on a farm in Ayrshire, and it took all my surplus over what I +thought necessary for my farming capital to save not only the comfort, but +the very existence, of that fireside circle from impending destruction.' + +He helped with sympathy, advice, and material support a younger brother +who lived in England. His true attitude towards his own wife and family is +shown in his 'Epistle to Dr Blacklock': + + To make a happy fireside clime + For weans and wife, + Is the true pathos and sublime + Of human life. + +The greatest dread of his later years was that he might not be able to +provide for his family in case of his death. + +Burns was an upright, honest man. To the mother of the Earl of Glencairn +he wrote: 'I would much rather have it said that my profession borrowed +credit from me, than that I borrowed credit from my profession.' + +To James Hamilton, of Glasgow, he wrote: 'Among some distressful +emergencies that I have experienced in life, I have ever laid it down as +my foundation of comfort--that he who has lived the life of an honest man +has by no means lived in vain.' + +To Sir John Whitefoord he wrote in 1787: 'Reverence to God and integrity +to my fellow-creatures I hope I shall ever preserve.' + +In a letter to John M'Murdo in 1793 he wrote: 'To no man, whatever his +station in life, have I ever paid a compliment at the expense of truth.' + +In 'Lines written in Friar's Carse' he wrote: + + Keep the name of Man in mind, + And dishonour not your kind. + +To Robert Ainslie he wrote: 'It is much to be a great character as a +lawyer, but beyond comparison more to be a great character as a man.' + +To Andrew Aiken, in his 'Epistle to a Young Friend,' he wrote: + + Where you feel your honour grip, + Let that aye be your border. + +In 'A Man's a Man for a' That' he expresses his faith in righteousness as +a fundamental element in character, where he says: + + The honest man, tho' e'er sae poor, + Is king o' men for a' that. + +Burns had a sympathetic heart that overflowed with kindness for his +fellow-men, and even for animals, domestic and wild. In a letter to the +Rev. G. H. Baird in 1791 he said: 'I am fain to do any good that occurs in +my very limited power to a fellow-creature, just for the selfish purpose +of clearing a little the vista of retrospection.' + +It was the big heart of Burns that directed the writing of the first part +of that sentence, and his modesty that led to the expression of the second +part. The joy of remembering a good deed was never his chief reason for +doing it. In a 'Tragic Fragment' he wrote: + + With sincere though unavailing sighs + I view the helpless children of distress. + +A number of stories have been preserved to prove that while Burns was +strict and stern in dealing with smugglers, and others who made a practice +of breaking the law by illegally selling strong drink without licence, he +was tenderly kind and protective to poor women who had little stores of +refreshments to sell to their friends on fair and market days. + +Professor Gillespie related that he overheard Burns say to a poor woman of +Thornhill one fair-day as she stood at her door: 'Kate, are you mad? Don't +you know that the Supervisor and I will be in upon you in the course of +forty minutes? Good-bye t'ye at present.' + +His friendly hint saved a poor widow from a heavy fine of several pounds, +while the annual loss to the revenue would be only a few shillings. + +He was ordered to look into the case of another old woman, suspected of +selling home-brewed ale without licence. When she knew his errand she +said: 'Mercy on us! are ye an exciseman? God help me, man! Ye'll surely no +inform on a puir auld body like me, as I hae nae other means o' leevin' +than sellin' my drap o' home-brewed to decent folk that come to Holywood +Kirk.' + +Burns patted her on the shoulder and said: 'Janet, Janet, sin awa', and +I'll protect ye.' + +In 'A Winter Night' Burns reveals a deep and genuine sympathy with the +outlying cattle, the poor sheep hiding from the storm, the wee helpless +birds, and even for the fox and the wolf; and mourns because the pitiless +tempest beats on them. + +Carlyle says of 'A Winter Night' that 'it is worth seven homilies on +mercy, for it is the voice of Mercy herself. Burns indeed lives in +sympathy; his soul rushes into all the realms of being; nothing that has +existence can be indifferent to him.' + +The auld farmer's 'New Year Morning Salutation to his Auld Mare, Maggie,' +reveals a profound and affectionate sympathy more tender than the pity he +felt for the animals and birds that suffered from the winter storm. It is +based on long years of friendly association in co-operative achievement. +From the New Year's wish at the beginning, to the end, where he assures +her that she is no less deserving now than she was + + That day ye pranced wi' muckle pride + When ye bure hame my bonnie bride; + And sweet and gracefu' she did ride + Wi' maiden air! + +and tells her that he has a heapet feed of oats laid by for her, and will +also tether her on a reserved ridge of fine pasture, where she may have +plenty to eat and a comfortable place on which to rest; each verse is full +of pleasant memories. + +His kindly sympathy is as appreciative as if she had been a human being +instead of a mare. + +'Poor Mailie's Elegy' is a natural expression of sorrow in the heart--the +great, loving heart of Burns--for the death of the pet lamb. He says: + + He's lost a friend and neighbour dear + In Mailie dead. + Thro' a' the toun she trotted by him; + A lang half-mile she could descry him; + Wi' kindly bleat, when she did spy him, + She ran wi' speed; + A friend mair faithfu' ne'er cam nigh him, + Than Mailie dead. + +So in the pathos and emotion shown for the mouse whose home his plough +destroyed at the approach of winter; for the wounded hare that limped past +him; for the starving thrush with which he offered to share his last +crust; and for the scared water-fowl that flew from him, when he regretted +that they had reason to do so on account of man's treatment of them, he +gives ample evidence of the warmth of the glow of his sympathy. + +One of the most prominent characteristics of Burns was loyalty to his +native land. One of his earliest dreams, when he was a boy, was a hope +that some day he might be able to do something that would bring honour to +Scotland. In his Epistle to Mrs Scott of Wauchope-House he says: + + I mind it weel, in early date, + When I was beardless, young, and blate, bashful + + * * * * * + + When first amang the yellow corn + A man I reckoned was, + + * * * * * + + E'en then a wish (I mind its power), + A wish that to my latest hour + Shall strongly heave my breast; + That I for poor auld Scotland's sake + Some usefu' plan or book could make, + Or sing a sang at least. + The rough burr-thistle, spreading wide + Amang the bearded bear, barley + I turned the weeder-clips aside + And spared the symbol dear: + No nation, no station, + My envy e'er could raise; + A Scot still, but blot still, without + I knew nae higher praise. + +The boy who had such a reverent feeling in his heart for the thistle, the +symbol of his native land, that he did not like to cut it, continued +throughout his life to have a reverence for the land itself, and tried to +honour it in every possible way. + +He did make the book and sing the songs that brought more lasting glory to +Scotland than any other work done by any other man or combination of men +in his time. + +He wrote more than two hundred and fifty love-songs, and he refused to +accept a shilling for them, though he needed money very badly. Many of his +love-songs were the direct out-pouring of his heart, the overflow of his +love for Nellie Kirkpatrick and Peggy Thomson, the girl lovers of his +boyhood; and for Alison Begbie, Jean Armour, Mary Campbell, and Mrs +M'Lehose; but most of his love-songs were 'fictitious,' as he said they +were in the inscription on the copy of his works presented to Jean +Lorimer, the Chloris of his Ellisland and Dumfries period. They were +written mainly to provide pure language and thought for fine melodies of +Scotland composed long before his time; but the words of the songs that +were sung to them were indelicate. He wrote his unequalled songs for +Scotland's sake, and by doing so he gave to Scotland the gift of the +sweetest love-songs ever written. But for these sacred songs his patriotic +spirit resented the idea of acceptance of material reward. No higher +revelation of genuine patriotism was ever shown than this. + +Burns was a sensitive and very shy man. He is commonly supposed to have +been just the opposite. He was brought up in a home at Mount Oliphant +where he rarely associated with other people. Months sometimes passed +without an evening spent in any other way than in reading and discussions +of the matter read by his father, Gilbert, and himself; so in boyhood and +early youth he was reserved. When he began to go out among other young men +his comparatively developed mind, his very unusual stores of +knowledge--not merely stored, but classified and related--and his +extraordinary power of eloquence made him at once a leader and a +favourite, so he soon overcame his reserve and shyness with young men. It +was not so with young women. He had been trained to wait for introductions +to them. He was walking past Jean Armour, when she was at the town pump at +Mauchline getting water to sprinkle the clothes on the bleaching-green, +without speaking to her, and she spoke to him, recalling a remark she +heard him make at the annual dance on the evening of the fair. He was +twenty-five, and she was eighteen. He would have passed close to her in +respectful silence if she had not spoken. + +Sir Walter Scott wrote: 'I was told, but did not observe it, that his +address to females was extremely deferential.' + +Scott did not mean to suggest a doubt about what he was told, but just to +intimate that he had not had opportunity to observe the fact. Scott met +Burns only once in company, and Scott was a boy at the time. + +He dearly and reverently loved Alison Begbie when he was twenty-one. She +was the first woman whom he asked to become his wife. She was a servant in +a farm-house on the banks of Cessnock Water, in the neighbourhood of +Lochlea farm. He was twenty-two when he asked her to marry him, and he was +so shy, even at that age, that he could not propose when he was with her. +She did not accept his offer. Few women of his acquaintance would have +refused to accept his written proposal. Probably none of them--not even +Alison Begbie--would have refused him if he had been able to overcome his +shyness, and had proposed in person instead of by letter. + +He wrote five letters to Alison Begbie, and definitely asked her to marry +him in the fourth letter. In the first he said: 'I am a stranger in these +matters, as I assure you that you are the first woman to whom I ever made +such a declaration, so I declare I am at a loss how to proceed. I have +more than once come into your company with a resolution to say what I have +just now told you; but my resolution always failed me, and even now my +heart trembles for the consequence of what I have said.' + +The following copies of the letter containing his proposal (the fourth), +and of his reply to her refusal, if read carefully, should reveal several +admirable characteristics of Burns. + + 'LOCHLEA, 1781. + + 'MY DEAR E.,[2]--I have often thought it a peculiarly unlucky + circumstance in love that, though in every other situation in life, + telling the truth is not only the safest, but actually by far the + easiest way of proceeding, a Lover is never under greater difficulty + in acting, or more puzzled for expression, than when his passion is + sincere, and his intentions are honourable. I do not think that it is + very difficult for a person of ordinary capacity to talk of love and + fondness which are not felt, and to make vows of constancy and + fidelity which are never intended to be performed, if he be villain + enough to practise such detestable conduct; but to a man whose heart + glows with the principles of integrity and truth, and who sincerely + loves a woman of amiable person, uncommon refinement of sentiment, + and purity of manners--to such a one in such circumstances I can + assure you, my Dear, from my own feelings at this present moment, + _Courtship_ is a task indeed. + + There is such a number of foreboding fears, and distrustful anxieties + crowd into my mind when I am in your company, or when I sit down to + write to you, that what to speak or what to write I am altogether at + a loss. + + 'There is one rule which I have hitherto practised, and which I shall + invariably keep with you, and that is, honestly to tell you the plain + truth. There is something so mean and unmanly in the arts of + dissimulation and falsehood, that I am surprised they can be used by + any one in so noble, so generous a passion as Virtuous Love. No, my + dear E., I shall never endeavour to gain your favour by such + detestable practices. If you will be so good and so generous as to + admit me for your partner, your companion, your bosom friend through + life, there is nothing on this side of eternity shall give me greater + transport; but I shall never think of purchasing your hand by any + arts unworthy of a man, and, I will add, of a Christian. There is one + thing, my Dear, which I earnestly request of you, and it is this: + that you would soon either put an end to my hopes by a peremptory + refusal, or cure me of my fears by a generous consent. + + 'It would oblige me much if you would send me a line or two when + convenient. I shall only add further, that if a behaviour regulated + (though perhaps but very imperfectly) by the rules of Honour and + Virtue, if a heart devoted to love and esteem you, and an earnest + endeavour to promote your happiness; if these are qualities you would + wish in a friend, in a husband, I hope you shall ever find them in + your real friend and sincere lover.' + +After her refusal he wrote: + + 'LOCHLEA, 1781. + + 'I ought in good manners to have acknowledged the receipt of your + letter before this time, but my heart was so shocked with the + contents of it, that I can scarcely yet collect my thoughts so as to + write to you on the subject. I will not attempt to describe what I + felt on receiving your letter. I read it over and over, again and + again, and though it was in the politest language of refusal, still + it was peremptory; you "were very sorry you could not make me a + return, but you wish me--what without you I can never obtain--you + wish me all kinds of happiness." It would be weak and unmanly to say + that without you I never can be happy; but sure I am, that sharing + life with you would have given it a relish that, wanting you, I can + never taste. + + 'Your uncommon personal advantages, and your superior good sense, do + not so much strike me; these possibly in a few instances may be met + with in others; but that amiable goodness, that tender, feminine + softness, that endearing sweetness of disposition, with all the + charming offspring of a warm, feeling heart--these I never again + expect to meet with in such a degree in this world. All these + charming qualities, heightened by an education much beyond anything I + have ever met with in any woman I ever dared to approach, have made + an impression on my heart that I do not think the world can ever + efface. My imagination had fondly flattered itself with a wish--I + dare not say it ever reached a hope--that possibly I might one day + call you mine. I had formed the most delightful images, and my fancy + fondly brooded over them; but now I am wretched for the loss of what + I really had no right to expect. I must now think no more of you as a + mistress, still I presume to ask to be admitted as a friend. As such + I wish to be allowed to wait on you, and as I expect to remove in a + few days a little farther off, and you, I suppose, will perhaps soon + leave this place, I wish to see you or hear from you soon; and if an + expression should perhaps escape me rather too warm for friendship, + I hope you will pardon it in, my dear Miss ---- (pardon me the dear + expression for once), + + 'R. B.' + +Those who say that these letters 'have an air of taskwork and constraint +about them' should remember that Burns formed the style of his +letter-writing when but a boy from a book containing the letters of +leaders of Queen Anne's time, which was given to him by his uncle. His own +letters on all subjects are written in a dignified style. It is worth +noting that Motherwell, who criticised the style of the letters, says of +them: 'They are, in fact, the only sensible love-letters we have ever +seen.' + +Though naturally a very shy man, he grew to be happier as his powers +developed. In his teens and young manhood he had fits bordering on +despondency. But he passed through them and became more buoyant in spirit, +and, though poor, was contented. + +In 'My Nannie O' he wrote: + + Come weel, come woe, I care na by, + I'll tak what Heaven will sen' me. + +In 'It is na, Jean, thy Bonnie Face,' he said: + + Content am I if Heaven shall give + But happiness to thee. + +This shows that consideration for others was one of his sources of +happiness. + +In his 'Epistle to James Smith' he wrote: + + Truce with peevish, poor complaining! + Is Fortune's fickle Luna waning? + E'en let her gang! + Beneath what light she has remaining + Let's sing our sang. + +Dr John M'Kenzie of Mauchline, in 1810, thirteen years after the death of +Burns, described a visit made to see his father when he was ill. In it he +says: 'Gilbert, in the first interview I had with him at Lochlea, was +frank, modest, well-informed, and communicative. The poet seemed distant, +suspicious, and without any wish to interest or please. He kept himself +very silent in a dark corner of the room; and before he took any part in +the conversation, I frequently detected him scrutinising me during my +conversation with his father and brother. + +'But afterwards, when the conversation, which was on a medical subject, +had taken the turn he wished, he began to engage in it, displaying a +dexterity of reasoning, an ingenuity of reflection, and a familiarity with +topics apparently beyond his reach, by which his visitor was no less +gratified than astonished.' + +Burns lived next door to Dr M'Kenzie after he was married the second time +to Jean Armour. They were great friends. Burns wrote a masonic poem to +him, and called him 'Common-sense' in 'The Holy Fair.' + +In the letter from which the above quotation is made, Dr M'Kenzie says +Robert took his characteristics mainly from his mother, and that Gilbert +resembled his father. + +Burns looked like his mother, and inherited his temperamental +characteristics mainly from her. + +Burns had a definitely religious tendency as one of his strong +characteristics when he was a child. In the sketch of his life that he +wrote to Dr Moore, of London, when he was twenty-eight years old, he says +that as a boy he possessed 'an enthusiastic idiot-piety. I say idiot-piety +because I was then a child.' + +He wrote several religious poems while living on Lochlea farm and on +Mossgiel farm. 'The Cotter's Saturday Night' was written at Mossgiel. + +Throughout his life his religious tendency was one of his characteristics. +This will be considered more fully in the chapter on 'Burns's Great Work +for Religion.' + +Burns was the warm, personal friend of the best people in every district +in or near which he lived. He must have been a good man who could count +among his friends such men and women as the following: Lord Glencairn, Mrs +Dunlop, the Earl of Eglintoun, Dr Moore, Dr M'Kenzie, Gavin Hamilton, Hon. +Henry Erskine, the Duchess of Gordon, Right Rev. Bishop Geddes, Robert +Graham of Fintry, Robert Riddell, Robert Aiken, the Earl of Buchan, Prof. +Dugald Stewart, Dr Candlish, Sir John Whitefoord, John Murdoch, Dr +Blacklock, Dr Hugh Blair, Alex. Cunningham, Rev. Archibald Alison, Sir +John Sinclair, Rev. John M'Math, and the best ministers of the 'New +Licht,' or progressive class; the leading professors in Edinburgh +University, and the leading schoolmasters in his neighbourhood. In fact, +he was loved and respected by leaders of all classes except the 'Auld +Licht' preachers. He lives on and becomes more popular as he becomes +better known. + +His one characteristic that would most fully represent him and his work +for God and humanity is his propelling tendency to be a reformer of +conditions. He accepted no existing conditions as good enough. He saw +quickly and clearly the defects of conditions as they existed, and he +never hesitated to attack any evil that he could help to overthrow. He +saw that individual freedom and pure religion were vital and essential +elements of human progress and happiness. He saw with unerring vision the +lack of freedom and of vital religion in the lives of the people; so to +make all men free, to give all children equal opportunity to develop the +best in their souls, and to purify religion from superstition, hypocrisy, +bigotry, and kindred evils that were blighting it, became his highest +purposes. + +What was the character of Burns in the estimation of the leading people of +his own time? On replying to a request that he would use his influence in +favour of Burns for an appointment Sir John Whitefoord wrote: 'Your +character as a man, as well as a poet, entitles you, I think, to the +assistance of every inhabitant of Ayrshire.' + +Sir John owned the Ballochmyle estate near Mauchline, and was one of the +leading country gentlemen of Ayrshire in his time. + +Mr Archibald Prentice, editor of the _Manchester Times_, was the son of a +prominent man who lived about half-way between Mauchline and Edinburgh, at +Covington, in Lanarkshire. Mr Prentice, senior, was a great admirer of +Burns, as were leaders everywhere. Mr Archibald Prentice, writing about +his father's affectionate respect for Burns, said; 'My father, though a +strictly moral and religious man himself, always maintained that the +virtues of the poet greatly predominated over his faults. I once heard him +exclaim with hot wrath, when somebody was quoting from an apologist, +"What! do _they_ apologise for _him_! One half of his good, and all his +bad divided among a score of them, would make them a' better men!" + +'In the year 1809 I resided for a short time in Ayrshire, in the +hospitable house of my father's friend Reid, and surveyed with a strong +interest such visitors as had known Burns. I soon learned how to +anticipate their representations of his character. The men of strong minds +and strong feelings were invariable in their expressions of admiration; +but the _prosy_, consequential _bodies_ all disliked him as exceedingly +dictatorial. The men whose religion was based on intellect and high moral +sentiment all thought well of him; but the mere professors [of religion] +"with their three-mile prayers and half-mile graces" denounced him as +worse than an infidel.' + +The progress of religious reformers has always been a thorny one. The +Master, Christ Himself, was crucified by the 'Auld Lichts' of His time, +and they stoned Stephen to death. So, through the centuries unprogressive +theologians have persecuted and often murdered the religious reformers, +who saw the evils in theology, and wished to remove them from the creeds +that blighted men's souls. They burned Latimer in England; and Luther in +Germany was saved by the action of his friends by shutting him in Wartburg +Castle for protection. Religious reformers in the time of Burns were not +burned or stoned to death, but they were persecuted and prosecuted before +the Church Courts by men who did not approve of their higher visions of +truth. Burns himself was regarded as unorthodox, but his creed is much +more in harmony with the religious thought of to-day than it was with the +creed of the 'Auld Licht' preachers. One of the marvels of human +development through the ages has been that the bigoted theologians of each +succeeding century resented the attempts of men with clearer vision to +reform their creeds. + +Men who truly believe in God cannot believe that any creed made by men can +be infallible; they should know that from generation to generation +humanity consciously grows towards the Divine, and that as they climb they +see in the clearer spiritual air new visions of higher meaning in regard +to life and to vital religion, revealing to each man new conceptions of +his duty to God and to his fellow-men. + +Lovers of Burns reverence his memory because he was so great and so wise a +reformer, and did so much to make men truly free, and to make religion a +more vitally uplifting agency in the hearts of men. + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + +BURNS WAS A RELIGIOUS MAN. + + +'Burns a religious man!' scoffers exclaim. 'He was a drunkard.' Burns was +a moderate drinker compared with most of the ministers of his time. If +drinking whisky was a disqualification for religious character in the time +of Burns, a large proportion of the ministers of his time were +disqualified. Burns should not, in all fairness, be judged by the +standards of our time. More than fifty years after Burns died it was +customary for even Methodist ministers in Canada, when visiting the +members of their churches, to accept a little whisky punch as an evidence +of good fellowship and comradeship. This custom persisted in Scotland and +England for more than a century after Burns died, and in many places it +exists still. In a letter to Mr William Cruickshank in 1788 he said: 'I +have fought my way severely through the savage hospitality of this +country--the object of all hosts being to send every guest to bed drunk if +they can.' + +Burns was not speaking of hotel-keepers, but of homes of people of high +respectability. He wrote in 1793: 'Taverns I have totally abandoned, but +it is the private parties in the family way among the hard-drinking +gentlemen of the country that do me the mischief.' + +He did occasionally go to the Globe Tavern in Dumfries after 1793, when +the guest of visitors who came to Dumfries solely for the purpose of +meeting him and having the honour of entertaining him. + +In his short life of Burns, Alexander Smith says: 'If he drank hard, it +was in an age when hard drinking was fashionable. If he sinned in this +respect, he sinned in company with English Prime Ministers, Scotch Lords +of Session, grave dignitaries of the Church in both countries, and +thousands of ordinary blockheads who went to their graves in the odour of +sanctity, and whose epitaphs are a catalogue of all the virtues.' + +Burns spoke with all sincerity, in a letter to his friend Samuel Clark of +Dumfries, when he wrote: 'Some of our folks about the Excise office, +Edinburgh, had, and perhaps still have, conceived a prejudice against me +as being a drunken, dissipated character. I might be all this, you know, +and yet be an honest fellow; but you know that _I am an honest fellow_, +and am nothing of this.' His superiors in the Excise department gave him +a high record for accuracy and honesty in his work. + +Other objectors say: 'He could not be religious, because he attacked +religion.' This statement is not correct. He attacked the evils that in +his time robbed religion of its vital power, but never religion. Emerson +says: 'Not Luther, not Latimer, struck stronger blows against false +theology than did the poet Burns.' + +To Clarinda, Burns wrote: 'I hate the superstition of a fanatic, but I +love the religion of a man.' + +In his poem 'The Tree of Liberty' he lays the blame of the terrible +degradation of the French peasantry on + + Superstition's wicked brood. + +In his 'Epistle to John Goudie' he speaks of + + Poor gapin', glowrin' superstition. + +He attacked superstition, but not religion. + +He attacked hypocrisy, and true men are grateful to him because he did so. + +In his 'Epistle to Rev. John M'Math,' the 'New Licht' minister of +Tarbolton, Burns says: + + God knows I'm not the thing I should be, + Nor am I ev'n the thing I could be; + But twenty times I rather would be + An atheist clean, + Than under gospel colours hid be + Just for a screen. + +He ridiculed hypocrisy, and we are grateful to him for doing so. Nothing +more contemptible than a religious hypocrite can be made of a being +created in the image of God. Hypocrisy is not religion. + +He attacked bigotry, one of the most savage monsters that ever tried to +block the way of Christ's highest teaching, the brotherhood of man. No +phenomenal religious absurdity is more incomprehensible than the idea that +Christianity can be promoted by the multiplication of religious +denominations; especially when, as in the time of Burns, and long after +his time, leaders of so-called Christian denominations refused to have +fellowship with each other, or to unite on a common platform in working +for the promotion of Christian ideals. How trivial the formalisms of +theologians seem that kept men apart whom Christ desired to become +co-operative and loving brothers, working harmoniously together for the +achievement of the great visions he revealed! + +He wrote to Clarinda, 1788: 'I hate the very idea of a controversial +divinity; and I firmly believe that every upright, honest man, of whatever +sect, will be accepted of the Deity.' + +In his 'Epistle to John Goudie' Burns calls bigotry + + Sour bigotry on its last legs. + +He wrote this in 1785, and much more than a century later bigotry is still +on its legs, but it is tottering to its final overthrow. Burns attacked +bigotry, but not religion. + +He attacked the doctrine of predestination, as taught in his time, a most +soul-dwarfing doctrine, calculated to rob humanity of motives to stimulate +it to greater and nobler efforts to achieve for God. He makes Holy Willie +say he deserved damnation five thousand years before he was born. Few +people now regard predestination as an element in vital religion. + +He attacked one of the most horribly blasphemous doctrines ever preached, +but preached in the time of Burns, and long after: + + That God sends ane to heaven and ten to hell + For His ain glory. + +He puts this impious doctrine into the mouth of Holy Willie. More than +half a century after the time of Burns, preachers in the presence of +mothers of their dead babies taught that the babes could not go to heaven +because they were too young to be 'believers in Christ;' and being unable +to account for their statements logically, would say, 'God did these +things for His own glory.' Burns attacked such horrible teaching, but in +doing so he was not attacking religion. + +Burns did not believe in the use of the fear of hell as a means of +promoting true religion. There is no soul-kindling power in fear. Fear is +one of the most powerful agencies of evil in preventing the conscious +development of the soul, and of the faith that each soul should have in +God as the source of power, in Christ as the revealer of individual power, +and in himself as God's partner. Fear is a negative agency that appeals to +the weaker side of character. Humanity will not be able to make the rapid +progress towards the Divine that it should make until fear ceases to be a +motive in the minds of men, women, and children. In his great 'Epistle to +a Young Friend' Burns says: + + The fear o' hell's a hangman's whip + To haud the _wretch_ in order. keep + +Burns proved himself to be a philosopher when he attacked the common plan +of using fear o' hell to make men religious. This was not attacking +religion. + +The Rev. L. MacLean Watt says: 'While the professional Christians of +Scotland were fighting about Hell, the humble hearts by the lowly +firesides, with the open book before them, were enriched by the knowledge +of heaven; and while the hypocrites in holy places were scourging those +who were in their power with the thorns of Christ, there were cotters in +their kitchens that had found the healing and the balm of the warm blood +of a Redeemer who died on Calvary for _a wider world_ than theologians +seemed to know.' + +Speaking further of the theologians of the time of Burns the Rev. Mr Watt +says: 'Their idea of God was shaped in fashion like themselves--merciless, +remorseless, hating, and hateful; His only passion seeming to their narrow +souls to be damnation and torture of the wretched, lost, and wandering. +Their preachers loved to picture the souls of the condemned swathed in +batches lying in eternal anguish of a most real blazing hell as punishment +for some small offence, or as having been outcast from grace through the +wanton exercise of divine prerogatives. To commend such a God for worship +were like praising and complimenting the cruel child who, for sport, spent +a whole day plucking the limbs and wings from the palpitating body of some +poor, helpless insect. It was a false and blasphemous insult to the human +intelligence.' + +Burns had the good fortune to be a cotter, trained by a father who was a +remarkably able man, a great teacher, and a reverently religious man of +very advanced ideals; and it took a century or more of theological +evolution to bring the religious teaching of the world up to the standards +of belief of the Ayrshire cotter. + +He attacked the doctrine of Faith without Works. In a letter to Gavin +Hamilton, one of the leading men of the town of Mauchline, a warm, +personal friend of the poet, and an advanced thinker among 'New Licht' +laymen, he wrote in a humorous but really profound way: 'I understand you +are in the habit of intimacy with that Boanerges of Gospel powers, Father +Auld. Be earnest with him that he will wrestle in prayer for you that you +may see the vanity of vanities in trusting to, even practising, the carnal +moral works of charity, humanity, and generosity; things which you +practised so flagrantly that it was evident you delighted in them, +neglecting, or perhaps profanely despising, the wholesome doctrine of +_faith without works_, the only hope of salvation.' + +Burns did not say a word against faith in Christ, or love for Christ, or +reverence for the teaching of Christ. So true a Christian as Dean Stanley +said Burns was a 'wise religious teacher.' Burns deplored the fact that +the love of Christ--the highest revelation of love ever given to the +world--should be limited to saving the individual believer from eternal +punishment. That was degrading the highest love into selfishness. Burns +pleaded for loving service for humanity, and for Christ's highest +revelation, brotherhood, as evidence of vital Christian-hood; not merely +'sound believing.' This was not attacking religion. He attacked the men +who attacked other men, like Gavin Hamilton among laymen, and Rev. Dr +M'Gill of Ayr among ministers, because they had advanced ideas regarding +religion. + +He attacked the gloom and awful Sunday solemnity of those who professed to +be religious. The world owes him a debt of gratitude for helping to remove +the shadows of religious gloom from human lives. In his poem 'A +Dedication,' addressed to Gavin Hamilton, he advises him ironically, in +order that he may be acceptable to Daddy Auld and others of the 'Auld +Licht' creed, to + + Learn three-mile pray'rs an' half-mile graces, + Wi' weel-spread looves, an' lang, wry faces; palms + Grunt up a solemn, lengthened groan, + And damn a' parties [religious] but your own; + I'll warrant then you're nae deceiver, + A steady, sturdy, staunch believer. + +If true religion means anything vitally hopeful to a man, it should mean +what Burns said it meant to him in a letter to Mrs Dunlop: 'My dearest +enjoyment.' + +In his wise poem, 'Epistle to a Young Friend,' he says: + + But still the preaching cant forbear, + And ev'n the rigid feature. + +He attacked the 'unco guid,' who delighted to tell how good they were +themselves, and how many were the weaknesses and evil-doings of their +neighbours. He had no more respect for the self-righteous than Christ had. +The fact that he attacked and exposed them, and spoke kindly and +reasonably to them, in his great 'Address to the Unco Guid,' is an +evidence that in this respect at any rate he was a true Christian. One of +the most comprehensively Christian doctrines ever written is the verse: + + Who made the heart, 'tis He alone + Decidedly can try us; + He knows each heart--its various tone, + Each spring--its various bias. + + Then at the balance let's be mute, + We never can adjust it; + What's done we partly may compute, + But know not what's resisted. + +There is sound philosophy in the first verse of the poem addressed to the +unco guid: + + The rigid righteous is a fool, + The rigid wise another. + +He often advised the 'douce folks' to be considerate of those who had +greater temptations than they knew; and advised them to try to help them +to overcome their temptations, and with Christian comradeship win their +admiration and sympathetic co-operation in some department of achieving +good. + +In the time of Burns nothing would have surprised a wayward man or woman +more than to have received genuine sympathy and respectful comradeship +from members of the Church, the institution that claimed to represent +Christ, who told the story of the one stray lamb, and the story of the +prodigal son; the Great Teacher who said, 'Let him that is without sin +cast the first stone.' + +Burns attacked superstition, hypocrisy, bigotry, predestination (taught in +its most repellent form in the time of Burns), the equally repellent +doctrine that 'God sends men to hell for His own glory;' fear of hell as a +basis of religious life; faith without works; religious gloom; and the +spirit of the unco guid. He helped to free religion from these evils more +than any other man of his time did; but that was just the opposite to +attacking religion. + +In the 'Holy Fair' and 'The Twa Herds' he criticised with biting sarcasm +certain things connected with religion in his time, from which it is now +happily free. But he did not attack religion. The Rev. L. MacLean Watt, +when summing up the great work Burns did for true religion, especially in +'The Holy Fair,' 'The Twa Herds,' and 'Holy Willie's Prayer,' says: 'It +was in consequence of this ecclesiastical contact that he was, ere long, +involved in a bitter and incessant warfare with the mediaeval shadows of +ultra-Calvinism, which laid upon the people the bondage of a rigid +predestinarianism, the terrible result of which in parochial religion was, +that it became a commonplace in the matter of conduct that it did not +matter what you did so long as you believed certain hard and fast tenets +dealing with the purpose of God and the future of the human soul. This +could not but inevitably lead to the observation of grave discrepancies +between creed and conduct; and the setting up of the greatest hypocrisies, +veiled in the cloak of religiousness, that yet, with searching eye of +judgment, sat testing the conduct of better men. Burns was one of the +better men.' + +His own attitude towards true religion is shown in his 'Epistle to the +Rev. John M'Math,' a progressive Presbyterian minister in Tarbolton. In it +he says: + + All hail, Religion! maid divine! + Pardon a muse sae mean as mine, + Who in her rough, imperfect line + Thus daurs to name thee; + To stigmatise _false friends_ of thine + Can ne'er defame thee. + +He stigmatised false friends of religion, but not religion itself. + +There are some who yet say 'Burns could not have been a religious man, +because he was a sceptic.' Burns was an independent thinker. His mind did +not accept dogmas or creeds without investigation. In his father's fine +school he was not trained to think he was thinking, when he was merely +allowing the ideas of others to run through his head on the path of +memory. Burns was not trained to believe that he believed, but to think +till he believed; and to accept in the realm beyond his power to reason +great fundamental principles that supplied the conscious needs of his own +heart, as those principles are revealed in the Bible. + +In a letter to Mrs Dunlop he wrote: 'I am a very sincere believer in the +Bible; but I am drawn by the conviction of a man, not by the halter of an +ass.' + +To Mrs Dunlop he wrote, 1788: 'My idle reasonings sometimes made me a +little sceptical, but the necessities of my own heart always gave the cold +philosophisings the lie.' + +To Mr Peter Stuart he wrote, referring to the poet Fergusson, 1789: 'Poor +Fergusson! If there be a life beyond the grave, which I trust there is; +and if there be a good God presiding over all Nature, which I am sure +there is--thou art now enjoying existence in a glorious world, where worth +of the heart alone is the distinction of man.' + +To Mrs Dunlop, to whom more than to any other person he revealed the +depths of his heart, he wrote again, 1789: 'In vain would we reason and +pretend to doubt. I have myself done so to a very daring pitch; but when I +reflected that I was opposing the most ardent wishes, and the most darling +hopes of good men, and flying in the face of all human belief, in all +ages, I was shocked at my own conduct.' + +To Robert Aiken he wrote, 1786: 'Though sceptical in some points of our +current belief, yet I think I have every evidence for the reality of a +life beyond the stinted bourne of our present existence.' + +To Dr Candlish, of Edinburgh, he wrote, 1787: 'Despising old women's +stories, I ventured into the daring path Spinoza trod, but my experience +with the weakness, not the strength, of human power _made me glad to grasp +revealed religion_.' + +To Clarinda he wrote, 1788: 'The Supreme Being has put the immediate +administration of all this for wise and good ends known to Himself into +the hands of Jesus Christ, a great personage whose relation to Him we +cannot comprehend, but whose relation to us is that of a Guide and +Saviour.' + +In his epistle to his young friend Andrew Aiken, he sums up in two lines +his attitude to scepticism: + + An atheist's laugh's a poor exchange + For Deity offended. + +The men who believe most profoundly are those who honestly doubted in +early life, but who naturally loved truth, and sought it with hopeful +minds till they found it. Burns was not a sceptic. He was a reverently +religious man. No man could have written 'The Cotter's Saturday Night' who +was not a reverently religious man. His father, from the earliest years, +when his children were old enough to understand them, began to teach them +fundamental religious principles. They took root deeply in Robert's mind. +William Burns preferred not to use the 'Shorter Catechism,' so he wrote a +special catechism for his own family. It is a remarkable production for a +man in his position in life. It deals with vitally fundamental principles, +and shows a clear understanding of the Bible. + +Burns wrote several short religious poems in his early young manhood, +probably his twenty-second and twenty-third years, showing that his mind +was deeply impressed by the majesty, justice, and love of God. Two of +these poems are paraphrases of the Psalms. + +The fact that religion was one of the most important elements of his +thought and life is amply proved by the five letters he wrote to Alison +Begbie in his twenty-first and twenty-second years--even before he wrote +his early religious poems. Love-letters though they were, they related +nearly as much to religion as to love. Some people have tried to say +irreverently smart things about the absurdity of writing about religion in +letters to his loved one. Both the religion and the love of his letters to +the first woman he ever asked to marry him are too sacred to provoke +ridicule in the minds of men with proper reverence for either religion or +love. No one can carefully read these five letters without having a +deeper respect for Burns, the young gentleman who loved so deeply that he +regarded love worthy to be placed in association with religion. Religion +was the subject that had been given first place in his life and thought by +the teaching and the life of his father, who had meant infinitely more to +him than most fathers ever mean to their sons. + +In his epistle to Andrew Aiken he recommends, in the last verse but one, +two things of vast importance 'when on life we're tempest-driv'n': first, + + A conscience but a canker. without + +Second, + + A correspondence fixed wi' Heaven + Is sure a noble anchor. + +Many people read the last couplet without consciously thinking what a +correspondence fixed with Heaven means. Clearly it may have three +meanings: prayer, communion in spirit with the Divine, and similarity to +or harmony with the divine spirit. + +Burns had family worship in his home every day to the end of his life when +he was not absent, and though some scoffers may smile, he was earnest and +sincere in trying to conduct for himself and for his family a +'correspondence fixed with heaven' in a spirit of communion with the +Divine Father. He had other altars for communion with God in addition to +his home. He composed his poems in the gloaming after his day's work, in +favourite spots in the deep woods, where he was 'hid with God' alone. God +revealed Himself to Burns in the woods and by the sides of his sacred +rivers more fully than in any other places. One of the most sacred shrines +in Scotland is the great root under one of the mighty beeches of the fine +park on Ballochmyle estate, on which Burns sat so often to compose his +poems in the long Scottish twilights, and later on in the moonlight, when +he lived on Mossgiel farm. Then next night, at his desk over the stable at +Mossgiel, he would rewrite them and improve their form. + +No man but a religious man would have written, in his 'Epistle to a Young +Friend,' as Burns did to Andrew Aiken: + + The great Creator to revere + Must sure become the creature. + +When in Irvine, in his twenty-third year, he wrote a letter to his father. +As usual, he wrote not of trivial matters, but of the great realities of +time and eternity. Among other serious things he wrote: 'My principal, +and, indeed, my only pleasurable, employment is looking backwards and +forwards in a moral and religious way.' In the same letter he wrote: + + The soul, uneasy and confined, at home + Rests and expatiates in a life to come.[3] + +Burns follows this quotation by saying to his father: 'It is for this +reason that I am more pleased with the 15th, 16th, and 17th verses of the +7th Chapter of Revelation than with any ten times as many verses in the +whole Bible, and would not exchange the noble enthusiasm with which they +inspire me for all that the world has to offer.' + +His imagination enabled him to see clearly the glories of joy, and +service, and association, and reward, in the heavenly paradise, as +revealed in those triumphant verses. + +To Mrs Dunlop he wrote, 1788: 'Religion, my honoured Madam, has not only +been all my life my chief dependence, but my dearest enjoyment.... An +irreligious poet would be a monster.' + +In his 'Grace before Eating' he reveals his gratitude and conscious +dependence on God: + + O Thou, who kindly dost provide + For every creature's want! + We bless Thee, God of Nature wide, + For all Thy goodness lent. + +In 'Winter: a Dirge' he says, in reverent submission to God's will: + + Thou Power supreme, whose mighty scheme + Those woes of mine fulfil, + Here firm I rest, they must be best, + Because they are Thy Will. + +In a poem to Clarinda he wrote, recognising the blessing of Gods universal +presence, not in awe so much as in joy: + + God is ever present, ever felt, + In the void waste, as in the city full; + And where He vital breathes, there must be joy! + +In the 'Cotter's Saturday Night' he teaches absolute faith in God, and +indicates man's true relationship to the Divine Father: + + Lest in temptation's path ye gang astray, + Implore His counsel and assisting might: + They never sought in vain, that sought the Lord aright. + +Writing in condemnation of a miserably selfish miser, he said: + + See these hands, ne'er stretched to save, + Hands that took, but never gave; + Keeper of Mammon's iron chest, + Lo, there she goes, unpitied and unblest; + She goes, but not to realms of everlasting rest. + + And are they of no more avail, + Ten thousand glittering pounds a year? + In other worlds can Mammon fail, + Omnipotent as he is here? + O, bitter mockery of the pompous bier, + While down the wretched Vital Part is driven! + The cave-lodged beggar, with a conscience clear, + Expires in rags, unknown, and goes to heaven. + +The philosophy of his mind, and the affectionate sympathy of his heart +made Burns believe that unselfish service for our fellow-men should be one +of the manifestations of true religion. + +In the fine poem he wrote to Mrs Dunlop on New Year's Day, 1790, he says: + + A few days may, a few years must, + Repose us in the silent dust. + Then is it wise to damp our bliss? + Yes--all such reasonings are amiss! + The voice of Nature loudly cries, + And many a message from the skies, + That something in us never dies; + That on this frail, uncertain state + Hang matters of eternal weight; + That future life in worlds unknown + Must take its hue from this alone; + Whether as heavenly glory bright, + Or dark as Misery's woeful night. + Let us the important Now employ, + And live as those who never die. + Since, then, my honoured first of friends, + On this poor living all depends. + +Any honest man who reads those lines must admit that Burns was a man of +deep religious thought and feeling. + +Mrs Dunlop, to whom he wrote so many letters, was one of the leading women +of Scotland in her time. She was a woman of great wisdom and deep +religious character. Like the other great people who knew Burns, she was +his friend. Many of his clearest expressions of his religious opinions are +contained in his letters to her. In a letter to her on New Year's morning, +1789, he said: 'I have some favourite flowers in Spring, among which are +the mountain-daisy, the hare-bell, the foxglove, the wild brier-rose, the +budding birk [birch], and the hoary hawthorn, that I view and hang over +with particular delight. I never hear the loud, solitary whistle of the +curlew in the Summer noon, or the wild, mixing cadence of a troop of +grey-plover in an Autumnal morning, without feeling an elevation of soul +like the enthusiasm of Devotion or Poetry. Tell me, my dear friend, to +what can this be owing? Are we a piece of machinery that, like the AEolian +harp, passive, takes the impression of the passing accident? Or do these +workings argue something within us above the trodden clod? I own myself +partial to these proofs of those awful and important realities--a God that +made all things--man's immaterial and immortal nature--and a world of weal +or woe beyond death and the grave--these proofs that we deduct by dint of +our own powers of observation. However respectable Individuals in all ages +have been, I have ever looked on Mankind in the lump to be nothing better +than a foolish, head-strong, credulous, unthinking Mob; and their +universal belief has ever had extremely little weight with me. Still, I am +a very sincere believer in the Bible.' + +In September 1789 he wrote to Mrs Dunlop: 'Religion, my dear friend, is +true comfort! A strong persuasion in a future state of existence; a +proposition so obviously probable, that, setting revelation aside, every +nation and people, so far as investigation has reached, for at least four +thousand years, have, in some mode or other, firmly believed it.' + +To Mrs Dunlop, in 1792, he wrote: 'I am so convinced that an unshaken +faith in the doctrines of religion is not only necessary by making us +better men, but also by making us happier men, that I shall take every +care that your little god-son [his son], and every creature that shall +call me father, shall be taught them.' + +One of his most beautiful religious letters was written to Alexander +Cunningham, of Edinburgh, in 1794: 'Still there are two pillars that bear +us up amid the wreck of misfortune and misery. The _one_ is composed of +the different modifications of a certain noble, stubborn something in man, +known by the names of courage, fortitude, magnanimity. The _other_ is made +up of those feelings and sentiments which, however the sceptic may deny +them, or the enthusiast may disfigure them, are yet, I am convinced, +original and component parts of the human soul; those _senses of the +mind_, if I may be allowed the expression, which connect us with and link +us to, those awful, obscure realities--an all-powerful and equally +beneficent God, and a world to come, beyond death and the grave. The first +gives the nerve of combat, while a ray of hope beams on the field; the +last pours the balm of comfort into the wounds which time can never cure. + +'I do not remember, my dear Cunningham, that you and I ever talked on the +subject of religion at all. I know some who laugh at it, as the trick of +the crafty FEW, to lead the undiscerning MANY; or at most as an uncertain +obscurity, which mankind can never know anything of, and with which they +are fools if they give themselves much to do. Nor would I quarrel with a +man for his irreligion, any more than I would for his want of a musical +ear. I would regret that he was shut out from what, to me and to others, +were such superlative sources of enjoyment. It is in this point of view, +and for this reason, that I will deeply imbue the mind of every child of +mine with religion. If my son should happen to be a man of feeling, +sentiment, and taste, I shall thus add largely to his enjoyments. Let me +flatter myself that this sweet little fellow, who is just now running +about my desk, will be a man of a melting, ardent, glowing heart; and an +imagination, delighted with the painter and rapt with the poet. Let me +figure him wandering out in a sweet evening, to inhale the balmy gales, +and enjoy the glowing luxuriance of the spring; himself the while in the +blooming youth of life. He looks abroad on all Nature, and thro' Nature up +to Nature's God; his soul, by swift delighting degrees, is rapt above this +sublunary sphere, until he can be silent no longer, and bursts out into +the glorious enthusiasm of Thomson: + + '"These, as they change, Almighty Father--these + Are but the varied God; the rolling year + Is full of thee." + +'and so on, in all the spirit and ardour of that charming hymn. + +'These are no ideal pleasures; they are real delights; and I ask what of +the delights among the sons of men are superior, not to say equal, to +them? And they have this precious, vast addition, that conscious Virtue +stamps them for her own, and lays hold on them to bring herself into the +presence of a witnessing, judging, and approving God.' + +In 1788 he wrote to Clarinda: 'My definition of worth is short: truth and +humanity respecting our fellow-creatures; reverence and humility in the +presence of that Being, my Creator and Preserver, and who, I have every +reason to believe, will be my judge.' + +Again to Clarinda he wrote in 1788: 'He who is our Author and Preserver, +and will one day be our Judge, must be--not for His sake in the way of +duty, but from the natural impulse of our hearts--the object of our +reverential awe and grateful adoration. He is almighty and all-bounteous; +we are weak and dependent; hence prayer and every other sort of devotion. +"He is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to +everlasting life;" consequently it must be in every one's power to embrace +His offer of everlasting life; otherwise He could not in justice condemn +those who did not.' + +Again in 1788 he wrote to Clarinda: 'In proportion as we are wrung with +grief, or distracted with anxiety, the ideas of a Compassionate Deity, an +Almighty Protector, are doubly dear.' + +To Mrs Dunlop, in 1795, a year and a half before he died, he wrote: 'I +have nothing to say to any one as to which sect he belongs to, or what +creed he believes; but I look on the man who is firmly persuaded of +Infinite Wisdom and Goodness superintending and directing every +circumstance that can happen in his lot--I felicitate such a man as having +a solid foundation for his mental enjoyment; a firm prop and stay in the +hour of difficulty, trouble, and distress; and a never-failing anchor of +hope when he looks beyond the grave.' + +This quotation emphasises his lifelong faith in God, and his belief in his +own immortality. It also shows his perfect freedom from bigotry, and the +broadness of his creed. + +In his first 'Commonplace Book' he wrote: 'The grand end of Human being is +to cultivate an intercourse with that Being to whom we owe life, with +every enjoyment that renders life delightful; and to maintain an +integritive conduct towards our fellow-creatures; that by so forming Piety +and Virtue into habit, we may be fit members for that society of the +Pious, and the Good, which reason and revelation teach us to expect beyond +the grave.' + +There are no truly good men who will yield to the temptation to speak +sneeringly of any man who fails in his life to reach his highest ideals. +The little-minded men who may sneer at Burns, when they read this +quotation written in his youth, should read his 'Address to the Unco Guid' +over and over, till they get a glimmering comprehension of its meaning. +Whatever the puny minds may be focussed on in the life of Burns, they +should be 'mute at the balance.' They should remember that Burns did more +than any man of his time for true religion, and that to the end of his +life his mind and heart overflowed with the same faith and gratitude to +God that he almost continuously expressed throughout his life. + +A final quotation from the letters of Burns about religion may fittingly +be taken from a letter to Robert Aiken, written in 1786: 'O thou unknown +Power! Thou Almighty God who hast lighted up Reason in my breast, and +blessed me with immortality! I have frequently wandered from that order +and regularity necessary for the perfection of Thy works, yet Thou hast +never left me nor forsaken me.' + +Burns was a reverently religious man. Dean Stanley said: 'Burns was a wise +religious teacher.' Principal Rainy objected to Dean Stanley's view +because 'Burns had never become a member of a church on profession of +Faith in Christ.' Professor Rainy either did not remember, or had never +realised, that Burns had done more to reveal Christ's highest +teachings--the value of the individual soul, and brotherhood--than any +other man in the church, or out of it, in Scotland in his time; and also +did more to make religion free from false theology and dwarfing practices, +than any other man of his time, or of any other time in Scotland. + +Rev. L. MacLean Watt, of Edinburgh, in his most admirable book on Burns, +answers Principal Rainy's objections with supreme ability, as the +following quotations amply prove: 'Because a man does not categorically +declare his belief in Christ, as that belief is formulated in existing +dogmatic statements of theological authority, it does not mean that he +abhors that belief; nor even though he withhold himself from explicitly +uttering that confession of the Christian faith, does it preclude him from +being a religious teacher. A man may have an enormous influence as a +religious teacher, and yet never have made a formal statement of +Christianity, nor signed a Christian creed.'--'The measure of a man's +faithfulness to the better side of his nature is not to be gauged by the +depth of his fall, but the height to which he rises.... Burns was, +unfortunately, confronted by a narrow and self-righteous set, who were +enslaved to doctrine and dogma, rather than to the practice of the +Christian life with charity and humanity of spirit, part and parcel of a +system of petty tyrannies and mean oppressions, the exercise of which made +for exile from the fold, because of the spiritual conceit and sectarian +humbug which created such characters as "Holy Willie," and the "Unco +Guid," with the superior airs of religious security from which they looked +down on all besides.' + +We should test neither the terrible theologians of his time--those men who +attacked Burns and called him irreligious, because he had a clear vision +of a higher, holier religion than the one they preached--nor Burns himself +by the conditions of our own time. It is unjust both to Burns and to his +enemies to do so. + +A comparison of the religious principles of the best Christians in the +world nearly a century and a half after his time will show, however, that +the creed of the present is more--much more--like the creed of Burns than +the creed of the dreadful theologians of his time. The creed of the +religious leaders a century hence will be still more like the creed of +Robert Burns than is the creed of to-day. + +The following creed is taken from the letters of Burns, expressed in his +own language, except the last article, which is found in longer form in +many of his letters, and more nearly in 'The Hermit,' in which he says: + + Let me, O Lord! from life retire, + Unknown each guilty, worldly fire, + Remorse's throb, or loose desire; + And when I die + Let me in this belief expire-- + To God I fly. + + +THE CREED OF ROBERT BURNS. + + 1. Religion should be a simple business, as it equally concerns the + ignorant and the learned, the poor and the rich. + + 2. There is a great and incomprehensible Being to whom I owe my + existence. + + 3. The Creator perfectly understands the being He has made. + + 4. There is a real and eternal distinction between vice and virtue. + + 5. There must be a retributive scene of existence beyond the grave. + + 6. From the sublimity, the excellence, and the purity of His + doctrines and precepts, I believe Jesus Christ came from God. + + 7. Whatever is done to mitigate the woes, or increase the happiness + of humanity, is goodness. + + 8. Whatever injures society or any member of it is iniquity. + + 9. I believe in the immaterial and immortal nature of man. + + 10. I believe in eternal life with God. + +Carlyle expressed regret that 'Burns became involved in the religious +quarrels of his district.' This statement proves that Carlyle failed fully +to comprehend the religious character of Burns. His chivalrous nature was +partly responsible for his entering the battle waged by the 'Auld Lichts' +against his dear friend the Rev. Dr M'Gill of Ayr and Gavin Hamilton of +Mauchline; but his chief reason was his innate determination to free +religion from the evils taught and practised in the name of religion in +his time. He had the soul of a reformer, and the two leading elements in +his soul were Religion and Liberty for the individual. It would have +robbed the world of one of the greatest steps in human progress towards +the Divine made in the eighteenth century, if Burns had failed to be true +to the greatest things in his mind and heart. + +Carlyle had clearly not studied the religious elements in either the poems +or the letters of Burns, or he could not have written his comparison +between Burns and Locke, Milton, and Cervantes, who did in poverty and +unusual difficulties grand work. He asks: 'What, then, had these men which +Burns wanted? Two things; both which, it seems to us, are indispensable +for such men. They had a true religious principle of morals, and a single, +not a double, aim in their activity. They were not self-seekers and +self-worshippers; but seekers and worshippers of something far better than +self. Not personal enjoyment was their object; but a high heroic idea of +Religion, of Patriotism, of Heavenly Wisdom in one form or the other form +ever hovered before them. + +It passes understanding to comprehend how Carlyle could regard Burns as a +'selfish' man, or a man with 'a double aim'--that is, two conflicting and +opposing aims that he wasted his power in trying to harmonise. + +Burns had three great aims: Purer Religion, a just Democracy, and closer +Brotherhood; but these aims are in perfect harmony. + +Carlyle ends the contrast between Burns and his model trio--Locke, Milton, +and Cervantes--by saying of Burns: 'He has no religion; in the shallow +age, where his days were cast, Religion was not discriminated from the New +and Old Light _forms_ of Religion; and was, with these, becoming obsolete +in the minds of men.' + +'The heart not of a mere hot-blooded, popular verse-monger, or poetical +_Restaurateur_, but of a true poet and singer, worthy of the old religions +heroic, had been given him, and he fell in an age, not of heroism and +religion, but of scepticism, selfishness, and triviality, when true +nobleness was little understood, and its place supplied by a hollow, +dissocial, altogether barren and unfruitful principle of Pride.' + +In a just comparison between Burns and the three named by Carlyle, Burns +will need no apologists. Burns, directly in opposition to the statement +of Carlyle, was more vitally religious and less selfish than any of them. +When twenty-one years of age he said, in one of his beautiful love-letters +to Alison Begbie: 'I grasp every creature in the arms of universal +benevolence, and equally participate in the pleasures of the happy, and +sympathise with the miseries of the unfortunate.' This alone proves that +Burns was one of the least selfish men who ever lived. + +As an heroic teacher of vital religion Burns was infinitely greater than +any other man of his time, and has been much more influential since his +time in promoting Christ's ideals than the men named by Carlyle. He was a +fearless hero, and so meets the requirements specified by Carlyle, +because, when he recognised the evils connected with religion in his time, +when true religion was, to use Carlyle's words, 'becoming obsolete,' he +valiantly attacked them, hoping to enable his fellow-men to see the vision +of true religion which his father had given him by his life and teaching. + +There was absolutely no justification for calling Burns a mere +verse-monger. To write such a wild nightmare dream about Scotland's +greatest and most self-less poet was unworthy of one of Scotland's leading +prose-writers. + +It seems almost ludicrous to take notice of the assertion that Burns had +not a high ideal of patriotism, as compared with the three ideal men of +Carlyle--Burns, whose love for Scotland was a sacred feeling, a holy fire +that never ceased to burn. This criticism needs no answer now. + + + + +CHAPTER V. + +BURNS THE DEMOCRAT. + + +No man ever comprehended Christ's ideals regarding democracy more fully +than did Burns. Christ based His teaching of the need of human liberty on +His revelation of the value of the individual soul. Burns clearly +understood Christ's ideals regarding individual freedom, and faithfully +followed Him. + +The message of Coila in 'The Vision' to Burns was: + + Preserve the dignity of man + With soul erect. + +This was the central thought in the work of Burns regarding the freedom of +all mankind: freedom from oppression by other men; freedom from the +bondage imposed on the peasant and the labouring man by customs organised +by so-called 'higher classes'; freedom from the hardship and sorrow of +poverty; freedom for each child to grow under proper conditions of +nourishment, of physical development, and of educational training. + +His whole nature was stirred to dignified indignation and resentment by +class distinctions among men and women who were all created in the image +of God, and who, in accordance with the teaching of Christ, should be +brothers. He despised class distinctions which were made by man, whether +the distinctions were made on the basis of rank or wealth. He was ashamed +of the toadies who reverenced a lord merely because he chanced to be born +a lord, and pitied those who accepted without protest inferiority to men +of wealth. He was so true a democrat that he freely and respectfully +recognised the worth of members of the aristocracy or of the wealthy class +whose ability and high character made them worthy of respect; but he held +in contempt those who assumed superiority simply because of rank or gold. + +One of his most brilliant poems is 'A Man's a Man for a' That.' In it he +gives comprehensive expression to his opinions, based on the fundamental +principle, + + The honest man, though e'er sae poor, + Is King o' men for a' that. + + Is there for honesty poverty, + That hangs his head an' a' that? + + The coward-slave, we pass him by; + We dare be poor for a' that. + + For a' that, an' a' that, + Our toils obscure, an' a' that; + The rank is but the guinea stamp, + The man's the gowd for a' that. gold + + Ye see yon birkie, ca'd a lord, + Wha struts, and stares, an' a' that; + Tho' hundreds worship at his word, + He's but a coof for a' that: blockhead + + For a' that, an' a' that, + His ribband, star, an' a' that; + The man of independent mind + He looks and laughs at a' that. + + A prince can mak a belted knight, + A marquis, duke, an' a' that; + But an honest man's aboon his might, above + Gude faith he maunna fa' that. must not try + + For a' that, an' a' that, + Their dignities an' a' that, + The pith o' sense, an' pride o' worth, + Are higher ranks than a' that. + +Labouring man on farm or in factory, this is your charter. Let this be +your creed. Sing this great democratic hymn at your gatherings--ay, sing +it in your homes with your children, and each time you sing it, it should +kindle some new light in your soul that will bring you new vision of the +greatest fact in connection with human life and duty, that you are alive +to be God's partner, and that while you remain honest, and unselfishly +consider the rights of others, as fully as you consider your own, you are +entitled to stand with kings, because you are an honest man. + +The discussion between Caesar the aristocratic dog and Luath the cotter's +dog is a fair representation of class conditions in Scotland in the time +of Burns. Caesar describes the laird's riches, his idleness, his racked +rents, and the compulsory services required from the poor tenants; dilates +on the wastefulness in connection with the meals even of the servants in +the homes of the great; and expresses surprise that poor folks could exist +under their trying conditions. + +Luath admits that sometimes the strain on the cotter was very severe: +digging ditches, building dykes with dirty stones, baring a quarry, 'an' +sic like,' as a means of sustaining a lot of ragged children with nothing +but his hand labour. He acknowledges that, when ill or out of work, it +sometimes seems hopeless; but, after all, though past his comprehension, +the poor folks are wonderfully contented, and stately men and clever +women are brought up in their homes. + +Caesar then expatiates on the contemptuous way the poor are 'huffed, and +cuffed, and disrespecket.' He especially sympathises with the poor on +account of the way tenants are treated by the laird's agents on +rent-day--compelled to submit to their insolence, while they swear and +threaten to seize their property; and concludes that poor folks must be +very wretched. + +Luath replies that, after all, they are not so wretched as he thinks; that +their dearest enjoyments are in their wives and thriving children; that +they often forget their private cares and discuss the affairs of kirk and +state; that Hallowe'en and Christmas celebrations give them grand +opportunities for happiness that make them forget their hardships and +sorrows, and that during these festivals the old folks are so cheery and +the young ones are so frolicsome that he 'for joy has barket wi' them!' +Still, he admits that it is owre true what Caesar says, and that many +decent, honest folk 'are riven out, baith root and branch, some rascal's +pridefu' greed to quench.' + +Caesar then describes the reckless way in which the money received from +the poor cotters was wasted at operas, plays, mortgaging, gambling, +masquerading, or taking trips to Calais, Vienna, Versailles, Madrid, or +Italy; and finally to Germany, to some resort where their dissipations may +be overcome by drinking muddy German water. + +Luath is surprised to learn that the money for which the cotters have +toiled so hard should be spent so wastefully; and wishes the gentry would +stay at home and take interest in the sports of their own country, as it +would be so much better for all: laird, tenant, and cotter. He closes by +saying that many of the lairds are not ill-hearted fellows, and asks Caesar +if there is not a great deal of true pleasure in the lives of the rich. + +Caesar replies: + + Lord, man, were ye but whyles where I am, + The gentles ye wad ne'er envy them. + +Admitting that they need not starve or work hard through winter's cold or +summer's heat, or suffer in old age from working all day in the wet, he +says: + + But human bodies are sic fools, + For a' their colleges and schools, + That when nae real ills perplex them, + They mak enow themsels to vex them; + An' aye the less they hae to sturt them, + In like proportion less will hurt them. + + A country fellow at the pleugh, + His acres till'd, he's right eneugh; + A country girl at her wheel, + Her dizzens dune, she's unco weel; + But gentlemen, and ladies warst, + Wi' ev'n-down want o' wark are curst. + They loiter, lounging, lank and lazy; + Tho' deil-haet ails them, yet uneasy; + Their days insipid, dull, an' tasteless; + Their nights unquiet, lang, and restless. + An' even their sports, their balls and races, + Their galloping through public places, + There's sic parade, sic pomp an' art, + The joy can scarcely reach the heart. + + The ladies arm-in-arm in clusters, + As great and gracious a' as sisters; + But hear their absent thoughts o' ither, + They're a' run deils and jads thegither. + Whyles, ower the wee bit cup an' plaitie, + They sip the scandal-potion pretty; + Or lee-lang nights, wi' crabbet leuks, + Pore ower the devil's pictured beuks; cards + Stake on a chance a farmer's stackyard, + An' cheat like ony unhanged blackguard. + There's some exceptions, man an' woman; + But this is gentry's life in common. + +Burns was a philosopher, and he knew such conditions were wrong, and that +they should not be allowed to last. They are better, after more than a +century, since Burns became the champion of the poor; but the great +problem, 'Why should ae man better fare, and a' men brothers?' is not +properly answered yet. The wisest among the aristocracy know this, and +admit it, and sincerely hope that the inevitable evolution to juster +conditions and relationships may be brought about by constitutional means, +and not by revolution. + +Professor Dugald Stewart, of Edinburgh University, wrote: 'I recollect +once he told me, when I was admiring a distant prospect in one of our +morning walks, that the sight of so many smoking cottages gave a pleasure +to his mind none could understand who had not witnessed, like himself, the +happiness and the worth which they contained.' + +It was not the unhappiness of the peasantry that stirred the democratic +heart of Burns. It was 'man's inhumanity' to his fellow-men; the +assumption of those belonging to the so-called upper classes that they had +a divine right to hold higher positions than the common people, and that +the poorer people should be contented in the 'station to which God had +called them,' that led Burns to write so ably in favour of democracy. He +recognised no human right to establish stations to which people were +called, and in which they should remain, in spite of their right to fill +any positions for which they had proved their fitness. He could not be so +irreverent or so unreasonable as to believe God could establish the +conditions found all around him, so he claimed the right of every child to +full opportunity for its best development, and to rise honourably to any +position to which it could attain. + +In a letter to Miss Margaret Chalmers, 1788, he wrote: 'What signify the +silly, idle gewgaws of wealth, or the idle trumpery of greatness? When +fellow-partakers of the same nature fear the same God, have the same +benevolence of heart, the same nobleness of soul, the same detestation of +everything dishonest, and the same scorn at everything unworthy--in the +name of common-sense, are they not equals?' + +To Mrs Dunlop he wrote in 1788: 'There are few circumstances, relating to +the unequal distribution of good things of this life, that give me more +vexation (I mean in what I see around me) than the importance the opulent +bestow on their trifling family affairs, compared with the very same +things on the contracted scale of the cottage. Last afternoon I had the +honour to spend an hour or two at a good woman's fireside, where the +planks that composed the floor were decorated with a splendid carpet, and +the gay table sparkled with silver and china. 'Tis now about term-day [a +regular time twice a year was fixed for hiring servants], and there has +been a revolution among those creatures [servants], who, though in +appearance partakers, and equally noble partakers, of the same nature as +Madame, are from time to time--their nerves, sinews, their health, +strength, wisdom, experience, genius, time, nay, a good part of their very +thoughts--sold for months and years, not only to the necessities but the +caprices of the important few. We talked of the insignificant creatures; +nay, notwithstanding their general stupidity and rascality, did some of +the poor devils the honour to commend them. But light be the turf upon his +breast who taught "Reverence thyself!" We looked down on the unpolished +wretches, their impertinent wives, and clouterly brats, as the lordly bull +does on the little, dirty anthill, whose puny inhabitants he crushes in +the carelessness of his ramble, or tosses in the air in the wantonness of +his pride.' + +Such experiences added fuel to the divine purpose in his mind to free a +large portion of his fellow-countrymen from the bonds that had been bound +on their bodies and souls by long years of class presumption and heartless +tyranny, which, till Burns attacked them, had grown more unjust and +contemptuous as generation succeeded generation. + +Burns's reverence for real manhood, a basic principle of true democratic +spirit, is shown in the closing verse of his 'Elegy on Captain Matthew +Henderson': + + Go to your sculptured tombs, ye Great, + In a' the tinsel trash o' state! + But by thy honest turf I'll wait, + Thou man of worth! + And weep the ae best fellow's fate + E'er lay in earth. + +To John Francis Erskine he wrote, 1793: 'Burns was a poor man from birth +and an exciseman from necessity; but--I will say it--the sterling of his +honest worth no poverty could debase, and his independent British mind +oppression might bend, but could not subdue.... Can I look tamely on and +see any machination to wrest from them the birthright of my boys--the +little, independent Britons, in whose veins runs my own blood?... Does +any man tell me that my full efforts can be of no service, and that it +does not belong to my humble station to meddle with the concerns of a +nation? I can tell him that it is on such individuals as I that a nation +has to rest, both for the hand of support and the eye of intelligence. The +uninformed Mob may swell a Nation's bulk, and the titled, tinsel, courtly +throng may be its feathered ornament; but the number of those who are +elevated enough in life to reason and reflect, yet low enough to keep +clear of the venal contagion of a court--these are a nation's strength.' + +He wrote the letter, from which this is an extract, because some +super-loyalists were trying to undermine his reputation on account of his +independence of spirit and his democratic principles, with a view to +having him removed from the paltry position he held as an Excise officer. + +He was proudly, sensitively independent. He inherited his temperamental +characteristics from his mother. He was happier defending others than +working for himself. Writing to the Earl of Eglintoun, he said: 'Mercenary +servility, I trust, I shall ever have as much honest pride as to detest.' + +Writing to Mr Francis Grose, F.S.A., in 1790, about Professor Dugald +Stewart, he said: 'Mr Stewart's principal characteristic is your favourite +feature--that sterling independence of mind which, though every man's +right, so few men have the courage to claim, and fewer still the +magnanimity to support.' + +In 1795, the year before his death, he wrote three poems favourable to the +election of Mr Heron, the Whig candidate. In the first poem he said: + + The independent commoner + Shall be the man for a' that. + +Mrs Riddell, writing of Burns after his death, said: 'His features were +stamped with the hardy character of independence.' + +He was a democrat whose democracy was based on the rock of independence +and a character that 'preserved the dignity of man with soul erect.' + +Burns saw both sides of the ideal of freedom. He hated tyrants, and he +despised those who tamely submitted to tyranny. The inscription on the +Altar to Independence, erected by Mr Heron at Kerroughtree, written by +Burns, reads: + + Thou of an independent mind, + With soul resolv'd, with soul resign'd; + Prepar'd Power's proudest frown to brave, + Who wilt not be, nor have a slave; + Virtue alone who dost revere, + Thy own reproach alone dost fear-- + Approach this shrine, and worship here. + +The man of whom Burns approved was 'one who wilt not _be_ nor _have_ a +slave.' + +In 'Lines Inscribed in a Lady's Pocket Almanac' he says: + + Deal Freedom's sacred treasures free as air, + Till Slave and Despot be but things that were. + +In the 'Lines on the Commemoration of Rodney's Victory' he wrote: + + Be Anarchy cursed, and be Tyranny damned; condemned + And who would to Liberty e'er be disloyal + May his son be a hangman--and he his first trial. + +Burns was a philosopher whose mind had been trained to look at both sides +of a question, and estimate truly their relationships to each other. Even +in one of his beautiful poems to his wife, written after he was married, +'I Hae a Wife o' My Ain,' he wrote: + + I am naebody's lord, + I'll be slave to naebody. + +While Burns was an intense lover of freedom, he had no sympathy with those +who would overturn constituted authority. He wished to achieve the freedom +of the people, but to achieve it by constitutional means. He was a +national volunteer in Dumfries, and he composed a fine patriotic song for +the corps to sing. He revealed his balanced mind in the following lines in +that song: + + The wretch that would a tyrant own, + And the wretch, his true-born brother, + Who would set the mob aboon the throne, above + May they be damned together. + +Burns had as little respect for a king who was a tyrant, as he had for a +tyrant in any other situation in life; but he clearly saw the wicked folly +of allowing mob-rule to be substituted for constitutional authority. + +In the Prologue written to be spoken by an actor on his benefit night, +Burns wrote: + + No hundred-headed Riot here we meet + With decency and law beneath his feet; + Nor Insolence assumes fair Freedom's name. + +Here, again, he records the dominant ideal of his mind through life; but +at the same time he utters a warning against ignorant and wild theorists, +who, in their madness, would overthrow civilisation. + +He overflows again on his favourite theme in the 'Lines on the +Commemoration of Rodney's Victory,' when he was proposing toasts: + + The next in succession I'll give you's the King! + Whoe'er would betray him, on high may he swing! + And here's the grand fabric, the free Constitution, + As built on the base of our great Revolution. + +The love of liberty grew stronger in his heart and in his mind as he grew +older. In his songs, and in his letters, he frequently moralised on +independence of character and the value of liberty. In a letter to the +_Morning Chronicle_ he said, 1795: 'I am a Briton, and must be interested +in the cause of liberty.' + +To Patrick Miller he sent a copy of his poems in 1793, accompanied by a +letter expressing gratitude for his kindness and appreciation of him 'as a +patriot who in a venal, sliding age stands forth the champion of the +liberties of my country.' + +In his love-song, 'Their Groves o' Sweet Myrtle,' he compares the boasted +glories of tropical lands with the beauty of his beloved Scotland, and +boasts in pride of the charms of the + + Lone glen o' green breckan, ferns + Wi' the burn stealing under the lang yellow broom, + +and of the sweetness of + + Yon humble broom bowers, + Where the blue-bell and gowan lurk, lowly, unseen. + +He cannot close the song, however, without claiming that beautiful as are +the 'sweet-scented woodlands' of these foreign countries, they are, after +all, 'the haunt of the tyrant and slave,' and that + + The slave's spicy forests, and gold-bubbling fountains, + The brave Caledonian views wi' disdain; + He wanders as free as the winds of his mountains. + +Burns celebrated the success of the French Revolution in a poem entitled +'The Tree of Liberty.' His heart bled for the peasantry of France, whom +the aristocrats had treated so contemptuously, and with such lack of +consideration, and cruelty. He rejoiced in the overthrow of their +oppressors, and the establishment of a republican form of government. In +this poem he gives credit to Lafayette, the great Frenchman who had gone +to assist the people of the United States in their brave struggle to get +free. He asks blessings on the head of the noble man, Lafayette, in the +verse: + + My blessings aye attend the chiel + Wha pitied Gallia's slaves, man, + And staw a branch, spite o' the deil, stole + Frae yont the western waves, man. + Fair Virtue watered it wi' care, + And now she sees wi' pride, man, + How weel it buds and blossoms there, + Its branches spreading wide, man. + + * * * * * + + A wicked crew syne, on a time, + Did tak a solemn aith, man, oath + It ne'er should flourish to its prime, + I wat they pledged their faith, man. + Awa they gaed, wi' mock parade, + Like beagles hunting game, man, + But soon grew weary o' the trade, + And wished they'd stayed at hame, man. + + Fair Freedom, standing by the tree, + Her sons did loudly ca', man; + She sang a song o' liberty, Marseillaise + Which pleased them ane and a', man. + By her inspired, the new-born race + Soon drew the avenging steel, man; + The hirelings ran--her friends gied chase + And banged the despot weel, man. + + * * * * * + + Wi' plenty o' sic trees, I trow, + The warld would live at peace, man; + The sword would help to mak' a plough; + The din o' war wad cease, man. + +The greatest poem Burns wrote to rejoice at the victorious progress of +humanity towards freedom was his 'Ode to Liberty,' written to express his +supreme gratification at the success of the people of the United States in +their struggle for independence from England. He wrote it, as he wrote +most of his poems during his life in Dumfries, in the moonlight in +Lincluden Abbey ruins, on the Nith River, just outside of Dumfries. He +introduces the ode in a poem named 'A Vision.' + +He tells that, at midnight, while in the ruins, he saw in the roofless +tower of the abbey, a vision: + + By heedless chance I turned my eyes, + And, by the moonbeam, shook to see + A stern and stalwart ghaist arise, ghost + Attired as minstrels wont to be. + + Had I a statue been o' stane, + His daring look had daunted me; + And on his bonnet graved was plain, + The sacred posy, 'Libertie.' + + And frae his harp sic strains did flow + Might rouse the slumbering dead to hear; + But oh! it was a tale of woe, + As ever met a Briton's ear! + +The ghost tells the story of the tyranny England exercised over the people +of the United States, and of the breaking of the tyrant's chains. Burns +had no more respect for despotism by an English king than he had for the +despotism of a tyrant in any other land. He knew the people of the +American colonies were right. England's greatest statesman, Pitt, had +said so, when the colonists, driven to desperation, rebelled; so the +ghost's revelation should be to a liberty-loving Briton's ear 'a tale of +woe.' + +The ode begins: + + No Spartan tube, no Attic shell, + No lyre AEolian I awake; + 'Tis liberty's bold note I swell; + Thy harp, Columbia, let me take! + See gathering thousands, while I sing, + A broken chain exultant bring, + And dash it in the tyrant's face, + And dare him to his very beard, + And tell him he no more is feared-- + No more the despot of Columbia's race! + A tyrant's proudest insults braved, + They shout--a People freed! They hail an Empire saved. + + * * * * * + + But come, ye sons of Liberty, + Columbia's offspring, brave and free. + In danger's hour still flaming in the van, + Ye know and dare maintain 'the Royalty of Man.' + +So the poem proceeds, till he appeals to King Alfred, and finally to +Caledonia: + + Alfred! on thy starry throne, + Surrounded by the tuneful choir, + The bards that erst have struck the patriotic lyre, + And rous'd the freeborn Briton's soul of fire, + No more thy England own! + Dare injured nations form the great design, + To make detested tyrants bleed? + Thy England execrates the glorious deed! + Beneath her hostile banners waving, + Every pang of honour braving, + England, in thunder calls, 'The tyrant's cause is mine!' + That hour accurst how did the fiends rejoice, + And hell, through all her confines, raise the exulting voice! + That hour which saw the generous English name + Linkt with such damned deeds of everlasting shame! + + Thee, Caledonia! thy wild heaths among, + Fam'd for the martial deed, the heaven-taught song, + To thee I turn with swimming eyes; + Where is that soul of Freedom fled? + Immingled with the mighty dead, + Beneath that hallow'd turf where Wallace lies! + Hear it not, Wallace! in thy bed of death. + Ye babbling winds! in silence sweep, + Disturb not ye the hero's sleep, + Nor give the coward secret breath. + Is this the ancient Caledonian form, + Firm as the rock, resistless as the storm? + +He loved to stir the liberty-loving spirit of his beloved Caledonia, so to +her sons he makes the final appeal in his great ode. He wrote in a similar +strain in the Prologue written for his friend Woods, the actor: + + O Thou dread Power! whose empire-giving hand + Has oft been stretched to shield the honoured land! + Strong may she glow with all her ancient fire! + May every son be worthy of his sire! + Firm may she rise with generous disdain + At Tyranny's, or direr Pleasure's, chain; + Still self-dependent in her native shore, + Bold may she brave grim Danger's loudest roar, + Till fate the curtain drop on worlds to be no more. + +He reached the highest degree of patriotic fervour, and his clearest call, +not only to Scotsmen, but to all true men, to be ready to do their duty +for justice and liberty, in 'Bruce's Address at Bannockburn.' + +In a letter to the Earl of Buchan, 1794, enclosing a copy of this poem, he +wrote: 'Independent of my enthusiasm as a Scotsman, I have rarely met with +anything in history which interests my feelings as a man equal with the +story of Bannockburn. On the one hand a cruel, but able, usurper, leading +on the finest army in Europe, to extinguish the last spark of freedom +among a greatly daring and greatly injured people; on the other hand, the +desperate relics of a gallant nation, devoting themselves to rescue their +bleeding country or perish with her. Liberty! thou art a prize truly and +indeed invaluable, for never canst thou be too dearly bought.' + + Scots, wha hae wi' Wallace bled, + Scots, wham Bruce has aften led, + Welcome to your gory bed, + Or to Victorie! + Now's the day and now's the hour; + See the front o' battle lour! + See approach proud Edward's power-- + Chains and slaverie! + + Wha will be a traitor knave? + Wha can fill a coward's grave? + Wha sae base as be a slave? + Let him turn and flee! + Wha for Scotland's King and Law, + Freedom's sword will strongly draw, + Free-Man stand, or Free-Man fa'? + Let him follow me! + + By Oppression's woes and pains! + By your Sons in servile chains! + We will drain our dearest veins, + But they _shall_ be free! + Lay the proud Usurpers low! + Tyrants fall in every foe! + Liberty's in every blow! + Let us Do--or Die. + + 'So may God ever defend the cause of Truth and Liberty as he did + that day. + + 'ROBERT BURNS.' + +Because he was so outspoken in regard to democracy, some men assumed he +was not a loyal man. The truth is, that he always loved his country, but +he ardently desired to improve the conditions of the great body of his +countrymen. Complaints were made about his disloyalty to the Excise +commissioners under whom he worked. These complaints were investigated, +and Burns was found to be a loyal man. + +When the call came from the Government for volunteers, Burns joined the +Dumfries Volunteers. In his great song composed for these volunteers he +strongly expresses his loyalty, both to his country and to his king, in +the following quotations: + + We'll ne'er permit a foreign foe + On British ground to rally. + + Be Britain still to Britain true, + Amang oursels united; + For never but by British hands + Maun British wrangs be righted. must + + Who will not sing 'God save the King,' + Shall hang as high's the steeple! + But while we sing 'God save the King,' + We'll ne'er forget the people. + +To Robert Graham of Fintry, 1792, he wrote: 'To the British Constitution +on revolution principles, next after my God, I am most devoutly +attached.' + +Again, a month later, he wrote to Mr Graham: 'I never uttered any +invectives against the King. His private worth it is altogether impossible +that such a man as I can appreciate; but in his public capacity I always +revered, and always will, with the soundest loyalty, revere the Monarch of +Great Britain as (to speak in Masonic) the sacred Keystone of our Royal +Arch Constitution. As to reform principles, I look upon the British +Constitution, as settled at the Revolution, to be the most glorious +Constitution on earth, or that perhaps the wit of man can frame. + + * * * * * + +'I never dictated to, corresponded with, or had the least connection with, +any political association whatever--except that when the magistrates and +principal inhabitants of Dumfries met to declare their attachment to the +Constitution, and their abhorrence of riot.' + +He had strong desires to effect many reforms in public life, but he was an +intelligent believer in the British Constitution, and had no faith in any +method of achieving reforms in the Empire except by constitutional +measures. He was a radical reformer with a grand mental balance-wheel; and +such reformers make the best type of citizens, ardent reformers with cool +heads and unselfish hearts. + +Carlyle strangely misunderstood the spirit of democracy in Burns, although +he justly wrote, long after the poet's death: 'He appears not only as a +true British poet, but as one of the most considerable British men of the +eighteenth century.' + +What were the achievements, in addition to his poetic power, that made +Burns 'one of the most considerable men of the eighteenth century?' Mainly +the work he did to develop in the souls of men a consciousness of +fundamental principles of democracy, and higher ideals of vital religion; +yet Carlyle does not approve of his efforts to reform either social or +religious conditions. As the centuries pass, the work of Burns for +Religion, Democracy, and Brotherhood will be recognised as his greatest +work for humanity. + +Carlyle's belief was that Burns wrote about the wrongs of the oppressed +because he could not become rich. In that belief he was clearly in error. +The love of freedom, justice, and independence was a basic passion in the +character of Burns. The anxiety of Burns regarding money was not for +himself, but for his family in case he should die. Several times he +referred to this in letters to his most intimate friends. + + + + +CHAPTER VI. + +BURNS AND BROTHERHOOD. + + +In the third letter Burns wrote Alison Begbie, the first woman he asked to +marry him, he said: 'I grasp every creature in the arms of Universal +Benevolence, and equally participate in the pleasures of the happy, and +sympathise with the miseries of the unfortunate.' + +This statement of one of the fundamental principles which guided him +during his whole life is a profound interpretation of the teachings of +Christ in regard to the attitude that each individual should have, must +have, in order that brotherhood may be established on the earth. He taught +universal benevolence and vital sympathy _with_--not _for_--humanity; not +merely when sorrows and afflictions bring dark clouds to hearts, but in +times of happiness and rejoicing; affectionate sympathy, unostentatious +sympathy, co-operative sympathy that stimulates helpfulness and +hopefulness; sympathy that produces activity of the divine in the human +heart and mind, and leads to brotherhood. + +The amazing fact is, not that Burns wrote such fundamental Christian +philosophy in a love-letter, but that a youth of twenty-one could think it +and express it so perfectly. + +To Clarinda he wrote, 1787: 'Lord! why was I born to see misery which I +cannot relieve?' + +Again, in 1788, he wrote to her: 'Give me to feel "another's woe," and +continue with me that dear-loved friend that feels with mine.' + +To Mrs Walter Riddell he wrote, 1793: 'Of all the qualities we assign to +the Author and Director of Nature, by far the most enviable is to be able +"to wipe away all tears from all eyes." O what insignificant, sordid +wretches are they, however chance may have loaded them with wealth, who go +to their graves, to their magnificent mausoleums, with hardly the +consciousness of having made one poor, honest heart happy.' + +In 'A Winter Night,' the great poem of universal sympathy, he says: + + Affliction's sons are brothers in distress; + A brother to relieve, how exquisite the bliss. + +He closes the poem with four great lines: + + But deep this truth impressed my mind-- + Thro' all His works abroad, + The heart benevolent and kind + The most resembles God. + +In the same poem he paints the characters who lack loving sympathy, and +whose lives and attitudes towards their fellow-men separate men, and break +the ties that should unite all men, and thus prevent the development of +the spirit of brotherhood. After describing the fierceness of the storm +and expressing his heartfelt sympathy for the cattle, the sheep, the +birds, and even with destructive animals such as prey on hen-roosts or +defenceless lambs, his mind was filled with a plaintive strain, as he +thought of the bitterness of man to his brother man, and he proceeds: + + Blow, blow, ye winds, with heavier gust! + And freeze, thou bitter-biting frost! + Descend, ye chilly, smothering snows! + Not all your rage, as now united, shows + More hard unkindness, unrelenting, + Vengeful malice unrepenting, + Than heaven-illumined man on brother man bestows. + +The depth and universality of his sympathy is shown in 'To a Mouse,' after +he had destroyed its nest while ploughing: + + I'm truly sorry man's dominion + Has broken Nature's social union, + An' justifies that ill opinion + Which makes thee startle + At me, thy poor earth-born companion, + An' fellow-mortal! + +In his 'Epistle to Davie,' a brother poet, he emphasises the value of true +sympathy, that should bind all hearts, must yet bind all hearts in +universal brotherhood, when he says: + + All hail! ye tender feelings dear! + The smile of love, the friendly tear, + The sympathetic glow! + Long since, this world's thorny ways + Had numbered out my weary days, + Had it not been for you. + +In his 'Epistle to Robert Graham of Fintry,' after describing the thrifty +but selfishly prudent, 'who feel by reason and who give by rule,' and +expressing regret that 'the friendly e'er should want a friend,' he +writes: + + But come ye, who the godlike pleasure know, + Heaven's attribute distinguished--to bestow! + Whose arms of love would grasp the human race. + +In the opinion of Burns, they are the ideal men and women who best +understood, and most perfectly practised, the teaching of Christ. + +In one of his epistles to his friend Lapraik he says: + + For thus the royal mandate ran, + When first the human race began: + The social, friendly, honest man, + Whate'er he be-- + 'Tis _he_ fulfils great Nature's plan, + And none but he. + +The influence of any act on society, on the brotherhood of man as a whole, +was the supreme test of Burns to distinguish between goodness and evil. + +To Dr Moore, of London, he said: 'Whatsoever is not detrimental to +society, and is of positive enjoyment, is of God, the giver of all good +things, and ought to be received and enjoyed by His creatures with +thankful delight.' + +To Clarinda he wrote: 'Thou Almighty Author of peace, and goodness, and +love! Do thou give me the social heart that kindly tastes of every man's +cup! Is it a draught of joy? Warm and open my heart to share it with +cordial, unenvying rejoicing! Is it the bitter potion of sorrow? Melt my +heart with sincerely sympathetic woe! Above all, do Thou give me the manly +mind, that resolutely exemplifies in life and manners those sentiments +which I would wish to be thought to possess.' + +In 'On the Seas and Far Away' he says: + + Peace, thy olive wand extend, + And bid wild war his ravage end; + Man with brother man to meet, + And as a brother kindly greet. + +In the 'Tree of Liberty' he says, if we had plenty of the trees of Liberty +growing throughout the whole world: + + Like brothers in a common cause + We'd on each other smile, man; + And equal rights and equal laws + Wad gladden ev'ry isle, man. + +To Clarinda, when he presented a pair of wine-glasses--a perfectly proper +gift to a lady in the opinion of his time--he gave her at the same time a +poem, in which he said: + + And fill them high with generous juice, + As generous as your mind; + And pledge them to the generous toast, + 'The whole of human kind!' + +In his 'Epistle to John Lapraik,' after describing those whose lives do +not help men towards brotherhood, he describes those who are true to the +great ideal: + + But ye whom social pleasure charms, + Whose hearts the tide of kindness warms, + Who hold your being on the terms, + 'Each aid the others,' + Come to my bowl, come to my arms, + My friends, my brothers. + +Burns gives each man the true test of the influence of his life for the +promotion of true brotherhood in the short line, 'Each aid the others.' +That line is the supreme test of duty, and is the highest interpretation +of Christ's commandment to His disciples, and through them to all men, +'Love one another, as I have loved you.' Vital love means vital +helpfulness. + +Dickens gives the same great message as Burns when, in describing Little +Dorritt, he says: 'She was something different from the rest, and she was +that something for the rest.' This is probably the shortest sentence ever +written that conveys so clearly the two great revelations of Christ: +Individuality and Brotherhood. + +There are some who dislike the expression 'Come to my bowl.' They should +test Burns by the accepted standards of his time, not by the standards of +our time. The bowl was the symbol of true comradeship in castle and cot, +in the manse and in the layman's home, in the time of Burns. + +No other writer has interpreted Christ's revelations of Democracy and +Brotherhood so clearly and so fully as Robert Burns. He sums up the whole +matter of man's relationship to man in 'A Man's a Man for a' That,' in the +last verse: + + Then let us pray that come it may-- + As come it will for a' that-- + That sense and worth, o'er a' the earth, + Shall bear the gree, an' a' that. pre-eminence + For a' that, an' a' that, + It's coming yet, for a' that, + That man to man the world o'er, + Shall brothers be for a' that. + +He revealed his supreme purpose in 'A Revolutionary Lyric': + + In virtue trained, enlightened youth + Will love each fellow-creature; + And future years shall prove the truth-- + That man is good by nature. + + The golden age will then revive; + Each man will love his brother; + In harmony we all shall live, + And share the earth together. + +While the so-called religious teachers of the time of Burns were dividing +men into creeds based on petty theological distinctions, Burns was +interpreting for humanity the highest teachings of Christ: Democracy based +on recognition of the value of the individual soul, and Brotherhood as the +natural fruit of true democracy. + + + + +CHAPTER VII. + +BURNS A REVEALER OF PURE LOVE. + + +Many people yet believe that Burns was a universal and inconstant lover. +He really did not love many women. He loved deeply, but he had not a great +many really serious experiences of love. He loved Nellie Kirkpatrick when +he was fifteen, and Peggy Thomson when he was seventeen. He says his love +of Nellie made him a poet. There is no other experience that will kindle +the strongest element in a human soul during the adolescent period so +fully, and so permanently, as genuine love. Love will not make all young +people poets, but it will kindle with its most developing glow whatever is +the strongest natural power in each individual soul. Parents should foster +such love in young people during the adolescent period, instead of +ridiculing it, as is too often done. God may not mean that the love is to +be permanent, but there is no other agency that can be so productive at +the time of adolescence as love that is reverenced by parents who, by due +reverence, sympathy, and comradeship, help love to do its best work. + +These two adolescent loves did their work in developing Burns, but they +were not loves of maturity. From seventeen till he was twenty-one he was +not really in love. Then he met, and deeply and reverently loved, Alison +Begbie. She was a servant girl of charm, sweetness, and dignity, in a home +not far from Lochlea farm. He wrote three poems to her: 'The Lass o' +Cessnock Banks,' 'Peggy Alison,' and 'Mary Morrison.' He reversed her name +for the second title, because it possessed neither the elements of metre +nor of rhyme. He gave his third poem to her the title 'Mary Morrison' to +make it conform to the same metre as 'Peggy Alison.' There was a Mary +Morrison who was nine years of age when Burns wrote 'Mary Morrison.' She +is buried in Mauchline Churchyard, and on her tombstone it is stated that +she was 'the Mary Morrison of Burns.' His brother Gilbert knew better. He +said the poem was written to the lady to whom 'Peggy Alison' was written. +It is impossible to believe that Burns would write 'Mary Morrison' to a +child only nine years old. + +Burns wrote five love-letters to Alison Begbie. Beautiful and reverent +letters they were, too. In the fourth, he asked her to become his wife. In +Chapter III. it has been explained that he was too shy, even at +twenty-two, to ask the woman whom he loved to marry him when he was with +her. This does not indicate that he had a new love each week, as many yet +believe. Miss Begbie refused to marry him, and his reply should win him +the respect of every reasonable man or woman who reads it. It is the +dignified and reverent outpouring of a loving heart, held in control by a +well-balanced and considerate mind. + +Although Burns had no lover from seventeen to twenty-one years of age, he +wrote love-songs during those years, but even his mother could not tell +the name of any young woman who kindled his muse during these four years. +Neither could the other members of his family. + +He wrote one poem, 'My Nannie O,' during this period. He first wrote for +the first line: + + Beyond the hills where Stinchar flows. + +He did not like the word 'Stinchar,' so he changed it to 'Lugar,' a much +more euphonious word. He had no lover named 'Nannie.' Lugar and Stinchar +were several miles apart. He was really writing about love, not the love +of any one woman, during those four years; and he was writing about other +great subjects more than about love, mainly religious and ethical ideals. + +From the age of twenty-two he was for three years without a lover. At +twenty-five he met Jean Armour, then eighteen. Jean spoke first to the +respectfully shy man. At the annual dance on Fair night in Mauchline, +Burns was one of the young men who were present. His dog, Luath, who loved +him, and whom he loved in return, traced his master upstairs to the dance +hall. Of course the dance was interrupted when Luath got on the floor and +found his master. Burns kindly led the dog out, and as he was going he +said, 'I wish I could find a lassie to loe me as well as my dog.' A short +time afterwards Burns was going along a street in Mauchline, and was +passing Jean Armour without speaking to her, because he had not been +introduced to her. She was at the village pump getting water to sprinkle +her clothes on the village green, and as he was passing her she asked, +'Hae you found a lassie yet to loe you as well as your dog?' Burns then +stopped and conversed with her. She was a handsome, bright young woman. +Their acquaintance soon developed a strong love between them, and resulted +in a test of the real manhood of the character of Burns. When he realised +that Jean was to become a mother, he did not hesitate as to his duty. He +gave her a legal certificate of marriage, signed by himself and regularly +witnessed, which was as valid as a marriage certificate of a clergyman or +a magistrate in Scottish law. + +Jean's father compelled her to destroy, or let him destroy, the +certificate. This, and her father's threatened legal prosecution, nearly +upset the mind of Burns. He undoubtedly loved Jean Armour. In a letter +written at the time to David Brice, a friend in Glasgow, he wrote: 'Never +man loved, or rather adored, a woman more than I did her; and, to confess +a truth between you and me, I do still love her to distraction after +all.... May Almighty God forgive her ingratitude and perjury to me, as I +from my very soul forgive her; and may His grace be with her, and bless +her in all her future life.' + +He had arranged to leave Scotland for Jamaica to escape from his mental +torture, when two things came into his life: Mary Campbell, and the +suggestion that he should publish his poems. The first filled his heart, +the second gave him the best tonic for his mind--deeply and joyously +interesting occupation. + +Mary Campbell, 'Highland Mary,' he had met when she was a nursemaid in the +home of his friend Gavin Hamilton. Meeting her again, when she was a +servant in Montgomery Castle, he became acquainted with her, and they soon +loved each other. It is not remarkable that Burns should love Mary +Campbell, because she was a winsome, quiet, refined young woman, and his +heart was desolate at the loss of Jean Armour. He, at the time he made +love to Mary, had no hope of reconciliation with Jean. The greater his +love for Jean had been, and still was, the greater his need was for +another love to fill his heart, and he found a pure and satisfying lover +in Mary. Their love was deep and short, lasting only about two months. Two +busy months they were, as Burns was preparing his poems for the Kilmarnock +edition, till he and Mary agreed to be married. They parted for the last +time on 14th May 1785. The day was Sunday. They spent the afternoon in the +fine park of Montgomery Castle, through which the Fail River runs for a +mile and a half. In the evening they went out of the grounds about half a +mile to Failford, a little village at the junction of the Fail with the +Ayr. The Fail runs parallel to the Ayr, and in the opposite direction +after leaving the castle grounds, until it reaches Failford. There it +meets a solid rock formation, which compels it to turn squarely to the +right and flow into the Ayr, about three hundred yards away. At a narrow +place where the Fail had cut a passage through the soft rock on its way to +the Ayr, Burns and Highland Mary parted. He stood on one side of the river +and Mary on the other, and after they had exchanged Bibles, they made +their vows of intention to marry, he holding one side of an open Bible and +she the other side. Mary went home to prepare for her marriage, but a +relative in Greenock fell ill with malignant fever, and Mary went to nurse +him, and caught the fever herself and died. + +The poems he wrote to her and about her made her a renowned character. +When in 1919 a shipbuilding company at Greenock, after a four years' +struggle, finally purchased the church and churchyard in which Mary was +buried, with the intention of removing the bodies to another place, the +British Parliament passed an Act providing that her monument must stand +forever over her grave, where it had always stood.[4] Though she held a +humble position, the beautiful poems of her lover gave her an honoured +place in the hearts of millions of people all over the world. + +Burns did not go to Jamaica, although he had secured a berth on a ship to +take him to that beautiful island. Calls came to him just in time to +publish an edition of his poems in Edinburgh. He answered the calls, +startled and delighted Edinburgh society, published his poems, and met +Clarinda. + +Mrs M'Lehose was a cultured and charming grass-widow. She had been courted +and married by a wealthy young man in Glasgow when she was only seventeen +years of age. Though a lady of the highest character, on the advice of +relatives and friends she left her husband. He then went to Jamaica. + +Burns and Mrs M'Lehose mutually admired each other when they met, and +their friendship quickly developed into affection. Under the names of +Sylvander and Clarinda they conducted a love correspondence which will +probably always remain the finest love correspondence of the ages. +Clarinda was a religious and cultured woman; Burns was a religious and +cultured man, so their letters of love are on a high plane. Clarinda wrote +very good poems as well as good prose, and Burns wrote some of his best +poems to Clarinda. His parting song to Clarinda is, in the opinion of many +literary men, the greatest love-song of its kind ever written. Those who +study the Clarinda correspondence will find not only love, but many +interesting philosophical discussions regarding religion and human life. + +Thus ends the record of his real loves, notwithstanding the outrageous +misstatements that his loves extended, according to one writer, to nearly +four hundred. He had just four deep and serious loves, not counting the +two deep and transforming affections of his adolescent period for Nellie +Kirkpatrick and Peggy Thomson. He loved four women: Alison Begbie, Jean +Armour, Mary Campbell, and Mrs M'Lehose. At the age of twenty-one he loved +Alison Begbie, and, when twenty-two, he asked her to marry him. She +declined his proposal. He was too shy to propose to her when he was with +her. Get this undoubted fact into your consciousness, and think about it +fairly and reasonably, and it will help you to get a truer vision of the +real Burns. Read the proposal and his subsequent letter on pages 51-55, +and your mind should form juster conceptions of Burns as a lover and as a +man. You will find it harder to be misled by the foolish or the malicious +misrepresentations that have too long passed as facts concerning him as a +lover. + +From twenty-two to twenty-five he had no lover; then he loved and married +Jean Armour. No act of his prevented that marriage-contract remaining in +force. When her father forced the destruction of the contract, and much +against his will, and in defiance of the love of his heart, he found that +he had lost his wife beyond any reasonable hope of reconciliation and +reunion, and was therefore free to love another, he loved Mary Campbell, +and honourably proposed marriage to her. She accepted his offer, but died +soon after. He was untrue to no one when he took Clarinda into his heart. +Of course he could not ask her to marry him, as she was already married. + +The first three women he loved after he reached the age of twenty-one +years were Alison Begbie, Jean Armour, and Mary Campbell. The first +refused his offer; he married the second, and was forced into freedom by +her father; the third accepted his offer of marriage, but died before they +could be married. The fourth woman whom he loved loved him, but could not +marry him, a fact recognised by both of them. There is not a shadow of +evidence of inconstancy or unfaithfulness on his part in the eight years +during which he loved the four women--the only four he did love after he +became a man. + +It may be answered that Burns was not loyal to Jean Armour because he +loved Mary Campbell and Clarinda after he was married to Jean. Burns +absolutely believed that his marriage to Jean was annulled by the burning +of the marriage certificate. He would not have pledged matrimony with Mary +Campbell if he had known that Jean was still his wife. When Mary died, and +he found Jean's father was willing that he might again marry Jean, he did +marry her in Gavin Hamilton's home. In writing to Clarinda he forgot +himself for a moment and spoke disrespectfully of Jean, but his prompt and +honourable action in marrying her soon after showed him to be a true man. + +It should ever be remembered that Burns was in no sense a fickle lover. To +each of the three women whom he loved, his love was reverent and true. He +had a reverent affection for Alison Begbie after she refused him; he loved +Jean Armour after she allowed their marriage-certificate to be destroyed; +and he loved Mary Campbell, not only till she died, but to the end of his +life. The fact that he sat out in the stackyard on Ellisland farm through +the long moonlit night, with tears flowing down his cheeks, on the third +anniversary of her death, and wrote 'To Mary in Heaven,' proves the depth +and permanency of his love. + +In 'My Eppie Adair' he says: + + By love and by beauty, by law and by duty, + I swear to be true to my Eppie Adair. + +In these lines Burns truly defines his own type of love. + +It is true that Miss Margaret Chalmers told the poet Campbell, after Burns +died, that he had asked her to marry him. His letters to her are letters +of deep friendship--reverent friendship--not love. It is true that the +last poem he ever wrote was written to Margaret Chalmers, and that in it +he said: + + Full well thou knowest I love thee, dear. + +But it must be remembered that Burns had been married to Jean and living +happily with her for eight years, so the love of this line was not the +love that is expected to lead to marriage, but an expression of reverent +affection. The whole tenor of this last poem of his life indicates that +he thought her feeling for him was cooling, and his deep affectionate +friendship urged him to plead with her for a continuance of their +long-existing and quite unusual relationship. + +Many people will doubtless say, 'What about Chloris?' Chloris was his name +for Jean Lorimer, the daughter of a friend of his who dwelt near him when +he lived on Ellisland farm after his second marriage to Jean Armour. +Chloris was a sweet singer and player, who frequently visited Mrs Burns, +and who sang for Burns, sometimes, with Mrs Burns the grand old Scottish +airs that had long been sung to words that were not pure, and to which he +was writing new and pure words nearly every day. A number of these songs +were addressed to Chloris, but in a book of his poems presented to Miss +Lorimer he states clearly that the love he appeared to be expressing for +her was an assumed, or, as he called it, a 'fictitious,' and not a real +love. + +When Burns had earned five hundred pounds by the sale of the Edinburgh +edition of his poems, he decided 'that he had the responsibility for the +temporal and possibly the eternal welfare of a dearly loved +fellow-creature;' so again giving proof of his honest manhood and +recognising his plain duty, he married Jean Armour a second time, in the +home of his dear friend Gavin Hamilton. Of the first three women whom he +loved one refused him, one died after their sacred engagement, and the +third he married twice. The fourth and last woman that he loved could not +marry. + +Any one of the first three would have made him a good wife, but no one +could have been more considerate or more faithful than the one he married. + +Could any reasonable man believe that if Burns had really loved other +women, as he loved Alison Begbie, Jean Armour, Mary Campbell, and Mrs +M'Lehose, the names of the other women would not have been known by the +world? He never tried to hide his love. He wrote songs of love with other +names attached to them, used for variety. In a letter to a friend he +regretted the use of 'Chloris' in several of his Ellisland and Dumfries +poems, and to her directly he said they were 'fictitious' or assumed +expressions of love. Notwithstanding the foolish or malicious statements +that Burns had many lovers, he had but four real loves. One would have +been his limit if the first had accepted him and lived as long as he did. + +It has been said that 'the love of Burns was the love of the flesh.' It +is worth while to examine the love-songs of Burns to learn what elements +of thought and feeling dominated his mind and heart. He wrote two hundred +and fifty love-songs, and only three or four contain indelicate +references; even these were not considered improper in his time. + +What were the themes of his love-songs? What were the symbols that he used +to typify love? There is no beauty or delight in Nature on earth or sky +that he did not use as a symbol of true love. He saw God through Nature as +few men ever saw Him, and he therefore naturally used the beauty and +sweetness and glory of Nature to help to reveal the beauty and sweetness +and glory of love, the element of the Divine that thrilled him with the +deepest joy and the highest reverence. + +In his first poem, written when he was fifteen, describing his +fourteen-year-old sweetheart, he says: + + A bonnie lass, I will confess, + Is pleasant to the e'e; + But without some better qualities, + She's no a lass for me. + + * * * * + + But it's innocence and modesty + That polishes the dart. + + 'Tis this in Nelly pleases me, + 'Tis this enchants my soul; + For absolutely in my breast + She reigns without control. + +Of Peggy Thomson, his second love, he wrote: + + Not vernal showers to budding flowers, + Not autumn to the farmer, + So dear can be as thou to me, + My fair, my lovely charmer. + +Of Alison Begbie he wrote in 'The Lass o' Cessnock Banks': + + But it's not her air, her form, her face, + Tho' matching beauty's fabled queen; + 'Tis the mind that shines in ev'ry grace, + And chiefly in her rogueish een. + +In 'Young Peggy Blooms' he describes her: + + Young Peggy blooms our bonniest lass, + Her blush is like the morning, + The rosy dawn, the springing grass + With early gems adorning. + Her eyes outshine the radiant beams + That gild the passing shower, + And glitter o'er the crystal streams, + And cheer each fresh'ning flower. + +In 'Will Ye Go to the Indies, My Mary?' he says: + + O sweet grows the lime and the orange, + And the apple o' the pine; + But a' the charms o' the Indies + Can never equal thine. + +The following are emblems of beauty in the 'Lass o' Ballochmyle': + + On every blade the pearls hang. + + Her look was like the morning's eye, + Her air like Nature's vernal smile. + + Fair is the morn in flowery May, + And sweet is night in autumn mild. + +Describing 'My Nannie O' he says: + + Her face is fair, her heart is true; + As spotless as she's bonnie, O; + The opening gowan, wat wi' dew, daisy + Nae purer is than Nannie O. + +In 'The Birks [birches] of Aberfeldy' he speaks to his lover of 'Summer +blinking on flowery braes' and 'Playing o'er the crystal streamlets;' and +the 'Blythe singing o' the little birdies' and 'The braes o'erhung wi' +fragrant woods' and 'The hoary cliffs crowned wi' flowers;' and 'The +streamlet pouring over a waterfall.' Love and Nature were united in his +heart. + +In 'Blythe was She' he describes the lady by saying she was like beautiful +things: + + Her looks were like a flower in May. + + Her smile was like a simmer morn; + + Her bonnie face it was as meek + As any lamb upon a lea; + +and the 'ev'ning sun.' + +Her step was + + As light's a bird upon a thorn. + +He wrote 'O' a' the Airts the Wind can Blaw' about Jean Armour after they +were married, while he was building their home on Ellisland. He says in +this exquisite song: + + By day and night my fancy's flight + Is ever wi' my Jean. + + I see her in the dewy flowers, + I see her sweet and fair; + I hear her in the tunefu' birds, + I hear her charm the air: + There's not a bonnie flower that springs + By fountain, shaw, or green; woodland + There's not a bonnie bird that sings, + But minds me o' my Jean. + +To Jean he wrote again: + + It is na, Jean, thy bonnie face, + Nor shape that I admire; + Although thy beauty and thy grace + Might weel awake desire. + Something in ilka part o' thee + To praise, to love, I find; + But dear as is thy form to me, + Still dearer is thy mind. + +In 'Delia--an Ode,' he uses the 'fair face of orient day,' and 'the tints +of the opening rose' to suggest her beauty, and 'the lark's wild warbled +lay' and the 'sweet sound of the tinkling rill' to suggest the sweetness +of her voice. + +In 'I Gaed a Waefu' Gate Yestreen' he says: + + She talked, she smiled, my heart she wiled; + She charmed my _soul_, I wist na how. + +It was the soul of Burns that responded to love. Neither Alison Begbie nor +Mary Campbell excelled in beauty, and no one acquainted with their high +character could have had the temerity to suggest that love for them was +'the love of the flesh.' His beautiful poems to Jean Armour place his love +for her on a high plane. He was a man of strong passion, but passion was +not the source of his love. + +In 'Aye sae Bonnie, Blythe and Gay' he says: + + She's aye sae neat, sae trim, sae light, the graces round her hover, + Ae look deprived me o' my heart, and I became her lover + +'Ilka bird sang o' its love' he makes Miss Kennedy say in 'The Banks o' +Doon.' As the birds ever sang love to Burns, he naturally makes them sing +love to all hearts. + +In 'The Bonnie Wee Thing' he gives high qualifications for love kindling: + + Wit, and grace, and love, and beauty + In ae constellation shine; + To adore thee is my duty, + Goddess o' this soul o' mine. + +In 'The Charms of Lovely Davies' he says: + + Each eye it cheers when she appears, + Like Phoebus in the morning, + When past the shower, and ev'ry flower + The garden is adorning. + +The last three poems from which quotations have been made were written +about two ladies whose lovers had been untrue to them: the first about +Miss Kennedy, a member of one of the leading Ayrshire families; the other +two about Miss Davies, a relative of the Glenriddell family. + +In a letter to Miss Davies he said: + +'Woman is the blood-royal of life; let there be slight degrees of +precedency among them, but let them all be sacred. Whether this last +sentiment be right or wrong, I am not accountable; it is an original +component feature of my mind.' + +Burns was not in love with either Miss Kennedy or Miss Davies, but he +explains the writing of the songs to Miss Davies, in a letter enclosing +'Bonnie Wee Thing,' by saying, 'When I meet a person of my own heart I +positively can no more desist from rhyming on impulse than an AEolian harp +can refuse its tones to the streaming air.' + +One of his most beautiful poems is 'The Posie,' which he planned to pull +for his 'Ain dear May.' + + The primrose I will pu', the firstling o' the year, + And I will pu' the pink, the emblem o' my dear, + For she's the pink o' womankind, and blooms without a peer. + + I'll pu' the budding rose, when Phoebus peeps in view, + For it's like a baumy kiss o' her sweet, bonnie mou'; + The hyacinth's for constancy, wi' its unchanging blue. + + The lily it is pure, and the lily it is fair, + And in her lovely bosom I'll place the lily there; + The daisy's for simplicity and unaffected air. + + The woodbine I will pu', when the e'ening star is near, + And the diamond draps o' dew shall be her een sae clear; + The violet's for modesty, which weel she fa's to wear. + + I'll tie the posie round wi' the silken band o' luve, + And I'll place it in her breast, and I'll swear by a' above + That to my latest draught o' life the band shall ne'er remove, + And this will be a posie to my ain dear May. + +In 'Lovely Polly Stewart' he says: + + O lovely Polly Stewart, + O charming Polly Stewart, + There's ne'er a flower that blooms in May + That's half so fair as thou art. + + The flower it blaws, it fades, it fa's, + And art can ne'er renew it; + But worth and truth, eternal youth + Will gie to Polly Stewart. + +In 'Thou Fair Eliza' he says: + + Not the bee upon the blossom, + In the pride o' sinny noon; + Not the little sporting fairy, + All beneath the simmer moon; + Not the minstrel, in the moment + Fancy lightens in his e'e, + Kens the pleasure, feels the rapture, + That thy presence gies to me. + +In 'My Bonie Bell' he writes: + + The smiling spring comes in rejoicing, + The surly winter grimly flies; + Now crystal clear are the falling waters, + And bonie blue are the sunny skies. + Fresh o'er the mountains breaks forth the morning, + The evening gilds the ocean's swell; + All creatures joy in the sun's returning, + And I rejoice in my Bonie Bell. + +'Sweet Afton' was suggested by the following: 'I charge you, O ye +daughters of Jerusalem, that ye stir not, nor awaken my love--my dove, my +undefiled! The flowers appear on the earth, the time of the singing of +birds is come, and the voice of the turtle is heard in the land.' + +In descriptive power and in fond and reverent love no poem of Burns, or +any other writer, surpasses Sweet Afton. Authorities have been divided in +regard to the person who was the Mary of Sweet Afton. Currie and Lockhart +declined to accept the statement of Gilbert Burns that it was Highland +Mary. Chambers and Douglas, the most illuminating and reliable of the +early biographers of Burns, agree with Gilbert. One of Mrs Dunlop's +daughters stated that she heard Burns himself say that Mary Campbell was +the woman whose name he used to represent the lover for whom he asked such +reverent consideration. He had no lover at any period of his life on the +Afton. He had but one lover named Mary, and she stirred him to a degree of +reverence that toned the music of his love to the end of his life. Mary +Campbell was alive to Burns in a truly realistic sense when he wrote the +sacred poem 'Sweet Afton.' + +In 'O were my Love yon Lilac Fair' he assumes that his love might be + + A lilac fair, + Wi' purpling blossoms in the spring, + And I a bird to shelter there, + When wearied on my little wing. + +In the second verse he says: + + O gin my love were yon red rose if + That grows upon the castle wa'; + And I mysel' a drop o' dew, + Into her bonie breast to fa'! + +Could imagination kindle more pure ideals to reveal love than these? In +'Bonie Jean--A Ballad' he gives two delightful pictures of love: + + As in the bosom of the stream + The moonbeam dwells at dewy e'en; + So trembling, pure, was tender love + Within the breast of Bonie Jean. + + * * * * * + + The sun was sinking in the west, + The birds sang sweet in ilka grove; every + His cheek to hers he fondly laid, + And whispered thus his tale of love. + +In 'Phillis the Fair' he writes: + + While larks, with little wing, fann'd the pure air, + Tasting the breathing spring, forth did I fare; + Gay the sun's golden eye + Peep'd o'er the mountains high; + Such thy morn! did I cry, Phillis the fair. + + In each bird's careless song glad did I share; + While yon wild-flow'rs among, chance led me there! + Sweet to the op'ning day, + Rosebuds bent the dewy spray; + Such thy bloom! did I say, Phillis the fair. + +In 'By Allan Stream' he describes the glories of Nature, but gives them +second place to the joys of love: + + The haunt o' spring's the primrose-brae, + The summer joys the flocks to follow; + How cheery thro' her short'ning day + Is autumn in her weeds o' yellow; + But can they melt the glowing heart, + Or chain the soul in speechless pleasure? + Or thro' each nerve the rapture dart, + Like meeting her, our bosom's treasure? + +In 'Phillis, the Queen o' the Fair' he uses many beautiful things to +illustrate her charms: + + The daisy amused my fond fancy, + So artless, so simple, so wild: + Thou emblem, said I, o' my Phillis-- + For she is Simplicity's child. + + The rosebud's the blush o' my charmer, + Her sweet, balmy lip when 'tis prest: + How fair and how pure is the lily! + But fairer and purer her breast. + + Yon knot of gay flowers in the arbour, + They ne'er wi' my Phillis can vie: + Her breath is the breath of the woodbine, + Its dew-drop o' diamond her eye. + + Her voice is the song o' the morning, + That wakes thro' the green-spreading grove, + When Phoebus peeps over the mountains + On music, and pleasure, and love. + + But beauty, how frail and how fleeting! + The bloom of a fine summer's day; + While worth, in the mind o' my Phillis, + Will flourish without a decay. + +In 'My Love is like a Red, Red Rose' he uses exquisite symbolism: + + My luve is like a red, red rose + That's newly sprung in June; + My luve is like a melodie + That's sweetly play'd in tune. + + As fair art thou, my bonie lass, + So deep in luve am I; + And I will luve thee still, my dear, + Till a' the seas gang dry. + +In the pastoral song, 'Behold, my Love, how Green the Groves,' he says in +the last verse: + + These wild-wood flowers I've pu'd to deck + That spotless breast o' thine; + The courtier's gems may witness love, + But never love like mine. + +In the dialogue song 'Philly and Willy,' + + _He says_, + As songsters of the early spring + Are ilka day more sweet to hear, each + So ilka day to me mair dear + And charming is my Philly. + + _She replies_, + As on the brier the budding rose + Still richer breathes and fairer blows, + So in my tender bosom grows + The love I bear my Willy. + +In 'O Bonnie was yon Rosy Brier' he says: + + O bonnie was yon rosy brier + That blooms so far frae haunt o' man; + And bonnie she, and ah, how dear! + It shaded frae the e'ening sun. + + Yon rosebuds in the morning dew, + How pure amang the leaves sae green; + But purer was the lover's vow + They witnessed in their shade yestreen. + + All in its rude and prickly bower, + That crimson rose, how sweet and fair. + But love is far a sweeter flower, + Amid life's thorny path o' care. + +In 'A Health to Ane I Loe Dear'--one of his most perfect love-songs--he +says: + + Thou art sweet as the smile when fond lovers meet, + And soft as their parting tear. + + * * * * * + + 'Tis sweeter for thee despairing + Than aught in the world beside. + +In 'My Peggy's Charms,' describing Miss Margaret Chalmers, Burns confines +himself mainly to her mental and spiritual charms. This was clearly a +distinctive characteristic of nearly the whole of his love-songs. No other +man ever wrote so many pure songs without suggestion of the flesh as did +Robert Burns. + + My Peggy's face, my Peggy's form, + The frost of hermit age might warm; + My Peggy's worth, my Peggy's mind, + Might charm the first of human kind. + + I love my Peggy's angel air, + Her face so truly, heavenly fair. + Her native grace, so void of art; + But I adore my Peggy's heart. + + The tender thrill, the pitying tear, + The generous purpose, nobly dear; + The gentle look that rage disarms-- + These are all immortal charms. + +In his 'Epistle to Davie--A Brother Poet' Burns, after detailing the many +hardships and sorrows of the poor, forgets the hardships, and recalls his +blessings: + + There's a' the pleasures o' the heart, + The lover and the frien'; + Ye hae your Meg, your dearest part, + And I my darling Jean. + + It warms me, it charms me, + To mention but her name; + It heats me, it beets me, kindles + And sets me a' on flame. + + O all ye powers who rule above! + O Thou whose very self art love! + Thou know'st my words sincere! + The life-blood streaming through my heart, + Or my more dear immortal part + Is not more fondly dear! + When heart-corroding care and grief + Deprive my soul of rest, + Her dear idea brings relief + And solace to my breast. + Thou Being, All-Seeing, + O hear my fervent prayer; + Still take her, and make her + Thy most peculiar care. + +Three years after the death of Highland Mary, Burns remained out in the +stackyard on Ellisland farm and composed 'To Mary in Heaven.' Nothing +could more strikingly prove the sincerity, the permanence, the purity, and +the sacredness of the white-souled love of Burns than this poem: + + Thou ling'ring star, with less'ning ray, + That lov'st to greet the early morn, + Again thou usher'st in the day + My Mary from my soul was torn. + O Mary! dear departed shade! + Where is thy place of blissful rest? + See'st thou thy lover lowly laid? + Hear'st thou the groans that rend his breast? + + That sacred hour can I forget? + Can I forget that hallow'd grove + Where, by the winding Ayr, we met + To live one day of parting love? + Eternity can not efface + Those records dear of transports past; + Thy image at our last embrace; + Ah! little thought we 'twas our last! + + Ayr, gurgling, kiss'd his pebbled shore, + O'erhung with wild-woods, thickening green; + The fragrant birch and hawthorn hoar + Twined amorous round the raptured scene: + The flowers sprang wanton to be prest, + The birds sang love on every spray; + Till too, too soon, the glowing west, + Proclaimed the speed of winged day. + + Still o'er these scenes my mem'ry wakes, + And fondly broods with miser-care; + Time but th' impression stronger makes, + As streams their channels deeper wear. + My Mary, dear departed shade! + Where is thy place of blissful rest? + See'st thou thy lover lowly laid? + Hear'st thou the groans that rend his breast? + +The general themes of this sacred poem, written three years after Mary +Campbell's death, are the preponderating themes of his love-songs. No +love-songs ever written have so little of even embracing and kissing as +the love-songs of Burns, except the sonnets of Mrs Browning. + +It is worthy of note that Mary Campbell was not a beauty--her attractions +were kindness, honesty, and unselfishness; yet, though happily married +himself, he loved her, three years after her death, as profoundly as when +they parted on the Fail, more than three years before he wrote the poem. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII. + +BURNS A PHILOSOPHER. + + +The fine training by their father developed the minds of both Robert and +Gilbert Burns as original, independent thinkers, chiefly in regard to +religious, ethical, and social problems. Professor Dugald Stewart, of +Edinburgh University, expressed the opinion that 'the mind of Burns was so +strong and clear that he might have taken high rank as a thinker in any +department of human thought; probably attaining as high rank in any other +department as he achieved as a poet.' The quotations given from his +writings in the preceding pages prove that he was a philosopher of unusual +power in regard to Religion, Democracy, and Brotherhood. + +Lockhart said, speaking of the ranking of Burns as a thinker, compared +with the best trained minds in Edinburgh: 'Even the stateliest of these +philosophers had enough to do to maintain the attitude of equality when +brought into contact with Burns's gigantic understanding.' + +Many of his poems are ornamented and increased in value by flashes of +philosophic thought. His 'Epistle to a Young Friend' is a series of +philosophical statements for human guidance. + + Ye'll find mankind an unco squad, strange + And muckle they may grieve ye, much + + I'll no say men are villains a'; + The real hardened wicked, + Wha hae nae check but human law, + Are to a few restricket; restricted + + But, och! mankind are unco weak, very + An' little to be trusted; + If self the wavering balance shake + It's rarely right adjusted. + +He takes a kindly view, that men as a whole are not so bad as pessimists +would have us believe; that there are comparatively few that have no +respect for the Divine Law, and are kept in check only by the fear of +human law; but mourns because most men yet think more of self than of +their neighbours, to whom they may be of service, and sees that, where our +relations with our fellow-men are not satisfactorily balanced, the +destroyer of harmony is universally selfishness in one form or another. + + The fear o' Hell's a hangman's whip + To haud the wretch in order. + +Even yet this is advanced philosophy, that fear, being a negative motive, +cannot kindle human power or lead men to higher growth. So far as it can +influence the human soul, its effect must be to depress it. Not only the +fear of hell, but fear of anything, is an agency of evil. Some day a +better word than fear will be used to express the proper attitude of human +souls towards God. + + But where you feel your honour grip + Let that aye be your border. + +What you think of yourself matters more to you than what others think of +you. Let honour and conscience be your guide, and go not beyond the limits +they prescribe. Stop at the slightest warning honour gives, + + And resolutely keep its laws, + Uncaring consequences. + +In regard to religious matters, he gave his young friend sage advice: + + The great Creator to revere + Must sure become the creature; + But still the preaching cant forbear, + And ev'n the rigid feature. + +The soul's attitude to the Creator is a determining factor in deciding its +happiness and growth. Reverence should not mean solemnity and awe. +Reverence based on dread blights the soul and dwarfs it. True reverence +reaches its highest when its source is joy; then it becomes productive of +character--constructively transforming character. The formalism of +'preaching cant' robs religion of its natural attractiveness, especially +to younger people; the 'rigid feature' turns those who would enjoy +religion from association with those who claim to be Christians, and yet, +especially when they speak about religion, look like melancholy and +miserable criminals whose final appeal for pardon has been refused. +Burns's philosophy would lift the shadows of frightfulness from religion +and let its joyousness be revealed. + + An Atheist's laugh's a poor exchange + For Deity offended. + + A correspondence fixed wi' heaven + Is sure a noble anchor. + +To Burns, the relationship of the soul to God was of first importance. He +cared little for man's formalisms, but personal connection with a loving +Father he regarded as the supreme source of happiness. Only a reverent +and philosophic mind would think of prayer as 'a correspondence with +heaven.' + +Burns holds a high rank as a profound philosopher of human life, of human +growth, and of human consciousness of the Divine, as the vital centre of +human power. + +Burns was a philosopher in his recognition that productive work is +essential to human happiness and progress. + +In 'The Twa Dogs' he makes Caesar say: + + But human bodies are sic fools, + For a' their colleges and schools, + That when nae real ills perplex them, + They mak enow themselves to vex them; + An' ay the less they hae to sturt them, trouble + In like proportion less will hurt them. + + * * * * * + + But gentleman, and ladies warst, + Wi' ev'n-down want o' wark are curst. + +Burns had real sympathy for the idle rich. He saw that idleness leads to +many evils, and that probably the worst evils, those that produce most +unhappiness, are those that result from neglecting to use, or misusing, +powers that, if wisely used, would produce comfort and happiness for +ourselves as well as for others. He believed that every man and woman +would be happier if engaged in some productive occupation, and that those +who do not use their hands to produce for themselves and their fellows are +'curst wi' want o' wark.' + +This belief is based on an old and very profound philosophy, that is not +even yet understood as widely and as fully as it should be: the philosophy +first expounded by Plato, and afterwards by Goethe and Ruskin, that 'all +evil springs from unused, or misused, good.' Whatever element is highest +in our lives will degrade us most if misused. The best in the lives of the +idle sours and causes deterioration instead of development of character, +and breeds discontent and unhappiness, so that days are 'insipid, dull and +tasteless,' and nights are 'unquiet, lang and restless.' + +Burns showed that he understood this revealing philosophy in 'The Vision.' +In this great poem he assumes that Coila, the genius of Kyle, his native +district in Ayrshire, appeared to him in a vision, and revealed a clear +understanding of the epoch events of his past life and their influence on +his development, and gave him advice to guide him for the future. In one +verse he says: + + I saw thy pulse's maddening play + Wild send thee pleasure's devious way, + Misled by fancy's meteor-ray, + By passion driven; + But yet the light that led astray + Was light from heaven. + +He was attacked and criticised severely for the statement contained in the +last two lines. The statement is but philosophic truth that his critics +did not understand. Fancy and passion are elements of power given from +heaven. Properly used they become important elements in human happiness +and development. Improperly used they produce unhappiness and degradation. + +Burns understood clearly the philosophic basis of modern education, the +importance of developing the individuality, or selfhood, or special power +of each child. The poem he wrote to his friend Robert Graham of Fintry, +beginning: + + When Nature her great masterpiece designed + And framed her last, best work, the human mind, + Her eye intent on all the mazy plan, + She formed of various parts the various man, + +is a philosophical description of how Nature produced various types of +men, giving to each mind special powers and aptitudes. The thought of the +poem is the basis of all modern educational thought: the value of the +individuality of each child, and the importance of developing it. + +He expresses very beautifully the philosophy of the ephemeral nature of +certain forms of pleasure in eight lines of 'Tam o' Shanter': + + But pleasures are like poppies spread, + You seize the flower, its bloom is shed; + Or as the snowfall in the river, + A moment white, then melts forever; + Or like the borealis race, + That flit e'er you can point their place; + Or like the rainbow's lovely form, + Evanishing amid the storm. + +Burns understood the philosophy of the simple life in the development of +character and happiness. + +In 'The Cotter's Saturday Night,' after dilating on the glories of simple, +reverent religion, as compared with 'Religion's Pride,' + + In all the pomp of method and of art, + When men display to congregations wide + Devotion's every grace except the heart, + +he prays for the young people of Scotland-- + + Long may thy hardy sons of rustic toil + Be blest with health, and peace, and sweet content; + And O! may Heaven their simple lives prevent + From luxury's contagion, weak and vile! + Then, howe'er crowns and coronets be rent, + A virtuous populace may rise the while, + And stand a wall of fire around their much-loved isle. + +He understood the value of simplicity in life as well as in religion, and +expressed it in admirable form. + +'The Address to the Unco Guid' has a kindly philosophic sympathy running +like a stream of light through it; the profound sympathy of the Master who +searched for the one stray lamb, and who suggested that he who was without +sin should cast the first stone. The last verse especially contains a +sublime human philosophy, that if studied till understood, and then +practised, would work a greatly needed change in the attitude of the rest +of humanity towards the so-called wayward. It is one of the strange +anomalies of life that, generally, professing Christian women have in the +past been the last to come with Christian sympathy of an affectionate, and +sisterly, and respectful quality to take an erring sister in their arms to +try to prove that she still possessed their esteem, and to rekindle faith +in her heart. + +His poem to Mrs Dunlop on 'New Year's Day, 1790;' 'A Man's a Man for a' +That;' 'A Winter Night;' 'Sketch in Verse;' and 'Verses written in +Friar's Carse Hermitage,' all show him to have been a philosophic student +of human nature. + +A few quotations from letters to his friends will show his philosophical +attitude to general matters, as the quotations from his letters showed the +clearness and trueness of his philosophy regarding religion, democracy, +and brotherhood. + +Burns saw man's duty to his fellows and to himself in this life. + +In a letter to Robert Ainslie, Edinburgh, 1788, he wrote: 'I have no +objection to prefer prodigality to avarice, in some few instances; but I +appeal to your observation, if you have not met, and often met, with the +same disingenuousness, the same hollow-hearted insincerity, and +disintegrative depravity of principle, in the hackneyed victims of +profusion, as in the unfeeling children of parsimony. I have every +possible reverence for the much-talked-of world beyond the grave, and I +wish that which piety believes, and virtue deserves, may be all matter of +fact. But in all things belonging to, and terminating in, the present +scene of existence, man has serious business on hand. Whether a man shall +shake hands with welcome in the distinguished elevation of respect, or +shrink from contempt in the abject corner of insignificance; whether he +shall wanton under the tropic of plenty, or at least enjoy himself in the +comfortable latitudes of easy convenience, or starve in the arctic circle +of poverty; whether he shall rise in the manly consciousness of a +self-approving mind, or sink beneath a galling load of regret and +remorse--these are alternatives of the last moment.' + +Since the time of Burns men and women, both in the churches and out of +them, have learned to set more store on the importance of living truly on +the earth, and have ceased to a large extent to think only of a life to +come after death. Men and women are now trying in increasing numbers to +make it more heavenly here. + +Burns taught a sound philosophy of contentment as a basis for happiness. + +He wrote to Mr Ainslie in 1789: 'You need not doubt that I find several +very unpleasant and disagreeable circumstances in my business [that of a +gauger], but I am tired with and disgusted at the language of complaint at +the evils of life. Human existence in the most favourable situations does +not abound with pleasures, and has its inconveniences and ills; +capricious, foolish man mistakes these inconveniences and ills, as if they +were the peculiar property of his own particular situation; and hence +that eternal fickleness, that love of change, which has ruined, and daily +does ruin, many a fine fellow, as well as many a blockhead; and is almost +without exception a constant source of disappointment and misery. So far +from being dissatisfied with my present lot, I earnestly pray the Great +Disposer of events that it may never be worse, and I think I can lay my +hand on my heart and say "I shall be content."' + +Good, sound philosophy of contentment! Not the contentment that does not +try to improve life's conditions, but the wise contentment that recognises +the best in present conditions, instead of foolishly resenting what it +cannot change. + +Burns taught the philosophy of good citizenship. + +In 1789 he wrote to Mr Ainslie: 'If the relations we stand in to King, +country, kindred, and friends be anything but the visionary fancies of +dreaming metaphysicians; if religion, virtue, magnanimity, generosity, +humanity, and justice be aught but empty sounds; then the man who may be +said to live only for others, for the beloved, honourable female whose +tender, faithful embrace endears life, and for the helpless little +innocents who are to be the men and women, the worshippers of his God, +the subjects of his King, and the support, nay the very vital existence, +of his country in the ensuing age, is the type of truest manhood.' + +This quotation from a letter written to a warm, personal friend from whom +he was not seeking any favours gives an insight into a rational mind loyal +to God, loyal to his king, loyal to his country, and lovingly loyal to his +wife and family. + +In a letter to the Right Rev. Dr Geddes, a Roman Catholic Bishop resident +in Edinburgh, a very kind friend to Burns, he wrote, 1789: 'I am conscious +that wherever I am, you do me the honour to interest yourself in my +welfare. It gives me pleasure to inform you that I am here at last [at +Ellisland], stationary in the serious business of life, and have now not +only the retired leisure, but the hearty inclination to attend to those +great and important questions: What I am? Where I am? For what I am +destined? Thus with a rational aim and method in life, you may easily +guess, my reverend and much honoured friend, that my characteristical +trade is not forgotten; I am, if possible, more than ever an enthusiast to +the Muses. I am determined to study Man and Nature, and in that view, +incessantly to try if the ripening and corrections of years can enable me +to produce something worth preserving.' + +Bishop Gillis, a Roman Catholic Bishop who lived more than sixty years +after the death of Burns, said, in reference to the letter from which this +quotation was made: 'If any man, after perusing this letter, will still +say that the mind of Burns was beyond the reach of religious influence, +or, in other words, that he was a scoffer at revelation, that man need not +be reasoned with, as his own mind must be hopelessly beyond the reach of +argument.' + +In a letter to his friend Cunningham he wrote, 1789: 'What strange beings +we are! Since we have a portion of conscious existence equally capable of +enjoying pleasure, happiness, and rapture, or of suffering pain, +wretchedness, and misery, it is surely worthy of inquiry whether there be +not such a thing as a science of life; whether method, economy, and +fertility of expedients be not applicable to enjoyment, and whether there +be not a want of dexterity in pleasure which renders our little scantling +of happiness still less; and a profuseness and intoxication in bliss which +leads to satiety, disgust, and self-abhorrence. + +'There is not a doubt but that health, talents, character, decent +competency, respectable friends, are real, substantial blessings; and yet +do we not daily see those who enjoy many, or all, of these good things, +and _notwithstanding_ contrive to be as unhappy as others to whose lot few +of them have fallen? I believe one great source of this mistake or +misconduct is owing to a certain stimulus, with us called ambition, which +goads us up the hill of life--not as we ascend other eminences, for the +laudable curiosity of viewing an extended landscape, but rather for the +dishonest pride of looking down on others of our fellow-creatures, +seemingly diminutive in other stations, &c.' + +His philosophy clearly recognised the evils of unduly centring our minds +and hearts on pleasure, and thus not only robbing ourselves of +development, and humanity of the advantage of the many things we might do +in our overtime devoted to pleasure, but destroying our interest in the +things that were intended to give us happiness. + +He also recognised fully the evils of selfish ambition which aims at +attaining higher positions than others; which climbs, not to get into +purer air to see more widely our true relationships to our fellow-men, but +for the degrading satisfaction of being able to look down with a +hardening pride that separates humanity into groups instead of uniting all +men in brotherhood. A man whose heart and mind are engrossed by base +material aims cannot grow truly, and he loses the advantages that should +have come to him from the elements of blessing he possesses by misusing +them for selfish ends. + +In another letter he wrote: 'All my fears and cares are of this world; if +there is another, an honest man has nothing to fear from it. I hate a man +that wishes to be a Deist; but, I fear, every fair, unprejudiced inquirer +must in some degree be a sceptic. It is not that there are any very +staggering arguments against the immortality of man, but, like +electricity, phlogiston, &c., the subject is so involved in darkness that +we want data to go upon.' + +His philosophy left him no fears for what comes after death. He had deep +faith in the justice of God. 'I believe,' he said, 'that God perfectly +understands the being He has made.' Believing this, and believing also +that God is just, he feared not the future. Burns, as he said to Mrs +Dunlop, was 'in his idle moments sometimes a little sceptical.' But they +were only moments. He knew there were problems he could not solve, and so, +as he wrote to Dr Candlish, 'he was glad to grasp revealed religion.' A +thoughtful man requires more faith in revealed religion than a man who +does not really think, but only thinks he is thinking, when other people's +thoughts are running through his head. Burns needed strong faith, and he +had it even about religious matters he could not explain. 'The necessities +of my own heart,' as he wrote to Mrs Dunlop, 'gave the lie to my cold +philosophisings.' His 'Ode to Mrs Dunlop on New Year's Day, 1790,' said: + + The voice of Nature loudly cries, + And many a message from the skies, + That something in us never dies. + +He accepted by faith the 'messages from the skies,' and in his soul +harmonised the messages with the 'Voice of Nature,' even though his +philosophic mind searched for proof of problems he could not solve. + +In a letter to Peter Hill, 1790, he wrote: 'Mankind are by nature +benevolent creatures, except in a few scoundrelly instances. I do not +think that avarice for the good things we chance to have is born with us; +but we are placed here among so much nakedness and hunger and poverty and +want, that we are under a damning necessity of studying selfishness in +order that we may EXIST. Still there are in every age a few souls that all +the wants and woes of life cannot debase into selfishness, or even give +the necessary alloy of caution and prudence. If ever I am in danger of +vanity, it is when I contemplate myself on this side of my disposition and +character. God knows I am no saint; I have a whole host of follies and +sins to answer for, but if I could (and I believe I do, as far as I can), +I would 'wipe away all tears from all eyes.' + +Burns was not self-righteous. He moralises in this quotation not as one of +the 'unco guid,' but as a man on what he thought was one of life's most +perplexing problems, poverty. He saw the problem more keenly than most men +see it yet. It was not the poverty of Burns himself that, as Carlyle +believed, made him write and work for freedom and justice for the +labouring-classes. It is quite true, however, that one of his reasons for +pleading for democracy was the poverty among the peasantry of his time. He +saw the injustice of conditions, and admitted in his poem to Davie, a +brother poet, that + + It's hardly in a body's power + To keep at times from being sour, + To see how things are shared. + +Burns recommended the philosophy of right, not expediency in public as +well as private matters. + +He wrote a letter to Mrs Dunlop in 1790, in which he said: 'I believe, in +my conscience, such ideas as, "my country; her independence; her honour; +the illustrious names that mark the history of my native land," &c.--I +believe these, among your _men of the world_; men who, in fact, guide, for +the most part, and govern our world, are looked on as so many +modifications of wrong-headedness. They knew the use of bawling out such +terms to rouse or lead the Rabble; but for their own private use, with +almost all the _able statesmen_ that ever existed, or now exist, when they +talk of right and wrong, they only mean proper and improper; and their +measure of conduct is not what they ought, but _what they dare_. For the +truth of this, I shall not ransack the history of nations, but appeal to +one of the ablest judges of men, and himself one of the ablest men that +ever lived--the celebrated Earl of Chesterfield. In fact a man that could +thoroughly control his vices, whenever they interfered with his interest, +and who could completely put on the appearance of every virtue as often as +it suited his purposes, is, on the Stanhopian plan, _the perfect man_, a +man to lead nations. But are great abilities, complete without a flaw, and +polished without a blemish, the standard of human excellence? This is +certainly not the staunch opinion of _men of the world_; but I call on +honour, virtue, and worth to give the Stygian doctrine a loud negative! +However, this must be allowed, that, if you abstract from man the idea of +an existence beyond the grave, then the true measure of human conduct is +_proper and improper_; virtue and vice, as dispositions of the heart, are, +in that case, of scarcely the same import and value to the world at large +as harmony and discord in the modifications of sound; and a delicate sense +of honour, like a nice ear for music, though it may sometimes give the +possessor an ecstasy unknown to the coarser organs of the herd, yet, +considering the harsh gratings and inharmonic jars in this ill-tuned state +of being, it is odds but the individual would be as happy, and certainly +would be as much respected by the true judges of society, as it would then +stand, without either a good ear or a good heart.... + +'Mackenzie has been called "the Addison of the Scots," and, in my opinion, +Addison would not be hurt at the comparison. If he has not Addison's +exquisite humour, he as certainly outdoes him in the tender and the +pathetic. His _Man of Feeling_--but I am not counsel-learned in the laws +of criticism--I estimate as the first performance of the kind I ever saw. +From what book, moral or even pious, will the susceptible young mind +receive impressions more congenial to humanity and kindness, generosity +and benevolence--in short, more of all that ennobles the soul to herself, +or endears her to others, than from the simple, affecting tale of poor +Harley? + +'Still, with all my admiration of Mackenzie's writings, I do not know if +they are the fittest reading for a young man who is about to set out, as +the phrase is, to make his way into life. Do you not think, Madam, that +among the few favoured of heaven in the structure of their minds (for such +there certainly are) there may be a purity, a tenderness, a dignity, and +elegance of soul, which are of no use, nay, in some degree absolutely +disqualifying, for the truly important business of making a man's way into +life?' + +Burns understood the underlying philosophy of sensitiveness. + +In a letter to Miss Craik, 1790, he wrote: 'There is not among the +martyrologies ever penned so rueful a narrative as the lives of the poets. +In the comparative view of wretches, the criterion is not what they are +doomed to suffer, but how they are formed to bear. Take a being of our +kind, give him a stronger imagination and a more delicate sensibility, +which between them will ever engender a more ungovernable set of passions +than are the usual lot of man; implant in him an irresistible impulse to +some idle vagary, such as arranging wild flowers in fantastical nosegays, +tracing the grasshopper to his haunt by his chirping song, watching the +frisks of the little minnows in the sunny pool, or hunting after the +intrigues of wanton butterflies--in short, send him adrift after some +pursuit which shall eternally mislead him from the paths of lucre, and yet +curse him with a keener relish than any man living for the pleasures that +lucre can purchase; lastly, fill up the measure of his woes by bestowing +on him a spurning sense of his own dignity, and you have created a wight +nearly as miserable as a poet. To you, Madam, I need not recount the fairy +pleasures the Muse bestows to counterbalance this catalogue of evils. +Bewitching poesy is like bewitching woman: she has in all ages been +accused of misleading mankind from the counsels of wisdom and the paths of +prudence, involving them in difficulties, baiting them with poverty, +branding them with infamy, and plunging them in the whirling vortex of +ruin; yet, where is the man but must own that all our happiness on earth +is not worth the name--that even the holy hermit's solitary prospect of +paradisaical bliss is but the glitter of a northern sun rising over a +frozen region, compared with the many pleasures, the nameless raptures +that we owe to the lovely Queen of the heart of Man!' + +He based the last two lines in his 'Poem on Sensibility' on this +philosophy: + + Chords that vibrate sweetest pleasure, + Thrill the deepest notes of woe. + +His 'Parting Song to Clarinda' reveals in the four lines, said by Sir +Walter Scott 'to contain the essence of a thousand love-tales,' how +deepest love may bring darkest sorrow: + + Had we never loved sae kindly, + Had we never loved sae blindly, + Never met--or never parted, + We had ne'er been broken-hearted. + +In a letter to Crawford Tait, Esq., Edinburgh, 1790, requesting a +sympathetic interest on behalf of a young man from Ayrshire, he says: 'I +shall give you my friend's character in two words: as to his head, he has +talents enough, and more than enough, for common life; as to his heart, +when Nature had kneaded the kindly clay that composes it, she said, "I can +no more." + +'You, my good Sir, were born under kinder stars; but your fraternal +sympathy, I well know, can enter into the feelings of the young man who +goes into life with the laudable ambition to _do_ something, and to _be_ +something among his fellow-creatures; but whom the consciousness of +friendless obscurity presses to the earth, and wounds to the soul! + +'Even the fairest of his virtues are against him. That independent spirit, +and that ingenuous modesty--qualities inseparable from a noble mind--are, +with the million, circumstances not a little disqualifying. What pleasure +is in the power of the fortunate and the happy, by their notice and +patronage, to brighten the countenance and glad the heart of such +depressed youth! I am not so angry with mankind for their deaf economy of +the purse--the goods of this world cannot be divided without being +lessened--but why be a niggard of that which bestows bliss on a +fellow-creature, yet takes nothing from our own means of enjoyment? We +wrap ourselves up in the cloak of our better-fortune and turn away our +eyes, lest the wants and woes of our brother-mortals should disturb the +selfish apathy of our souls.' + +Burns was a deep character student, and he was able to adjust the balance +fairly when weighing the characteristics that count for success in public +life, in business, and in private life. He always recommended honesty, and +always admired that independent spirit and that ingenuous modesty +inseparable from a noble mind. Much as he admired them, however, he +clearly understood that these admirable qualities might prevent the +perfect development of a soul if they made a man morbidly sensitive, or +interfered in any way with his faith in himself. + +Speaking of 'independence and sensibility,' the same qualities he +discussed in the letter quoted (to Mr Crawford Tait), he says in a letter +to Peter Hill, Edinburgh, 1791, addressing poverty: 'By thee the man of +sentiment, whose heart flows with independence, and melts with +sensibility, inly pines under the neglect or writhes in bitterness of soul +under the contumely of arrogant, unfeeling wealth.' + +Burns taught the just philosophy of gratitude to God. + +In a letter to Dr Moore, of London, he wrote, 1791: 'Whatsoever is not +detrimental to society, and is of positive enjoyment, is of God, the +Giver of all good things, and ought to be received and enjoyed by His +creatures with thankful delight.' + +We cannot yet estimate the philosophic vision of Burns. It will grow +clearer as century follows century. Carlyle said of him: 'We see that in +this man was the gentleness, the trembling pity of a woman, with the deep +earnestness, the force, and passionate ardour of a hero. Tears lie in him, +and a consuming fire, as lightning lurks in the drop of the summer +clouds.' + +So much for his heart; what says Carlyle about his mind? + +'Burns never studied philosophy.... Nevertheless, sufficient indication, +if no proof sufficient, remains for us in his works; we discern the brawny +movements of a gigantic though untutored strength; and can understand how, +in conversation, his quick, sure insight into men and things may, as aught +else about him, have amazed the best thinkers of his time and country. + +'But, unless we mistake, the intellectual gift of Burns is fine as well as +strong. The more delicate relations of things could not well have escaped +his eye, for they were intimately present to his heart. The logic of the +senate and the forum is indispensable, but not all-sufficient; nay, +perhaps the highest truth is that which will most certainly elude it, for +this logic works by words, and "the highest," it has been said, "cannot be +expressed in words." We are not without tokens of an openness for this +higher truth also, a keen though uncultivated sense for it having existed +in Burns. Mr Stewart, it will be remembered, wondered that Burns had +formed some distinct conception of the doctrine of Association. We rather +think that far subtler things than the doctrine of Association had from of +old been familiar to him.' + +Carlyle's last statement is correct. He admits the great essential truth +that Burns was a subtle philosopher. What a pity that such a man as +Carlyle should have thought it necessary to say that Burns 'never studied +philosophy.' The statement is incorrect, but, if it had been correct, why +make it? and why call his mental strength 'untutored,' and his 'keen sense +of the highest philosophy' 'uncultivated'? + +Did any other philosopher of the time of Burns in the universities reveal +a more profound philosophy of human life, and make so many applications of +it, as Robert Burns revealed in the quotations in this chapter, and in +the chapters on Democracy, Brotherhood, and Love? + +Burns was a philosopher, an independent thinker, whose thought is more +highly appreciated now than it was in the time of Carlyle. + +In a letter to Mrs Graham, 1791, he wrote: 'I was born a poor dog; and +however I may occasionally pick a better bone than I used to do, I know I +must live and die poor. But I will indulge the flattering faith that my +poetry will considerably outlive my poverty; and without any fustian +affectation of spirit, I can promise and affirm that it must be no +ordinary craving of the latter that shall ever make me do anything +injurious to the honest fame of the former. Whatever may be my +failings--for failings are a part of human nature--may they ever be those +of a generous heart and an independent mind.' + +Speaking of the moral character of Burns, Carlyle is wise and just. He +says: 'We are far from regarding him as guilty before the world, as +guiltier than the average; nay, from doubting that he is less guilty than +one of ten thousand tried at a tribunal far more rigid than that where the +Plebiscite of common civic reputations are pronounced, he has seemed to us +less worthy of blame than of pity and wonder. But the world is habitually +unjust in its judgments of such men; unjust on many grounds, of which +this one may be stated as the substance; it decides, like a court of law, +by dead statutes; and not positively, but negatively, less on what is done +right than on what is or is not done wrong.... What Burns did under his +circumstances, and what he forbore to do, alike fill us with astonishment +at the natural strength and worth of his character.' + +Burns was naturally a student gifted with a great mind. His splendid mind +was trained to act logically by his remarkable father, and quickened and +illuminated by his great teacher John Murdoch. He was a great philosopher, +not merely because he read Locke's 'Essay on the Human Understanding' when +a boy, but because during his short life he read with joyous interest many +books of a philosophical character, and what is of infinitely greater +importance, he interpreted all he read with an independent mind, and +related all truth as he understood it to human life. He could discuss even +the principles of Spinoza, and 'venture into the daring path Spinoza +trod.' Yet, as he told Dr Candlish, of Edinburgh, he merely 'ventured in' +to test Spinoza's philosophy, which he soon found to be inadequate to the +true development of the human soul, and therefore he 'was glad to grasp +revealed religion.' Not merely as a great poetic genius, but as a profound +philosophic teacher of religion, democracy, and brotherhood--the most +essentially vital elements related to the highest development of the souls +of men and women--will the real Robert Burns become known as he is more +justly and more deeply studied. + + + + +CHAPTER IX. + +THE DEVELOPMENT OF BURNS. + + +BORN 1759--DIED 1796. + +_6 Years Old._ + +At six years of age he was sent to a school in a little home near Alloway +Mill for a few months. Then the school was closed, and William Burns, his +father, and a few neighbours engaged a remarkably fine teacher named John +Murdoch to teach their children. + + +_7 Years Old._ + +When Burns was seven years old his father moved to Mount Oliphant farm, +about two miles from Alloway. Robert continued to attend Murdoch's school. + + +_8 Years Old._ + +He continued to attend Murdoch's school. + + +_9 Years Old._ + +Murdoch, his beloved teacher, left Alloway. He had not only been the +teacher of Burns, but had lent the boy books, among them being _The Life +of Hannibal_. Burns said this book 'was the earliest I recollect taking +any pleasure in.' Murdoch presented him with an English grammar and a book +translated from the French, named _The School for Love_. His imagination +during this period was kindled by many legends, ghost stories, tales, and +songs told and sung by an old lady, Betty Davidson, who lived in the +family home. + + +_10 Years Old._ + +Read and studied with his father, discussing freely the merits of the +books read. + + +_11 Years Old._ + +He studied, and continued to study with enthusiasm, English grammar, and +had become an unusually excellent scholar for his age in English. His +father regularly taught his family after Murdoch left Alloway. A deep and +lasting impression was made on Robert's mind during this year by a +_Collection of Letters_, written by the leading authors of Queen Anne's +reign. + + +_12 Years Old._ + +Worked on the farm, and read with his father at night. Wrote many letters +to imaginary correspondents. + + +_13 Years Old._ + +He was sent for a few weeks to a school in Dalrymple to learn penmanship. +John Murdoch was appointed teacher in the High School at Ayr. He became +again a visitor to the Burns' home, in which he was a most welcome guest. +He presented Pope's works to Robert. During this year Burns continued an +imaginary correspondence with many people, and began to form a style +moulded by the Letters of the great prose-writers of Queen Anne's time. + + +_14 Years Old._ + +Boarded with Murdoch in Ayr for a few weeks, to devote himself to a deeper +study of English. Studied French a little, and gave a little attention to +Latin. The best influence of his brief period with Murdoch was the +kindling of his vision with higher ideals of life, his relationship to his +fellow-men, and his duty to God. + + +_15 Years Old._ + +Began to take his place as an independent thinker with men, and surprised +them by his wide knowledge and his unusual powers of expression and +impression. Took his share in reaping the grain on the farm, and fell in +love with his harvest mate, Nellie Kirkpatrick, who bound and shocked, or +stooked, what he reaped. She was a good-looking girl of fourteen, who sang +well. Burns said her love made him a poet. He composed his first poem, +'Handsome Nell,' as a tribute to her. His love for her undoubtedly kindled +him at the centre of his power, as a true love that is respectfully +treated by parents always does for a youth during the adolescent period. + + +_16 Years Old._ + +He laboured hard on the farm, but was worried by his father's poverty, by +the poorness of the soil of Mount Oliphant farm, and especially by the +harsh and over-bearing manner in which his father was treated by the +landlord's agent. Hard labour and possibly insufficient nourishment for a +youth growing rapidly, coupled with his humiliation at the conduct of the +agent, and his sorrowful sympathy, affected his health. He became +depressed and moody, and suffered from headaches and palpitation of the +heart. He had become acquainted with a few respectable women in Ayr, one +of whom lent him the _Spectator_ and Pope's _Homer_. These he read and +digested with a growing interest, and used with rapidly developing power. + + +_17 Years Old._ + +Was sent to the school of Hugh Rodger at Kirkoswald to learn mathematics, +especially mensuration and surveying. He enjoyed the work and made rapid +progress. He formed a friendship with William Niven, who went to the same +school; and in order to develop his powers as an independent thinker and a +public speaker, he and Willie organised a debating society of two, which +met in formal debate once a week. This developed his intellectual powers +more than the study of mathematics. His school-days in Kirkoswald came to +a sudden ending when he met Peggy Thomson, who lived next to the school. +His second adolescent love came unexpectedly, and with great force. He +says Peggy Thomson's charms 'Overset his trigonometry, and set him off at +a tangent from his studies.' He tried to study, but at the end of the week +gave it all up and went home. + +His schoolmaster learned about the debates between him and Willie Niven, +and determined to put an end to such waste of time from the study of +mathematics. He charged Niven one day with the crime of debating, and +demanded the subject for the next debate. Willie told him the subject for +to-morrow was, 'Resolved that a great general is of more use to the world +than a good merchant.' 'Nonsense,' thundered the teacher; 'everybody ought +to know that a general is of far more importance to the world than a +merchant.' Burns promptly said to the teacher, 'You take the general's +side, and I will take the merchant's side, and let us see.' + +Burns spoke with such wide information, such fine reasoning and such +splendid eloquence, that he soon had the boys cheering him wildly. This +annoyed the master, and he became so angry that he dismissed the school +for the day. + +Even at the early age of seventeen he had few rivals as a public speaker +and debater. He took lessons in a dancing-school at Tarbolton, when he +returned from Kirkoswald, to improve his social manners. During this year +he read Thomson's works, Shenstone's works, a _Select Collection of +English Songs_, Allan Ramsay's works, Hervey's _Meditations_, and some of +Shakespeare's plays. + + +_18 Years Old._ + +The family moved to Lochlea farm, about four miles from Mauchline. Up to +this time he had been an awkward and bashful youth. He began now to be +more at ease with the opposite sex after he had been introduced to them. +He had no real lover, however, between 17 and 21. + + +_19 Years Old._ + +About this time he made a plan for a tragedy. He never finished it, and +preserved only a fragment, beginning, 'All devil as I am.' + + +_20 Years Old._ + +A year of work, reading, and visions that were but the bases of higher +visions yet to come. + + +_21 Years Old._ + +He, with his brother Gilbert and five other young men, founded a debating +club in an upstairs room of a private house in Tarbolton. He read +persistently; held a book in his left hand at meals; and usually carried a +book with him while walking. About this time he began to be known as a +critic of the preaching and practices of the 'Auld Licht' preachers, and +enjoyed shocking those who were, in his judgment, not vital, but only +professing, Christians, who did nothing to prove the genuineness of their +religion. In this year his heart was kindled by the first love of his +manhood. + + +_22 Years Old._ + +He read Sterne's works, Macpherson's Ossian, and Mackenzie's _The Man of +the World_ and _Man of Feeling_. He said 'he valued the last book more +than any other book, except the Bible.' His mind turned to religious +subjects very definitely at this period. He developed a deep and reverent +affection for Alison Begbie, who was a servant on a farm not far from +Lochlea farm. The farm was on Cessnock Water. He wrote three poems to her: +'The Lass of Cessnock Banks,' 'Peggy Alison,' and 'Mary Morrison.' His +letters to her reveal the two great dominant elements in his mind and +heart at that time: a deep and respectful love, and some of the highest +ideals of vital religion. + +In this year love again stirred him to write poetry. He said it became 'a +darling walk for his mind.' 'Winter--a Dirge' belongs to this period. + + +_23 Years Old._ + +This was an eventful year. Alison Begbie had declined his offer of +marriage. Had she married him and lived he would have had but one love +after maturity. He ventured into business in Irvine. He says his partner +'was a scoundrel of the first water, who made money by the mystery of +thieving.' Their shop was burned, and he found himself not worth a +sixpence. He read two novels, _Pamela_, and _Ferdinand, Count Fathom_, and +_Fergusson's Poems_, which filled him with a deeper determination to write +poetry. He wrote several religious poems this year. + + +_24 Years Old._ + +He became a Freemason in Tarbolton, and devoted a good deal of time to the +order. He did not write much poetry. His mind was occupied by religious +matters, and he had an impression that his life was not going to last very +long. This idea haunted him for two or three years after his maturity. He +contemplated death as a rest, but he continued to store his mind and think +independently. Dr Mackenzie, who attended his father on his death-bed +towards the end of the year, wrote, 'that on his first visit he found +Gilbert and his father friendly and cordial, but Robert silent and +uncompanionable, till he began discussing a medical subject, when Robert +promptly joined in the discussion, and showed an unexpected and remarkable +understanding of the subject.' During this year he wrote 'My Father was a +Farmer' and 'The Death and Dying Words of Poor Mailie.' + + +_25 Years Old._ + +His father died in February, leaving the family very poor. Robert and +Gilbert rented Mossgiel farm, about two miles from Mauchline, and the +family moved there. Robert determined to be a scientific farmer. He read +the best books he could get on agriculture; but bad seed, bad weather, and +late harvest left the brothers only half an average crop. He continued to +work on the farm, but evidently began to realise more clearly the kindling +call to poetry as the special work of his life. During the next twelve +years he produced a continuous out-pouring of wonderful poems, although +about half of the twelve years he worked as a farmer on Mossgiel and +Ellisland farms, and most of the rest of the time worked hard as a gauger, +riding two hundred miles each week in the performance of his duties. In +this year he wrote 'The Rigs of Barley,' composed in August; 'My Nannie +O,' 'Green Grow the Rashes,' 'Man was Made to Mourn,' 'The Twa Herds,' and +the 'Epitaph on My Ever Honoured Father.' In this year he met Jean +Armour, and soon loved her. + + +_26 Years Old._ + +He wrote many poems during this year, the most important being 'Epistle to +Davie, a Brother Poet,' 'Holy Willie's Prayer,' 'Death and Doctor +Hornbook,' three long 'Epistles to John Lapraik,' 'Epistle to William +Simpson,' 'Epistle to John Goldie,' 'Rantin', Rovin' Robin,' 'Epistle to +Rev. John M'Math,' 'Second Epistle to Davie,' 'Farewell to Ballochmyle,' +'Hallowe'en,' 'To a Mouse,' 'The Jolly Beggars,' 'The Cotter's Saturday +Night,' 'Address to the Deil,' and 'The Auld Farmer's New-Year Morning +Salutation to his Auld Mare Maggie.' + + +_27 Years Old._ + +This was an eventful and productive year for Burns. Quickly following each +other came 'The Twa Dogs,' 'The Author's Earnest Cry and Prayer,' 'The +Ordination,' 'Epistle to James Smith,' 'The Vision,' 'Address to the Unco +Guid,' 'The Holy Fair,' 'To a Mountain Daisy,' 'To Ruin,' 'Despondency: an +Ode,' 'Epistle to a Young Friend,' 'Nature's Law,' 'The Brigs of Ayr,' 'O +Thou Dread Power!' 'Farewell Song to the Banks of Ayr,' 'Lines on Meeting +Lord Daer,' 'Masonic Song,' 'Tam Samson's Elegy,' 'A Winter Night,' 'Yon +Wild Mossy Mountains,' 'Address to Edinburgh,' and 'Address to a Haggis,' +with love-songs and many minor pieces. + +Burns had given Jean Armour a certificate of marriage, and he nearly lost +his mental balance when, at her father's order, she consented to have it +burned. Fortunately for him two things aided in preserving his balance: +the publication of the Kilmarnock edition of his poems, and his love for +Mary Campbell, 'Highland Mary.' No man ever needed a love, deep and true, +to save him more than Burns did. He believed Jean was lost to him for +ever. He was not a faithless but a needy lover when he found a responsive +heart in Highland Mary. They made their marriage vows on the Fail, Sunday, +14th May 1786. Mary went home to prepare for marriage, but caught a fever +and died. Burns went to Edinburgh later in the year to publish a second +edition of his poems, as the first edition had been so well received. In +Edinburgh he was the hero of the highest and most thoroughly educated +classes. He wrote several fine poems to Mary Campbell. + + +_28 Years Old._ + +Three thousand copies of his poems were published in April in Edinburgh, +netting him over five hundred pounds. He made two triumphal tours--the +Border Tour and the Highland Tour. As Mary Campbell was dead, his love was +kindled by Clarinda, Mrs M'Lehose, with whom he conducted an intensive +love correspondence, and to whom he wrote several beautiful love-songs. As +she was a married woman who was separated from her husband, Burns could +not marry her. In this year he wrote the 'Inscription for the Headstone of +Fergusson,' 'Epistle to Mrs Scott,' 'The Bonnie Moor Hen,' 'On the Death +of John M'Leod,' 'Elegy on the Death of James Hunter Blair,' 'The Humble +Petition of Bruar Water,' 'Lines on the Fall of Fyers,' 'Castle Gordon,' +'On Scaring Some Waterfowl,' 'A Rosebud by My Early Walk,' 'The Banks of +Devon,' 'The Young Highland Rover,' 'Birthday Ode,' and many short pieces +and love-songs, among them 'The Birks of Aberfeldy.' + + +_29 Years Old._ + +Rented Ellisland farm, on the Nith, near Dumfries. Married Jean Armour +(second marriage to her) in April, and left her in Mauchline till he +could build a home for her on Ellisland, which was ready in December. +Building his new home, stocking and managing the farm, and riding fifty +miles occasionally to his Jean, made his year so busy that he wrote little +poetry, but exquisite love-songs. The estate of Glenriddell, owned in the +time of Burns by Robert Riddell, bordered on Ellisland farm. Robert +Riddell was a fine type of Scottish gentleman, and Burns and he became +warm friends. Among the best poems of this year, not love-songs, are +'Verses written in Friar's Carse Hermitage,' 'Epistle to Robert Graham of +Fintry,' 'The Day Returns,' 'A Mother's Lament,' 'The Fall of the Leaf,' +'Auld Lang Syne,' 'The Poet's Progress,' 'Elegy on the Year 1788,' and +'Epistle to James Tennant.' + + +_30 Years Old._ + +Wrote many love-songs for Johnson's Scots Musical Museum, though busily +engaged in farming, and, in addition, a new Psalm for the Chapel of +Kilmarnock; a sketch in verse to Right Hon. C. J. Fox, 'The Wounded Hare,' +'The Banks of Nith,' 'John Anderson my Joe,' 'The Kirk of Scotland's +Alarm,' 'Caledonia,' 'The Battle of Sherramuir,' 'The Braes o' +Killiecrankie,' 'Farewell to the Highlands,' 'To Mary in Heaven,' 'Epistle +to Dr Blacklock,' and 'New Year's Day, 1790.' + + +_31 Years Old._ + +Found his farm 'a ruinous affair.' Accepted a position as an exciseman at +fifty pounds a year. Had to ride two hundred miles each week. Continued +writing love-songs for Johnson's Museum (without pay), and wrote in +addition, 'Tam o' Shanter,' 'Lament of Mary Queen of Scots,' and 'The +Banks of Doon.' + + +_32 Years Old._ + +Continued to write love-songs, among the most beautiful being 'Sweet +Afton' and 'Parting Song to Clarinda.' In addition, wrote 'Lament for +James, Earl of Glencairn,' 'On Glenriddell's Fox Breaking his Chain,' +'Poem on Pastoral Poetry,' 'Verses on the Destruction of the Woods near +Drumlanrig,' 'Second Epistle to Robert Graham of Fintry,' 'The Song of +Death,' and 'Poem on Sensibility.' + + +_33 Years Old._ + +Wrote many love-songs, among them 'The Lea Rig' and 'Highland Mary.' His +other poems were mainly election ballads. His love-songs were now written +mainly for Thomson's _National Songs and Melodies_. He still refused pay +for his songs. + + +_34 Years Old._ + +Still, notwithstanding his very busy life, he sent a continuous stream of +songs to Edinburgh. Other poems of the year were 'Sonnet Written on the +Author's Birthday,' 'Lord Gregory,' and 'Scots, wha hae wi' Wallace bled.' +In this year he moved to the house in which he died, and in which Jean +died thirty-eight years afterwards. + + +_35 Years Old._ + +In this year Burns, to supplement 'Scots, wha hae' (the greatest +bugle-song of freedom), wrote two grand poems on Liberty: 'The Ode to +Liberty' and 'The Tree of Liberty;' and 'Contented Wi' Little and Cantie +Wi' Mair.' In this year he declined an offer from the London _Morning +Chronicle_ to become a regular contributor to that paper. + + +_36 Years Old._ + +Love-songs, and election ballads in favour of his friend Mr Heron, were +his most numerous poems this year. In addition to other minor pieces he +wrote a fine poem to his friend, Alexander Cunningham, 'Does Haughty Gaul +Invasion Threat,' and the most triumphant combined interpretation of +democracy and brotherhood ever written, 'A Man's a Man for a' That.' + + +_37 Years Old._ + +Early in the year his health gave way, and he died, 21st July 1796. Though +apparently a strong man, it is reasonable to believe that he had a +constitutional tendency towards consumption. His father died from this +dread disease, and his grandmother (his mother's mother) died at +thirty-five from the same cause. Burns inherited his physical and +intellectual powers mainly from his mother. Both by heredity and +contagion, therefore, he was made susceptible to influences that develop +consumption. He continued to write poetry, chiefly love-songs, during his +illness. His last poem was written, nine days before his death, to Miss +Margaret Chalmers, for whom he had a reverent affection. + +No reference has been made in this sketch of his development to the prose +written each year. Five hundred and thirty-four of his letters have been +published. They are written in a stately style, and most of them contain +philosophic discussions of religion, ethics, or democracy. + +A shy, sensitive, retiring boy; a deep-thinking, persistently studying, +eloquent, still shy youth; a brilliant reasoner, a thinker ranking with +leaders in his neighbourhood, meeting each on equal terms, and easily +proving his superiority by his remarkable knowledge of each man's special +subject of study, and by his still more remarkable powers of independent +thinking and clear revelation of his thought in his young manhood, but +still at twenty-two too shy to propose to the first lover of his maturity; +always a reverent lover of Nature, whose mind saw God in beauty, in +dawn-gleam and eve-glow, in tree and flower, in river and mountain; he +studied, thought, and expressed his thoughts in exquisite poetry, and, +according to those who knew him best, in still richer and more captivating +conversation, until at twenty-seven he stood in the midst of the most +learned professors of Scotland and outclassed them all. No single +professor of the galaxy of culture in which he stood, modest and +dignified, could have spoken so wisely, so profoundly, so easily, and +with such graceful manner and charming eloquence on _so many subjects_ as +did Burns. + +It is a marvel that grows greater the more we try to understand it, that a +boy who left school when he was nine years old, and, except for a few +weeks, did not go to school again; and who, from nine years of age to his +thirty-second year, was a steady farm-worker, with the exception of a +brief interval during which he was engaged publishing his poems; and was a +gauger from thirty-two to thirty-six, should have been able to write so +much immortal poetry and so much instructive prose in such a short time. + +One of the most interesting of all the pictures of the lives of the +world's literary leaders is the picture of Robert Burns, after a day of +toil on the farm, walking from Mossgiel farm, when his evening meal was +over, two miles to his favourite seat in the woods on Ballochmyle estate, +and sitting there on the high bank of the Ayr in the long Scottish +gloaming, and often on in the moonlight, 'shut in with God,' revealing in +sublime form the visions that thrilled his soul. During the last few years +of his life he walked from his home to Lincluden Abbey ruins on his +favourite path beside the winding Nith to spend his gloaming hours alone, +and composed there some of his masterpieces. + +Short was his life, but he lives on in the hearts of succeeding +generations. He lives on, too, in his permanent influence on religion, +freedom, and brotherhood. + + +THE END. + + +Edinburgh: Printed by W. & R. Chambers, Limited. + + + + +Footnotes: + +[1] Dr Moore was the father of Sir John Moore, the British general who was +killed at Corunna in the Peninsular War. + +[2] Her name was spelled Alison or Elison. + +[3] One of John Murdoch's quotations used as a headline to be copied in +his copy-book. + +[4] The lovers of Burns afterwards got permission to remove the monument +and remains of Highland Mary to a more suitable location. + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Real Robert Burns, by J. L. 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