Your critic-folk may cock their nose,
And say, 'how can you e'er propose,
You wha ken hardly verse frae prose,
To mak a sang?'

But, by your leave, my learned foes,
Ye're maybe wrang.

What's a' your jargon o' your schools— Your Latin names for horns an' stools? If honest Nature made you fools,

What sairs your grammars? Ye'd better taen up spades and shools, Or knappin-hammers.

A set o' dull, conceited hashes
Confuse their brains in college-classes!
They gang in stirks, and come out asses,
Plain truth to speak;

An' syne they think to climb Parnassus
By dint o' Greek!

Gie me ae spark o' nature's fire,
That's a' the learning I desire;

Then tho' I drudge thro' dub an' mire
At pleugh or cart,

My muse, tho' hamely in attire,

May touch the heart.

Awa' ye selfish, warl'y race,

Wha think that havins, sense, an' grace,

SELECTIONS FROM EPISTLES TO J. LAPRAIK

Ev'n love an' friendship should give place
To catch-the-plack!

I dinna like to see your face,

Nor hear your crack.

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!

'O Thou wha gies us each guid gift!
Gie me o' wit an' sense a lift,

Then turn me, if Thou please adrift,
Thro' Scotland wide;

Wi' cits nor laird I wadna shift,
In a' their pride!'

Were this the charter of our state,
'On pain o' hell be rich an' great,'
Damnation then would be our fate,
Beyond remead;

But, thanks to heaven, that no the gate
We learn our creed.

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.'

O mandate glorious and divine!
The followers o' the ragged nine-
Poor, thoughtless devils-yet may shine
In glorious light;

While sordid sons o' Mammon's line
Are dark as night!

Then may Lapraik and Burns arise,
To reach their native, kindred skies,
And sing their pleasures, hopes an' joys
In some mild sphere;

Still closer knit in friendship's ties,
Each passing year.

PART THREE: POEMS OF DEMOCRACY AND

BROTHERHOOD