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Untitled Article
people in language which all understood . CoiiventicmalitUws were nothing to therfl . They hallowed the loves of the Tillage maiden—asserted the inherent dignity of man ' nature , whether the clay tabernacle was clothed in silk , or woollen , and blessed the poor man ' s heart by exalting his affections . Had the song-singers of Scotland not been poor men singing for poor men—had they bowed their knee in lordly hallsand sung for
, and of the few instead of the many , Scotland had had tio popular national song ; but let us be thankful that her songsingers vrere , for the most part , men born under stern and truth-telling influences , who had to struggle their hour with bold heart and manful hand , until it pleased "The Master" to call them , It is a heart-breaking thing to watch the struggles
Of genius , lowly of lot , and lofty of soul , caged like the bird , and like it beating the bars in bitterness , while longing to soar away into the light and the stiti 9 hine of heaven ; but nevertheless , it may be asserted , that there never was a truly lofty intellect nurtured , unless it had to struggle even as the swimmer for life . Before the snirit can be cleared from the swimmer for life . Before the spirit can be cleared from the
earth ' s impurities , it must be made to feel its nothingness , and to cling only to that which is pure and noble . Pain and want must be smiled over , and while love and hope rejoice in the heart , it must learn to contemn life ' s littlenesses . Something of the spirit of him who trampled on the pride of Plato must live in the soul . The meaner parts of human nature must die , tmt the affections must be nursed and cherished . Because
they led hard and renouncing lives , the songsters of Scotland sung as never men did . They were pure , free-minded men , and their Songs have become their country ' s best inheritance . Gold is but a poor legacy in comparison with an immortal thought . The one is human , worthless , the other divine , invaluable . But it is not by their songs merely that Robert Burns and his brethren , known and unknown , have made
their country and the world better . The fact that such men were of the people ennobles our very nature . Who dare mock me , lowly as I am—for whose mockery shall 1 care when I know that I have " titles manifold , " that Burns was a man even such as I , with hard hands and a peasant ' s heart and
home ? These memories are my inheritance . Aye , and this feeling is spreading , and that wider and wider every day . Many who aforetime would have worshipped wealth , bow to mind , and the soul that rejoiced once in its ingots , looks upward and onward , saying , " I have dreamed !—Why should
I have placed my soul in a coffer , while this glorious world and that sky , and these stars , and suns , and systems , and tha poets' songs , and good men ' s memories were my inheritance- —' my charter of manhood and freedom ? " The dry bones are stirring . The poet ' s song , and the sage ' s musing , are turning souln from world-worship to that nobler and better way whicu
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), April 2, 1836, page 207, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2656/page/15/
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