Jan 25, 1759 - Jul 21, 1796
a Scottish poet
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The wisest man the warl' e'er saw,<br />He dearly loved the lasses, O.
To see her is to love her,<br />And love but her forever;<br />For nature made her what she is,<br />And never made anither!
Life is but a day at most.
O, Life! how pleasant is thy morning,<br />Young Fancy's rays the hills adorning!<br />Cold pausing Caution's lesson scorning,<br />We frisk away,<br />Like schoolboys, at the expected warning,<br />To joy and play.
O Life! thou art a galling load,<br />Along a rough, a weary road,<br />To wretches such as I!
Affliction's sons are brothers in distress; A brother to relieve, how exquisite the bliss!
The snowdrop and primrose our woodlands adorn, and violets bathe in the wet o' the morn.
The wide world is all before us - but a world without a friend.
Suspicion is a heavy armor and with its weight it impedes more than it protects.
Oh would some power the gift give us,<br />to see ourselves as others see us!
Nae man can tether time or tide; The hour approachesTam maun ride; That hour, o'night's black arch the key-stane, That dreary hourTam mounts his beast in.
And O! be sure to fear the Lord alway, And mind your duty, duly, morn and night; Lest in temptation's path ye gang astray, Implore His counsel and assisting might: They never sought in vain that sought the Lord aright.
Now's the day and now's the hour.
Morality, thou deadly bane,Thy tens o' thousands thou has slain!
Prudent, cautious self-control Is wisdom's root.
Beneath the milk-white thorn that scents the evening gale. <br />from the poem<br />The Cotter's Saturday Night.
When chill November's surly blast make fields and forest bare.
But to see her was to love her, Love but her, and love forever.
Ae fond kiss, and then we sever!A farewell, and then forever!Deep in heart-wrung tears I'll pledge thee,Warring sighs and groans I'll wage thee.Who shall say that Fortune grieves him,While the star of hope she leaves him?Me, nae cheerful twinkle lights me,Dark despair around benights me. - Ae Fond Kiss.
The great Creator to revereMust sure become the creature;But still the preaching cant forbear,And ev'n the rigid feature:Yet ne'er with wits profane to rangeBe complaisance extended;An atheist laugh's a poor exchangeFor deity offended. - Epistle to a Young Friend, An.
O Life! thou art a galling load, Along a rough, a weary road, To wretches such as I.
Man's inhumanity to man Makes countless thousands mourn!
The best-laid schemes o' mice an 'menGang aft agley. - \'To A Mouse\'.
Firmness in enduring and exertion is a character I always wish to possess. I have always despised the whining yelp of complaint and cowardly resolve.
There is no such uncertainty as a sure thing.
Dare to be honest and fear no labor.
Or were I in the wildest waste,<br /> Sae bleak and bare, sae bleak and bare,<br /> The desert were a paradise<br /> If thou wert there, if thou were there.
Green, slender, leaf-clad holly boughs<br /> Were twisted gracefu' round her brows,<br /> I took her for some Scottish Muse,<br /> By that same token,<br /> An' come to stop those reckless vows,<br /> Would soon be broken.
That hour o' night's black arch the keystane.
