Life of Robert Burns

Front Cover
W. Stodart, 1831 - 320 pages
 

Selected pages

Other editions - View all

Common terms and phrases

Popular passages

Page 266 - He is a man speaking to men : a man, it is true, endowed with more lively sensibility, more enthusiasm and tenderness, who has a greater knowledge of human nature, and a more comprehensive soul, than are supposed to be common among mankind ; a man pleased with his own passions and volitions, and who rejoices more than other men in the spirit of life that is in him ; delighting to contemplate similar volitions and passions as manifested in the goings-on of the universe, and habitually impelled to...
Page 104 - FLOW gently, sweet Afton, among thy green braes, Flow gently, I'll sing thee a song in thy praise ; My Mary's asleep by thy murmuring stream, Flow gently, sweet Afton, disturb not her dream. Thou stock-dove whose echo resounds thro...
Page 184 - And mony a hill between ; But, 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...
Page 181 - To make a happy fire-side clime To weans and wife, That's the true pathos and sublime Of human life.
Page 196 - I have some favourite flowers in spring, among which are the mountain-daisy, the harebell, the foxglove, the wild-brier rose, the budding birch, and the hoary hawthorn, that I view and hang over with particular delight.
Page 48 - ... backwards and forwards in a moral and religious way. I am quite transported at the thought that ere long, perhaps very soon, I shall bid an eternal adieu to all the pains, and...
Page 121 - I was a lad of fifteen in 1786-7, when he came first to Edinburgh, but had sense and feeling enough to be much interested in his poetry, and would have given the world to know him : but I had very little acquaintance with any literary people, and still less with the gentry of the west country, the two sets that he most frequented. Mr. Thomas Grierson was at that time a clerk of my father's. He knew Burns, and promised to ask him to his lodgings to dinner, but had no opportunity to keep his word ;...
Page 97 - I had been for some days skulking from covert to covert, under all the terrors of a jail; as some ill-advised people had uncoupled the merciless pack of the law at my heels. I had taken the last farewell of my few friends; my chest was on the road to Greenock; I had composed the last song I should ever measure in Caledonia—"The gloomy night is gathering fast,
Page 220 - It was little in Burns's character to let his feelings on certain subjects escape in this fashion. He, immediately after reciting these verses, assumed the sprightliness of his most pleasing manner ; and taking his young friend home with him, entertained him very agreeably till the hour of the ball arrived.
Page 24 - This cultivated the latent seeds of poetry ; but had so strong an effect on my imagination, that to this hour, in my nocturnal rambles, I sometimes keep a sharp look-out in suspicious places : and though nobody can be more skeptical than I am in such matters, yet it often takes an effort of philosophy to shake off these idle terrors.

Bibliographic information