Songs. SONG. IRVINE STREAM. Tune-The Lass o' Patie's Mill. Come let us sing in praise. She skirts the verdant field, She wanders to the main; Sweet emblem of the flight Oh! happy is the swain, SONG. TUNE-" Dainty Davie." My mither kensna whare we stray,, An' think, how lang we've been away! I maun gae hame my Davie. As licht is to the wakefu' ee! Till ither twa short years we see, We'll meet again, &c. TIMOTHY CARELITTLE Scrapiana Poetica. SCRAPIANA POETICA. THE PLEASURES OF READING. Golden volumes! richest treasures! Objects of delicious pleasures! You, my eyes rejoicing please, You, my hands in rapture seize! Brilliant Wits and musing sages, (Light, who beamed through many ages!) Left, to your conscious leaves their story, And dared to trust you with their glory; Their hope of honoured Fame atchieved; Dear volumes! you have not deceived. THE POET'S GRAVE.. The rose that blooms to charm the eye, OLD ROBIN. Old Robin was singing, and this was his song. "I've liv'd a good fellow three score years and ten,. And the ale I have in me so mellow and strong; Impels me to wish the time over again. Though my hairs are grown grey, and my nose rather blue, What is it but symptoms of living through life; Besides, cried old Robin, if care I e'er knew, I buried it all when I buried my wife." EPITAPH ON A WORTHLESS WOMAN. Sound sleeps that blasted blinkin' ON SEEING THE DANDY HOBBIES. EPIGRAM. Ile tries to write because his father writ, And shews himself a bastard by his wit. MISCELLANEOUS OBSERVATIONS.-DR. CHALMERS, &c. Among the features of the Scottish nation, there are perhaps none more striking, than the general diffusion of knowledge among all denominations of people. A nation at one time, and at no very distant period, one of the most barbarous in Europe, has triumphed over its former ignorance, and bursting asunder the fetters of ecclesiastical superstition, has risen to a pitch of literary eminence which is scarcely equalled in modern times. The Gothic ages which succeeded the decline of the Western Empire, saw the human race involved in ignorance and barbarity, and so far prevailed over the light which the Greek and Roman literature had shed, as to efface from the generality of mankind, all traces of their former radiance. The mental faculties at that time appear to have lost their energy. Man was degraded to the gloomy regions of superstition, and if a genius did occasionally appear to illuminate the misty horizon, it was only to see itself despised, and obscured by the impenetrable cloud of ignorance which then universally reigned. The idle mummery of the Church of Rome, was hardly more favourable to literature, than ages which preceded this era of clerical dominion. It had ever been the policy of that church to keep her members in the abyss of ignorance; to shut up every avenue of knowledge, and to confine learning to her ambitious clergy. A system founded the Essays on Eminent Characters. on the rotten pillars of superstition, could only be supported by ignorance, and to exclude mankind from knowledge, it was necessary to impose trammels on the understanding, which while they repressed his acquirements, only added fresh excitement to those daring spirits who in a later day, arose to assert that liberty and research, which belonged to man. But even under all disadvantages, the world was not without its literature; ignorance although it might abate, was unable to destroy the seeds of genius, although it kept the knowledge of mankind at a very low ebb; it could not prevent a fruitful production from springing up in a barren soil. In the Gothic ages, a luminary of transcendant brightness would at times arise, and in the gloomiest periods of Popish superstition, Dante, Ariosto and Tasso arose in the delightful clime of Italy. At these times however the effusions of genius were disregarded. A blinded fanaticism shackled the human understanding, and led man to despise the noblest efforts of which man was capable. Encouragement was given to no kind of literature, its progress was conceived to be an encroachment on the stability of the church, it was dreaded as a monitor, which would awake her votaries from their delusive adoration. At this time, although science feil to the ground, and literature was nearly banished, yet the fine arts continued to prosper; Painting and Statuary reached a pitch of excellence, which is vainly sought for in the present day. Architecture continued to flourish, and rose to unparalelled perfection. But it was only to those arts which would conduce to the prosperity of the church, without endangering her empire, that encouragement was given; they grew up under this dark reign like a flower in the desert. They were countenanced by the clergy, and employed in the erection and adornment of those gorgeous temples which they devoted to religious worship. They gave an external lustre to the edifices of devotion, and inspired a solemnity and awe, weil calculated to sustain that sacred character, which the priests impressed upon the people, as belonging to themselves and to their altars. Here the arts were cherished and grew with prosperity, but literature which would have a more extensive influence, was consigned to decay, and its cultivators persecuted to destruction. The learning of the age was confined to the inmates of a cloister, who with all their boasted acquirements, were but children in Essays on Eminent Characters. the art, although thorough masters of dissimulation, and of a knowledge of mankind. Those who cultivated study, and attempted to think for themselves, were watched with an eagle eye, those who presumed to dissent in religion, were marked out as fit objects for the flames. In this inauspicious period science had scarcely begun-a profound ignorance of nature reignedand when the aspiring soul of Galileo expanded, he was thrown into the inquisition, for asserting that the earth performed an annual rotation round the sun. The reign of Popery and superstition, form a memorable cra in the history of Europe; and although they still continue to reign too extensively, they are tottering on their once stable thrones. Their dynasty has been broken, and their effects like a poisonous stream, diluted and rendered less baneful by the intermixture of a purer current. The At one time the first and its constant attendant prevailed as universally in Britain as in other nations, but a few even during the darkest ages, had discernment to perceive it in all its pollution. Over this island the same ignorance reigned-the same intolerant spirit of innovation-and the same unyielding resolution to keep the people in darkness. But when the Reformation like a vigorous wind had dispelled the mist which obscured our horizon, a new series of changes was produced on the moral constitution of man. He was taught to see the artifice which formerly shackled his judgement, and to throw off with disdain, the degrading fetters of priestly domination. powerful eloquence of the intrepid Knox, led to results which in more cautious, but less vigorous hands, could never have occured, and by the subsequent introduction of more liberal views than had formerly prevailed, the people began to breathe in a freer world, and to examine with critical acuteness into the doctrines by which they had been so long embezzled. The reformed clergy who imagined that they could not go sufficiently contrary to the tenets of the Popish faith, laid open the stores of knowledge to the people; instructed them in the doctrines of Christianity, and pointed out the errors of Popery with all the enthusiasm of conscious rectitude. To follow out the progress of the reformed doctrines, would be quite foreign to our purpose; suffice it to say, that from the period when the reformation commenced, we are to date the dawn of learning in Scotland-it seemed to give fresh vigour |