No More Learning

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IX.

A PRAYER,

UNDER THE PRESSURE OF VIOLENT ANGUISH.

["There was a certain period of my life," says Burns, "that my spirit
was broke by repeated losses and disasters, which threatened and
indeed effected the ruin of my fortune. My body, too, was attacked by
the most dreadful distemper, a hypochondria or confirmed melancholy.
In this wretched state, the recollection of which makes me yet
shudder, I hung my harp on the willow-trees, except in some lucid
intervals, in one of which I composed the following. "]


O Thou Great Being! what Thou art
Surpasses me to know;
Yet sure I am, that known to Thee
Are all Thy works below.

Thy creature here before Thee stands,
All wretched and distrest;
Yet sure those ills that wring my soul
Obey Thy high behest.

Sure Thou, Almighty, canst not act
From cruelty or wrath!
O, free my weary eyes from tears,
Or close them fast in death!

But if I must afflicted be,
To suit some wise design;
Then, man my soul with firm resolves
To bear and not repine!

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X.

A PRAYER

IN THE PROSPECT OF DEATH.

[I have heard the third verse of this very moving Prayer quoted by
scrupulous men as a proof that the poet imputed his errors to the
Being who had endowed him with wild and unruly passions. The meaning
is very different: Burns felt the torrent-strength of passion
overpowering his resolution, and trusted that God would be merciful to
the errors of one on whom he had bestowed such o'ermastering gifts.
]


O Thou unknown, Almighty Cause
Of all my hope and fear?
In whose dread presence, ere an hour
Perhaps I must appear!

If I have wander'd in those paths
Of life I ought to shun;
As something, loudly, in my breast,
Remonstrates I have done;

Thou know'st that Thou hast formed me,
With passions wild and strong;
And list'ning to their witching voice
Has often led me wrong.

Where human weakness has come short,
Or frailty stept aside,
Do Thou, All-Good! for such thou art,
In shades of darkness hide.

Where with intention I have err'd,
No other plea I have,
But, Thou art good; and goodness still
Delighteth to forgive.

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XI.

STANZAS

ON THE SAME OCCASION.

[These verses the poet, in his common-place book, calls "Misgivings in
the Hour of Despondency and Prospect of Death. " He elsewhere says they
were composed when fainting-fits and other alarming symptoms of a
pleurisy, or some other dangerous disorder, first put nature on the
alarm. ]


Why am I loth to leave this earthly scene?
How I so found it full of pleasing charms?
Some drops of joy with draughts of ill between:
Some gleams of sunshine 'mid renewing storms:
Is it departing pangs my soul alarms?
Or Death's unlovely, dreary, dark abode?
For guilt, for guilt, my terrors are in arms;
I tremble to approach an angry God,
And justly smart beneath his sin-avenging rod.

Fain would I say, "Forgive my foul offence!