CCLV.
TO JOHN FRANCIS ERSKINE, ESQ.,
OF M A R.
[This remarkable letter has been of late the subject of some controversy: Mr. Findlater, who happened then to be in the Excise, is vehement in defence of the “honourable board,” and is certain that Burns has misrepresented the conduct of his very generous masters. In answer to this it has been urged that the word of the poet has in no other thing been questioned: that in the last moments of his life, he solemnly wrote this letter into his memorandum-book, and that the reproof of Mr. Corbet, is given by him either as a quotation from a paper or an exact recollection of the words used: the expressions, “not to think” and be “silent and obedient” are underlined.]
Dumfries, 13th April, 1793.
Sir,
Degenerate as human nature is said to be, and in many instances, worthless and unprincipled it is, still there are bright examples to the contrary; examples that even in the eyes of superior beings, must shed a lustre on the name of man.
Such an example have I now before me, when you, Sir, came forward to patronize and befriend a distant, obscure stranger, merely because poverty had made him helpless, and his British hardihood of mind had provoked the arbitrary wantonness of power. My much esteemed friend, Mr. Riddel of Glenriddel, has just read me a paragraph of a letter he had from you. Accept, Sir, of the silent throb of gratitude; for words would but mock the emotions of my soul.
You have been misinformed as to my final dismission from the Excise; I am still in the service.—Indeed, but for the exertions of a gentleman who must be known to you, Mr. Graham of Fintray, a gentleman who has ever been my warm and generous friend, I had, without so much us a hearing, or the slightest previous intimation, been turned adrift, with my helpless family, to all the horrors of want. Had I had any other resource, probably I might have saved them the trouble of a dismission; but the little money I gained by my publication, is almost every guinea embarked, to save from ruin an only brother, who, though one of the worthiest, is by no means one of the most fortunate of men.
In my defence to their accusations, I said, that whatever might be my sentiments of republics, ancient or modern, as to Britain, I abjured the idea!—That a constitution, which, in its original principles, experience had proved to be every way fitted for our happiness in society, it would be insanity to sacrifice to an untried visionary theory:—that, in consideration of my being situated in a department, however humble, immediately in the hands of people in power, I had forborne taking any active part, either personally, or as an author, in the present business of Reform. But, that, where I must declare my sentiments, I would say there existed a system of corruption between the executive power and the representative part of the legislature, which boded no good to our glorious constitution; and which every patriotic Briton must wish to see amended.—Some such sentiments as these, I stated in a letter to my generous patron, Mr. Graham, which he laid before the Board at large; where, it seems, my last remark gave great offence; and one of our supervisors-general, a Mr. Corbet, was instructed to inquire on the spot, and to document me—“that my business was to act, not to think; and that whatever might be men or measures, it was for me to be silent and obedient.”