The retribution with which the errors of Burns chastised him, holds out impressive warning to all who are capable of drawing wisdom from example. If happiness could have found a resting-place in one of the most honest hearts that ever struck against a manly bosom; if happiness had been with noble poetry, with an eloquence that never failed, with an imagination rich as the breast of nature, and bright as the stars in heaven; if happiness could have been brought down from the sky by lofty and aspiring sentiments, or fixed upon earth by generous and gentle affections; then happiness would have been the lot of Burns. But Burns had contracted habits to which peace soon becomes a stranger; and he who has such habits, be he bard, or be he beggar, has already entered on the evil day; he may say in all the bitterness of his soul, “Farewell the tranquil mind.” It would seem as if Burns pictured by anticipation his own sad fate when he wrote the Bard’s Epitaph. “Whom did the poet intend?” asks Wordsworth, as quoted by Allan Cunningham, “who but himself—himself anticipating the too probable termination of his own course. Here is a sincere and solemn avowal—a public declaration from his own will—a confession at once devout, poetical and human—a history in the shape of a prophesy!” What more was required of the biographer than to have put his seal to the writing, testifying that the foreboding had been realized, and the record was authentic.
Is there a whim-inspired fool,
Owre fast for thought, or hot to rule,
Owre blate to seek, owre proud to snool,
Let him draw near;
And owre this grassy heap sing dool,
And drap a tear.
Is there a bard of rustic song,
Who, noteless, steals, the crowds among,
That weekly this area throng,