TO SAMUEL ROSE, ESQ.
Weston, July 24, 1787.
Dear Sir,—This is the first time I have written these six months, and nothing but the constraint of obligation could induce me to write now. I cannot be so wanting to myself as not to endeavour, at least, to thank you both for the visits with which you have favoured me, and the poems that you sent me; in my present state of mind I taste nothing, nevertheless I read, partly from habit, and partly because it is the only thing I am capable of.
I have therefore read Burns's poems, and have read them twice; and, though they be written in a language that is new to me, and many of them on subjects much inferior to the author's ability, I think them on the whole a very extraordinary production. He is, I believe, the only poet these kingdoms have produced in the lower rank of life since Shakspeare (I should rather say since Prior) who need not be indebted for any part of his praise to a charitable consideration of his origin and the disadvantages under which he has laboured. It will be a pity if he should not hereafter divest himself of barbarism, and content himself with writing pure English, in which he appears perfectly qualified to excel. He who can command admiration dishonours himself if he aims no higher than to raise a laugh.
I am, dear sir, with my best wishes for your prosperity, and with Mrs. Unwin's respects,
Your obliged and affectionate humble servant,
W. C.
Burns is one of those instances which the annals of literature occasionally furnish of genius surmounting every obstacle by its own natural powers, and rising to commanding eminence. He was a Scottish peasant, born in Ayrshire, a native of that land where Fingal lived and Ossian sung.[367] He rose from the plough, to take his part in the polished and intellectual society of Edinburgh, where he was admitted to the intercourse of Robertson, Blair, Lord Monboddo, Stewart, Alison, and Mackenzie, and found a patron in the Earl of Glencairn.
His poetry is distinguished by the powers of a vivid imagination, a deep acquaintance with the recesses of the human heart, and an ardent and generous sensibility of feeling. It contains beautiful delineations of the scenery and manners of his country. "Many of her rivers and mountains," observes his biographer,[368] "formerly unknown to the muse, are now consecrated by his immortal verse; the Doon, the Lugar, the Ayr, the Nith, and the Cluden, will in future, like the Yarrow, the Tweed, and the Tay, be considered as classic streams, and their borders will be trod with new and superior emotions."