r joyless breast,
And with a mother's fears shrinks at the rocking blast!
Oh ye! who, sunk in beds of down,
Feel not a want but what yourselves create,
Think, for a moment, on his wretched fate,
Whom friends and fortune quite disown!
Ill satisfied keen nature's clamorous call,
Stretched on his straw he lays himself to sleep,
While through the ragged roof and chinky wall,
Chill o'er his slumbers piles the drifty heap!
Think on the dungeon's grim confine,
Where guilt and poor misfortune pine!
Guilt, erring man, relenting view!
But shall thy legal rage pursue
The wretch, already crushed low
By cruel fortune's undeserved blow?
Affliction's sons are brothers in distress,
A brother to relieve, how exquisite the bliss!"

I heard nae mair, for Chanticleer
Shook off the pouthery snaw,
And hailed the morning with a cheer--
A cottage-rousing craw!

But deep this truth impressed my mind--
Through all his works abroad,
The heart benevolent and kind
The most resembles GOD.

* * * * *

XIII.

REMORSE.

A FRAGMENT.

["I entirely agree," says Burns, "with the author of the _Theory of
Moral Sentiments_, that Remorse is the most painful sentiment that can
embitter the human bosom; an ordinary pitch of fortitude may bear up
admirably well, under those calamities, in the procurement of which we
ourselves have had no hand; but when our follies or crimes have made
us wretched, to bear all with manly firmness, and at the same time
have a proper penitential sense of our misconduct, is a glorious
effort of self-command."]

Of all the numerous ills that hurt our peace,
That press the soul, or wring the mind with anguish,
Beyond comparison the worst are those
That to our folly or our guilt we owe.
In every other circumstance, the mind
Has this to say, 'It was no deed of mine;'
But when to all the evil of misfortune
This sting is added--'Blame thy foolish self!'
Or worser far, the pangs of keen remorse;
The torturing, gnawing consciousness of guilt,--
Of guilt, perhaps, where we've involved others;
The young, the innocent, who fondly lov'd us,
Nay, more, that very love their cause of ruin!
O burning hell! in all thy store of torments,
There's not a keener lash!
Lives