ime when Highland Mary died,
and the conflicting feelings which agitated him, are depicted in the
following extract from a letter which he wrote probably about October,
1786, to his friend Robert Aiken:--

"There are many things that plead strongly against it [seeking a place
in the Excise]: the uncertainty of getting soon into business; the
consequences of my follies, which perhaps make it impracticable for me
to stay at home; and, besides, I have been for some time pining under
secret wretchedness, from causes which you pretty well know--the pang
of disappointment, the sting of pride, with some wandering stabs of
remorse, which never fail to settle on my vitals like vultures, when
attention is not called away by the calls of society or the vagaries
of the Muse. Even in the hour of social mirth, my gaiety is the
madness of an intoxicated criminal under the hands of the executioner.
All these reasons urge me to go abroad, and to all these reasons I
have only one answer--the feelings of a father. This, in the present
mood I am in, overbalances everything that can be laid in the scale
against it. You may perhaps think it an extravagant fancy, but it is a
sentiment which strikes home to my very soul; though sceptical in some
points of our current belief, yet I think I have every evidence for
the reality of a life beyond the stinted bourne of our present existence:
if so, then how should I, in the presence of that tremendous Being,
the Author of existence, how should I meet the reproaches of those who
stand to me in the dear relation of children, whom I deserted in (p. 030)
the smiling innocency of helpless infancy? Oh, Thou great unknown
Power! Thou Almighty God! who hast lighted up reason in my breast, and
blessed me with immortality! I have frequently wandered from that
order and regularity necessary for the perfection of Thy works, yet
Thou hast never left me nor forsaken me...."

* * * * *

"You see, sir, that if to know one's errors were a probability of
mending them, I stand a fair chance; but, according to the reverend
Westminster divines, though conviction must precede conversion, it is
very far from always implying it."

This letter exhibits the tumult of soul in which he had been tossed
during the last six months before it was written. He had by his own
conduct wound round himself complications from which he could not
extricate himself, yet which he could not but poignantly fe