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Rh And if despondency weigh down
 * Thy spirit’s fluttering pinions then,

Despair—thy name is written on
 * The roll of common men.

There have been loftier themes than his,
 * And longer scrolls, and louder lyres,

And lays lit up with Poesy’s
 * Purer and holier fires:

Yet read the names that know not death;
 * Few nobler ones than Burns are there;

And few have won a greener wreath
 * Than that which binds his hair.

His is that language of the heart,
 * In which the answering heart would speak,

Thought, word, that bids the warm tear start,
 * Or the smile light the cheek;

And his that music, to whose tone
 * The common pulse of man keeps time,

In cot or castle’s mirth or moan,
 * In cold or sunny clime.

And who hath heard his song, nor knelt
 * Before its spell with willing knee,

And listened, and believed, and felt
 * The Poet’s mastery: