SCOTLAND (LITERATURE) 



251 



tii, a a and The Chanueleon, we have the most skilfully 

 wrought Scottish prose that has come down to us. 

 As a scholar of singular attainments, though of no 

 distinctive literary genius, Andrew Melville may 

 also be mentioned as one among many examples of 

 Scotsmen who profited to the utmost by the new 

 studies of the Revival of Learning. 



For the 17th century Scotland has but one dis- 

 tinguished poet to show William Drummond of 

 Hawthornden (1585-1649). In other departments 

 of literature there were many able workers, but 

 none of whom it can be said that their work is of 

 very higli order in its kind. During this century 

 also Scotland was absorbed in questions that lay 

 at the roots of the national life, and till these 

 questions should be finally settled a collective 

 intellectual movement, such as is necessary to a 

 great literature, was a moral impossibility. The 

 union of the crowns and the removal of the court 

 in 1603 had likewise for the time an injurious effect 

 in weakening the national spirit, which in the 15th 

 century had oeen so potent an inspiration. Thence- 

 forward the Scottish language gradually gave way 

 before the standard English, and it is a significant 

 fact that Scotland produced nothing of literary 

 importance in its own dialect till tlie appearance of 

 Allan Ramsay's Gentle Shepherd in the following 

 century. As regards its achievement in literature 

 during the 17th century, therefore, Scotland may 

 be very briefly disposed of. 



With Drummond of Hawthornden may be named 

 as poets Sir William Alexander (Earl of Stirling) 

 and Sir Robert Ayton, though neither produced 

 work that deserves a place in a British anthology. 

 In Drummond, however, we have a poet the dis- 

 tinction of whose character and genius has made 

 him one of the interesting figures in literary history. 

 Poor as was the beginning of the century in poetry, 

 the latter half is poorer still, since it boasts not 

 one name that deserves even a passing mention. 

 As continuing the tradition in Latin poetry so 

 brilliantly initiated by Buchanan may be noted the 

 Delitice Poetarum Scotarum, a collection of Latin 

 poetry written by Scotsmen. Among its con- 

 tributors Arthur Johnston merits special mention 

 as the Scotsman of the period who after Dnimmond 

 gave proof of the finest literary gift. In history 

 the best work was done by David Calderwood and 

 Archbishop Spottiswoode during the first half of 

 the century, and by Sir James Dalrymple and 

 Bishop Burnet in the second half. Against the 

 brilliant list of English divines for this period 

 Scotland can only show as its two best Known 

 Samuel Rutherford and Archbishop Leighton the 

 latter, however, a writer of such fine suggestions 

 that Coleridge could speak of him as a Christian- 

 ised Plato. As miscellaneous writers holding a 

 place apart Sir Thomas Urquhart, the translator 

 of the first three books of RaMais, and Robert 

 Barclay (1648-90), author of the Apology for the 

 Quakers, close the list of the most distinguished 

 names in Scottish literature during the 17th 

 century. 



Far different is the literary record of Scotland 

 for the 18th century. Due proportion guarded, it 

 may be safely said that during this period she was 

 surpassed by no country in Europe in brilliant 

 initiative and in solid contribution in every field 

 of intellectual activity. The mere enumeration of 

 the more important names in each department 

 shows that this statement is no exaggeration. 



Of the crowd of poets who wrote in the ver- 

 nacular two stand out pre-eminently as the repre- 

 sentatives of their fellows. In the first half of 

 the century Allan Ramsay in his Gentle Shepherd 

 produced a work which, in virtue of its intrinsic 

 quality, and as the only example in its kind, is in its 

 own degree a British classic. Robert Burns, born 



the year after Ramsay's death, is the greatest 

 natural force in the imaginative literature of the 

 18th century, and it is the supreme tribute to 

 his genius that his poems have made classic the 

 dialect in which he wrote. Two poets who wrote 

 in English also call for special notice in virtue of 

 the fresh impulse of thought and feeling which 

 they communicated to the poetry not only of 

 Britain but of Europe. In nis Seasons James 

 Thomson (1700-48) gave expression to certain 

 aspects of man's relation to nature which freshened 

 the sources of English poetry and on the Continent 

 influenced notably, among others, Jean-Jacques 

 Rousseau. As perhaps the first to strike the 

 dominant note of Romanticism James Macpherson 

 (1738-96), the 'translator' of the pseudo-Ossianic 

 poems, is rightly regarded as one of the literary 

 forces of his century. In history David Hume 

 (1711-76) and William Robertson (1721-93), both 

 writing before Gibbon, gave a new character and 

 aim to the treatment of the past, and by their 

 insight, philosophic breadth, and literary skill 

 made an era in the science of human affairs. As 

 has l>een already said, it is the ruling instinct of 

 the Scottish mind to busy itself with the mysteries 

 that lie at the heart of things, and in the 18th 

 century we have signal illustration of the fact. In 

 the line of philosophic thinkers it is sufficient to 

 name Hume, Reid, and Adam Smith to indicate 

 the far-reaching importance of Scottish thought 

 and speculation during the period we are consider- 

 ing. From Hume's disintegrating scepticism dates 

 an epoch in metaphysical science, the extraordinary 

 development of modern German thought resulting 

 by natural recoil from his main position. As the 

 founder of what is distinctively known as the 

 Scottish philosophy Thomas Reid had in France 

 an even more direct and potent influence than 

 Hume in Germany. Of Adam Smith's Wealth of 

 Nation* it is enough to say that by the consenting 

 opinion of Europe it is one of the epoch-making 

 books in man's history. As masters in their own 

 department, Smollett and James Boswell likewise 

 deserve to be named even in the most cursory 

 account of British letters. 



The time has not yet come when the literary 

 forces of the 19th century can be reckoned with 

 the same precision as in the case of the centuries 

 that preceded it. Of Scotland, however, it may 

 be safely said that the literary succession of the 

 19th century is not unworthy of its brilliant 

 predecessor; and it may also be added that all 

 the work of the highest order contributed by 

 Scotsmen to the imperial literature bears the 

 unmistakable stamp of its national origin. In 

 the two greatest literary Scotsmen of the century, 

 Scott and Carlyle, the distinctive genius of their 

 country cannot be missed. While the work of 

 Scott has its elements of universal interest, in 

 its initial inspiration, in its recurrent moods it is 

 one in nature with the Scottish soil and the 

 Scottish race. In Carlyle we have in ungovern- 

 able force that emotion in the presence of the 

 mystery of things against which, as he has him- 

 self told us, Scott likewise had all his life to do 

 battle, and which, as we have seen, may be re- 

 garded as the deepest and most constant note of 

 the Scottish character and genius. 



In the foregoing sketch only writers of the first 

 importance have necessarily been mentioned ; but 

 such names as the following can hardly be left 

 unnoticed in the briefest account of the literature 

 of Scotland. For the 18th century Miss Jean 

 Elliot, Mrs Cockburn, Lady Anne Barnard, John 

 Skinner, and Robert Fergusson as writers of 

 Scottish verse ; and John Home, Henry Mackenzie, 

 Lord I hul^s, and Dr Adam Ferguson as writers in 

 standard English, may be specially named. In the 



