Morality, thou deadly bane,
Thy tens o' thousands thou hast slain!
Vain is his hope, whose stay and trust is
In moral mercy, truth and justice!
No--stretch a point to catch a plack; [small coin]
Abuse a brother to his back;
Steal thro' the winnock frae a whore, [window from]
But point the rake that takes the door:
* * * * *
Be to the poor like ony whunstane, [any whinstone]
And haud their noses to the grunstane; [hold, grindstone]
Ply ev'ry art o' legal thieving;
No matter--stick to sound believing.
Learn three-mile pray'rs, an' half-mile graces,
Wi' weel-spread looves, an' lang, wry faces; [palms]
Grunt up a solemn, lengthen'd groan,
And damn a' parties but your own;
I'll warrant them ye're nae deceiver,
A steady, sturdy, staunch believer.
The period within which these satires were written was short--1785 and
1786; but some three years later, on the prosecution of a liberal
minister, Doctor McGill of Ayr, for the publication of _A Practical
Essay on the Death of Jesus Christ_, which was charged with teaching
Unitarianism, Burns took up the theme again. _The Kirk's Alarm_ is a
rattling "ballad," full of energy and scurrilous wit, but, like many
of its kind, it has lost much of its interest through the great amount
of personal detail.
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