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O Thou Great Governor of all below!
If I may dare a lifted eye to Thee,
Thy nod can make the tempest cease to blow,
Or still the tumult of the raging sea:
With that controlling pow'r assist ev'n me.
Those headlong furious passions to confine;
For all unfit I feel my pow'rs to be,
To rule their torrent in th' allowed line:
O aid me with Thy help, Omnipotence Divine!

 

Divider from 'The Beauties of Burn's Poems' a chapbook printed in Falkirk in 1819

 

The First Psalm.

The man, in life wherever plac'd,
Hath happiness in store,
Who walks not in the wicked's way,
Nor learns their guilty lore:

Nor from the seat of scornful Pride
Casts forth his eyes abroad,
But with humility and awe
Still walks before his God.

That man shall flourish like the trees
Which by the streamlets grow;
The fruitful top is spread on high,
And firm the root below.

But he whose blossom buds in Guilt,
Shall to the ground be cast:
And like the rootless stubble, tost
Before the sweeping blast.