SOURCE: "Eighteenth-Century Poetry: Burns," in A Literary History of Scotland, T. Fisher Unwin, 1903, pp. 370-429.

In the following excerpt, Millar surveys the development of Scottish poetry during the eighteenth century, examining the role of the classical English-language tradition and the revival of local vernacular verse, which culminated with the poetry of Robert Burns.

Poetry is an art more provocative of imitation than prose; and it is not surprising that, when to excel in the use of English and to eschew the Scots dialect became the mark of an enlightened mind and a cultivated taste, a considerable number of Scottish writers should have betaken themselves to verse as their form of literary expression. In too many of these it is impossible, even for partiality, to ignore "the vain stiffness of a lettered Scot." But they must all be supposed to have served some purpose, and it is proposed to...