Can expression be more distinct?  And let me ask your friend how it is possible for flowers to be reflected in water when there are waves?  They may, indeed, in still water; but the very object of my poem is the trouble or agitation, both of the flowers and the water.  I must needs respect the understanding of every one honoured by your friendship; but sincerity compels me to say that my poems must be more nearly looked at, before they can give rise to any remarks of much value, even from the strongest minds.  With respect to this individual poem, Lady B. will recollect how Mrs. Fermor expressed herself upon it.  A letter also was sent to me, addressed to a friend of mine, and by him communicated to me, in which this identical poem was singled out for fervent approbation.  What then shall we say?  Why, let the poet first consult his own heart, as I have done, and leave the rest to posterity—­to, I hope, an improving posterity.  The fact is, the English public are at this moment in the same state of mind with respect to my poems, if small things may be compared with great, as the French are in respect to Shakespeare, and not the French alone, but almost the whole Continent.  In short, in your friend’s letter, I am condemned for the very thing for which I ought to have been praised, viz., that I have not written down to the level of superficial observers and unthinking minds.  Every great poet is a teacher:  I wish either to be considered as a teacher, or as nothing....

SIR WALTER SCOTT

1771-1832

TO HIS MOTHER

Marriage with Miss Carpenter

[1797.]

MY DEAR MOTHER,

I should very ill deserve the care and affection with which you have ever regarded me, were I to neglect my duty so far as to omit consulting my father and you in the most important step which I can possibly take in life, and upon the success of which my future happiness must depend.  It is with pleasure I think that I can avail myself of your advice and instructions in an affair of so great importance as that which I have at present on my hands.  You will probably guess from this preamble, that I am engaged in a matrimonial plan, which is really the case.  Though my acquaintance with the young lady has not been of long standing, this circumstance is in some degree counterbalanced by the intimacy in which we have lived, and by the opportunities which that intimacy has afforded me of remarking her conduct and sentiments on many different occasions, some of which were rather of a delicate nature, so that in fact I have seen more of her during the few weeks we have been together, than I could have done after a much longer acquaintance, shackled by the common forms of ordinary life.  You will not expect from me a description of her person,—­for which I refer you to my brother, as also for a fuller