How express in the language of Pope or even of Wordsworth an effect like this:-- "They reeled, they set, they cross'd, they cleekit, Till ilka carlin swat and reekit, And coost her duddies to the wark, And linket at it in her sark." or this-- "Yestreen when to the trembling string, The dance gaed thro' the lighted ha' To thee my fancy took its wing-- I sat but neither heard nor saw: Tho' this was fair, and that was braw, And yon the toast of a' the toun, I sigh'd and said amang them a', You are na Mary Morison." It may be objected that in all this there is only one word, and but two or three forms of words that are not English.

But the accent, the rhythm, the air of it are all Scots, and it was a Burns thinking in his native tongue who wrote it, not the Burns of "Anticipation forward points the view "; or "Pleasures are like poppies spread, You grasp the flower, the bloom is shed." or any other of the exercises in the school of Thomson and Pope.
It is easy to see that though Burns admired unaffectedly the "classic" writers, his native realism and his melody made him a potent agent in the cause of naturalism and romance.

In his ideas, even more than in his style, he belongs to the oncoming school.

The French Revolution, which broke upon Europe when he was at the height of his career, found him already converted to its principles.

As a peasant, particularly a Scotch peasant, he believed passionately in the native worth of man as man and gave ringing expression to it in his verse.