“When chill November’s surly blast Made fields and forests bare.”

Be Briton still to Britain true, Among oursel’s united; For never but by British hands Maun British wrangs be righted.

I pick my favourite quotations and store them in my mind as ready armour, offensive or defensive, amid the struggle of this turbulent existence.

O Scotia! my dear, my native soil! For whom my warmest wish to Heaven is sent

O, wad some Power the giftie gie us To see oursels as others see us! It wad frae monie a blunder free us, An’ foolish notion.

The best laid plans take 40 years to complete.

I have a hundred times wished that one could resign life as an officer resigns a commission.

The heart that is generous and kind most resembles God.

O Life! thou art a galling load, Along a rough, a weary road, To wretches such as I!

Man’s inhumanity to man makes countless thousands mourn!

Ye Hypocrites, are these your pranks To murder men and gie God thanks Desist for shame, proceed no further God won’t accept your thanks for murder.

A women can make an average man great, and a great man average.

My heart ‘s in the Highlands, my heart is not here; My heart ‘s in the Highlands a-chasing the deer.

Look abroad through Nature’s range, Nature’s mighty law is change.

But pleasures are like poppies spread, You seize the flower, it’s bloom is shed; Or, like the snow-fall in the river, A moment white, then melts forever.

But to see her was to love her, Love but her, and love forever. Had we never lou’d sae kindly, Had we never lou’d sae blindly, Never met – or never parted – We had ne’er been broken hearted.

Oh would some power the gift give us, to see ourselves as others see us!