1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Pollok, Robert

POLLOK, ROBERT (1798–1827), Scottish poet, son of a small farmer, was born at North Moorhouse, Renfrewshire, on the 19th of October 1798. He was trained as a cabinet-maker and afterwards worked on his father's farm, but, having prepared himself for the university, he took his degree at Glasgow, and studied for the ministry of the United Secession Church. He published Tales of the Covenanters while he was a divinity student, and planned and completed a strongly Calvinistic poem on the spiritual life and destiny of man. This was the Course of Time (1827), which passed through many editions and became a favourite in serious households in Scotland. It was written in blank verse, in ten books, in the poetic diction of the 18th century, but with abundance of enthusiasm, impassioned elevation of feeling and copious force of words and images. The poem at once became popular, but within six months of its publication, on the 18th of September 1827, its author died of consumption.