Ilk man perfytes not quhat they once intend,
So frail and brittle ar our wretched dayes ;
Let sume man then begine quhair he doeth end,
Give him the first, tak thame the secund praise :
No, no! to Titus Livius give all,
That peerles prince for feattis historical!."
A small manuscript volume bearing the name of Alexander Hume, and entitled "Rerum Scoticarum Compendium," is probably from the pen of one of these four, but of which, it may now be impossible to determine.
Alexander Hume, minister of Logic, is, however, the undoubted author of "Hymnes or Sacred Songs, wherein the right use of poesie may be espied: whereunto are added, the experience of the author's youth, and certain precepts serving to the practice of sanctification." This volume, printed by Waldegrave in 1599, was dedicated to Elizabeth Melvill, by courtesy styled lady Culross, a woman of talent and literary habits, the authoress of "Ane godlie dream, compylit in Scottish meter," printed at Aberdeen in 1644. The Hymns and Sacred Songs have been several times partially reprinted, and the original having fallen into extreme rarity, the whole has lately been reprinted by the Bannatyne club. In the prose introduction, the author addressing the youth of Scotland, exhorts them to avoid "profane sonnets and vain ballads of love, the fabulous feats of Palmerine, and such like reveries." "Some time," he adds, "I delighted in such fantasies myself, after the manner of riotous young men : and had not the Lord in his mercy pulled me aback, and wrought a great repentance in me, I had doubtless run forward and employed my time and study in that profane and unprofitable exercise, to my own perdition." The first of his hymns he styles his "Recantation:" it commences in the following solemn terms:
Alace, how long have I delayed
To leave the laits[1] of youth!
Alace how oft have I essayed
To daunt ray lascive mouth,
And make my vayne polluted thought,
My pen and speech prophaine,
Extoll the Lord quhilk made of nocht
The heaven, the earth, and maine.
Skarce nature yet my face about,
Hir virile net had spun,
Quhen als oft as Phoebea stout
Was set agains the Sun:
Yea, als oft as the fierie flames
Arise and shine abroad,
I minded was with sangsand psalms
To glorifie my God.
But ay the cancred carnall kind,
Quhilk lurked me within,
Seduced my heart, withdrew my mind,
And made me sclave to sin.
My senses and my saull I saw
Debait a deadlie strife,
Into my flesh I felt a law
Gainstand the Law of life.
- ↑ Habits or manners.
