He was a believer in God, and had confidence that this God was sitting at the loom weaving with warp and woof of cause and effect, of fear and fancy, pain and hope, of dream and shadows, of despair and death, mingled with the light of love, the tapestries in which at last all souls will see that all was perfect from the first. He believed or hoped that the spirit of infinite goodness, soft as the autumn air, filled all of heaven's dome with love. Such a religion is easy to understand when it includes all races through all times. It is consistent, if not with the highest thought, with the deepest and the tenderest feelings of the heart. FROM CRADLE TO COFFIN. There is no time to follow the steps of Burns from old Alloway, by the Bonnie Doon in the clay-built hut, where the January wind blew hansel in on Robin--to Mt. Oliphant, with its cold and stingy soil, the hard factor, whose letters made the children weep--working in the fields, or tired with "The thresher's weary flinging tree," where he was thrilled, for the first time with love's sweet pain that set his heart to music. To Lochlea, still giving wings to thought--still working in the unproductive fields, Lochlea where his father died, and reached the rest that life denied. To Mossgiel, where Burns reached the top and summit of his art and wrote like one enrapt, inspired. Here he met and loved and gave to immortality his Highland Mary. To Edinburgh and fame, and back to Mauchline to Jean Armour and honor, the noblest deed of all his life. To Ellisland, by the winding Nith. To Dumfries, a poor exciseman, wearing out his heart in the disgusting details of degrading drudgery--suspected of treason because he preferred Washington to Pitt--because he sympathized with the French Revolution--because he was glad that the American colonies had become a free nation. At a banquet once, being asked to drink the health of Pitt, Burns said: "I will give you a better toast--George Washington." A little while after, when they wanted him to drink to the success of the English arms, Burns said: "No; I will drink this: May their success equal the justice of their cause." He sent three or four little cannon to the French Convention, because he sympathized with the French Revolution, and because of these little things, his love of liberty, of freedom and justice, at Dumfries he was suspected of being a traitor, and, as a result of these trivial things, as a result of that suspicion, Burns was obliged to join the Dumfries volunteers. How pitiful that the author of "Scots wha hae with Wallace bled," should be thought an enemy of Scotland! Poor Burns! Old and broken before his time--surrounded by the walking lumps of Dumfries' clay! To appease the anger of his fellow-citizens--to convince them that he was a patriot, he actually joined the Dumfries volunteers,--bought his uniform on credit--amount about seven pounds--was unable to pay--was threatened with arrest and a jail by Matthew Penn.