Comparing To A Mouse And To A Louse By Robert Burns

To A Mouse and To A Louse is one of Robert Burns best works, pointing out things people would have never even think in their lifetime. He wants to point out that though people and other things are different in appearance and other things, there are things that are similar as well, like he explained in To A Mouse. He also points out that no matter how rich and “on top of the world” a person is, they still have their imperfections, like he explained in To A Louse. Each of the stories have valid messages behind them and makes the reader really think about the different messages that Burns is trying to explain in his stories. From comparing himself to a mouse to noticing a woman having lice, Burns brings up some important messages within these

The main theme that Burns was trying to get across was to basically, not be full of yourself. In the story, this woman who the narrator of the story clearly stated was very wealthy, showed up to church late on purpose so everyone could pay attention to her. As she took her seat in front of the narrator, he noticed something coming off her hat, and what he noticed was a louse, which is single for lice. “Sae fine a lady? Gae somewhere else, and seek your dinner on some poor body.” (page 738, lines 10-12), The narrator basically said that the louse should be somewhere else other than this woman’s head but it also shows that anyone, rich or poor can get lice though usually lice is associated with poverty. If the narrator of this story were to point out that the women had lice, she would have flipped because lice tends to go with poverty and poor people. “Burns’s address poems promote a range of speakers who both frame and intervene in their narratives.” (Pittock, Murray GH, "Robert Burns and British Poetry"), Burns wanted to show the different personalities each person has and wanted to make other aware that there are those snobby rich people that think they have the world in the palm of their

Though both of these stories are very different in their own ways, the one thing that is similar is how Burns focuses strictly one that one little thing. Like the story To A Mouse, he focuses on writing an apology letter to the mouse and then explains how they are both similar and how they are also different from one another. In the story To A Louse, as soon as he sees the louse on the woman’s hat, he focuses on that and begins to bring up how even on of the richer ladies in town has her imperfections and how much the woman would react if she knew she had lice. “If a poet, recognised to be a quite true person, describes his character and its faults as they are, and draws quite justly and sternly the moral of them, the public might let him alone and the moralist critics might cease to preach” (Brooke, Stopford A. "Robert Burns"), Burns focuses on each character carefully, especially the narrator when he is explaining what he sees/what is happening in the story, he makes sure that the reader is well aware of what each character is like. For example, in Mouse, the narrator is sorry for destroying the mouse’s home and in Louse, the narrator briefly speaks about it but when he does, the reader gets the point that the lady in the story is full of herself. “I think it quite within bounds of truth to say we learn more