# Robbie Burns fans - Comment on "Jacobites by Name"

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/robbie-burns-fans-comment-on-jacobites-by-name/756095>\
**Category:** Cafe Society\
**Created:** [May 30, 2016, 3:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/robbie-burns-fans-comment-on-jacobites-by-name/756095 "2016-05-30T15:53:35Z")\
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**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\
**Post date:** [May 30, 2016, 3:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/robbie-burns-fans-comment-on-jacobites-by-name/756095/1 "2016-05-30T15:53:35Z")

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I came across this song, and was struck with how nearly every part of it could quite legitimately be read in different ways.

Here’s a very nice (if ‘modernized’) version of it:

[![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/-e7eqCldZ7E/hqdefault.jpg "Eddi Reader ~ Ye Jacobites") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-e7eqCldZ7E)

The original lyrics:

> [@](#):
>
> Ye Jacobites by name, give an ear, give an ear,  
> Ye Jacobites by name, give an ear,  
> Ye Jacobites by name,  
> Your fautes I will proclaim,  
> Your doctrines I maun blame, you shall hear, you shall hear  
> Your doctrines I maun blame, you shall hear.
> 
> What is Right, and What is Wrang, by the law, by the law?  
> What is Right and what is Wrang by the law?  
> What is Right, and what is Wrang?  
> A weak arm and a strang,  
> A short sword, and a lang, for to draw, for to draw  
> A short sword, and a lang, for to draw.
> 
> What makes heroic strife, famed afar, famed afar?  
> What makes heroic strife famed afar?  
> What makes heroic strife?  
> To whet th’ assassin’s knife,  
> Or haunt a Parent’s life, wi’ bluidy war?
> 
> Then let your schemes alone, in the state, in the state,  
> Then let your schemes alone in the state.  
> So let your schemes alone,  
> Adore the rising sun,  
> And leave a man undone, to his fate, to his fate.  
> And leave a man undone, to his fate.

Some background: Burns was re-writing a _previous_ song, one that was a clear anti-Jacobite polemic. By the time Burns was writing the song, in 1791, Jacobianism (that is, the desire to set the Stewarts on the throne in place of the Hanoverians) had been dead for a long time.

There is no question that the song uses irony (“right and wrong” is compared to force - “a short sword and a long”; “heroic strife” = “the assassin’s knife”; etc.). To my mind, the question is - how much irony? Is the song intended to be anti-Jacobian, or is it really (as some commentators have suggested) really pro-Jacobian?

To my mind, the song is ultimately sincere: it is, essentially, a sorrowful acknowledgement that, in some situations, ‘heroism’ (i.e., support for the Jacobian cause) simply is not worth it; that it may become mere fanaticism, intended to bolster the ego.