Hume (Home), Alexander

(?1560-1609)

   Scottish poet, born at Polwarth, Berwickshire, the son of Patrick Hume, fifth baron of Polwarth. A graduate of St. Andrews University, he studied law in Paris. Disappointed at not obtaining a suitable law appointment in Edinburgh, he became a minister of Logie Church, near Stirling, where he stayed until he died. His ardent Puritanism is expressed in Hymns and Sacred Songs, accompanied by an Address to the Youth of Scotland (1599), in which he exhorts young people to abstain from "profane sonnets and vain ballads of love...." all of which were anathema to devout Protestants. Some of his poems were published in Sibbald's Chronicle of Scottish Poetry (1802); in Leyden's Scottish Descriptive Poetry (1803); and in Campbell's Specimens of the British Poets (1819). Some of his other publications: A Description of the Day Estivall, 1588. The Triumph of the Lord after the Manner of Men: Alluding to the Defait of the Spanish Navie, 1588. Of the Felicitie of the World to come, 1594. Some of his poems: "Thankes for Deliverance of the Sicke," "To His Sorrowfull Saull, Consolation," "Of Gods Benefites Bestowed Vpon Man," "Happie Death."

   Sources: Dictionary of National Biography. Electronic Edition 1.1. Oxford University Press, 1997. English Poetry: Author Search. Chadwyck-Healey Ltd., 1995 (http://www.lib.utexas.edu:8080/search/epoetry/author.html). The Columbia Granger's Index to Poetry. 11th ed (http://www.columbiagrangers.org). The New Penguin Book of Scottish Verse. Robert Crawford and Mick Imlah, eds. Penguin Books, 2000. The Scottish Collection of Verse to 1800. Eileen Dunlop and Kamm Antony, eds. Richard Drew, 1985.