---
title: "Epigram on Seeing Miss Fontenelle in a Favourite Character"
author: "Robert Burns"
form: "Poem"
year: "1792"
location: "Dumfries"
source: "Project Gutenberg #1279 — Poems and Songs of Robert Burns"
source_url: "https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/1279/pg1279.txt"
canonical_url: "https://robert-burns.com/poems/epigram-on-seeing-miss-fontenelle-in-a-favourite-character/"
---

# Epigram on Seeing Miss Fontenelle in a Favourite Character

## Poem
Sweet naivete of feature,  
Simple, wild, enchanting elf,  
Not to thee, but thanks to Nature,  
Thou art acting but thyself.

Wert thou awkward, stiff, affected,  
Spurning Nature, torturing art;  
Loves and Graces all rejected,  
Then indeed thou’d’st act a part.

---

Source: [Project Gutenberg #1279 — Poems and Songs of Robert Burns](https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/1279/pg1279.txt)  
Canonical HTML: https://robert-burns.com/poems/epigram-on-seeing-miss-fontenelle-in-a-favourite-character/