---
title: "“No Churchman Am I”"
author: "Robert Burns"
form: "Song"
year: "1782"
tune: "Prepare, my dear Brethren, to the tavern let’s fly"
location: "Lochlea"
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/no-churchman-am-i/"
---

# “No Churchman Am I”

## Song
No churchman am I for to rail and to write,  
No statesman nor soldier to plot or to fight,  
No sly man of business contriving a snare,  
For a big-belly’d bottle’s the whole of my care.

The peer I don’t envy, I give him his bow;  
I scorn not the peasant, though ever so low;  
But a club of good fellows, like those that are here,  
And a bottle like this, are my glory and care.

Here passes the squire on his brother—his horse;  
There centum per centum, the cit with his purse;  
But see you the Crown how it waves in the air?  
There a big-belly’d bottle still eases my care.

The wife of my bosom, alas! she did die;  
for sweet consolation to church I did fly;  
I found that old Solomon proved it fair,  
That a big-belly’d bottle’s a cure for all care.

I once was persuaded a venture to make;  
A letter inform’d me that all was to wreck;  
But the pursy old landlord just waddl’d upstairs,  
With a glorious bottle that ended my cares.

“Life’s cares they are comforts”—a maxim laid down  
By the Bard, what d’ye call him, that wore the black gown;  
And faith I agree with th’ old prig to a hair,  
For a big-belly’d bottle’s a heav’n of a care.

---

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/no-churchman-am-i/