O wad some Power the giftie gie us

                           To see oursels as ithers see us!

                           It wad frae mony a blunder free us

                           And foolish notion

                           What airs in dress an' gait wad lea'e us

                           An' ev'n devotion

Concluding with this admonition that we should all reflect upon from time to time, To A Louse describes the reaction of Burns and others in the congregation on seeing a louse crawling over the head and expensive hat of the smartly dressed and blissfully unaware young Jeany as she attends to her devotions in church.

Burns himself appears fascinated by the incident, reflecting in turn that the louse would be more at home in the temples of a beggar, the cheap hat of an elderly lady or even the undershirt of a ragged boy rather than on the high quality bonnet whose design was inspired by the exploits of the balloonist Vincenzo Lunardi, whose flights in Scotland the previous year had attracted widespread interest.

He follows the louse's progress as it makes its way under Jeany's ribbons and on to the two-foot high summit of her stylish headwear before advising her to keep her head still in order to contain the beast, and not make its presence any more obvious to the rest of the congregation who are already winking at each other, while pointing their fingers at her.

It is at this point that Burns reflects on how helpful it would be if only the heavenly power would grant all of us the insight to see ourselves as we really are. How we would make fewer gaffes and lose some of our pretentions.