IS'^
Vr-
G/Vi. H^
THE
POEMS OF OSSIAN.
#
the :ii^ PcLoeaZ VolJ ,
THE
POEMS OF OSSIAN,
TRANSLATED BY
JAMES MACPHERSON, Esq.
IN THREE VOLUMES.
THE ENGRAVINGS BY
JAMES FITTLER, A. R.A.
FROM PICTURES BY
HENRY SINGLETON.
VOL. I.
LONDON:
PRINTED FOR "WILLIAM MILLER, ALBEMARLE-STREET,
By George Ramsay Sf Co. Edinburgh,
1812.
The/olloixiing are the Poems from tvhich the subjects of the Engravings in this Edition are taken.
VOL. II.
Page
Cath-Loda to face 16
Carric-Thura 63
Oithona 132
Calthon and Colmal 164
Fingal, Book 1 272
VOL. IIL
Fingal, Book V 14
Xjathmon 54
Temora, Book 1 136
Temora, Book III 183
Temora, Book V 225
Temora, Book VII 267
The Portrait of Macfherson to face the Title-Page of Vol. L
VOL. I,
PREFACE.
W iTHOi]T increasing his genius, the Author may have improved his language, in the eleven years that the following Poems have been in the hands of the Public. Errors in diction might have been committed at twenty-four, which the experience of a riper age may re- move ; and some exuberances in imagery may be restrained, with advantage, by a degree of judgment acquired in the progress of time. Impressed with this opinion, he ran over the whole with attention and accuracy; and, he hopes, he has brought the work to a state of correctness, which will preclude all future im- provements.
VJII PREFACE.
The eagerness, with which these poems have been received abroad, are a recompence for the coldness with which a few have affect- ed to treat them at home. All the polite na- tions of Europe have transferred them into their respective languages ; and they speak of him, who brought them to light, in terms that might flatter the vanity of one fond of fame. In a convenient indifference for a literary re- putation, the Author hears praise without being elevated, and ribaldry without being depressed. He has frequently seen the first bestowed too precipitately ; and the latter is so faithless to its purpose, that it is often the only index to merit in the present age.
Though the taste, which defines genius by the points of the compass, is a subject fit for mirth in itself, it is often a serious matter in the sale of a work. When rivers define the limits of abilities, as well as the boundaries of countries, a writer may measure his success, by the latitude under which he was born. It was to avoid a part of this inconvenience, that the Author is said, by some, who speak without any
PREFACE. ix
authority, to have ascribed his own productions to another name. If this was the case, he was •but young in the art of deception. When he placed the poet in antiquity, the Translator should have been born on this side of the Tweed.
These observations regard only the frivo- lous in matters of literature; these, how- ever, form a majority in every age and na- tion. In this country, men of genuine taste abound ; but their still voice is drowned in the clamours of a multitude, who judge by fashion, of poetry as of dress. The truth is, to judge aright, requires almost as much genius as to write w ell ; and good critics are as rare as great poets. Though two hun- dred thousand Romans stood up, when Virgil came to the Theatre, Varius only could cor- rect the .^neid. He that obtains fame must receive it through mere fashion ; and gratify his vanity with the applause of men, of whose judgment he cannot approve.
The following Poems, it must be confes- sed, are more calculated to please persons of
X PREFACE.
exquisite feelings of heart, than those who re- ceive all their impressions by the ear. The novelty of cadence, in what is called a prose version, though not destitute of harmony, will not to common readers supply the absence of the frequent returns of rhime. This was the opinion of the Writer himself, though he yield- ed to the judgment of others, in a mode, which presented freedom and dignity of expression, instead of fetters, which cramp the thought, whilst the harmony of language is preserved. His intention was to publish in verse. The making of poetry, like any other handicraft, may be learned by industry ; and he had ser- ved his apprenticeship, though in secret, to the Muses.
It is, however, doubtful, whether the har- mony which these Poems might derive from rhime, even in much better hands than those of the Translator, could atone for the sim- plicity and energy, which they would lose. The determination of this point shall be left to the readers of this preface. The following is the beginning of a Poem, translated from
1
PREFACE. XI
the Norse to the Gaelic language ; and, from the latter, transferred into English. The verse took little more time to the writer than the prose ; and even he himself is doubtful (if he has succeeded in either), which of them is the most literal version.
Xll PREFACE.
FRAGMENT
0£
A NORTHERN TALK.
Where Harold, with golden hair, spread o'er Lochlin^ his high commands; where, with justice, he ruled the tribes, who sunk, subdued, beneath his sword ; abrupt rises Gormalt in snow! The tempests roll dark on his sides, but calm, above, his vast forehead appears. White-issuing from the skirt of his storms, the troubled torrents pour down his sides. Joining, as they roar along, they bear the Torno, in foam, to the main.
• The Gaelic name of Scandinavia, or Scandinia. t The mountains of Sevo.
PREFACE. Xlll
Grey on the bank, and far from men, half- covered, by ancient pines, from the wind, a lonely pile exalts its head, long shaken by the storms of the north. To this fled Sigurd, fierce in fight, from Harold the leader of ar- mies, when fate had brightened his spear with renown : When he conquered in that rude field, where Lulan's warriors fell in blood, or rose in terror on the waves of the main. Dark- ly sat the grey-haired chief ; yet sorrow dwelt not in his soul. But when the warrior thought on the past, his proud heart heaved against his side : Forth flew his ^word from its place, he wounded Harold in all the winds.
One daughter, and only one, but bright in "form and mild of soul, the last beam of the setting line, remained to Sigurd of all his race. His son, in Lulan's battle slain, beheld not his father's flight from his foes. Nor finished seemed the ancient line ! The splendid beauty of bright-eyed Fithon, covered still the fallen king with renown. Her arm was white like Gormal's snow ; her bosom whiter than the
XiV PREFACE.
foam of the main, when roll the waves beneatli the wrath of the winds. Like two stars were her radiant eyes, like two stars that rise on the deep, when dark tumult embroils the night. Pleasant are their beams aloft, as stately they ascend the skies.
Nor Odin forgot, in aught, the maid. Her form scarce equalled her lofty mind. Awe moved around her stately steps. Heroes lov- ed— but shrunk away in their fears. Yet midst the pride of all her charms, her heart was soft, and her soul was kind. She saw the mournful with tearful eyes. Transient darkness arose in her breast. Her joy was in the chace. Each morning, when doubtful light wandered dimly on Lulan's waves, she roused the resounding woods, to Gormal's head of snow. Nor mov- ed the maid alone, &c.
PREFACE. XV
THE SAME VERSIFIED.
Where fair-haired Harold, o'er Scandinia reign'd And held, withjustice, what his valour gaia'd, Sevo, in snow, his rugged forehead rears, And, o'er the warfare of his storms, appears Abrupt and vast. — White-wandering down his side, A thousand torrents, gleaming as they glide, Unite below : and pouring thro' the plain Hurry the troubled Torno to the main.
Grey, on the bank, remote from human kind, By aged pines, half-shelter'd from the wind, A homely mansion rose, of antique form, For ages batter'd by the polar storm. To this, fierce Sigurd fled, from Norway's lord. When fortune settled on the warrior's sword. In that rude field, where Suecia's chiefs were slain. Or forced to wander o'er the Bothnic main. Dark was his life, yet undisturb'd with woes. But when the memory of defeat arose. His proud heart struck his side; he graspt the spear, And wounded Harold in the vacant air.
One daughter only, but of form divine, The last fair beam of the departing line, Remain'd of Sigurd's race. His warlike son Fell in the shock, which overturn'd the throne.
XVI pr£:face.
Nor desolate the house ! Fiouia's charms Siistain'd the glory, which they lost in arms. White was her arm, as Sevo's lofty snow, Her bosom fairer, than the waves below, When heaving to the winds. Her radiant eyes Like two blight stars, exulting as they rise, O'er the dark tumult of a stormy night, And gladd'ning heaven, with their majestic light.
In nought is Odin to the maid unkind. Her form scarce equals her exalted "mind j Awe leads her sacred steps where'er they move, And mankind worship, where they dare not love. But, mix'd with softness, was the virgin's pride, Her heart had feelings, which her eyes denied. Her bright tears started at another's woes, While transient darkness on her soul arose.
The chace she lov'd ; when mom with doubtful beam Came dimly wandering o'er the Bothnic stream. On Sevo's sounding sides, she bent the bow, And rous'd his forests to his head of snow. Nor mov'd the maid alone, &c.
One of the chief improvements, on this edi- tion, is the care taken, in arranging the Poems in the order of time ; so as to form a kind of regular history of the age to which they relate. The writer has now resigned them for ever to their fate. That they have been well received
PREFACE. XVli
by the Public, appears from an extensive sale; that they shall continue to be well received, he may venture to prophecy without the gift of that inspiration, to which poets lay claim. Through the medium of version upon version, they retain, in foreign languages, their native character of simplicity and energy. Genuine poetry, like gold, loses little, when properly transfused ; but when a composition cannot bear the test of a literal version, it is a counter- feit which ought not to pass current. The ope- ration must, however, be performed with skilful hands. A translator, who cannot equal his ori- ginal, is incapable of expressing its beauties.
London, August 15. 1773. ^
CONTENTS
OF
THE FIRST VOLUME.
Page A Dissertation concerning the ^ra of Os-
sian *â–
A Dissertation concerning the Poems of
Ossian "^
A Critical Dissertation on the Poems of
Ossian ........•••M.t <7
DISSERTATION
CONCERNING
THE .ERA OF OSSIAN.
VOL. I.
DISSERTATION
CONCERNING
THE ^RA OF OSSIAN
Inquiries into the antiquities of nations afford more pleasure than any real advantage to man- kind. The ingenious may form systems of history on probabiHties and a few facts ; but, at a great distance of time, their accounts must be vague and uncertain. The infancy of states and kingdoms is as destitute of great events, as of the means of transmitting them to posterity. The arts of po- lished life, by which alone facts can be preserved with certainty, are the production of a well-form- ed community. It is then historians begin to
4 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
write, and public transactions to be worthy re- membrance. The actions of former times are left in obscurity, or magnified by uncertain tradi- tions. Hence it is that we find so much of the marvellous in the origin of every nation ; posteri- ty being always ready to believe any thing, how- ever fabulous, that reflects honour on their an- cestors.
The Greeks and Romans were remarkable for this weakness. They swallowed the most absurd fables concerning the high antiquities of their re- spective nations. Good historians, however, rose very early amongst them, and transmitted, with lustre, their great actions to posterity. It is to them that they owe that unrivalled fame they now enjoy, while the great actions of other nations are involved in fables, or lost in obscurity. The Celtic nations afford a striking instance of this kind. They, though once the masters of Europe from the mouth of the river Oby*, in Russia, to Cape Finisterre, the western point of Gallicia, in Spain, are very little mentioned in history. They trusted their fame to tradition and the songs of their bards, which, by the vicissitude of human
* Plin. 1. 6.
THE iERA OF OSSIAN^. 5
affairs, are long since lost. Their ancient language is the only monument that remains of them ; and the traces of it being found in places so widely distant from each other, serves only to shew the extent of their ancient power, but throws very little light on their history.
Of all the Celtic nations, that which possessed old Gaul is the most renowned ; not perhaps on account of worth superior to the rest, but for their wars with a people who had historians to transmit the fame of their enemies, as well as their own, to posterity. Britain was first peopled by them, ac- cording to the testimony of the best authors * ; its situation, in respect to Gaul, makes the opinion, probable ; but what puts it beyond all dispute, is, that the same customs and language prevailed among the inhabitants of both in the days of Julius Caesar f.
The colony from Gaul possessed themselves, at first, of that part of Britain which was next to their own country ; and spreading northward, by de- grees, as they increased in numbers, peopled the whole island. Some adventurers, passing over
* Caes. 1. 5. Tac. Agric. c. 2. t Cffisar. Pomp. Mel. Tacitus.
6 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
from those parts of Britain that are within sight of Ireland, were the founders of the Irish nation ; which is a more probable story than the idle fables of Milesian and Gallician colonies. Diodoriis Siculus * mentions it as a thing well known in his time, that the inhabitants of Ireland were ori- ginally Britons ; and his testimony is unques- tionable, when we consider that, for many ages, the language and customs of both nations were the same.
Tacitus was of opinion, that the ancient Cale- donians were of German extract ; but even the ancient Germans themselves were Gauls. The present Germans, properly so called, were not the same with the ancient Celtae. The manners and customs of the two nations were similar ; but their language different. The Germans -j- are the genuine descendants of the ancient Scandina- vians, who crossed, in an early period, the Baltic. The Celtae:};, anciently, sent many colonies in- to Germany, all of whom retained their own laws, language, and customs, till they were dis- sipated in the Roman empire ; and it is of them,
* Diod. Sic. 1. 5. t Strabo, 1. 7.
I Cecs. 1. 6. Liv. 1. 5. Tac. de mor. Germ.
THE iERA OF OSSIAN. 7
if any colonies came from Germany into Scot- land, that the ancient Caledonians were descend- ed.
But whether the Caledonians were a colony of the Celtic Germans, or the same with the Gauls that first possessed themselves of Britain, is a mat- ter of no moment at this distance of time. What- ever their origin was, we find them very numerous in the time of Julius Agricola, which is a pre- sumption that they were long before settled in the country. The form of their government was a mixture of aristocracy and monarchy, as it was in all the countries where the Druid^ bore the chief sway. This order of men seems to have been formed on the same principles with the Dactyli Idae and Curetes of the ancients. Their pretend- ed intercourse with heaven, their magic and divi- nation, were the same. The knowledge of the Druids in natural causes, and the properties of certain things, the fruit of the experiments of ages, gained them a mighty reputation among the people. The esteem of the populace soon in- creased into a veneration for the order ; which these cunning and ambitious priests took care to improve, to such a degree, that they, in a manner, engrossed the management of civil, as well as reli-
8 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
gious, matters. It is generally allowed that they did not abuse this extraordinary power ; the pre- serving their character of sanctity was so essential to their influence, that they never broke out into violence or oppression. The chiefs were allowed to execute the laws, but the legislative power was entirely in the hands of the Druids *. It was by their authority that the tribes were united, in times of the greatest danger, under one head. This temporary king, or Vergobretus f, was chosen by them, and generally laid down his of- fice at the end of the war. These priests enjoyed long this extraordinary privilege among the Celtic nations who lay beyond the pale of the Roman empire. It was m the beginning of the second century that their power among the Caledonians began to decline. The traditions concerning Tra- thal and Cormac, ancestors to Fingal, are full of the particulars of the fall of the Druids : a singu- lar fate, it must be owned, of priests, who had once established their superstition.
The continual wars of the Caledonians against the Romans, hindered the better sort from initi- ating themselves, as the custom formerly was, into
* Caes. 1. 6. t Fer-gubreth, the man to judge.
THE ^RA OF OSSIAN. 9
the order of the Druids. The precepts of their religion were confined to a few, and were not much attended to by a people inured to war. The Ver- gobretus, or chief magistrate, was chosen without the concurrence of the hierarchy, or continued in his office against their will. Continual power strengthened his interest among the tribes, and enabled him to send down, as hereditary to his posterity, the office he had only received himself by election.
On occasion of a new war against the King of the World, as tradition emphatically calls the Ro- man emperor, the Druids, to vindicate the ho- nour of the order, began to resume their ancient privilege of chusing the Vergobretus. Garmal, the son of Tarno, being deputed by them, came to the grandfather of the celebrated Fingal, who was then Vergobretus, and commanded him, in the name of the whole order, to lay down his office. Upon his refusal, a civil war commen- ced, which soon ended in almost the total ex- tinction of the religious order of the Druids. A few that remained, retired to the dark reces- ses of their groves, and the caves they had for- merly used for their meditations. It is then we find them in the circle of stones, and unheeded
10 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
by the world. A total disregard for the order, and utter abhorrence of the Druidical rites, en- sued. Under this cloud of public hate, all that had any knowledge of the religion of the Druids became extinct, and the nation fell into the last degree of ignorance of their rites and cere- monies.
It is no matter of wonder then, that Fingal and his son Ossian disliked the Druids, who were the declared enemies to their succession in the su- preme magistracy. It is a singular case, it must be allowed, that there are no traces of religion in the poems ascribed to Ossian ; as the poetical compositions of other nations are so closely con- nected with their mythology. But gods are not necessary, when the poet has genius. It is hard to account for it to those who are not made ac- quainted with the manner of the old Scotish bards. That race of men carried their notions of martial honour to an extravagant pitch. Any aid given their heroes in battle, was thought to derogate from their fame ; and the bards immediately trans- ferred the glory of the action to him who had given that aid.
Had the poet brought down gods, as often as Homer hath done, to assist his heroes, his work
THE JERA OF OSSIAN. H
had not consisted of eulogiums on men, but of hymns to superior beings. Those who write in the GaeHc language, seldom mention religion in their profane poetry ; and when they profes- sedly write of religion, they never mix with their compositions, the actions of their heroes. This custom alone, even though the religion of the Druids had not been previously extinguish- ed, may, in, some measure, excuse the au- thor's silence concerning the rehgion of ancient times.
To allege that a nation is void of all religion, would betray ignorance of the history of mankind. The traditions of their fathers, and their own ob- servations on the works of nature, together with that superstition which is inherent in the human frame, have, in all ages, raised in the minds of men some idea of a superior being. Hence it is, that, in the darkest times, and amongst the most barbarous nations, the very populace themselves had some faint notion, at least, of a divinity. The Indians, who worship no God, believe that he exists. It would be doing injustice to the author of these poems, to think, that he had not opened his conceptions to that primitive and greatest of all truths. But let his religion be what it will, it
12 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
is certain he has not alluded to Christianity, or any of its rites, in his poems ; which ought to fix his opinions, at least, to an aera prior to that reli- gion. Conjectures, on this subject, must supply the place of proof. The persecution begun by Dioclesian, in the year 303, is the most probable time in which the first da^\Tiing of Christianity in the north of Britain can be fixed. The humane and mild character of Constantius Chlorus, who commanded then in Britain, induced the persecut- ed Christians to take refuge under him. Some of them, through a zeal to propagate their tenets, or through fear, went beyond the pale of the Ro- man empire, and settled among the Caledonians ; who were ready to hearken to their doctrines, if the religion of the Druids was exploded long be- fore.
These missionaries, either through choice, or to give more weight to the doctrine they advanced, took possession of the cells and groves of the Druids ; and it was from this retired life they had the name of Culdees *, which, in the language of the country, signifies sequestered persons. It was with one of the Culdees that Ossian, in his ex-
* Culdich.
THE iERA OF OSSIAN. 13
treme old age, is said to have disputed concerning the Christian religion. This dispute, they say, is extant ; and is couched in verse, according to the custom of the times. The extreme ignorance, on the part of Ossian, of the Christian tenets, shews, that that rehgion had only been lately introduced ; as it is not easy to conceive how one of the first rank could be totally unacquainted with a religion that had been known for any time in the country. The dispute bears the genuine marks of antiqui- ty. Tlie obsolete phrases and expressions pecu- liar to the times, prove it to be no forgery. If Ossian then lived at the introduction of Christi- anity, as by all appearance he did, his epoch will be the latter end of the third, and beginning of the fourth century. Tradition here steps in with a kind of proof.
The exploits of Fingal against Caracul *, the son of the King of the Worlds are among the first brave actions of his youth. A complete poem, which relates to this subject, is printed in this col- lection.
In the year 210, the emperor Severus, after re-
* Carac'huil, terrible eye. Carac'Iiealla, terrible looJc, Caracchallaml), a sort of upper garment.
14; A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
turning from his expedition against the Cale- donians, at York, fell into the tedious illness of which he afterwards died. The Caledonians and Maiatae, resuming courage from his indisposition, took arms in order to recover the possessions they had lost. The enraged emperor commanded his army to march into their country, and to destroy it with fire and sword. His orders were but ill executed ; for his son, Caracalla, was at the head of the army, and his thoughts were entirely taken up with the hopes of his father*s death, and with schemes to supplant his brother Geta. He scarce- ly had entered the enemy's country, when news was brought him that Severus was dead. A sudden peace is patched up with the Caledo- nians ; and, as it appears from Dion Cassius, the country they had lost to Severus was restored to them.
The Caracul of Fingal is no other than Cara- calla, who, as the son of Severus, the emperor of Rome, whose dominions were extended almost over the known world, was not without reason called the Son of the King of the World. The space of time between 211, the year Severus died, and the beginning of the fourth century, is not so great, but Ossian, the son of Fingal, might have
THE .?:ra of ossian. 15
seen the Christians whom the persecution under Dioclesian had driven beyond the pale 'of the Ro- man empire.
In one of the many lamentations on the death of Oscar, a battle which he fought against Caros, king of ships, on the banks of the winding Carun*, is mentioned among his great actions. It is more than probable, that the Caros mentioned here, is the same with the noted usurper Carausius, who assumed the purple in the year 287 ; and, seizing on Britain, defeated the emperor Maximinian Her- culius, in several naval engagements, which gives propriety to his being called the King of Ships. The winding Carun is that small river retaining still the name of Carron, and runs in the neigh- bourhood of Agricola's wall, which Carausius re- paired to obstruct the incursions of the Caledo- nians. Several other passages in traditions allude to the wars of the Romans ; but the two just men- tioned clearly fix the epocha of Fingal to the third century ; and this account agrees exactly with the Irish histories, which place the death of Fingal, the son of Comhal, in the year 283, and
* Car-avon, winding river.
16 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
that of Oscar and their own celebrated Cairbre, in the ye^ 296.
Some people may imagine, that the allusions to the Roman history might have been derived by tradition, from learned men, more than from ancient poems. This must then have happen- ed at least three ages ago, as these allusions are mentioned often in the compositions of those times.
Every one knows what a cloud of ignorance and barbarism overspread the north of Europe three hundred years ago. The minds of men, addicted to superstition, contracted a narrowness that de- stroyed genius. Accordingly, we find the com- positions of those times trivial and puerile to the last degree. But let it be allov/ed, that, amidst all the untoward circumstances of the age, a genius might arise, it is not easy to determine what could induce him to allude to the Roman times. We find no fact to favour any designs which could be entertained by any man who lived in the fifteenth century.
The strongest objection to the antiquity of the poems, now given to the public under the name of Ossian, is the improbability of their being
THE iERA OF OSSIAN. 17
handed down by tradition through so many cen- turies. Ages of barbarism, some will say, could not produce poems abounding with the disinter- ested and generous sentiments so conspicuous in the compositions of Ossian ; and could these ages produce them, it is impossible but they must be lost, or altogether corrupted in a long succession of barbarous generations.
These objections naturally suggest themselves to men unacquainted with the ancient state of the northern parts of Britain. The bards, who were an inferior order of the Druids, did not share their bad fortune. They were spared by the victori- ous king ; as it was through their means only he could hope for immortality to his fame. They attended him in the camp, and contributed to establish his power by their songs. His great actions were magnified, and the populace, who had no ability to examine into his character nar- rowly, were dazzled with his fame in the rhimes of the bards. In the meantime, men assumed sentiments that are rarely to be met with in an age of barbarism. The bards, who were original- ly the disciples of the Druids, had their minds opened, and their ideas enlarged, by being in- itiated in the learning of that celebrated order.
VOL. I. B
18 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
They could form a perfect hero in their own minds, and ascribe that character to their prince. The inferior chiefs made this ideal character the model of their conduct ; and, by degrees, brought their minds to that generous spirit which breathes in all the poetry of the times. The prince, flattered by his bards, and rivalled by his own heroes, who imitated his character, as de- scribed in the eulogies of his poets, endeavour- ed to excel his people in merit, as he was above them in station. This emulation continuing, formed at last the general character of the na- tion, happily compounded of what is noble in barbarity, and virtuous and generous in a polish- ed people.
When virtue in peace, and bravery in war, are the characteristics of a nation, their actions be- come interesting, and their fame worthy of im- mortality. A generous spirit is warmed with noble actions, and becomes ambitious of perpe- tuating them. This is the true source of that di- vine inspiration, to which the poets of all ages pretended. When they found their themes ina- dequate to the warmth of their imaginations, they varnished them over with fables, supplied by their own fancy, or furnished by absurd tra-
THE JERA OF OSSIAX. 19
ditions. These fables, however ridiculous, had their abettors ; posterity either implicitly believ- ed them, or, through a vanity natural to man- kind, pretended that they did. They loved to place the founders of their families in the days of fable, when poetry, without the fear of con- tradiction, could give what characters she plea- sed of her heroes. It is to this vanity that we owe the preservation of what remain of the more ancient poems. Their poetical merit made their heroes famous in a country where heroism was much esteemed and admired. The posterity of those heroes, or those who pretended to be de- scended from them, heard with pleasure the eu- logiums of their ancestors ; bards were employed to repeat the poems, and to record the connec- tion of their patrons with chiefs so renowned. Every chief, in process of time, had a bard in his family, and the office became at last heredi- tary. By the succession of these bards, the poems concerning the ancestors of the family were handed down from generation to genera- tion ; they were repeated to the whole clan on solemn occasions, and always alluded to in the new compositions of the bards. This custom came down to near our own times ; and after
20 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
the bards were discontinued, a great number in a clan retained by memory, or committed to writing, their compositions, and founded the an- tiquity of their families on the authority of their poems.
The use of letters was not known in the north of Europe till long after the institution of the bards : the records of the families of their pa- trons, their own, and more ancient poems, were handed down by tradition. Their poetical com- positions were admirably contrived for that pur- pose. They were adapted to music ; and the most perfect harmony was observed. Each verse was so connected with those which preceded or followed it, that if one line had been remem- bered in a stanza, it was almost impossible to forget the rest. The cadences followed in so natural a gradation, and the words were so adapt- ed to the common turn of the voice, after it is rais- ed to a certain key, that it was almost impossible, from a similarity of sound, to substitute one word for another. This excellence is peculiar to the Celtic tongue, and is perhaps to be met with in no other language. Nor does this choice of words clog the sense, or weaken the expression. The numerous flections of consonants, and vari-
THE iERA OF OSSIAN. 21
ation in declension, make the language very co- pious.
The descendants of the Celtae, who inhabited Britain and its isles, were not singular in this me- thod of preserving the most precious monuments of their nation. The ancient laws of the Greeks were couched in verse, and handed down by tra- dition. The Spartans, through a long habit, be- came so fond of this custom, that they would never allow their laws to be committed to writ- ing. The actions of great men, and the eulo- giums of kings and heroes, were preserved in the same manner. All the historical monuments of the old Germans were comprehended in their ancient songs * ! which were either hymns to their gods, or elegies in praise of their heroes ; and were in- tended to perpetuate the great events in their na- tion, which were carefully interwoven with them. This species of composition was not commit- ted to writing, but delivered by oral tradition f. The care they took to have the poems taught to their children, the uninterrupted custom of re- peating them upon certain occasions, and the
• Tac. de mor. Germ.
t Aby de la Bleterie Rc7navqnes siir la Germaine,
22 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
happy measure of the verse, served to preserve them for a long time uncorrupted. This oral chronicle of the Germans was not forgot in the eighth century, and it probably would have re- mained to this day, had not learning, which thinks every thing that is not committed to writing fabu- lous, been introduced. It was from poetical tra- ditions that Garcillasso composed his account of the Yncas of Peru. The Peruvians had lost all other monuments of their history ; and it was from ancient poems, which his mother, a princess of the blood of the Yncas, taught him in his youth, that he collected the materials of his his- tory. If other nations, then, that had been often over-run by enemies, and had sent abroad and re- ceived colonies, could for many ages preserve, by oral tradition, their laws and histories uncorrupt- ed, it is much more probable that the ancient Scots, a people so free of intermixture with foreigners, and so strongly attached to the me- mory of their ancestors, had the works of their bards handed down with great purity.
What is advanced, in this short Dissertation, It must be confessed, is mere conjecture. Be- yond the reach of records, is settled a gloom, which no ingenuity can penetrate. The man-
THE JERA OF OSSIAN. 2S
ners described, in these poems, suit the ancient Celtic times, and no other period that is known in history. We must, therefore, place the heroes far back in antiquity ; and it matters little, who were their contemporaries in other parts of the world. If we have placed Fingal in his proper period, we do honour to the manners of barbar- ous times. He exercised every manly virtue in Caledonia, while Heliogabalus disgraced human nature at Rome.
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The history of those nations, who originally possessed the north of Europe, is less known than their manners. Destitute of the use of let- ters, they themselves had not the means of trans- mitting their great actions to remote posteri- ty. Foreign writers saw them only at a distance, and described them as they found them. The vanity of the Romans induced them to consider the nations beyond the pale of their empire as barbarians ; and consequently their history unwor- thy of being investigated. Their manners and
28 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
singular character were matters of curiosity, as they committed them to record. Some men, otherwise of great merit among ourselves, give into confined ideas on this subject. Having ear- ly imbibed their idea of exalted manners from the Greek and Roman writers, they scarcely ever afterwards have the fortitude to allow any dignity of character to any nation destitute of the use of letters.
Without derogating from the fame of Greece and Rome, we may consider antiquity beyond the pale of their empire worthy of some atten- tion. The nobler passions of the mind never shoot forth more free and unrestrained than in the times we call barbarous. That irregular manner of life, and those manly pursuits from which bar- barity takes its name, are highly favourable to a strength of mind unknown in polished times. In advanced society the characters of men are more uniform and disguised. The human pas- sions lie in some degree concealed behind forms, and artificial manners ; and the powers of the soul, without an opportunity of exerting them, lose their vigour. The times of regular go- vernment, and polished manners, are therefore to be wished for by the feeble and weak in mind.
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 29
An unsettled state, and those convulsions which attend it, is the proper field for an exalted character, and the exertion of great parts. Me- rit there rises always superior ; no fortuitous event can raise the timid and mean into power. To those who look upon antiquity in this light, it is an agreeable prospect ; and they alone can have real pleasure in tracing nations to their source.
The establishment of the Celtic states in the north of Europe, is beyond the reach of writ- ten annals. The traditions and songs to which they trusted their history, were lost, or altoge- ther corrupted in their revolutions and migra- tions, which were so frequent and universal, that no kingdom in Europe is now possessed by its original inhabitants. Societies were formed, and kingdoms erected, from a mixture of nations, who, in process of time, lost all knowledge of their own origin. If tradition could be depended upon, it is only among a people, from all time, free from intermixture with foreigners. We are to look for these among the mountains and inac- cessible parts of a country : places, on account of their barrenness, uninviting to an enemy, or whose natural strength enabled the natives to
30 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
repel invasions. Such are the inhabitants of the mountains of Scotland. We, accordingly, find, that they differ materially from those who pos- sess the low and more fertile part of the king- dom. Their language is pure and original, and their manners are those of an ancient and unmix- ed race of men. Conscious of their own anti- quity, they long despised others, as a new and mixed people. As they lived in a country only fit for pasture, they were free from that toil and bu- siness which engross the attention of a commer- cial people. Their amusement consisted in hear- ing or repeating their songs and traditions ; and these entirely turned on the antiquity of their na- tion, and the exploits of their forefathers. It is no wonder, therefore, that there are more remains of antiquity among them, than among any other people in Europe. Traditions, however, concern- ing remote periods, are only to be regarded in so far as they coincide with contemporary writers of imdoubted credit and veracit}^
No writers began their accounts from a more early period, than the historians of the Scots nation. Without records, or even tradition it- self, they give a long list of ancient kings, and a detail of their transactions, with a scrupiUous ex-
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 31
actness. One might naturally suppose, that, when they had no authentic annals, they should, at least, have recourse to the traditions of their country, and have reduced them into a regular system of history. Of both they seem to have been equally destitute. Born in the low country, and strangers to the ancient language of their nation, they con- tented themselves with copying from one another, and retailing the same fictions, in a new colour and dress.
John Fordun was the first who collected those fragments of the Scots history, which had escap- ed the brutal policy of Edward I., and reduced them into order. His accounts, in so far as they concerned recent transactions, deserved credit : beyond a certain period, they were fabulous and unsatisfactory. Some time before Fordun wrote, the king of England, in a letter to the pope, had run up the antiquity of his nation to a very re- mote aera. Fordun, possessed of all the national prejudice of the age, was unwilling that his coun- try should yield, in point of antiquity, to a people, then its rivals and enemies. Destitute of annals in Scotland, he had recourse to Ireland, which, iaccording to the vulgar errors of the times, was reckoned the first habitation of the Scots. He
32 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
found, there, that the Irish bards had carried their pretensions to antiquity as high, if not beyond any nation in Europe. It was from them he took those improbable fictions, which form the first part of his history.
The writers that succeeded Fordun impHcit- ly followed his system, though they sometimes varied from him in their relations of particular transactions, and the order of succession of their kings. As they had no new lights, and were, equally with him, unacquainted with the tradi- tions of their country, their histories contain little information concerning the origin of the Scots. Even Buchanan himself, except the ele- gance and vigour of his style, has very little to recommend him. Blinded with political pre- judices, he seemed more anxious to turn the fic- tions of his predecessors to his own purposes, than to detect their misrepresentations, or in- vestigate truth amidst the darkness which they had thrown round it. It therefore appears, that little can be collected from their own historians, concerning the first migration of the Scots into Britain.
That this island was peopled from Gaul, ad- mits of no doubt. Whether colonies came after-
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 33
wards from the north of Europe, is a matter of mere speculation. Wlien South Britain yielded to the power of the Romans, the unconquered nations to the north of the province were distin- guished by the name of Caledonians. From their very name, it appears, that they were of those Gauls, who possessed themselves originally of Bri- tain. It is compounded of two Celtic words, Cael signifying Celts, or Gauls, and Dun or Don, a hill; so that Cael-don, or Caledonians, is as much as to say, the Celts of the hill country* The Highlan- ders, to this day, call themselves Cael, their lan- guage Caelic, or Gaelic, and their country Caeldoch, which the Romans softened into Caledonia. This, of itself, is sufficient to demonstrate, they are the genuine descendants of the ancient Caledo- nians, and not a pretended colony of Scots, who settled first in the north, in the third or fourth century.
From the double meaning of the word Cael, which signifies strangers, as well as Gauls, or Celts, some have imagined, that the ancestors of the Ca- ledonians were of a different race from the rest of the Britons, and that they received their name upon that account. This opinion , say they, is supported by Tacitus, who, from several circum-
VOL. I. c
S4f A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
Stances, concludes, that the Caledonians were of German extraction. A discussion of a point so intricate, at this distance of time, could neither be satisfactory nor important.
Towards the latter end of the third, and be- ginning of the fourth century, we meet with the Scots in the north. Porphyrius * makes the first mention of them about that time. As the Scots were not heard of before that period, most wri- ters supposed them to have been a colony new- ly come to Britain, and that the Picts were the only genuine descendents of the ancient Cale- donians. This mistake is easily removed. The Caledonians, in process of time, became natural- ly divided into two distinct nations, as posses- sing parts of the country entirely different in their nature and soil. The western coast of Scotland is hilly and barren ; towards the east the coun- try is plain, and fit for tillage. The inhabitants of the mountains, a roving and uncontrouled race of men, lived by feeding of cattle, and what they killed in hunting. Their employment did not fix them to one place. They removed from one heath to another, as suited best ^vith their con-
* St. Hierom. ad Ctesiphoii. 1
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 35
venience or inclination. They were not, therefore, improperly called by their neighbours, Scuite, or the xvandering nation ; which is evidently the origin of the Roman name of Scoti.
On the other hand, the Caledonians, who pos- sessed the east coast of Scotland, as the division of the country was plain and fertile, applied them- selves to agriculture, and raising of corn. It was from this, that the Gaelic name of the Picts proceeded ; for they are called, in that language, Cruithnich, i. e. the xvheat or corn eaters. As the Picts lived in a country so different in its na- ture from that possessed by the Scots, so their national character suifered a material change. Un- obstructed by mountains, or lakes, their commu- nication with one another was free and frequent. Society, therefore, became sooner established among them, than among the Scots, and, conse- quently, they were much sooner governed by ci- vil magistrates and laws. This, at last, produ- ced so great a difference in the manners of the two nations, that they began to forget their common origin, and almost continual quarrels and animo- sities subsisted between them. These animosities, after some ages, ended in the subversion of the
86 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
Pictish kingdom, but not in the total extirpation of the nation, according to most of the Scots writers, who seemed to think it more for the ho- nour of their countrymen to annihilate, than re- duce, a rival people under their obedience. It is certain, however, that the very name of the Picts was lost, and those that remained were so completely incorporated with their conquerors, that they soon lost all memory of their own ori- gin.
The end of the Pictish government is placed so near that period, to which authentic annals reach, that it is matter of wonder, that we have no mo- numents of their language or history remaining. This favours the system I have laid down. Had they originally been of a different race from the Scots, their language of course would be different. The contrary is the case. The names of places in the Pictish dominions, and the very names of their kings, which are handed down to us, are of Gaelic original ; which is a convincing proof that the two nations were, of old, one and the same, and only divided into two governments, by the ef- fect which their situation had upon the genius of the people.
THE POEMS OF OSSlAN. j?
The name of Picts is said to have been given by the Romans to the Caledonians, who posses- sed the east coast of Scotland, from their painting their bodies. The story is silly, and the argmnent absurd. But let us revere antiquity in her very follies. This circumstance made some imagine, that the Picts were of British extract, and a dif- ferent race of men from the Scots. That more of the Britons who fled northward from the tyranny of the Romans, settled in the low country of Scot- land, than among the Scots of the mountains, may be easily imagined, from the very nature of the country. It was they who introduced painting among the Picts. From this circumstance, affirm some antiquaries, proceeded the name of the lat- ter, to distinguish them from the Scots, who ne- ver had that art among them, and from the Bri- tons, who discontinued it after the Roman con- quest.
The Caledonians, most certainly, acquired a considerable knowledge in navigation, by their liv- ing on a coast intersected with many arms of the sea, and in islands, divided, one from another, by wide and dangerous firths. It is, therefore, high- ly probable, that they, very early, found their way to the north of Ireland, which is within sight of
38 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
their own country. That Ireland was first peopled from Britain, is, at length, a matter that admits of no doubt. The vicinity of the two islands ; the exact correspondence of the ancient inhabitants of both, in point of manners and language, are sufficient proofs, even if we had not the testimo- ny of * authors of undoubted veracity to confirm it. The abettors of the most romantic systems of Irish antiquities allow it ; but they place the co- lony from Britain in an improbable and remote aera. I shall easily admit, that the colony of the Fir- holg, confessedly the Belgce of Britain, settled in the south of Ireland, before the Cael, or Caledo- nians, discovered the north : but it is not at all likely, that the migration of the Firbolg to Ireland happened many centuries before the Christian aera.
The poem of Temora throws considerable light on this subject. The accounts given in it agree so well with what the ancients have delivered, con- cerning the first population and inhabitants of Ireland, that every unbiassed person will con- fess them more probable, than the legends hand- ed down, by tradition, in that country. It ap-
* Dio. Sic. 1. 5,
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 39
pears, that, in the days of Trathal, grandfather to Fingal, Ireland was possessed by two nations ; the Firbolg, or Belgce of Britain, who inhabited the south, and the Cael^ who passed over from Caledonia and the Hebrides to Ulster. The two nations, as is usual among an unpolished and late- ly settled people, were divided into small dynas- ties, subject to petty kings, or chiefs, independent of one another. In this situation, it is probable, they continued long, without any material revo- lution in the state of the island, until Crothar, lord of Atha, a country in Connaught, the most potent chief of the Firbolg, carried away Con- lama, the daughter of Cathmin, a chief of the Cael, who possessed Ulster.
Conlama had been betrothed some time be- fore to Turloch, a chief of their own nation. Turloch resented the affront offered him by Cro- thar, made an eruption into Connaught, and killed Cormul, the brother of Crothar, who came to oppose his progress. Crothar himself then took up arms, and either killed or expelled Tur- loch. The war, upon this, became general be- tween the two nations : and the Cael were redu- ced to the last extremity. In this situation, they applied for aid to Trathal, king of Morven, w|io
40 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
sent his brother Conar, already famous for his great exploits, to their relief. Conar, upon his arrival at Ulster, was chosen king, by the una- nimous consent of the Caledonian tribes, who possessed that country. The war was renewed with vigour and success ; but the FirboJg appear to have been rather repelled than subdued. In succeeding reigns, we learn from episodes in the same poem, that the chiefs of Atha made several efforts to become monarchs of Ireland, and to ex- pel the race of Conar,
To Conar succeeded his son Cormac, who ap- pears to have reigned long. In his latter days he seems to have been driven to the last extre- mity, by an insurrection of the Firbolg who sup- ported the pretensions of the chiefs of Atha to the Irish throne. Fingal, who then was very young, came to the aid of Cormac, totally defeat- ed Colc-ulla, chief of Atha, and re-established Cormac in the sole possession of all Ireland. It was then he fell in love with, and took to wife, Roscrana, the daughter of Cormac, who was the mother of Ossian.
Cormac was succeeded in the Irish throne by his son Cairbre ; Cairbre by Artho, his son, who ivas the father of that Cormac, in whose mi-
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 41
nority the invasion of Svv^aran happened, which is the subject of the poem of Fingal. The fa- mily of Atha, who had not rehnquished their pre- tensions to the Irish throne, rebelled in the mi- nority of Cormac, defeated his adherents, and murdered him in the palace of Temora. Cair- bar, lord of Atha, upon this, mounted the throne. His usurpation soon ended with his life ; for Fin- gal made an expedition into Ireland, and restor- ed, after various vicissitudes of fortune, the fami- ly of Conar to the possession of the kingdom. This war is the subject of Temora ; the events, though certainly heightened and embellished by poetry, seem, notwithstanding, to have their foun- dation in true history.
Temora contains not only the history of the first migration of the Caledonians into Ireland, it also preserves some important facts, concern- ing the first settlement of the Firbolg, or Belgce of Britain, in that kingdom, under their leader Larthon, who was ancestor to Cairbar and Cath- mor, who successively mounted the Irish throne, after the death of Connac, the son of Artho. I forbear to transcribe the passage, on account of its length. It is the song of Fonar, the bard ; towards the latter end of the seventh book of
42 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
Temora. As the generations from Larthon to Cathmor, to whom the episode is addressed, are not marked, as are those of the family of Conar, the first king of Ireland, we can form no judg- ment of the time of the settlement of the Fir- bolg. It is, however, probable, it was some time before the Gael, or Caledonians, settled in Ulster. One important fact may be gathered from this history, that the Irish had no king be- fore the latter end of the first century. Fingal lived, it is supposed, in the third century ; so Conar, the first monarch of the Irish, who was his grand-uncle, cannot be placed farther back than the close of the first. To establish this fact, is to lay at once aside the pretended antiquities of the Scots and Irish, and to get quit of the long list of kings which the latter give us for a millennium before.
Of the affairs of Scotland, it is certain, no- thing can be depended upon, prior to the reign of Fergus, the son of Ere, who lived in the fifth century. The true history of Ireland begins somewhat later than that period. Sir James Ware*, who was indefatigable in his researches
* War. de antiq. Hybeni. pras. p. l .
THE POEMS OP OSSIAN. 43
after the antiquities of his country, rejects, as mere fiction and idle romance, all that is related of the ancient Irish, before the time of St Pa- trick, and the reign of Leogaire. It is from this consideration, that he begins his history at the introduction of Christianity ; remarking, that all that is delivered down, concerning the times of Paganism, were tales of late invention, strangely mixed with anachronisms and inconsistencies. Such being the opinion of Ware, who had col- lected, with uncommon industry and zeal, all the real and pretendedly ancient manuscripts, concerning the history of his country, we may, on his authority, reject the improbable and self- condemned tales of Keating and O'Flaherty. Credulous and puerile to the last degree, they have disgraced the antiquities they meant to establish. It is to be wished, that some able Irishman, who understands the language and re- cords of his country, may redeem, ere it is too late, the genuine antiquities of Ireland, from the hands of these idle fabulists.
By comparing the history in these poems with the legends of the Scots and Irish writers, and, by afterwards examining both by the text of the Roman authors, it is easy to discover which is
44* A DISSERTATION CONCERNINa
the most probable. Probability is all that can be established on the authority of tradition, ever dubious and uncertain. But when it favours the hypothesis laid down by contemporary writers of undoubted veracity, and, as it were, finishes the figure of which they only drew the outlines, it ought, in the judgment of sober reason, to be preferred to accounts framed in dark and distant periods, with little judgment, and upon no au- thority.
Concerning the period of more than a cen- tury, which intervenes between Fingal and the reign of Fergus, the son of Ere or Arcath, tra- dition is dark and contradictory. Some trace up the family of Fergus to a son of Fingal of that name, who makes a considerable figure in Os- sian's poems. The three elder sons of Fingal, Ossian, Fillan, and Ryno, dying without issue, the succession, of coui'se, devolved upon Fer- gus, the fourth son, and his posterity. This Fergus, say some traditions, was the father of Congal, whose son was Arcath, the father of Fergus, properly called the first king of Scots ; as it was in his time the Gael, who possessed the western coast of Scotland, began to be distin- guished, by foreigners, by the name of Scots.
THE POEMS OF OSSIAX. 45
From thence-forward the Scots and Picts, as distinct nations, became objects of attention to the historians of other countries. The internal state of the two Caledonian kingdoms has always continued, and ever must remain, in obscurity and fable.
It is in this epoch we must fix the beginning of the decay of that species of heroism, which subsisted in the days of Fingal. There are three stages in human society. The first is the result of consanguinity, and the natural affection of the members of a family to one another. The se- cond begins when property is established, and men enter into associations for mutual defence against the invasions and injustice of neighbours. Mankind submit, in the third, to certain laws and subordinations of government, to which they trust the safety of their persons and property. As the first is formed on nature, so, of course, it is the most disinterested and noble. Men, in the last, have leisure to cultivate the mind, and to restore it, with reflection, to a primaeval dignity of sentiment. The middle state is the region of complete barbarism and ignorance. About the beginning of the fifth century, the Scots and Picts were advanced into the second stage, and,
46 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
consequently, into those circumscribed senti- ments, which always distinguish barbarity. The events which soon after happened, did not at all contribute to enlarge their ideas, or mend their national character.
About the year 426, the Romans, on account of domestic commotions, entirely forsook Bri- tain, finding it impossible to defend so distant a frontier. The Picts and Scots, seizing this fa- vourable opportunity, made incursions into the deserted province. The Britons, enervated by the slavery of several centuries, and those vices which are inseparable from an advanced state of civility, were not able to withstand the impetu- ous, though irregular, attacks of a barbarous enemy. In the utmost distress, they applied to their old masters, the Romans, and (after the unfortunate state of the empire could not spare aid) to the Saxons, a nation equally barbarous and brave with the enemies of whom they were so much afraid. Though the bravery of the Saxons repelled the Caledonian nations for a time, yet the latter found means to extend them- selves, considerably, towards the south. It is in this period we must place the origin of the arts of civil life among the Scots. The seat of
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 47
government was removed from the mountains to the plain and more fertile provinces of the south, to be near the common enemy, in case of sudden incursions. Instead of roving through unfre- quented wilds, in search of subsistence, by means of hunting, men applied to agriculture, and raising of corn. This manner of life was the first means of changing the national character. The next thing which contributed to it, was their mixture with strangers.
In the countries which the Scots had conquer- ed from the Britons, it is probable the most of the old inhabitants remained. These incorpo- rating with the conquerors, taught them agricul- ture, and other arts, which they themselves had received from the Romans. The Scots, however, in number as well as power, being the most pre- dominant, retained still their language, and as many of the customs of their ancestors as suited with the nature of the country they possessed. Even the union of the two Caledonian kingdoms did not much affect the national character. Be- ing originally descended from the same stock, the manners of the Picts and Scots were as simi- lar as the different natures of the countries they possessed permitted.
48 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
What brought about a total change in the ge- nius of the Scots nation, was their wars and other transactions with the Saxons. Several counties in the south of Scotland were alternate- ly possessed by the two nations. They were ceded, in the ninth age, to the Scots ; and, it is probable, that most of the Saxon inhabitants re- mained in possession of their lands. During the several conquests and revolutions in England, many fled for refuge into Scotland, to avoid the oppression of foreigners, or the tyranny of do- mestic usurpers ; in so much, that the Saxon race formed perhaps near one half of the Scot- ish kingdom. The Saxon manners and lan- guage daily gained ground, on the tongue and customs of the ancient Caledonians, till, at last, the latter were entirely restricted to inhabitants of the mountains, who were still unmixed with strangers.
It was after the accession of territory which the Scots received, upon the retreat of the Ro- mans from Britain, that the inhabitants of the Highlands were divided into clans. The king, when he kept his court in the mountains, was considered, by the whole nation, as the chief of their blood. Their small number, as well as the
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 49
presence of their prince, prevented those divi- sions which afterwards sprung forth into so many separate tribes. When the seat of government Avas removed to the south, those who remained in the Highlands were, of course, neglected. They naturally formed themselves into small so- cieties, independent of one another. Each so- ciety had its own reguliis, who either was, or in the succession of a few generations, was regard- ed as chief of their blood. The nature of tlie country favoured an institution of this sort. A iQ\\' valleys, divided from one another by exten- sive heaths and impassable mountains, form the face of the Highlands. In these valleys the chiefs fixed their residence. Round them, and almost within sight of their dwellings, were the habita- tions of their relations and denendents.
The seats of the Highland chiefs were neither disagreeable nor inconvenient. Surrounded with mountains and hanging woods, tliey were cover- ed from the inclemency of the weather. Near them generally ran a pretty large river, w'hich, discharging itself not far oflP, into an arm of the sea, or extensive lake, swarmed w^ith variety of fish. The woods were stocked with wild-fowl ; and the heaths and mountains behind them were
VOL. I. D
50 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
the natural seat of the red-deer and roe. If we make allowance for the backward state of agri- culture, the valleys were not unfertile ; afford- ing, if not all the conveniences, at least the ne- cessaries of life. Here the chief lived, the su- preme judge and lawgiver of his own people ; but his sway was neither severe nor unjust. As the populace regarded him as the chief of their blood, so he, in return, considered them as members of his family. His commands, therefore, though absolute and decisive, partook more of the au- thority of a father, than of the rigour of a judge. Though the whole territory of the tribe was con- sidered as the property of the chief, yet his vas- sals made him no other consideration for their lands than services, neither burdensome nor fre- quent. As he seldom went from home, he was at no expence. His table was supplied by his own herds, and what his numerous attendants killed in hunting.
In this rural kind of magnificence, the High- land chiefs lived for many ages. At a distance from the seat of government, and secured by the inaccessibleness of their country, they were free and independent. As they had little communi- cation with strangers, the customs of their an-
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 51
cestors remained among them, and their lan- guage retained its original purity. Naturally fond of military fame, and remarkably attached to the memory of their ancestors, they delighted in traditions and songs, concerning the exploits of their nation, and especially of their own par- ticular families. A succession of bards was re- tained in every clan, to hand down the memor- able actions of their forefathers. As Fingal and his chiefs were the most renowned names in tra- dition, the bards took care to place them in the genealogy of every great family. They became famous among the people, and an object of fic- tion and poetry to the bards.
The bards erected their immediate patrons into heroes, and celebrated them in their songs. As the circle of their knowledge was narrow, their ideas were confined in proportion. A few happy expressions, and the manners they repre- sent, may please those who understand the lan- guage ; their obscurity and inaccuracy would dis- gust in a translation. It was chiefly for this rea- son, that I have rejected wholly the works of the bards in my pubhcations. Ossian acted in a more extensive sphere, and his ideas ought to be more noble and universal ; neither gives he,
52 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
I presume, so many of those peculiarities, which are only understood in a certain period or coun- try. The other bards have their beauties, but not in this species of composition. Their rhimes, only calculated to kindle a martial spirit among the vulgar, afford very little pleasure to genuine taste. This observation only regards their poems of the heroic kind ; in every inferior species of poetry they are more successful. They express the tender melancholy of desponding love, with simplicity and nature. So well adapted are the sounds of the words to the sentiments, that, even without any knowledge of the language, they pierce and dissolve the heart. Successful love is expressed with peculiar tenderness and ele- gance. In all their compositions, except the heroic, which was solely calculated to animate the vulgar, they give us the genuine language of the heart, without any of those affected orna- ments of phraseology, which, though intended to beautify sentiments, divest them of their natural force. The ideas, it is confessed, are too local to be admired in another language; to those who are acquainted with the manners they represent, and the scenes they describe, they must afford pleasure and satisfaction.
8
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 53
It was the locality of their description and sentiment, that, probably, has kept them hither- to in the obscurity of an almost lost language. The ideas of an unpolished period are so con- trary to the present advanced state of society, that more than a common mediocrity of taste is required to relish them as they deserve. Those who alone are capable of transferring ancient poetry into a modern language, might be better employed in giving originals of their own, were it not for that wretched envy and meanness which affects to despise contemporary genius. My first publication was merely accidental. Had I then met with less approbation, my after pursuits would have been more profitable ; at least I might have continued to be stupid, without being branded with dulness.
These poems may furnish light to antiquaries, as well as some pleasure to the lovers of poetry. The first population of Ireland, its first kings, and several circumstances which regard its con- nection of old with the south and north of Bri- tain, are presented in several episodes. The sub- ject and catastrophe of the poem are founded upon facts, which regarded the first peopling of that country, and the contests bet^yten the two
54? A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
British nations, who originally inhabited that island. In a preceding part of this Dissertation, I have shewn how superior the probability of this system is to the undigested fictions of the Irish bards, and the more recent and regular legends of both Irish and Scotish historians. I mean not to give offence to the abettors of the high antiquities of the two nations, though I have all along expressed my doubts, concerning the veracity and abilities of those who deliver down their ancient history. For my own part, I prefer the national fame, arising from a few certain facts, to the legendary and uncertain an- nals of ages of remote and obscure antiquity. No kingdom now established in Europe can pre- tend to equal antiquity with that of the Scots, inconsiderable as it may appear in other respects, even according to my system, so that it is altoge- ther needless to fix its origin a fictitious millen- nium before.
Since the first publication of these poems, many insinuations have been made, and doubts arisen, concerning their authenticity. Whether these suspicions are suggested by prejudice, or are only the effects of malice, I neither know nor care. Those who have doubted my veracity
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 55
have paid a compliment to my genius ; and, were even the allegation true, my self-denial might have atoned for my fault. Without vanity I say it, I think I could write tolerable poetry ; and I assure my antagonists, that I should not translate what I could not imitate.
As prejudice is the effect of ignorance, I am not surprised at its being general. An age that produces few marks of genius ought to be spar- ing of admiration. The truth is, the bulk of mankind have ever been led by reputation more than taste, in articles of literature. If all the Romans, who admired Virgil, understood hi^ beauties, he would have scarce deserved to have come down to us, through so many centuries. Unless genius were in fashion, Homer himself might have written in vain. He that wishes to come with weight, on the superficial, must skim the surface in their own shallow way. Were my aim to gain the many, I would write a madrigal sooner than an heroic poem. Laberius himself would be always sure of more followers than So- phocles.
Some who doubt the authenticity of this work, with peculiar acuteness appropriate them to the Irish nation. Though it is not easy to conceive
36 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
how these poems can belong to Ireland and to me at once, I shall examine the subject, without further animadversion on the blunder.
Of all the nations descended from the ancient Celtae, the Scots and Irish are the most similar In language, customs, and manners. This ar- gues a more intimate connection between them, than a remote descent from the great Celtic stock. It is evident, in short, that at some one period or other, they formed one society, were subject to the same government, and were, in all respects, one and the same people. How they became divided, which the colony, or which the mother nation, I have in another work amply discussed. The first circumstance that induced me to disregard the vulgarly-received opinion of the Hibernian extraction of the Scotish nation, was my observations on their ancient language. That dialect of the Celtic tongue, spoken in the north of Scotland, is much more pure, more agreeable to its mother language, and more abounding with primitives, than that now spoken, or even that which has been written for some centuries back, amongst the most unmixed part of the Irish nation. A Scotchman, tolerably con- versant in his own language, understands an Irish
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 57
composition, from that derivative analogy which it has to the Gahc of North Britain. An Irish- man, on the other hand, without the aid of study, can never understand a composition in the Gae- hc tongue. This affords a proof that the Scotch Gahc is the most original, and, consequently, the language of a more ancient and unmixed people. The Irish, however backward they may be to al- low any thing to the prejudice of their antiquity, seem inadvertently to acknowledge it, by the very appellation they give to the dialect they speak. They call their own language Gaelic Eirinach, i.e. Caledonian Irish, when, on the contrary, they call the dialect of North Britain, a Gaelic, or the Ca- ledonian tongue, emphatically. A circumstance of this nature tends more to decide which is the most ancient nation, than the united testimonies of a whole legion of ignorant bards and senachies, who, perhaps, never dreamed of bringing the Scots from Spain to Ireland, till some of them, more learned than the rest, discovered that the Romans called the first Iberia, and the latter Hibernia. On such a slight foundation were probably built the romantic fictions concerning the Milesians of Ireland.
From internal proofs it sufficiently appear^
58 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
that the poems published under the name of Os- sian, are not of Irish composition. The favourite chimaera, that Ireland is the mother-country of the Scots, is totally subverted and ruined. The fictions concerning the antiquities of that country, which were forming for ages, and growing as they came down, on the hands of successive senachies and fileas, are found, at last, to be the spurious brood of modern and ignorant ages. To those who know how tenacious the Irish are, of their pretended Iberian descent, this alone is proof suf- ficient, that poems, so subversive of their system, could never be produced by an Hibernian bard. But when we look to the language, it is so diffe- rent from the Irish dialect, that it would be as ri- diculous to think that Milton's Paradise Lost could be wrote by a Scottish peasant, as to suppose that the poems ascribed to Ossian were writ in Ireland.
The pretensions of Ireland to Ossian proceed from another quarter. There are handed down, in that country, traditional poems, concerning the Fiona, or the heroes of Fion Mac Comnal. This Fion, say the Irish annalists, was general of the militia of Ireland, in the reign of Cormac, in the third century, ^\^^ere Keating and O'Fla-
THE POEMS OF OSSIAX. 59
herty learned that Ireland had an embodied mili- tia, so early, is not easy for me to determine. Tiieir information certainly did not come from the Irish poems concerning Fion. I have just now in my hands all that remain of those compositions ; but, unluckily for the antiquities of Ireland, they appear to be the work of a very modern period. Every stanza, nay almost every line, affords strik- ing proofs that they cannot be three centuries old. Their allusions to the manners and customs of the fifteenth century are so many, that it is matter of wonder to me how any one could dream of their antiquity. They are entirely writ in that romantic taste which prevailed two ages ago. Giants, enchanted castles, dwarfs, palfreys, witches, and magicians, form the whole circle of the poet's invention. The celebrated Fion could scarcely move from one hillock to another, without en- countering a giant, or being entangled in the circles of a magician. Witches on broomsticks were continually hovering round him like crows ; and he had freed enchanted virgins in every val- ley in Ireland. In short, Fion, great as he was, passed a disagreeable life. Not only had he to engage all the mischiefs in his own country, fo- jreign armies invaded him, assisted by magicians
60 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
and witches, and headed by kings as tall as the main-mast of a first-rate. It must be owned, however, that Fion was not inferior to these in height.
A chos air Cromleacli, druim-ard, Chos eile air Crom-meaJ tlnbb, Tho,£:a Fion le lamli mboir An d'uisiie o Lubhair na truth.
With one foot on fromleach his brow, The other on Cromnial the dark, Fion took up with his lar<ie hand '1 he water from Liibar of the streams.
Cromleach and Crommal were two mountains in the neighbourhood of one another, in Ulster, and the river Lubar ran through the intermediate valley. The property of such a monster as this Fion, I should never have disputed with any na- tion. But the bard himself, in the poem from which the above quotation is taken, cedes him to Scotland.
Fion o Albin, siol nan laoich ! Fion from Albion, race of heroes !
Were it allowable to contradict the authority of a bard at this distance of time, I should have given as my opinion, that this enormous Fion was
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 61
of the race of the Hibernian giants, of Ruanus, or some other celebrated name, rather than a native of Caledonia, whose inhabitants, now, at least, are not remarkable for thei. statm^e. As for the poe- try, I leave it to the reader.
If Fion w^as so remarkable for his stature, his heroes had also other extraordinary properties. In weight all the sons of strangers yielded to the celebrated Toniosal ; and for hardness of skull, and, perhaps, for thickness too, the valiant Oscar stood unrivalled and alone. Ossian himself had many singular and less delicate qualifications than playing on the harp ; and the brave Cuthullin was of so diminutive a size, as to be taken for a child of tv\'o years of age, by the gigantic Swaran. To illus- trate this subject, I shall here lay before the reader the history of some of the Irish poems, concerning Fion jVIac Comnal. A translation of these pieces, if well executed, might afford satisfaction, in an uncommon way, to the public. But this ought to be the work of a native of Ireland. To draw forth from obscurity the poems of my own country, has wasted all the time I had allotted for the muses ; besides, I am too diffident of my own abilities, to undertake such a work. A gentleman in Dublin accused me to the public of committing blunders
62 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
and absurdities in translating the language of my country, and that before any translation of mine appeared*. How the gentleman came to see my blunders before I committed them, is not easy to determine ; if he did not conclude that, as a Scots- man, and, of course, descended of the Milesian race, I might have committed some of those over- sights which, perhaps very justly, are said to be ^ peculiar to them.
* In Faulkner's Dublin Journal, of the first December, 1761, appeared the lollowing aflveitis* meiit : tv\o weeks before my first publication appeared in London.
Speedily will be published, by a gentleman of this king- dom, who hath been, for sometime past, employed in trans- lating and writing historical Notes to
FINGAL, A Poem,
Originally wrote in the Irish or E«se language. In the pre- face to which, the translator, who is a perfect master of the Irish tongue, will give an account of the manners and cus- toms of the ancient Irish or Scotch : and, therefore, most humbly entreats tiie public lo wait for his edition, wiiich will appear in a short tijue, as he will set forth all the blunders and absurdities in the edition now printing in London, and shew the ignorance of tiie English translator, in his know- ledge of Irish grammar, not understanding any part of that accidence.
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 63
From the whole tenor of the Irish poems, con- cerning the Fiona, it appears that Fion Mac Comnal flourished in the reign of Cormac, which is placed, by the universal consent of the sena- chies, in the third century. They even fix the death of Fingal in the year 286, yet his son Os- sian is made contemporary with St Patrick, who preached the gospel in Ireland about the middle of the fifth age. Ossian, though at that time he must have been two hundred and fifty years of age, had a daughter young enough to become wife to the saint. On account of this family con- nection, Patrick of the Psalms, for so the apostle of Ireland is emphatically called in the poems, took great delight in the company of Ossian, and in hearing the great actions of his family. The saint sometimes threw off the austerity of his pro- fession, drunk freely, and had his soul properly warmed with wine, to receive, with becoming en- thusiasm, the poems of his father-in-law. One of the poems begins with this piece of useful infor- mation.
Lo don rabh Padric na mhur. Gun .Sailin air iiidli, ach a gol, Gliluais e thigh Ossiau mhic Fhion, O san leis bu bhiun a ghloir.
64f A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
The title of this poem is Teantach mor na Fi- ona. It appears to have been founded on the same story as the battle of Lora. The circumstances and catastrophe in both are much the same ; but the Irish Ossian discovers the age in which he lived, by an unlucky anachronism. After describ- ing the total route of Erragon, he very gravely concludes with this remarkable anecdote, that none of the foe escaped, but a few who were permitted to go on a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. This circumstance fixes the date of the composition of the piece some centuries after the famous croi- sade ; for it is evident, that the poet thought the time of the croisade so ancient, that he confounds it with the age of Fingal. Erragon, in the course of this poem, is often called,
Riogh Lochlin an do shloigh, King of Denmark of two nations,
which alludes to the union of the kingdoms of Norway and Denmark ; a circumstance which happened under INIargaret de Waldemar, in the close of the fourteenth age. Modern, however, as this pretended Ossian was, it is certain he li- ved before the Irish had dreamed of appropria-
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 65
ting Fion, or Fingal, to themselves. He con- cludes the poem, with this reflection :
Na fagha se comhUiiom nan n' aim, Erragon Mac Annir nan Idnn glas 'San n' Albin ni n' abeurtair Triath Agiis ghlaoite an n' Fhiooa as.
" Had Erragon, son of Annir of gleaming swords, avoided the equal contest of arms, ( single combat) no chief should have afterwards been numbered in Albion, and the heroes of Fion should no more be named."
The next poem that falls under our observation, is Cath-cabhra, or the death of Oscar. This piece is founded on the same story which we have in the first book of Temora. So little thought the author of Cath-cabhra of making Oscar his coun- tryman, that, in the course of two hundred lines, of which the poem consists, he puts the following expression in the mouth of the hero :
Albin an sa d' roina m' arach.
Albion, where I was bom and bred.
The poem contains almost all the incidents in the first book of Temora. In one circumstance
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66 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
the bard differs materially from Ossiaii. Oscar, after he was mortally wounded by Cairbar, was carried by his people to a neighbouring hill, which commanded a prospect of the sea. A fleet ap- peared at a distance, and the hero exclaims with
Loiugeas mo sbean-alliair at' an 'S iati a tiitchd le cabhair cliugain, O Albin na n' ioraa stuagh.
" It is the fleet of my grandfather, coming Mith aid to our field, from Albion of many waves !"
The testimony of this bard is sufficient to con- fute the idle fictions of Keating and O'Flaherty ; for, though he is far from being ancient, it is pro- bable he flourished a full century before these his- torians. He appears, however, to have been a much better Christian than chronologer ; for Fion, though he is placed two centuries before St Pa- trick, very devoutly recommends the soul of his grandson to his Redeemer.
Duan a Gharibh Mac-Starn is another Irish poem of high repute. The grandeur of its images, and its propriety of sentiment, might have induced me to give a translation of it, had
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 67
not I some expectations, which are now over, of seeing it in the collection of the Irish Ossian's poems, promised twelve years since to the pub- lic. The author descends sometimes from the region of the sublime to low and indecent de- scription ; the last of which the Irish translator no doubt will choose to leave in the obscurity of the original. In this piece Cuthullin is used with very little ceremony, for he is oft called the dog of Tara, in the county of Meath. This se- vere title of the redoubtable Cuthullin, the most renowned of Irish champions, proceeded from the poet's ignorance of etymology. Cu — voice, or commander, signifies also a dog. The poet chose the last, as the most noble appellation for his hero.
The subject of the poem is the same with that of the epic poem of Fingal. Caribh Mac-Starn is the same with Ossian's Swaran, the son of Starno. His single combats with, and his vic- tory over all the heroes of Ireland, excepting the celebrated dog of Tara, i. e. Cuthullin, afford matter for two hundred lines of tolerable poetry. Caribh's progress in search of Cuthullin, and his intrigue with the gigantic Emir-bragal, that hero's wife, enables the poet to extend his piece
6S A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
to four hundred lines. This author, ii is true, makes Cuthullin a native of Ireland ; the gigantic Emir-bragal he calls the guiding-star of the wo- men of Ireland. The property of this enormous lady I shall not dispute with him or any other. But as he speaks with great tenderness of the daughters of the convent, and throws out some hints against the English nation, it is probable he lived in too modern a period to be intimately ac- quainted with the genealogy of Cuthullin.
Another Irish Ossian, for there are many, as appears from their difference in language and sentiment, speaks very dogmatically of Fion Mac Comnal as an Irishman. Little can be said for the judgment of this poet, and less for his delica- cy of sentiment. The history of one of his epi- sodes may at once stand as a specimen of his want of both. Ireland, in the days of Fion, hap- pened to be threatened with an invasion by three great potentates, the kings of Lochlin, Sweden, and France. It is needless to insist upon the impropriety of a French invasion of Ireland ; it is sufficient for me to be faithful to the language of my author. Fion, upon receiving intelligence of the intended invasion, sent Ca-olt, Ossian, and Oscar, to watch the bay in which it was appre-
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 69
hended the enemy was to land. Oscar was the worst choice of a scout that could be made, for, brave as he was, he had the bad property of fal- ling very often asleep on his post, nor was it pos- sible to awake him, without cutting off one of his fingers, or dashing a large stone against his head. When the enemy appeared, Oscar, very unfor- tunately, was asleep. Ossian and Ca-olt consult- ed about the method of wakening him, and they, at last, fixed on the stone as the less dangerous expedient. i
Gun Ihog Caoilte a chlach, nach gan, Agus a n' aigbai' chieau gun bhnail ; Tri mil an tulioch gun cliri', &c.
*' Ca-olt took up a heavy stone, and struck it against the hero's head. The hill shook for three miles, as the stone rebounded and rolled away."
Oscar rose in wrath, and his father gravely desired him to spend his rage on his enemies, which he did to so good purpose, that he singly routed a vrhole wing of their army. The con- federate kings advanced, notwithstanding, till they came to a narrow pass, possessed by the celebrated Ton-iosaL This name is very sig-
70 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
nificant of the singular property of the hero who bore it. Ton-iosal, though brave, was so heavy and unwieldy, that when he sat down, it took the whole force of an hundred men to set him up- right on his feet again. Luckily for the preser- vation of Ireland, the hero happened to be stand- ing when the enemy appeared, and he gave so good an account of them, that Fion, upon his ar- rival, found little to do, but to divide the spoil among his soldiers.
All these extraordinary heroes, Fion, Ossian, Oscar, and Ca-olt, says the poet, were
Siol Erin na gorm lann.
Tlie sons of Erin of blue steel.
Neither shall I much dispute the matter with him : He has my consent also to appropriate to Ireland the celebrated Ton-iosal. I shall only say, that they are different persons from those of the same name in the Scotch poems ; and that, though the stupendous valour of the first is so remarkable, they have not been equally lucky with the latter, in their poet. It is somewhat extraordinary that Fion, who lived some ages before St Patrick, swears like a very good Chris- tian.
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 71
Air an Dia do chr.m gach case. By God, who shaped every case.
It is worthy of being remarked, that, in the line quoted, Ossian, who hved in St Patrick's days, seems to have understood something of the Enghsh language, not then subsisting. A per- son more sanguine for the honour of his countrj' than I am, might argue, from this circumstance, that this pretendedly Irish Ossian was a native of Scotland ; for my countrymen are universally allow- ed to have an exclusive right to the second-sight.
From the instances given, the reader may form a complete idea of the Irish compositions con- cerning the Fiona. The greatest part of them make the heroes of Fion,
Siol Albin a ii'nioma caoile.
The race of Albion of many firths.
The rest make them natives of Ireland. But the truth is, that their authority is of little con- sequence on either side. From the instances I have given, they appear to have been the work of a very modern period. The pious ejaculations they contain, their allusions to the manners of the times, fix them to the fifteenth century. Had
72 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
even the authors of these pieces avoided all al- lusions to their own times, it is impossible that the poems could pass for ancient, in the eyes of any person tolerably conversant with the Irish tongue. The idiom is so corrupted, and so many words borrowed from the English, that the lan- guage must have made considerable progress in Ireland before the poems were written.
It remains now to shew how the Irish bards began to appropriate the Scottish Ossian and his heroes to their own country. After the Eng- lish conquest, many of the natives of Ireland, averse to a foreign yoke, either actually were in a state of hostility with the conquerors, or at least paid little regard to their government. The Scots, in those ages, were often in open war, and never in cordial friendship, with the Eng- lish. The similarity of manners and language, the traditions concerning their common origin, and above all, their having to do with the same enemy, created a free and friendly intercourse between the Scottish and Irish nations. As the custom of retaining bards and senachies was common to both, so each no doubt had formed a system of history, it matters not how much so- ever fabulous, concerning their respective origin.
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 73
It was the natural policy of the times to recon- cile the traditions of both nations together, and, if possible, to deduce them from the same original stock.
The Saxon manners and language had, at that time, made great progress in the south of Scot- land. The ancient language, and the traditional history of the nation, became confined entirely to the inhabitants of the Highlands, then fallen, from several concurring circumstances, into the last de- gree of ignorance and barbarism. The Irish who, for some ages before the conquest, had possessed a competent share of that kind of learning which then prevailed in Europe, found it no difficult mat- ter to impose their own fictions on the ignorant Highland senachies. By flattering the vanity of the Highlanders with their long list of Here- monian kings and heroes, they, without contradic- tion, assumed to themselves the character of be- ing the mother nation of the Scots of Britain. At this time, certainly, was established that Hiber- nian system of the original of the Scots, which af- terwards, for want of any other, was universally received. The Scots of the low country, who, by losing the language of their ancestors, lost, toge- ther with it, their national traditions, received,
74? A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
implicitly, the history of their country, from Irish refugees, or from Highland senachies, persuaded over into the Hibernian system.
These circumstances are far from being ideal. We have remaining many particular traditions which bear testimony to a fact, of itself abundant- ly probable. What makes the matter incontes- tible, is, that the ancient traditional accounts of the genuine original of the Scots, have been handed down without interruption. Though a few igno- rant senachies might be persuaded out of their own opinion, by the smoothness of an Irish tale, it was impossible to eradicate, from among the bulk of the people, their own national traditions. These traditions afterwards so much prevailed, that the Highlanders continue totally unacquainted with the pretended Hibernian extract of the Scots nation. Ignorant chronicle writers, strangers to the an- cient language of their country, preserved only from falling to the ground so improbable a story.
This subject, perhaps, is pursued farther than it deserves ; but a discussion of the pretensions of Ireland, was become in some measure necessary. If the Irish poems concerning the Fiona should appear ridiculous, it is but justice to observe, that they are scarcely more so than the poems of other
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 75
nations at that period. On other • subjects the bards of Ireland have displayed a genius for poe- try. It was alone in matters of antiquity, that they were monstrous in their fables. Their love- sonnets, and their elegies on the death of persons worthy or renowned, abound with simplicity, and a wild harmony of numbers. They become more than an atonement for their errors in every other species of poetry. But the beauty of these spe- cies depends so much on a certain ciiriosajelicitas of expression in the original, that they must ap- pear much to disadvantage in another language.
CRITICAL DISSERTATION
ON THE
POEMS OF OSSIAN.
BY
HUGH BLAIR, D. D.
CRITICAL DISSERTATION
ON THE
POEMS OF OSSIAN.
Among the monuments remaining of the ancient state of nations, few are more valuable than their poems or songs. History, when it treats of remote and dark ages, is seldom very instructive. The be- ginnings of society, in every country, are involv- ed in fabulous confusion ; and though they were not, they would furnish few events worth record- ing. But, in every period of society, human man- ners are a curious spectacle ; and the most natu- ral pictures of ancient manners are exliibited in
80 A CRITICAL DISSERTATION ON
the ancient poems of nations. These present to us what is much more valuable than the history of such transactions as a rude age can afford, — the history of human imagination and passion. They make us acquainted with the notions and feelings of our feilovz-creatures in the most artless ages ; discovering what objects they admired, and what pleasures they pursued, before those refinements of society had taken place, which enlarge indeed, and diversify the transactions, but disguise the manners of mankind.
Besides this merit, which ancient poems have with philosophical observers of human nature, they have another with persons of taste. They promise some of the highest beauties of poetical writing. Irregular and unpolished we may expect the productions of uncultivated ages to be ; but abounding, at the same time, with that enthusi- asm, that vehemence and fire, which are the soul of poetry. For, many circumstances of those times which we call barbarous, are favourable to the poetical spirit. That state in which human nature shoots wild and free, though unfit for other improvements, certainly encourages the high ex- ertions of fancy and passion.
In the infancy of societies, men live scattered
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 81
and dispersed in the midst of solitary rural scenes, where the beauties of nature are their chief entertainment. They meet with many ob- jects, to them new and strange ; their wonder and surprise are frequently excited ; and by the sudden change of fortune occurring in their un- settled state of life, their passions are raised to the utmost; their passions have nothing to re- strain them, their imagination has nothing -to check it. They display themselves to one ano- ther without disguise : and converse and act in the uncovered simplicity of nature. As their feelings are strong, so their language of itself as- sumes a poetical turn. Prone to exaggerate, they describe every thing in the strongest co- lours ; which of course renders their speech pic- turesque and figurative. Figurative language owes its rise chiefly to two causes ; to the want of proper names for objects, and to the influence of imagination and passion over the form of ex- pression. Both these causes concur in the in- fancy of society. Figures are commonly con- sidered as artificial modes of speech, devised by orators and poets, after the world had advanced to a refined state. The contrary of this is the truth. Men never have used so many figures
VOL. I. F
82 A CRITICAL DISSERTATION 0»
of Style, as in those rude ages, when, besides the power of a warm imagination to suggest Hvely images, the want of proper and precise terms for the ideas they would express, obhged them to have recourse to circumlocution, metaphor, com- parison, and all those substituted forms of expres- sion, which give a poetical air to language. An American chief, at this day, harangues at the head of his tribe, in a more bold metaphorical style, than a modern European would adventure to use in an Epic poem.
In the progress of society, the genius and man- ners of men undergo a change more favourable to accuracy than to sprightliness and sublimity. As the world advances, the understanding gains ground upon the imagination ; the understand- ing is more exercised ; the imagination, less. Fewer objects occur that are new or surprising. Men apply themselves to trace the causes of things ; they correct and refine one another ; they subdue or disguise their passions ; they form their exterior manners upon one uniform standard of politeness and civility. Human na- ture is pruned according to method and rule. Language advances from sterility to copiousness, and at the same time from fervour and enthu-
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 83
siasm, to correctness and precision. Style be- comes more chaste ; but less animated. The progress of the world in this respect resembles the progress of age in man. The powers of ima- gination are most vigorous and predominant in youth ; those of the understanding ripen more slowly, and often attain not to their maturity, till the imagination begin to flag. Hence poe- try, which is the child of imagination, is fre- quently most glowing and animated in the first ages of society. As the ideas of our youth are remembered with a peculiar pleasure on account of their loveliness and vivacity ; so the most an- cient poems have often proved the greatest fa- vourites of nations.
Poetry has been said to be more ancient than prose : and, however paradoxical such an asser- tion may seem, yet, in a qualified sense, it is true. Men certainly never conversed with one another in regular numbers ; but even their or- dinary language would, in ancient times, for the reasons before assigned, approach to a poetical style ; and the first compositions transmitted to posterity, beyond doubt, were, in a literal sense, poems ; that is, compositions in which imagina- tion had the chief hand, formed into some kind
84- A CRITICAL DISSERTATION O^"
of numbers, and pronounced with a musical mo- dulation or tone. Music or song has been found coeval with society among the most barbarous nations. The only subjects which could prompt men, in their first rude state, to utter their thoughts in compositions of any length, w^ere such as naturally assumed the tone of p'oetry ; praises of their gods, or of their ancestors ; com- memorations of their own w^arlike exploits ; or lamentations over their misfortunes. And before writing was invented, no other compositions ex- cept songs or poems, could take such hold of the imagination and memory, as to be preserved by oral tradition, and handed down from one race to another.
Hence we may expect to find poems among the antiquities of all nations. It is probable too, that an extensive search would discover a cer- tain degree of resemblance among all the most ancient poetical productions, from whatever country they have proceeded. In a similar state of manners, similar objects and passions operat- ing upon the imaginations of men, will stamp their productions with the same general charac- ter. Some diversity will, no doubt, be occasion- ed by climate and genius. But mankind never
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 85
bear such resembling features, as they do in the beginnings of society. Its subsequent revolutions give rise to the principal distinctions among na- tions ; and divert, into channels widely separated, that current of human genius and manners, which descends originally from one spring. What we have been long accustomed to call the oriental vein of poetry, because some of the earliest poeti- cal productions have come to us from the east, is probably no more oriental than occidental ; it is characteristical of an age rather than a country ; and belongs, in some measure, to all nations at a certain period. Of this the works of Ossian seem to furnish a remarkable proof.
Our present subject leads us to investigate the ancient poetical remains, not so much of the east, or of the Greeks or Romans, as of the northern nations ; in order to discover whether the Gothic poetry has any resemblance to the Celtic or Galic, which we are about to consider. Though the Goths, under which name we usually comprehend all the Scandinavian tribes, were a people altogether fierce and martial, and noted, to a proverb, for their ignorance of the liberal arts, yet they too, from the earliest times, had their poets and their songs. Their poets were
86 A CRITICAL DISSERTATION ON
distinguished by the title of Scalders, and their songs were termed Vyses *. Saxo Grammati- cus, a Danish historian of considerable note, who flourished in the thirteenth century, informs
* Olaus Wormius, in the appendix to his Treatise de Literatura Riniica, has sriven a particular account of the Gothic poetry, commonly called Runic, from Runes, which signifies the Gothic letters. He informs us. that there were no fewer than l.SG different kinds of measure or verse used in their Vyses; and though we are accustomed to call rhyme a Gothic invention, he says expressly, that among all these measures, rhyme, or correspondence of final syllables, was never employed. He analyses the structure of one of these kinds of verse, that in which the poem of Lodbrog, aftei-wards quoted, is written : wliich exhibits a very sin<:ular species of harmony, if it can be allowed that name, depending neither upon rhyme nor upon metrical feet, or quantity of syllables, but chiefly upon the number of syllables, and the disposition of the letters. In every stanza was an equal number of lines : in eveiy line six syllables. In each distich, it was requisite that three words should begin with the same let- ter; two of the corresponding words placed in the first line of the distich, the third, in the second line. In each line were also required two syllables, but never the final ones, formed either of the same consonants, or same vowels. As an example of this measure, Olaus gives us these two Latin lines, constructed according to the above rules of Riinic verse:
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 87
US that very many of these songs, containing the ancient traditionary stories of the country, were found engraven upon rocks in the old Runic character ; several of which he has translated into Latin, and inserted into his History. But his versions are plainly so paraphrastical, and
ChrJstus caput nostrum Coronet te bonis.
The initial letters of Christus, Caput, and Coronet, make tlie three corresponding letters of the distich. In the first line, the first syllables of Christus and of nostrum : in the second line, the on in coronet and in bonis make the re- quisite correspondence of syllables. Frequent inversions and transpositions were permitted in this poetry; which would naturally follow from such laborious attention to the collocation of words.
The curious on this subject may consult likewise Dr Hicks's Thesaurus Linguarum Septentrionalium ; particular- ly the 23d chapter of his Grammatica Anglo-Saxonica & Maeso-Gothica ; where they will find a full account of the structure of the Anglo-Saxon verse, which nearly resembled the Gothic. Tliey will find also some specimens both of Gothic and Saxon poetry-. An extract which Dr Hicks has given from the Mork of one of the Danish Scalders, entitled Hervarer Saga, containing an evocation from the dead, may be found in the 6 th volume of Miscellany Poems, published by Mr Dryden.
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forced into such an imitation of the style and the measures of the Roman poets, that one can form no judgment from them of th6 native spirit of the original. A more curious monument of the true Gothic poetry is preserved by Olaus Wor- mius in his book de Literatura Runica. It is an Epicedium, or funeral song, composed by Reg- ner Lodbrog ; and translated by Olaus, word for word from the original. This Lodbrog was a king of Denmark, who lived in the eighth cen- tury, famous for his wars and victories ; and at the same time an eminent Scalder or poet. It was his misfortue to fall at last into the hands of one of his enemies, by whom he was thrown into prison, and condemned to be destroyed by serpents. In this situation he solaced himself with rehearsing all the exploits of his life. The poem is divided into twenty-nine stanzas, of ten lines each ; and every stanza begins with these words, Pugnavimus Ensibus, We have fought with our swords. Olaus's version is in many places so obscure as to be hardly intelligible. I have subjoined the whole below, exactly as he has published it ; and shall translate as much as
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 89
may give the English reader an idea of the spirit and strain of this kind of poetry *.
" We have fought with our swords. I was *' young, when, towards the east, in the bay of
1. •
Pugiiavimns Ensibus Hand post longum tempus Cum in Gotlandia accessimus Ad seipenlis immensi necem Tunc impetravinius Thoram Ex hoc vocarunt me virum Quod serpentem transfodi Hirsutam biaccam ob illam cedem Cuspide ictum intuli in colubrum Ferro lucidorum stupendiorum.
2. Multum juvenis fui quando acquisivimus Orientem versus in Oreonico freto Viilnerum amnes avidae ferae Et flavipedi avi Accepimus ibidem sonuerunt Ad sublimes galeas Dura ferra magnam escam Omnis erat oceanus vulnus Vadavit corvus in sanguine Caesonim.
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" Oreon, we made torrents of blood flow, to *' gorge the ravenous beast of prey, and the yel- *' low-footed bird. There resounded the hard ** steel upon the lofty helmets of men. The
3. Alte tulimus tunc lanceas Quando viginti anuos nuraeraviraus Et celebrem landem coinparavimus passim Vicimus octo barones In oriente ante Dimini portum Aqnilee impeti-avinuis tunc sufficientem Hospitii sumptum in ilia strage Sudor decidit in vulnerum Oceano perdidit exercitus aetalem.
4. Pugnae facta copia Cum Helsingianos postulavimus Ad aulam Odini
Naves direximus in ostium Vistula; Mucro potuit tum mordere Omuis erat vulnus unda Terra rubefacla Calido Frendebat gladius in loricas Gladius findebat Clypeos.
5. Memini neminem tunc fjigisse Priusquam in navibus
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" whole ocean was one wound. The crow waded " in the blood of the slain. Wlien we had num- " bered twenty years, we lifted our spears on " high, and everywhere spread our renown,
Heraudus in bello caderet Non findit navibus Alius baro praestantior Mare ad portiun In navibus lon^is post ilium Sic attulit princeps passim Alacre in bcUum cor.
6.
Exercitns abjecit clypeos Cum hasla volavit Ardua ad virorum pectora Momordit Scarforum cautes Gladius in pagna Sanguineus erat Clypeus Antequam Rafno rex caderet Fluxit ex virorum capitibus CaJidus in loricas sudor.
7. Habere potuerunt turn corvi Ante Indirorum insnlas Sufficientem praedam dilaniandam Acquisivimus feris camivoris Plenum prandium unico actu
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*' Eight barons we overcame in the east, before " the port of Diminum ; and plentifully we " feasted the eagle in that slaughter. The warm *^ stream of wounds ran into the ocean. The
Difficile erat unius facere mentioiiem Oriente sole Spicula vidi pungere Propulerunt arcus ex ce ferra.
Altum miigienmt euses Anteqnam in Laneo campo Eislinus rex cecicUt Processimus auro ditati Ad terram prostiatorum dimicanduui Gladius secuit Clypeorum Picturas in galearum conventu Cervicum mustum ex vulneribus DifFusum per cerebrum fissum.
9. Teniimis Clypeos in sanguine Cum bastam unximus Ante Boring holmum Telorum nubes disrumpunt clypeum Extrusit arcus ex se metallum Volnir cecidit in conflictu Non erat illo rex major Caesi dispersi late per littora Ferae amplectebantur escam.
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*' army fell before us. Wlien we steered our " ships into the mouth of the Vistula, we sent " the Helsingians to the Hall of Odin. Then '' did the sword bite. The waters were all one
10. Pagna manifeste crescebat Antequam Freyr rex caderet In Flandrorum terra Caepit cseruleus ad iiicidendum Sanguine illitus in aureatn Loricam in pugna Durus armorum mucro olim Virgo deploravit matutinam lanienam Mnlta praeda dabatur feris.
11.
Centies centenos vidi jacere
In uavibus
Ubi iEuglanes vocatur
Navigavimus ad pugnam
Per sex dies antequam exercitus caderet
Transegimus mucronum missam
Idexorlu solis
Coactus est pro nostris gladiis
Valdiofur in bello occumbere.
12. Ruit pluvia sanguinis de gladiis Praeceps in Bardafyrde
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" wound. The earth was dyed red with the *' warm stream. The sword rung upon the " coats of mail, and clove the bucklers in twain. " None fled on that day, till among his ships
Pallidum corpus pro accipitribus
Murmuravit arcus ubi mucro
Acriter mordebat Loricas
In conflictu
Odini Pileus Galea
Cucurrit arcus ad vulnus
Venenate acutus conspersus sudore sanguineo.
13. Tenuimus magica scuta Alte in pugnae ludo Ante Hiadningum sinum Videre licuit tuni viros Qui gladiis lacerarunt Clypeos In gladiatorio murmure Galeee attritae virorum Erat sicut splendidam virginem In leclojuxta se collocarc.
14. Dura venit tempestas Clypeis Cadaver cecidit in terrain In Nortumbria Erat circa matutinum tempus Hominibus necessum erat fngere
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN^. 95
'* Heraudus fell. Than him no braver baron " cleaves the sea with ships ; a cheerful heart " did he ever bring to the combat. Then the •' host threw away their shields, when the up-
Ex praelio ubi acute Cassidis campos mordebant gladii Eral hoc veluti Juveneni viduam In primaria sede osculari.
15. Herthiofe evasit fortunatus In Aiistralibiis Orcadibus ipse Victoriae in nostris hominibus Cogebatiir in armorum nimbo Rogvaldus occumbere Iste venit summus super accipitres Lucius in gladiorum ludo Strenue jactabat concussor Galea sanguinis teli.
16. Quilibet jacebat transversim supra alium Gdudebat pugna laetus Accipiter ob gladiorum ludum Non fecit aquilam aut aprum Qui Irlandiam gubernavit Conventus fiobat ferri & Clypei Marstauus rex jejunis Fiebat in vedrae siuu Praeda data corvLs.
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*' lifted spear flew at the breasts of heroes. The *' sword bit the Scarfian rocks ; bloody was the *' shield in battle, until Rafno the king was slain. " From the heads of warriors the warm sweat
17. Bellatorem multum vidi cadere Maute ante machzeram Viruin in mucronum dissidio Filio meo incidit mature Gladius jnxta cor Egillus fecit Agnerum spoliatuni Imperterritiim virum vita Sonuit lancea prope Haindi Griseaniloiicain splendebant vexilla.
18. Veiborum tenaces vidi dissecare Haut minutim pro Iiipis Endili maris ensibus Erat per Hebdoraadae spacium Quasi mulieres vinum apportarent Rubefactae erant naves Valde in slrepitu armor um Scissa erat lorica In Scioldungorum praslio.
19. Pulchiicomum vidi crepusculascere Virginis amatorera circa matutinum 1
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 97
•' Streamed down their armour. The crows a- " round the Indirian islands had an ample prey. " It were difficult to single out one among so " many deaths. At the rising of the sun I be-
Et confabulationis atnicum viduarum Erat sicut calidum balneum Vinei vasis nymplia portaret Nos in Has freto Antiquam Orn rex caderet Sanguineum Clypeum vidi ruptum Hoc invertit virorum vitam.
20. Egimiis gladiomm ad caedem Lndum in Lindis insula Cum Regibus Iribus Pauci potuerunt inde laetari Cecidit multus in rictum ferarum Accipiter dilaniavit carnem cum lupo Ut satur inde discederet Hyberuorum sanguis in oceanum Copiose decidit per mactationis tempiis.
21. Alte gladius mordebat Clypeos Tunc cum aurei coloris Hasta fricabat loricas Videre licuit in Onlugs insula Per secula multum post VOL. I. G
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" held the spears piercing the bodies of foes, and " the bows throwing forth their steel-pointed ar- " rows. Loud roared the swords in the plains *• of Lano. The virgin long bewailed the slaugh-
Ibi fuit ad gladiorum liidos Reges processeruBt Rubicundiim erat circa insulam Ar volans Draco vulnerum.
22. Quid est viro forti morte certius Etsi ipse in arraorum nimbo Adversus coUocatus sit Szepe deplorat aetatem Qui nuuquara premitur Malum ferunt tiniidum incitare Aquilam ad gladiorum ludum Meticulosus venit nuspiam Cordi stio usui.
23. Hoc numero aequum ut pro In contactu gladiorum Juvenis uuus contra aHerum Non retrocedai vir a Tiro. Hoc fuit viii fortis nobilitas diu •Semper debat amoris amicus virginum Audax esse in fiemitu arnioium.
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 99
" ter of that morning." In this strain the poet continues to describe several other military ex- ploits. The images are not much varied : The noise of arms, the streaming of blood, and the
24. Hoc videtur niihi re vera Quod fata sequimur Rarus transgreditur fata Parcarum Non destinavi Ellae De vitae exitu meae
Cum ego sanguinem semimortuus tegerem Et naves in aquas protnisi Passim impetravimus turn feris Escam in Scotiae sinubus.
25. Hoc ridere me facii semper Quod Balderi patris scamna Parata scio in aula Bibemus cerevisiam brevi Ex coucavis ciateribus craniorum Non gemit vir fortis contra mortem Magnifici in Odini domibus Non venio desperabuudis Verbis ad Odini aulam.
26. Hie vellent nunc omues Filii Aslaugse gladiis
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feasting the birds of prey, often recurring. He mentions the death of two of his sons in battle ; and the lamentation he describes as made for one of them is very singular. A Grecian or Ro-
Amarum bellum excitar e Si exacte scirent Calamitatcs nostras Queni non pauci angues Venenati me diseerpunt Matrem accepi meis Filiis ita utcorda valeant,
27. Valde inclinatur ad haereditatera Crudele stat uocumentum a vipera Anguis inhabitat aulain cordis Speramns alleriiis ad Othini Virgam in EUze sanguine Fill ismeis livescet Sua iri rubescet Non acres juvenes Sessionem tranquillam faciant.
28. Habeo quinquagies Piffilia sub signis facta Ex belli invitatione & semel Minime pulavi hominum Quod me futuris esset
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 101
man poet would have introduced the virgins or nymphs of the wood, bewaihng the untimely fall of a young hero. But, says our Gothic poet, " When Rogvaldus was slain, for him mourned " all the hawks of heaven," as lamenting a bene- factor who had so liberally supplied them with prey; " for boldly," as he adds, " in the strife of " swords, did the breaker of helmets throw the " spear of blood."
The poem concludes with sentiments of the highest bravery and contempt of death. " What " is more certain to the brave man than death, " though amidst the storm of swords, he stands
Juvenis didici mucronem nibefacere Alius rex praestantior Nos Asae invitabunt Nou est lugeuda mors.
29. Fert animus finire Invitant me Dysae Quas ex Othini aula Othinus mihi misit Laetus cerevisiam cum Asis In summa sede bibani Vilae elapsae sunt horae Ridens moriar.
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*' always ready to oppose it ? He only regrets *' this life who hath never known distress. The " timorous man allures the devouring eagle to " the field of battle. The coward, wherever he " comes, is useless to himself. This I esteem ho- " nourable, that the youth should advance to " the combat fairly matched one against another ; *' nor man retreat from man. Long was this the " warrior's highest glory. He who aspires to " the love of virgins, ought always to be fore- " most in the roar of arms. It appears to me " of truth, that we are led by the Fates. Sel- " dom can any overcome the appointment of " destiny. Little did I foresee that Ella * M^as *' to have my life in his hands, in that day when " fainting I concealed my blood, and pushed " forth my ships into the waves ; after we had " spread a repast for the beasts of prey through- " out the Scottish bays. But this makes me al- " ways rejoice that in the halls of our father Bal- " der (or Odin) I know there are seats prepared, " where, in a short time, we shall be drinking ale " out of the hollow skulls of our enemies. In " the house of the mighty Odin, no brave man
* This was the name of hb rnemy vlio had ccndemned hiin to death.
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 103
" laments death. I come not with the voice of " despair to Odin's hall. How eagerly would " all the sons of Aslauga now rush to war, did " they know the distress of their father, whom a " multitude of venomous serpents tear ! I have " given to my children a mother who hath filled " their hearts with valour. I am fast approach- " ing to my end. A cruel death awaits me from " the viper's bite. A snake dwells in the midst " of my heart. I hope that the sword of some " of my sons shall yet be stained with the blood " of Ella. The valiant youths will wax red with '' anger, and will not sit in peace. Fifty and one " times have I reared the standard in battle. In " my youth I learned to dye the sword in blood ; " my hope was then, that no king among men " would be more renowned than me. The god- " desses of death will now soon call me ; I must " not mourn my death. Now I end my song. " The goddesses invite me away ; they whom " Odin has sent to me from his hall. I will sit *' upon a lofty seat, and drink ale joyfully with " the goddesses of death. The hours of my life " are run out. I will smile when I die."
This is such poetry as we might expect from a
lO^ A CRITICAL DISSERTATION ON
barbarous nation. It breathes a most ferocious spirit. It is wild, harsh, and irregular; but at the same time animated and strong ; the style, in the original, full of inversions, and, as we learn from some of Olaus's notes, highly metaphorical and figured.
But when we open the works of Ossian, a very different scene presents itself. There we find the fire and the enthusiasm of the most early times, combined with an amazing degree of regularity and art. We find tenderness, and even delicacy of sentiment, greatly predominant over fierceness and barbarity. Our hearts are melted with the softest feelings, and at the same time elevated with the highest ideas of magnanimity, generosity, and true heroism. When we turn from the poe- try of Lodbrog to that of Ossian, it is like passing from a savage desert into a fertile and cultivated country. How is this to be accounted for ? Or by what means to be reconciled with the remote antiquity attributed to these poems? This is a curious point : and requires to be illustrated.
That the ancient Scots were of Celtic original is past all doubt. Their conformity with the Celtic nations, in language, manners, and reli-
THE POEMS OF OSSIAIf. 105
gion, proves it to a full demonstration. The Celtae, a great and mighty people, altogether dis- tinct from the Goths and Teutones, once extend- ed their dominion over all the west of Europe ; but seem to have had their most full and com- plete establishment in Gaul. Wherever the Cel- tae or Gauls are mentioned by ancient writers, we seldom fail to hear of their Druids and their Bards ; the institution of which two orders, was the capital distinction of their manners and poli- cy. The Druids were their philosophers and priests ; the Bards, their poets and recorders of heroic actions : And both these orders of men seem to Have subsisted among them, as chief members of the state, from time immemorial *. We must not therefore imagine the Celtae to have been altogether a gross and rude nation. They possessed from very remote ages a formed system
Strabo, lib. iv.
Eiffi va>^ *t/ToTc "jtj TToiiirat /uiiKoiVy «c BAfSm ovof^ci^isa-tv. hTot S'i fxsT h^yoivuy, Tat7? W^ntg o/uotdv, it <fs &\!tT<p)i/uii9'i. Diodor. Siciil. 1. 5.
Tac (Tg AKHcrfAitra. duTm na-iv ot KAhifjitvoi ^agJ'oi. voihtu'i (T'fcTo/ tvlx^itvia^t fjLiT' eeJ^nt iTrmviic Kiyovri;. Posidonius ap. Athenieuin, 1. 6.
106 A CRITICAL DISSERTATION ON
of discipline and manners, which appears to have had a deep and lasting influence. Ammianus Marcellinus gives them this express testimony, that there flourished among them the study of the most laudable arts ; introduced by the Bards, whose office it was to sing in heroic verse, the gallant actions of illustrious men ; and by the Druids, who lived together in colleges or socie- ties, after the Pythagorean manner, and philoso- phizing upon the highest subjects, asserted the immortality of the human soul *. Though Ju- lius Caesar, in his account of Gaul, does not ex- pressly mention the bards, yet it is plain that un- der the title of Druids, he comprehends that whole college or order ; of which the Bards, who it is probable were the disciples of the
* Per haec loca (speaking of Gaul) honiinibus paulaliin excultis viguere stiidia laudabiUum doctrirmrum ; inchoata per Bardos & Euhages Sc Druidas. £t liardi quidem for- tia virorum illustrinm facta heroicis composita versibus cnni dulcibus lyrae modulis cantitaruut. Euhages vcro scru- tantes serium «& sublimia naturae paudeie coiiabantur. In- ter hos, Druidae ingeniis celgiores, ul auctoritas Pylhagorap. decrevit, sodalitiis adstricti consoi tiis, quzeslionibiss altanmi occultarumque rerum erecti sunt ; &c despectantes humana pionuutiavuut animas iramortalcs. Amm. Marcellinus, lib, 1 5. cap. 9.
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 107
Druids, undoubtedly made a part. It deserves remark, that, according to his account, the Drui- dical institution first took rise in Britain, and pas- sed from thence into Gaul ; so that they who aspired to be thorough masters of that learning were wont to resort to Britain. He adds too, that such as were to be initiated among the Druids, were obliged to commit to their memory a great nmiiber of verses, insomuch that some employed twenty years in this course of education ; and that they did not think it lawful to record these poems in writing, but sacredly handed them down by tradition from race to race *.
So strong was the attachment of the Celtic nations to their poetry and their bards, that a- midst all the changes of their government and manners, even long after the order of the Druids was extinct, and the national religion altered, the bards continued to flourish ; not as a set of strolling songsters, like the Greek Aot^oi or Rhap- sodists, in Homer's time, but as an order of men highly respected in the state, and supported by a public establishment. We find them, according to the testimonies of Strabo and Diodorus, be-
* Vid. Csesar de beUo Gall. lib. 5.
108 A CRITICAL DISSERTATION ON
fore the age of Augustus Caesar; and we find them remaining under the same name, and exer- cising the same functions as of old, in Ireland, and in the north of Scotland, almost down to our own times. It is well known that in both these countries, every Regulus or chief had his own bard, who was considered as an officer of rank in his court ; and had lands assigned him, which descended to his family. Of the honour in which the bards were held, many instances oc- cur in Ossian's poems. On all important occa- sions, they were the ambassadors between con- tending chiefs ; and their persons were held sa- cred. " Cairbar, feared to stretch his sword to " the bards, though his soul was dark." " Loose *' the bards," said his brother Cathmor, " they *' are the sons of other times. Their voice shall *' be heard in other ages, when the kings of Te- *' mora have failed."
From all this, the Celtic tribes clearly appear to have been addicted in so high a degree to poetry, and to have made it so much their study from the earliest times, as may remove our won- der at meeting with a vein of higher poetical re- finement among them, than was at first sight to have been expected among nations whom we are
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 109
accustomed to call barbarous. Barbarity, I must observe, is a very equivocal term ; it ad- mits of many different forms and degrees ; and though in all of them it excludes polished man- ners, it is, however, not inconsistent with gene- rous sentiments and tender aflPections *. What degrees of friendship, love, and heroism, may possibly be found to prevail in a rude state of so-
* Surely among the wild Laplanders, if anywhere, bar- barity is in i's most perfect state. Yet their love songs, which Scheffer has given us in his Lapponia, are a proof that natural tenderness of sentiment may be found in a coun- try into which the least glimmering of science has never pe- netrated. To most English readers these songs are well known by the elegant translations of them in the Spectator, No. 366 and 400. I shall subjoin Scheffer's Latin version of one of them, which has the appearance of being strictly literal :
Sol, clarissimum emitte lumen in paludem Orra. Si eni- sus in summa picearum cacumina scirem mc visurum Orra paludem, in ea eniterer, ut viderem inter quos arnica, niea esset flores ; oranes suscinderem frutices ibi enatos, omnes ramos praesecarem, hos virentes ramos. Cursum nubium essem secutus, quae iter suuni instituunt versus paludem Or- ra, si ad te volare possem alis, cornicum ahs. Sed mihi de- sunt alae, alae querquedul*, pedesque, ansenim pedes plan- taive bonse quae deferre me valeant ad te. Satis expectasti
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ciety, no one can say. Astonishing instances of them, we know, from history, have sometimes appeared : and a few characters distinguished by those high quahties, might lay a foundation for a set of manners being introduced into the songs of the bards, more refined, it is probable, and ex- alted, according to the usual poetical license, than the real manners of the country. In par- ticular, with respect to heroism ; the great em- ployment of the Celtic bards, was to delineate the characters, and sing the praises of heroes. So Lucan :
Vos quoque qui fortes animos, belloque peremtos, Laudibus in longum vates diffunditis aevum Plnrima securi fudistis carmina bardi. Phars. 1. 1.
Now, when we consider a college or order of
diu; per tot dies, tot dies tuos optimos, oculisluisjucundis- simis, corde tuo aniicissimo. Quod si longissime velles effu- gere, cito tanien te consequerer. Quid finnius validiusve esse potest quam eontorti nervi, cateneeve ferreae, quae du- rissime ligant ? Sic amor conlorquet caput nostrum, nmlat cogitationcs & sententias. Peurorum voluntas, voluntas venti ; juvenum cogitationcs, longae cogitationcs. Qnos si audirem omnes, a via, a via justa declinarem. Unum est consilium quod capiam ; ita scio viam rectiorem me repertu- rum. Schtfferi Lapponia, cap. 25.
THE POEMS OF OSSIAli. Ill
men, who, cultivating poetry throughout a long series of ages, had their imaginations continually employed on the ideas of heroism ; who had all the poems and panegyrics, which were composed by their predecessors, handed down to them with care ; who rivalled and endeavoured to outstrip those who had gone before them, each in the ce- lebration of his particular hero ; is it not natural to think that at length the character of a hero would appear in their songs with the highest lustre, and be adorned with qualities truly noble ? Some of the qualities, indeed, which distinguish a Fingal, moderation, humanity, and clemency, would not probably be the first ideas of heroism occurring to a barbarous people ; but no sooner had such ideas begun to dawn on the minds of poets, than, as the human mind easily opens to the native representations of human perfection, they would be seized and embraced ; they would enter into their panegyrics ; they would afford materials for succeeding bards to work upon and improve ; they would contribute not a Httle to exalt the public manners. For such songs as these, familiar to the Celtic warriors from their child- hood, and throughout their whole life, both in war
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and in peace, their principal entertainment, must have had a very considerable influence in propa- gating among them real manners nearly approach- ing to the poetical ; and in forming even such a hero as Fingal. Especially when we consider that among their limited objects of ambition, among the few advantages which in a savage state man could obtain over man, the chief was fame, and that im- mortality which they expected to receive from their virtues and exploits, in the songs of bards *.
Having made these remarks on the Celtic poe- try and bards in general, I shall next consider the particular advantages which Ossian posses- sed. He appears clearly to have lived in a pe- riod which enjoyed all the benefit I just now mentioned of traditionary poetry. The exploits of Trathal, Trenmor, and the other ancestors of Fingal, are spoken of as familiarly known. An- cient bards are frequently alluded to. In one
* When Edward I. conquered Wales, he put to death all the Welch bards. 'I'his cruel policy plainly shews how great an influence he imagined the songs of these bards to have over the minds of the people; and ofwhat nature he judged that influence to be. The Welch bards were of the same Celtic race with the Scotish and Irish.
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 113
remarkable passage, Ossian describes himself as living in a sort of classical age, enlightened by the memorials of former times, which were conveyed in the songs of bards ; and points at a period of darkness and ignorance which lay beyond the reach of tradition. " His words," says he, " came " only by halves to our ears ; they were dark as " the tales of other times, before the light of the " song arose." Ossian himself appears to have been endowed by nature with an exquisite sensi- bility of heart ; prone to that tender melancholy which is so often an attendant on great genius ; and susceptible equally of strong and of soft emo- tions. He was not only a professed bard, educat- ed with care, as we may easily believe, to all the poetical art then known, and connected, as he shews us himself, in intimate friendship with the other contemporary bards, but a warrior also ; and the son of the most renowned hero and prince of his age. This formed a conjunction of circum- stances, uncommonly favourable towards exalting the imagination of a poet. He relates expedi- tions in which he had been engaged ; he sings of battles in which he had fought and overcome ; he had beheld the most illustrious scenes which that age could exhibit, both of heroism in war,
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and magnificence in peace. For however rude the magnificence of those times may seem to us, we must remember that all ideas of magnificence are comparative ; and that the age of Fingal was an aera of distinguished splendour in that part of the world. Fingal reigned over a considerable territory ; he was enriched with the spoils of the Roman province ; he was ennobled by his victo- ries and great actions ; and was in all respects a personage of much higher dignity than any of the chieftains, or heads of clans, who lived in the same country, after a more extensive monarchy was established.
The manners of Ossian's age, so far as we can gather them from his writings, were abun- dantly favourable to a poetical genius. The two dispiriting vices, to which Longinus imputes the decline of poetry, covetousness and effeminacy, were as yet unknown. The cares of men were few. They lived a roving indolent life ; hunting and war, their principal employments ; and their chief amusements, the music of bards and " the feast of shells." The great object pursued by heroic spirits, was, " to receive their fame," that is, to become worthy of being celebrated in the songs of bards ; and " to have their names on
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 115
'" four grey stones.'^ To die, unlamented, by a bard, was deemed so great a misfortune, as even to disturb their ghosts in another state. " They " wander in thick mists beside the reedy lake : '* but never shall they rise, without the song, to " the dwelling of winds." After death they ex- pected to follow employments of the same nature with those which had amused them on earth ; to fly with their friends on clouds, to pursue airy deer, and to listen to their praise in the mouths of bards. In such times as these, in a country where poetry had been so long cultivated, and so highly honoured, is it any wonder that among the race and succession of bards, one Homer should arise ; a man who, endowed with a natu- ral happy genius, favoured by peculiar advanta- ges of birth and condition, and meeting, in the course of his life, with a variety of incidents, pro- per to fire his imagination, and to touch his heart, should attain a degree of eminence in poe- try, worthy to draw the admiration of more refin- ed ages ?
The compositions of Ossian are so strongly marked with characters of antiquity, that al- though there were no external proof to support that antiquity, hardly any reader of judgment
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and taste, could hesitate in referring them to a very remote aera. There are four great stages through which men successively pass in the pro- gress of society. The first and earliest is the life of hunters ; pasturage succeeds to this, as the ideas of property begin to take root ; next agri- culture ; and lastly, commerce. Throughout Os- sian's poems we plainly find ourselves in the first of these periods of society ; during which, hunting was the chief employment of men, and the principal method of their procuring subsist- ence. Pasturage was not indeed wholly un- known ; for we hear of dividing the herd in the case of a divorce ; but the allusions to herds and to cattle are not many ; and of agriculture, we find no traces. No cities appear to have been built in the territories of Fingal. No arts are mentioned, except that of navigation and of work- ing in iron *. Every thing presents to us the
* Their skill in navigation need not at all surprise us. Living in the western islands, along the coast, or in a country which is everywhere intersected with arms of the sea, one of the first objects of their attention, fi-om the ear- liest time, must have been how to traverse the waters. Hence that knowledge of the stars, so necessary for guid-
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 117
most simple and unimproved manners. At their feasts, the heroes prepared their own repast ; they sat round the Hght of the burning oak ; the wind lifted their locks, and whistled through their open halls. Whatever was beyond the necessaries of life was known to them only as the spoil of the Roman province ; " the gold of the stranger ; the " hghts of the stranger; the steeds of the stran- " ger, the children of the rein."
This representation of Ossian's times, must strike us the more, as genuine and authentic, when
ing them by night, of which we find several traces in Os- sian's works; particularly in the beautiful description of Catiimor's shield, in the 7th book of Temora. Among all the northern maritime nations, navigation was very early studied. PiraUcal incursions were the chief means they eukployed for acquiimg booty ; and were an)oug ttie first exploits whicli distinguished them in the woil 1. Even the savage Americans were, at their fiist discovery, found to possess the most surprising skill and dexterity m navigating their immense lakes and rivers.
The description of CuthuUin's chariot, in the first book of Fingal, has been objected to by some, as representing greater magnificence than is consistent witli the supposed poverty of that age. But this chariot is plainly only a horse litter ; and the gems mentioned in the description, are no otiier than the shming stones or pebbles, known to be frequently found along the western coast of Scotl^d.
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it is compared with a poem of later date, which Mr Macpherson has preserved in one of his notes. It is that wherein five bards are represented as passing the evening in the house of a chief, and each of them separately giving his description of the night. The night scenery is beautiful ; and the author has plainly imitated the manner and style of Ossian : But he has allowed some images to appear which betray a later period of society. For we meet with windows clapping, the herds of goats and cows seeking shelter, the shepherd wan- dering, corn on the plain, and the wakeful hind rebuilding the shocks of corn which had been overturned by the tempest. Whereas in Ossian 's works, from beginning to end, all is consistent ; no modern allusion drops from him ; but every- where the same face of rude nature appears ; a country wholly uncultivated, thinly inhabited, and recently peopled. The grass of the rock, the flower of the heath, the thistle with its beard, are the chief ornaments of his landscapes. " The de- sert," says Fingal, " is enough for me, with all its woods and deer."
The circle of ideas and transactions is no wi- der than suits such an age ; nor any greater di- versity introduced into characters, than the events
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of that period would naturally display. Valour and bodily strength are the admired qualities. Contentions arise, as is usual among savage na- tions, from the slightest causes. To be affronted at a tournament, or to be omitted in the invita- tion to a feast, kindles a war. Women are often carried away by force ; and the Avhole tribe, as in the Homeric times, rise to avenge the wrong. The heroes show refinement of sentiment indeed on several occasions, but none of manners. They speak of their past actions with freedom, boast of their exploits, and sing their own praise. In their battles, it is evident that drums, trumpets, or bagpipes, were not known or used. They had no expedient for giving the military alarms but strik- ing a shield, or raising a loud cry : And hence the loud and terrible voice of Fingal is often men- tioned, as a necessary qualification of a general ; like the (ioiiv ctyctSoi MivtAetoi of Homer. Of mi- litary discipline or skill, they appear to have been entirely destitute. Their armies seem not to have been numerous ; their battles were disorderly ; and terminated, for the most part, by a personal combat, or wrestling of the two chiefs ; after which, " the bard sung the song of peace, and *• the battle ceased along the field."
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The manner of composition bears all the marks of the greatest antiquity. No artful transitions ; nor full and extended connection of parts ; such as we find among the poets of later times, when order and regularity of composition were more studied and known ; but a style always rapid and vehement ; in narration concise even to abruptness, and leaving several circumstances to be supplied by the reader's imagination. The lan- guage has all that figurative cast, which, as I be- fore shewed, partly a glowing and undisciplined imagination, partly the sterility of language and the want of proper terms, have always introdu- ced into the early speech of nations ; and in se- veral respects, it carries a remarkable resem- blance to the style of the Old Testament. It de- serves particular notice, as one of the most ge- nuine and decisive characters of antiquity, that very few general terms, or abstract ideas, are to be met with in the whole collection of Ossian's works. The ideas of men, at first, were all par- ticular. They had not words to express general conceptions. These were the consequence of more profound reflection, and longer acquain- tance with the arts of thought and of speech. Ossian, accordingly, almost never expresses him-
THE POEMS OF OSSIAX. 121
self in the abstract. His ideas extended little far- ther than to the objects he saw around him. A public, a community, the universe, were con- ceptions beyond his sphere. Even a mountain, a sea, or a lake, which he has occasion to men- tion, though only in a simile, are for the most part particularized ; it is the hill of Cromla, the storm of the sea of Malmor, or the reeds of the lake of Lego. A mode of expression, which whilst it is characteristical of ancient ages, is at the same time highly favourable to descriptive poetry. For the same reasons, personification is a poetical fi- gure not very common with Ossian. Inanimate objects, such as winds, trees, and flowers, he sometimes personifies with great beauty. But the personifications which are so familiar to later poets, of Fame, Time, Terror, Virtue, and the rest of that class, were unknown to our Celtic bard. These were modes of conception too abstract for his age.
All these are marks so undoubted, and some of them too so nice and delicate, of the most early times, as put the high antiquity of these poems out of question. Especially when we con- sider, that if there had been any imposture in
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this case, it must have been contrived and exe- cuted in the Highlands of Scotland, two or three centuries ago ; as up to this period, both by ma- nuscripts, and by the testimony of a multitude of living witnesses, concerning the uncontrovert- ible tradition of these poems, they can clearly be traced. Now this is a period when that country enjoyed no advantages for a composition of this kind, which it may not be supposed to have en- joyed in as great, if not in a greater degree, a thousand years before. To suppose that two or three hundred years ago, when we well know the Highlands to have been in a state of gross igno- rance and barbarity, there should have arisen in that country a poet, of such exquisite genius and of such deep knowledge of mankind, and of history, as to divest himself of the ideas and man- ners of his own age, and to give us a just and na- tural picture of a state of society ancienter by a thousand years ; one who could support this counterfeited antiquity through such a large col- lection of poems, without the least inconsistency ; and who, possessed of all this genius and art, had at the same time the self-denial of concealing himself, and of ascribing his own works to an
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 12c>
antiquated bard, without the imposture being de- tected ; is a supposition that transcends all bounds of credibility.
There are, besides, two other circumstances to be attended to, still of greater weight, if possible, against this hypothesis. One is, the total ab- sence of religious ideas from this work ; for which the translator has, in his preface, given a very probable account, on the footing of its being the work of Ossian. The druidical superstition was, in the days of Ossian, on the point of its final ex- tinction ; and for particular reasons odious to the family of Fingal ; whilst the Christian faith was not yet established. But had it been the work of one, to whom the ideas of Christianity were familiar from his infancy ; and who had superadded to them also the bigoted superstition of a dark age and country ; it is impossible but in some passage or other, the traces of them would have appeared. The other circumstance is, the entire silence which reigns with respect to all the great clans or families, which are now established in the Highlands. The origin of these several clans is known to be very ancient : And it is as well known, that there is no passion by which a native Highlander is more distinguish-
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ed, than by attachment to his clan, and jealousy for its honour. That a Highland bard, in forging a work relating to the antiquities of his coun- try, should have inserted no circumstance which pointed out the rise of his own clan, which ascer- tained its antiquity, or increased its glory, is, of all suppositions that can be formed, the most im- probable ; and the silence on this head, amounts to a demonstration that the author lived before any of the present great clans were formed or known.
Assuming it then, as we well may, for certain, that the poems now under consideration are ge- nuine venerable monuments of very remote anti- quity, I proceed to make some remarks upon their general spirit and strain. The two charac- teristics of Ossian's poetry are, tenderness and sublimity. It breathes nothing of the gay and cheerful kind ; an air of solemnity and serious- ness is diffused over the whole. Ossian is per- haps the only poet who never relaxes, or lets himself down into the light and amusing strain ; which I readily admit to be no small disadvan- tage to him, with the bulk of readers. He moves perpetually in the high region of the grand and the pathetic. One key note is struck at the be-
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ginning, and supported to the end ; nor is any or- nament introduced, but what is perfectly con- cordant with the general tone or melody. The events recorded are all serious and grave ; the scenery throughout, wild and romantic. The extended heath by the sea shore ; the mountain shaded with mist ; the torrent rushing through a solitary valley ; the scattered oaks, and the tombs of warriors overgrown with moss ; all pro- duce a solemn attention in the mind, and pre- pare it for great and extraordinary events. We find not in Ossian, an imagination that sports itself, and dresses out gay trifles to please the fancy. His poetry, more perhaps than that of any other writer, deserves to be styled, the Poe- try of the Heart. It is a heart penetrated -with noble sentiments, and with subjime and tender passions ; a heart that glows, and kindles the fancy ; a heart that is full, and pours itself forth. Ossian did not ^vrite, like modern poets, to please readers and critics. He sung from the love of poetiy and song. His delight was to think of the heroes among whom he had flourished ; to recal the affecting incidents of his life ; to dwell upon his past wars, and loves, and friendships ; till, as he expresses it himself, " there comes a
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" voice to Ossian and awakes his soul. It is the " voice of years that are gone ; they roll before " me with all their deeds ;" and under this true poetic inspiration, giving vent to his genius, no wonder we should so often hear and acknowledge in his strains, the powerful and ever-pleasing voice of nature.
Arte, natura potentior omni
Est Deus in nobis, agitante calescimus illo.
It is necessary here to observe, that the beau- ties of Ossian's writings cannot be felt by those who have given them only a single or a hasty perusal. His manner is so different from that of the poets to whom we are most accustomed ; his style is so concise, and so much crowded with imagery ; the mind is kept at such a stretch in accompanying the author ; that an ordinary reader is at first apt to be dazzled and fatigued, rather than pleased. His poems require to be taken up at intervals, and to be frequently re- viewed ; and then it is impossible but his beau- ties must open to every reader who is capable of sensibility. Those who have the highest degree of it, will relish them the most.
As Homer is, of aJl the great poets, the one
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whose manner, and whose times come the near- est to Ossian's, we are naturally led to run a pa- rallel in some instances between the Greek and the Celtic bard. For, though Homer lived more than a thousand years before Ossian, it is not from the age of the world, but from the state of society, that we are to judge of resembling times. The Greek has, in several points, a manifest su- periority. He introduces a greater variety of incidents ; he possesses a larger compafes of ideas ; has more diversity in his characters ; and a much deeper knowledge of human nature. It was not to be expected, that, in any of these particulars, Ossian could equal Homer. For Homer lived in a country where society was much farther ad- vanced ; he had beheld many more objects ; ci- ties built and flourishing ; laws instituted ; order, discipline, and arts begun. His field of obser- vation was much larger and more splendid ; his knowledge, of course, more extensive ; his mind also, it shall be granted, more penetrating. But if Ossian's ideas and objects be less diversified than those of Homer, they are all, however, of the kind fittest for poetry : The bravery and generosity of heroes, the tenderness of lovers, the attachments of friends, parents, and children.
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In a rude age and country, though the events that happen be few, the undissipated mind broods over them more ; they strike the imagination, and fire the passions in a higher degree ; and of con- sequence become happier materials to a poetical genius, than the same events when scattered through the wide circle of a more varied action and cultivated life.
Homer is a more cheerful and sprightly poet than Ossian. You discern in him all the Greek vivacity ; whereas Ossian uniformly maintains the gravity and solemnity of a Celtic hero. This too is in a great measure to be accounted for from the different situations in which they lived, partly personal, and partly national. Ossian had survived all his friends, and was disposed to melancholy by the incidents of his life. But be- sides this, cheerfulness is one of the many bles- sings which we owe to formed society. The so- litary wild state is always a serious one. Bating the sudden and violent bursts of mirth, which sometimes break forth at their dances and feasts, the savage American tribes have been noted by all travellers for their gravity and taciturnity. Somewhat of this taciturnity may be also remark- ed in Ossian. On all occasions he is frugal of
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his words ; and never gives you more of an image or a description, than is just sufficient to place it before you in one clear point of view. It is a blaze of lightning, which flashes and vanishes. Homer is more extended in his descriptions ; and fills them up with a greater variety of circum- stances. Both the poets are dramatic ; that is, they introduce their personages frequently speak- ing before us. But Ossian is concise and rapid in his speeches, as he is in every other thing. Homer, with the Greek vivacity, had also some portion of the Greek loquacity. His speeches indeed are highly characteristical ; and to them we are much indebted for that admirable display he has g-iven of human nature. Yet if he be te- dious anywhere, it is in these ; some of them trifling ; and some of them plainly unseasonable. Both poets are eminently sublime ; but a differ- ence may be remarked in the species of their sublimity. Homer's sublimity is accompanied with more impetuosity and fire ; Ossian's with more of a solemn and awful grandeur. Homer hurries you along ; Ossian elevates, and fixes you in astonishment. Homer is most sublime in actions and battles ; Ossian, in description and sentiment. In the pathetic, Homer, when, he
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chooses to exert it, has great power ; but Ossian exerts that power much oftener, and has the character of tenderness far more deeply imprint- ed on his works. No poet knew better how to seize and melt the heart. With regard to digni- ty of sentiment, the pre-eminence must clearly \>e given to Ossian. This is indeed a surprising circumstance, that in point of humanity, magna- nimity, virtuous feelings of every kind, our rude Celtic bard should be distinguished to such a de- gree, that not only the heroes of Homer, but even those of the polite and refined Virgil, are left far behind by those of Ossian.
After these general observations on the genius and spirit of our author, I now proceed to a near- er view, and more accurate examination of his works : and as Fingal is the first great poem in this collection, it is proper to begin with it. To refuse the title of an epic poem to Fingal, be- cause it is not, in every little particular, exactly conformable to the practice of Homer and Vir- gil, were the mere squeamishness and pedantry of criticism. Examined even according to Aris- totle's rules, it will be found to have all the es- sential requisites of a true and regular epic ; and to have several of them in so high a degree, as at
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first view to raise our astonishment on finding Ossian's composition so agreeable to rules of which he was entirely ignorant. But our asto- nishment will cease, when we consider from what source Aristotle drew those rules. Homer knew no more of the laws of criticism than Ossian ; but guided by nature, he composed in verse a re- gular story, founded on heroic actions, which all posterity admired. Aristotle, with great sagaci- ty and penetration, traced the causes of this ge- neral admiration. He observed what it was in Homer's composition, and in the conduct of his story, which gave it such power to please ; from this observation he deduced the rules which poets ought to follow, who would write and please like Homer ; and to a composition formed according to such rules, he gave the name of an epic poem. Hence his whole system arose. Aristotle studi- ed nature in Homer. Homer and Ossian both wrote from nature. No wonder that among all the three there should be such agreement and conformity.
The fundamental rules delivered by Aristotle concerning an epic poem, are these : That the action, which is the ground-work of the poem, should be one, complete, and great ; that it
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should be feigned, not merely historical ; that it should be enlivened with characters and manners^ and heightened by the marvellous.
But before entering on any of these, it may perhaps be asked, what is the moral of Fingal ? For, according to M. Bossu, an epic poem is no other than an allegory, contrived to illustrate some moral truth. The poet, says this critic, must begin with fixing on some maxim, or in- struction, which he mtends to inculcate on man- kind. He next forms a feble, like one of iFlsop's, wholly with a view to the moral ; and having thus settled and arranged his plan, he then looks into traditionary history for names and incidents, to give his fable some air of probability. Never did a more frigid, pedantic notion, enter into the mind of a critic. We may safely pronounce, that he who should compose an epic poem after this manner, who should first lay down a moral and contrive a plan, before he had thought of his personages and actors, might deliver indeed very sound instruction, but would find few readers. There cannot be the least doubt that the first object which strikes an epic poet, which fires his genius, and gives him any idea of his work, is the action or subject he is to celebrate. Hardly is
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there any tale, any subject a poet can choose for such a work, but will aiFord some general moral instruction. An epic poem is by its nature one of the most moral of all poetical compositions. But its moral tendency is by no means to be li- mited to some common-place maxim, which may be gathered from the story. It arises from the admiration of heroic actions, which such a com- position is peculiarly calculated to produce ; from the virtuous emotions which the characters and incidents raise, whilst we read it ; from the hap- py impression which all the parts separately, as Avell as the whole taken together, leave upon the mind. However, if a general moral be still in- sisted on, Fingal obviously furnishes one, not in- ferior to that of any other poet, viz. That Wis- •dom and Bravery always triumph over brutal force : or another nobler still ; That the most complete victory over an enemy is obtained by that moderation and generosity which convert him into a friend.
The unity of the epic action, which, of all Aristotle's rules is the chief and most material, is so strictly preserved in Fingal, that it must be perceived by every reader. It is a more com- plete unity than what arises from relating the ac-
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tions of one man, which the Greek critic justly censures as imperfect ; it is the unity of one En- terprise, the dehverance of Ireland from the in- vasion of Swaran : An enterprise which has sure- ly the full heroic dignity. All the incidents re- corded bear a constant reference to one end ; no double plot is carried on ; but the parts unite into a regular whole : and as the action is one and great, so it is an entire and complete action. For w^e find, as the critic further requires, a be- ginning, a middle, and an end ; a Nodus, or in- trigue in the poem ; difficulties occurring through Cuthullin's rashness and bad success : those dif- ficulties gradually surmounted ; and at last the work conducted to that happy conclusion which is held essential to epic poetry. Unity is indeed observed with greater exactness in Fingal, than in almost any other epic composition. For not only is unity of subject maintained, but that of time and place also. The autumn is clearly pointed out as the season of the action ; and from beginning to end the scene is never shifted from the heath of Lena, along the sea shore. The duration of the action in Fingal, is much shorter than in the Iliad or iEneid, but sure there may be shorter as well as longer heroic
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poems ; and if the authority of Aristotle be al- so required for this, he says expressl}^, that the epic composition is indefinite as to the time of its duration. Accordingly, the action of the Iliad lasts only forty-seven days, whilst that of the iEneid is continued for more than a year.
Throughout the whole of Fingal, there reigns that grandeur of sentiment, style, and imagery, which ought ever to distinguish this high species of poetr}-. The story is conducted with no small art. The poet goes not back to a tedious recit- al of the beginning of the war with SMaran ; but hastening to the main action, he falls in exactl3^ by a most happy coincidence of thought, with the rule of Horace.
Semper ad eventum festinat, et in medias res,
Non secns ac notas, auditorem rapit —
Nee gemino bellum Trojanum auditiir ab ovo.
DE ARTE POET.
He invokes no muse, for he acknowledged none ; but his occasional addresses to Malvina have a finer effect than the invocation of any muse. He sets out with no formal proposition of his subject; but the subject naturally and easily unfolds itself; the poem opening in an animated manner with the situation of Cuthullin,
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and the arrival of a scout v/ho informs him of Swaran's landing. Mention is presently made of Fingal, and of the expected assistance from the ships of the lonely isle, in order to give far- ther light to the subject. For the poet often shows his address in gradually preparing us for the events he is to introduce ; and in particular the preparation for the appearance of Fingal, the previous expectations that are raised, and the extreme magnificence fully answering these expectations, with which the hero is at length presented to us, are all worked up with such skilful conduct as would do honour to any poet of the most refined times. Homer's art in mag- nifying the character of Achilles has been uni- versally admired. Ossian certainly shews no less art in aggrandizing Fingal. Nothing could be more happily imagined for this purpose than the whole management of the last battle, wherein Gaul, the son of Morni, had besought Fingal to retire, and to leave to him and his other chiefs the honour of the day. The generosity of the king in agreeing to this proposal ; the majesty with which he retreats to the hill, from whence he was to behold the engagement, attended by his bards, and waving the lightning of his sword ;
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 137
his perceiving the chiefs overpowered by num- bers, but from unwilHngness to deprive them of the glory of the victory by coming in person to their assistance, first sending UHin, the bard, to animate their courage ; and, at last, when the dan- ger becomes more pressing, his rising in his might, and interposing, like a divinity, to decide the doubtful fate of the day ; are all circumstances contrived M^ith so much art as plainly discover the Celtic bards to have been not unpractised in he- roic poetry.
The story which is the foundation of the Iliad is in itself as simple as that of Fingal. A quarrel arises between Achilles and Agamemnon con- cerning a female slave ; on which Achilles, ap- prehending himself to be injured, withdraws his assistance from the rest of the Greeks. The Greeks fall into great distress, and beseech him to be reconciled to them. He refuses to fight for them in person, but sends his friend Patroclus ; and upon his being slain, goes forth to revenge his death, and kills Hector. The subject of Fin- gal is this : Swaran comes to invade Ireland : Cu- thullin, the guardian of the young king, had ap- plied for assistance to Fingal, who reigned in the opposite coast of Scotland. But before Fingal's
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arrival, he is hurried by rash counsel to encoun- ter Swaran. He is defeated ; he retreats ; and desponds, Fingal arrives in this conjuncture. The battle is for some time dubious ; but in the end he conquers Swaran ; and the remembrance of Swaran's being the brother of Agandecca, who had once saved his life, makes him dismiss him honourably. Homer, it is true, has filled up his story with a much greater variety of particulars than Ossian ; and in this has shewn a compass of invention superior to that of the other poet. But it must not be forgotten, that though Ho- mer be more circumstantial, his incidents, how- ever, are less diversified in kind than those of Os- sian. War and bloodshed reign throughout the Iliad ; and notwithstanding all the fertility of Homer's invention, there is so much uniformity in his subjects, that there are few readers who, before the close, are not tired of perpetual fight- ing. Whereas in Ossian, the mind is relieved by a more agreeable diversity. There is a finer mix- ture of war and heroism, with love and friend- ship, of martial, with tender scenes, than is to be met with, perhaps, in any other poet. The epi- sodes, too, have great propriety ; as natural, and proper to that age and country : consisting of the
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 139
songs of bards, which are known to have been the great entertainment of the Celtic heroes in war, as well as in peace. These songs are not in- troduced at random ; if you except the episode of Duchommar and Morna, in the first book, which, though beautiful, is more unartful than any of the rest ; they have always some particular relation to the actor who is interested, or to the events which are going on ; and, whilst they vary the scene, they preserve a sufficient connection with the main subject, by the fitness and propriety of their introduction.
As Fingal's love to Agandecca influences some circumstances of the poem, particularly the ho- nourable dismission of Sv/aran at the end ; it was necessary that we should be let into this part of the hero's story. But as it lay without the com- pass of the present action, it could be regularly introduced nowhere, except in an episode. Ac- cordingly the poet, with as much propriety, as if Aristotle himself had directed the plan, has contrived an episode for this purpose in the song of Carril, at the beginning of the third book.
The conclusion of the poem is strictly accord- ing to rule ; and is every way noble and pleasing. The reconciliation of the contending heroes, the
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consolation of Cuthullin, and the general felici- ty that crowns the action, sooth the mind in a very agreeable manner, and form that passage from agitation and trouble, to perfect quiet and repose, which critics require as the proper ter- mination of the epic work. " Thus they passed " the night in song, and brought back the morn- " ing with joy. Fingal arose on the heath ; and " shook his glittering spear in his hand. He " moved first towards the plains of Lena ; and " we followed like a ridge of fire. Spread the " sail, said the king of Morven, and catch the " winds that pour from Lena. We rose on the " wave with songs ; and rushed with joy through " the foam of the ocean." So much for the uni- ty and general conduct of the epic action in Fingal.
With regard to that property of the subject which Aristotle requires, that it should be feign- ed, not historical, he must not be understood so strictly, as if he meant to exclude all subjects which have any foundation in truth. For such exclusion would both be unreasonable in itself, and, what is more, would be contrary to the practice of Homer, who is known to have found- ed his Iliad on historical facts concerning the war
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 141
of Troy, which was famous throughout all Greece. Aristotle means no more than that it is the busi- ness of a poet not to be a mere annalist of facts, but to embellish truth with beautiful, probable, and useful fictions ; to copy nature, as he himself explains it, like painters, who preserve a likeness, but exhibit their objects more grand and beauti- ful than they are in reality. That Ossian has fol- lowed this course, and building upon true his- tory, has sufficiently adorned it with poetical fic- tion for aggrandizing his characters and facts, will not, I believe, be questioned by most readers. At the same time, the foundation which those facts and characters had in truth, and the share which the poet himself had in the transactions which he records, must be considered as no small advantage to his work. For truth makes an im- pression on the mind far beyond any fiction ; and no man, let his imagination be ever so strong, re- lates any events so feelingly as those in which he has been interested ; paints any scene so naturally as one which he has seen ; or draws any charac- ters in such strong colours as those which he has personally known. It is considered as an advan- tage of the epic subject to be taken from a period
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SO distant, as by being involved in the darkness of tradition, may give licence to fable. Though Ossian's subject may at first view appear unfavour- able in this respect, as being taken from his own times, yet when we reflect that he lived to an ex- treme old age ; that he relates what had been transacted in another country, at the distance of many years, and after all that race of men Avho had been the actors were gone off the stage ; we shall find the objection in a great measure obvi- ated. In so rude an age, when no written records were known, when tradition was loose, and accu- racy of any kind little attended to, what was great and heroic in one generation, easily ripened into the marvellous in the next.
The natural representation of human characters in an epic poem is highly essential to its merit ; and in respect of this there can be no doubt of Homer's excelling all the heroic poets who have ever wrote. But though Ossian be much inferior to Homer in this article, he will be found to be equal at least, if not superior, to Virgil ; and has indeed given all the display of human nature, which the simple occurrences of his times could be expected to furnish. No dead uniformity of
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. HS
character prevails in Fingal ; but, on the contra- ry, the principal characters are not only clearly distinguished, but sometimes artfully contrasted, so as to illustrate each other. Ossian's heroes are, like Homer's, all brave ; but their bravery, like those of Homer's too, is of different kinds. For instance, the prudent, the sedate, the modest and circumspect Connal, is finely opposed to the pre- sumptuous, rash, overbearing, but gallant and ge- nerous Calmar. Calmar hurries Cuthullin into action by his temerity ; and when he sees the bad effect of his counsels, he will not survive the dis- grace. Connal, like another Ulysses, attends Cu- thullin to his retreat, counsels, and comforts him under his misfortune. The fierce, the proud, the high-spirited Swaran is admirably contrasted with the calm, the moderate, and generous Fingal. The character of Oscar is a favourite one through- out the whole poems. The amiable warmth of the young warrior ; his eager impetuosity in the day of action ; his passion for fame ; his submis- sion to his father ; his tenderness for Malvina, are the strokes of a masterly pencil ; the strokes are few ; but it is the hand of nature, and attracts the heart. Ossian's own character, the old man, the hero, and the bard, all in one, presents to us
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through the whole work a most respectable and venerable figure, which we always contemplate with pleasure. Cuthullin is a hero of the highest class ; daring, magnanimous, and exquisitely sen- sible to honour. We become attached to his in- terest, and are deeply touched with his distress ; and after the admiration raised for him in the first part of the poem, it is a strong proof of Ossian's masterly genius that he durst adventure to pro- duce to us another hero, compared with whom, even the great Cuthullin should be only an inferi- or personage ; and who should rise as far above him, as Cuthullin rises above the rest.
Here indeed, in the character and description of Fingal, Ossian triumphs almost unrivalled : for we may boldly defy all antiquity to shew us any hero equal to Fingal. Homer's Hector posses- ses several great and amiable qualities ; but Hec- tor is a secondary personage in the Ihad, not the hero of the work. We see him only occasionally ; we know much less of him than we do of Fingal ; who not only in this Epic poem, but in Temora, and throughout the rest of Ossian's works, is pre- sented in all that variety of lights, which give the full display of a character. And though Hec- tor faithfully discharges his duty to his country,
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 145
his friends, and his family, he is tinctured, how- ever, with a degree of the same savage ferocity, which prevails among all the Homeric heroes. For we find him exulting over the fallen Patro- clus, with the most cruel taunts, and telling him when he lies in the agony of death, that Achilles cannot help him now ; and that in a short time his body, stripped naked, and deprived of funeral honours, shall be devoured by the vultures*. Wliereas in the character of Fingal, concur al- most all the qualities that can ennoble human na- ture ; that can either make us admire the hero, or love the man. He is not only unconquerable in war, but he makes his people happy by his wis- dom in the days of peace. He is truly the father of his people. He is known by the epithet of " Fin- " gal of the mildest look ;" and distinguished, on every occasion, by humanity and generosity. He is merciful to his foesf ; full of affection to his
* Iliad, xvi. 850. II. xvii. 127.
t When he commands his sons, after Swaran is taken pri- soner, to '' pursue the rest of Lochlin, over the heath of *' Lena ; that no vessel may hereafter bound on the dark- *'â– rolling waves of Inistore ;" he means not assuredly, as some Ixave misrepresented him, to order a general slaughter of the foes, and to prevent their saving themselves by flight j butj VOL. I. K
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children ; full of concern about his friends ; and never mentions Agandecca, his first love, with- out the utmost tenderness. He is the universal protector of the distressed ; " None ever went " sad from Fingal." " O Oscar ! bend the strong " in arms ; but spare the feeble hand. Be thou a " stream of many tides against the foes of thy " people ; but like the gale that moves the grass " to those who ask thine aid. So Trenmor liv- " ed ; such Trathal was ; and such has Fingal " been. My arm was the support of the injured ; " the weak rested behind the lightning of my " steel." These were the maxims of true heroism, to which he formed his grandson. His fame is represented as everywhere spread ; the greatest heroes acknowledge his superiority ; his enemies tremble at his name ; and the highest encomium that can be bestow ed on one whom the poet w ould most exalt, is to say, that his soul was like the soul of Fingal.
To do justice to the poet's merit, in supporting such a character as this, I must observe, what is
like a wise general, he commands his chiefs to render the victory complete, by a total rout of the enemy j that they might adventure no more for the future, to tit out any fleet against him or his allies.
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not commonly attended to, that there is no part of poetical execution more difficult, than to draw a perfect character in such a manner, as to render it distinct and affecting to the mind. Some strokes of human imperfection and frailty, are what usually give us the most clear view, and the most sensible impression of a character ; because they present to us a man, such as we have seen ; they recal known features of human nature. When poets attempt to go beyond this range, and de- scribe a faultless hero, they, for the most part, set before us a sort of vague undistinguishable character, such as the imagination cannot lay hold of, or realize to itself, as the object of affection. We know how much Virgil has failed in this par- ticular. His perfect hero, iEneas, is an unanimat- ed, insipid personage, whom we may pretend to admire, but whom no one can heartily love. But v^^hat Virgil has failed in, Ossian, to our astonish- ment, has successfully executed. His Fingal, though exhibited without any of the common hu- man failings, is nevertheless a real man ; a cha- racter which touches and interests every reader. To this it has much contributed, that the poet has represented him as an old man ; and by this has gained the advantage of throwing around him
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a great many circumstances peculiar to that age, which paint him to the fancy in a more distinct light. He is surrounded by his family : he in- structs his children in the principles of virtue : he is narrator of his past exploits ; he is vener- able with the grey locks of age ; he is frequently disposed to moralize, like an old man, on human vanity and the prospect of death. There is more art, at least more felicity, in this, than may at first be imagined. For youth and old age, are the two states of human life, capable of being placed in the most picturesque lights. Middle age is more general and vague ; and has fewer circumstances peculiar to the idea of it. And when any object is in a situation that admits it to be rendered particular, and to be cloth- ed with a variety of circumstances, it always stands out more clear and full in poetical descrip- tion.
Besides human personages, divine or superna- tural agents are often introduced into epic poe- try ; forming what is called the machinery of it ; which most critics hold to be an essential part. The marvellous, it must be admitted, has always a great charm for the bulk of readers. It grati- fies the imagination, and affords room for striking
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and sublime description. No wonder, therefore, that all poets have a strong propensity towards it. But I must observe, that nothing is more dif- ficult, than to adjust properly the marvellous with the probable. If a poet sacrifice probability, and fill his work with extravagant supernatural scenes, he spreads over it an appearance of ro- mance and childish fiction ; he transports his rea- der from this world, into a fantastic, visionary re- gion ; and loses that weight and dignity which should reign in epic poetry. No work, from which probability is altogether banished, can make a lasting and deep impression. Human actions and manners, are always the most interesting objects which can be presented to a human mind. All machinery, therefore, is faulty which withdraws these too much from view, or obscures them un- der a cloud of incredible fictions. Besides being temperately employed, machinery ought always to have some foundation in popular belief. A poet is by no means at liberty to invent what sys- tem of the marvellous he pleases : he must avail himself either of the religious faith, or the super- stitious credulity of the country wherein he lives ; so as to give an air of probability to events
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which are most contrary to the common course of nature.
In these respects, Ossian appears to me to have been remarkably happy. He has indeed follow- ed the same course with Homer. For it is per- fectly absurd to imagine, as some critics have done, that Homer's mythology was invented by him, in consequence of profound reflections on the benefit it would yield to poetry. Homer was no such refining genius. He found the tradition- ary stories on which he built his Iliad, mingled with popular legends concerning the intervention of the gods ; and he adopted these, because they amused the fancy. Ossian, in like nianner, found the tales of his country full of ghosts and spirits : It is likely he believed them himself; and he in- troduced them, because they gave his poems that solemn and marvellous cast, which suited his ge- nius. This was the only machinery he could em- ploy with propriety ; because it was the only in- tervention of supernatural beings, which agreed with the common belief of the country. It was happy ; because it did not interfere in the least with the proper display of human characters and actions ; because it had less of the incredible than
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 15]
most Other kinds of poetical machinery ; and be- cause it served to diversify the scene, and to heighten the subject by an a\^^ul grandeur, which is the great design of machinery.
As Ossian's mythology is peculiar to himself, and makes a considerable figure in his other poems, as well as in Fingal, it may be proper to make some observations on it, independent of its subserviency to epic composition. It turns, for the most part, on the appearances of departed spirits. These, consonantly to the notions of eve- ry rude age, are represented not as purely im- material, but as thin airy forms, which can be vi- sible or invisible at pleasure ; their voice is feeble ; their arm is weak ; but they are endowed with knowledge more than human. In a separate state, they retain the same dispositions which animated them in life. They ride on the wind ; they bend their airy bows ; and pursue deer formed of clouds. The ghosts of departed bards continue to sing. The ghosts of departed heroes frequent the fields of their former fame. " They rest together in " their caves, and talk of mortal men. Their " songs are of other worlds. They come some- " times to the ear of rest, and raise their feeble '' voice." All this presents to us much the same
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set of ideas, concerning spirits, as we find in the eleventh book of the Odyssey, where Ulysses vi- sits the regions of the dead : and in the twenty- third book of the IHad, the ghost of Patroclus, af- ter appearing to Achilles, vanishes precisely like one of Ossian's, emitting a shrill, feeble cry, and melting away like smoke.
But though Homer's and Ossian's ideas con- cerning ghosts were of the same nature, we can- not but observe, that Ossian's ghosts are drawn with much stronger and livelier colours than those of Homer. Ossian describes ghosts with all the particularity of one who had seen and con- versed with them, and whose imagination was V full of the impression they had left upon it. He calls up those awful and tremendous ideas which the
Simulacra modis pallentia miris —
are fitted to raise in the human mind ; and which, in Shakespeare's style, " harrow up the " soul." Crugal's ghost, in particular, in the beginning of the second book of Fingal, may vie with any appearance of this kind, described by any epic or tragic poet whatever. Most poets
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 15^5
would have contented themselves with telling us, that he resembled, in every particular, the living Crugal ; that his form and dress were the same, only his face more pale and sad ; and that he bore the mark of the wound by which he fell. But Ossian sets before our eyes a spirit from the invisible world, distinguished by all those fea- tures which a strong astonished imagination would give to a ghost. " A dark red stream of fire " comes down from the hill, Crugal sat upon " the beam ; he that lately fell by the hand of " Swaran, striving in the battle of heroes. His *' face is like the beam of the setting moon. His " robes are of the clouds of the hill. His eyes " are like two decaying flames. Dark is the " wound of his breast. — The stars dim -twinkled *' through his form ; and his voice w^as like the *' sound of a distant stream." The circumstance of the stars being beheld, " dim-twinkling through " his form," is wonderfully picturesque ; and conveys the most lively impression of his thin and shadowy substance. The attitude in which he is afterwards placed, and the speech put into his mouth, are full of that solemn and awful su- blimity which suits the subject. " Dim, and in " tears he stood, and stretched his pale hand
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" over the hero. Faintly he raised his feeble " voice, like the gale of the reedy Lego. — My " ghost, O Connal ! is on my native hills ; but " my corse is on the sands of Ullin. Thou " shalt never talk with Crugal, or find his lone " steps in the heath. I am light as the blast of " Cromla ; and I move like the shadow of mist. '' Connal, son of Colgar ! I see the dark cloud " of death. It hovers over the plains of Lena. " The sons of green Erin shall fall. Remove " from the field of ghosts. — Like the darkened " moon he retired in the midst of the whisthng " blast."
Several other appearances of spirits might be pointed out, as among the most sublime passages of Ossian's poetry. The circumstances of them are considerably diversified ; and the scenery always suited to the occasion. " Oscar slowly " ascends the hill. The meteors of night set " on the heath before him. A distant torrent *' faintly roars. Unfrequent blasts rush through " the aged oaks. The half-enlightened moon " sinks dim and red behind the hill. Feeble *' voices are heard on the heath. Oscar drew " his sword." Nothing can prepare the fancy more happily for the awful scene that is to fol-
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 155
low. " Trenmor came from his hill, at the " voice of his mighty son. A cloud like the " steed of the stranger, supported his airy limbs. " His robe is of the mist of Lano, that brings " death to the people. His sword is a green me- " teor, half-extinguished. His face is without " form, and dark. He sighed thrice over the " hero : And thrice the winds of the night roar- " ed around. Many were his words to Oscar.— " He slowly vanished, like a mist that melts on " the sunny hill." To appearances of this kind, we can find no parallel among the Greek or Ro- man poets. They bring to mind that noble de- scription in the book of Job : " In thoughts " from the visions of the night, when deep sleep " falleth on men, fear came upon me, and trem- " bling, which made all my bones to shake. " Then a spirit passed before my face. The hair " of my flesh stood up. It stood still ; but I '' could not discern the form thereof. An image " was before mine eyes. There was silence ; and " I heard a voice — Shall mortal man be more "just than God*!"
As Ossian's supernatural beings are described
* Job, iv. 13. — ^17.
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with a surprising force of imagination, so they are introduced with propriety. We have only three ghosts in Fingal : That of Crugal, which comes to warn the host of impending destruction, and to advise them to save themselves by retreat ; that of Evirallin, the spouse of Ossian, which calls him to rise and rescue their son from danger ; and that of Agandecca, which, just before the last engagement with Swaran, moves Fingal to pity, by mourning for the approaching destruc- tion of her kinsmen and people. In the other poems, ghosts sometimes appear when invoked to foretel futurity ; frequently, according to the notions of these times, they come as forerunners of misfortune or death, to those whom they vi- sit ; sometimes they inform their friends at a distance, of their own death ; and sometimes they are introduced to heighten the scenery on some great and solemn occasion. " A hundred *' oaks burn to the wind ; and faint light gleams " over the heath. The ghosts of Arven pass *' through the beam ; and shew their dim and " distant forms. Comala is half unseen on her
" meteor ; and Hidallan is sullen and dim."
" The awful faces of other times, looked from " the clouds of Crona." — Fercuth ! I saw the
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN, 157
" ghost of night. Silent he stood on that bank ; " his robe of mist flew on the wind. I could be- " hold his tears. An aged man he seemed, and '' full of thought."
The ghosts of strangers mingle not with those of the natives. " She is seen ; but not like the " daughters of the hill. Her robes are from " the strangers' land ; and she is still alone." WTien the ghost of one whom we had formerly known is introduced, the propriety of the living character is still preserved. This is remarkable in the appearance of Calmar's ghost, in the poem entitled The Death of Cuthullin. He seems to forebode Cuthullin's death, and to beckon him to his cave. Cuthullin reproaches him for sup- posing that he could be intimidated by such prognostics. " Why dost thou bend thy dark *' eyes on me, ghost of the car-borne Calmar ? " Wouldst thou frighten me, O Matha's son ! " from the battles of Cormac ? Thy hand was " not feeble in war ; neither was thy voice for *' peace. How art thou changed, chief of La- *' ra ! if now thou dost advise to fly ! Retire " thou to thy cave : Thou art not Calmar's " ghost : He delighted in battle ; and his arm " was like the thunder of heaven." Calmar
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makes no return to this seeming reproach : But, " He retired in his blast with joy ; for he had " heard the voice of his praise." This is precise- ly the ghost of Achilles in Homer ; who, notwith- standing all the dissatisfaction he expresses with his state in the region of the dead, as soon as he had heard his son Neoptolemus praised for his gal- lant behaviour, strode away with silent joy to re- join the rest of the shades *.
It is a great advantage of Ossian's mythology, that it is not local and temporary, like that of most other ancient poets ; which of course is apt to seem ridiculous, after the superstitions have passed away on which it was founded. Ossian's mythology is, to speak so, the mythology of hu- man nature ; for it is founded on what has been the popular belief, in all ages and countries, and under all forms of religion, concerning the ap- pearances of departed spirits. Homer's machin- ery is always lively and amusing ; but far from being always supported with proper dignity. The indecent squabbles among his gods, surely do no honour to epic poetry. Whereas Ossian's machinery has dignity upon all occasions. It is
* Odyss. Lib. 11.
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indeed a dignity of the dark and awful kind ; but this is proper ; because coincident with the strain and spirit of the poetry. A hght and gay mythology, like Homer's, would have been per- fectly unsuitable to the subject on which Os- sian's genius was employed. But though his machinery be always solemn, it is not, however, always dreary or dismal ; it is enlivened, as much as the subject would permit, by those pleasant and beautiful appearances, which he sometimes introduces, of the spirits of the hill. These are gentle spirits ; descending on sun-beams ; fair- moving on the plain ; their forms white and bright; their voices sweet; and their visits to men propitious. The greatest praise that can be given, to the beauty of a living woman, is to say, " She is fair as the ghost of the hill ; when " it moves in a sun-beam at noon, over the " silence of Morven." " The hunter shall hear " my voice from his booth. He shall fear, but " love my voice. For sweet shall my voice " be for my friends ; for pleasant were they to " me."
Besides ghosts, or the spirits of departed men, we find in Ossian some instances of other kinds of machinery. Spirits of a superior nature to
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ghosts are sometimes alluded to, which have power to embroil the deep ; to call forth winds and storms, and pour them on the land of the stranger ; to overturn forests, and to send death among the people. We have prodigies too ; a shower of blood ; and when some disaster is be- falling at a distance, the sound of death heard on the strings of Ossian's harp : all perfectly consonant, not only to the peculiar ideas of northern nations, but to the general current of a superstitious imagination in all countries. The description of Fingal's airy hall, in the poem cal- led Berrathon, and of the ascent of Malvina in- to it, deserves particular notice, as remarkably noble and magnificent. But above all, the en- gagement of Fingal with the spirit of Loda, in Carric-thura, cannot be mentioned without ad- miration. I forbear transcribing the passage, as it must have draw^n the attention of every one who has read the works of Ossian. The un- daunted courage of Fingal, opposed to all the terrors of the Scandinavian God ; the appear- ance and the speech of that awful spirit ; the wound which he receives, and the shriek which he sends forth, '' as, rolled into himself, he rose " upon the wind ;" are full of the most amazing
2
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 161
and terrible majesty. I know no passage more sublime in the writings of any uninspired author. The fiction is calculated to aggrandize the hero, which it does to a high degree ; nor is it so un- natural or wild a fiction, as might at first be thought. According to the notions of those times, supernatural beings were material, and conse- quently, vulnerable. The spirit of Loda was not acknowledged as a deity by Fingal : he did not worship at the stone of his power ; he plainly con- sidered him as the God of his enemies alone ; as a local deity, whose dominion extended no further than to the regions where he was worshipped ; who had, therefore, no title to threaten him, and no claim to his submission. We know there are poetical precedents of great authority, for fictions fully as extravagant ; and if Homer be forgiven for making Diomed attack and wound in battle, the gods whom that chief himself worshipped, Os- sian surely is pardonable for making his hero su- perior to the god of a foreign territory *.
* The scene of this encounter of Fingal with the spiri t of
Loda is laid at Inistore, or the islands of Orkney ; and iu
the description of Fingal's landing there, it is said, " A
" rock bends along the coast with all its echoing wood. On
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Notwithstanding the poetical advantages which I have ascribed to Ossian's machinery, I ac- knowledge it would have been much more beau- tiful and perfect, had the author discovered some knowledge of a Supreme Being. Although his silence on this head has been accounted for by the learned and ingenious translator in a very probable manner, yet still it must be held
"â– the top is the circle of Loda, with the mossy stone of " power." In confirmation of Ossian's topography, it is proper to acquaint the reader, that in these islands, as I have been well informed, there are many pillars, and circles of stones, still remaining, known by the name of the stones and circles of Loda, or Loden ; to which some degree of snpcrstilions regard is annexed to this day. These islands, until the year 1468, made a part of the Danish dominions. Their ancient language, of which there are yet some remains among the natives, is called the Norse ; and is a dialect, not of the Celtic, but of the Scandinavian tongue. The manners and the superstitions of the inhabitants are quite distinct from those of the Highlands and western isles of Scotland. Their ancient songs, too, are of a different strain and character, turning upon magical incantations and evocations from the dead, which were the favourite subjects of the old Runic poetry. They have many traditions, among them, of wars in former times with the inhabitants of the western islands.
8
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a considerable disadvantage to the poetry. For the most august and lofty ideas that can embel- lish poetry are derived from the belief of a divine administration of the universe : And hence the invocation of a Supreme Being, or at least of some superior powers who are conceived as presiding over human affairs, the solemnities of religious worship, prayers preferred, and assistance implor- ed on critical occasions, appear with great digni- ty in the works of almost all poets as chief orna- ments of their compositions. The absence of all such religious ideas from Ossian's poetry, is a sensible blank in it ; the more to be regretted, as we can easily imagine what an illustrious figure they would have made under the management of such a genius as his ; and how finely they would have been adapted to many situations which oc- cur in his works.
After so particular an examination of Fingal, it were needless to enter into as full a discussion of the conduct of Temora, the other epic poem. Many of the same observations, especially with regard to the great characteristics of heroic poe- try, apply to both. The high merit, however, of Temora, requires that we should not pass it by without some remarks.
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The scene of Temora, as of Fingal, is laid in Ireland ; and the action is of a posterior date. The subject is, an expedition of the hero, to de- throne and punish a bloody usurper, and to re- store the possession of the kingdom to the pos- terity of the lawful prince ; an undertaking wor- thy of the justice and heroism of the great Fin- gal. The action is one, and complete. The poem opens with the descent of Fingal on the coast, and the consultation held among the chiefs of the enemy. The murder of the young prince Cormac, which was the cause of the war, being antecedent to the epic action, is introduced with great propriety as an episode in the first book. In the progress of the poem, three battles are described, which rise in their importance above one another ; the success is various, and the is- sue for some time doubtful ; till at last, Fingal brought into distress, by the wound of his great general, Gaul, and the death of his son Fillan, assumes the command himself, and having slain the king in single combat, restores the rightful heir to his throne.
Temora has perhaps less fire than the other epic poem ; but in return it has more variety, more tenderness, and more magnificence. The
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*
reigning idea, so often presented to us of " Fin- " gal in the last of his fields," is venerable and affecting ; nor could any more noble conclusion be thought of, than the aged hero, after so many- successful atchievements, taking his leave of battles, and, with all the solemnities of those times, resigning his spear to his son. The events are less crowded in Temora than in Fingal ; actions and characters are more particularly displayed ; we are let into the transactions of both hosts ; and informed of the adventures of the night as well as of the day. The still pathetic, and the romantic scenery of several of the night adven- tures, so remarkably suited to Ossian's genius, oc- casion a fine diversity in the poem ; and are hap- pily contrasted with the military operations of the day.
In most of our author's poems, the horrors of war are softened by intermixed scenes of love and friendship. In Fingal, these are introduced as episodes ; in Temora, we have an incident of this nature wrought into the body of the piece ; in the adventure of Cathmor and Sulmalla. This forms one of the most conspicuous beauties of that poem. The distress of Sulmalla, disguised and unknown among strangers, her tender and
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anxious concern for the safety of Cathmor, her dream, and her melting remembrance of the land of her fathers ; Cathmor's emotion when he first discovers her, his struggles to conceal and ex- press his passion, lest it should unman him in the midst of war, " though his soul poured forth in " secret, when he beheld her fearful eye ;" and the last interview between them, when overcome by her tenderness, he lets her know he had disco- vered her, and confesses his passion ; are all wrought up with the most exquisite sensibility and delicacy.
Besides the characters which appeared in Fin- gal, several new ones are here introduced ; and though, as they are all the characters of warriors, bravery is the predominant feature, they are, ne- vertheless, diversified in a sensible and striking manner. Foldath, for instance, the general of Cathmor, exhibits the perfect picture of a savage chieftain : bold, and daring, but presumptuous, cruel, and overbearing. He is distinguished, on his first appearance, as the friend of the tyrant Cairbar ; " His stride is haughty ; his red eye " rolls in wrath." In his person and whole de- portment, he is contrasted with the mild and wise Hidalla, another leader of the same army, on
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. J 67
whose humanity and gentleness he looks with great contempt. He professedly delights in strife and blood. He insults over the fallen. He is unre- lenting in all his schemes of revenge, even to the length of denying the funeral song to the dead ; which, from the injury thereby done to their ghosts, was, in those days, considered as the greatest barbarity. Fierce to the last, he com- forts himself in his dying moments, with thinking that his ghost shall often leave its blast to rejoice over the graves of those he had slain. Yet Os- sian, ever prone to the pathetic, has contrived to throw into his account of the death even of this man, some tender circumstances ; by the moving description of his daughter Dardulena, the last of his race.
The character of Foldath tends much to exalt that of Cathmor, the chief commander, which is distinguished by the most humane virtues. He abhors all fraud and cruelty, is famous for his hos- pitality to strangers, open to every generous sen- timent, and to every soft and compassionate feel- ing. He is so amiable as to divide the reader's attachment between him and the hero of the poem; though our author has artfully managed it so, as to make Cathmor himself indirectly acknowledge
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Fingal's superiority, and to appear somewhat 'ap- prehensive of the event, after the death of Fillan, which he knew would call forth Fingal in all his might. It is very remarkable, that although Os- sian has introduced in his poems three complete heroes, Cuthullin, Cathmor, and Fingal, he has, however, sensibly distinguished each of their cha- racters. Cuthullin is particularly honourable ; Cathmor particularly amiable ; Fingal wise, and great, retaining an ascendant peculiar to himself in whatever light he is viewed.
But the favourite figure in Temora, and the one most highly finished, is Fillan. His character is of that sort, for which Ossian shews a particular fondness ; an eager, fervent, young warrior, fired with all the impatient enthusiasm for military glo- ry, peculiar to that time of life. He had sketch- ed this in the description of his own son Oscar ; but as he has extended it more fully in Fillan, and as the character is so consonant to the epic strain, though, so far as I remember, not placed in such a conspicuous light by any other epic poet, it may be worth while to attend a little to Ossian's management of it in this instance.
Fillan was the youngest of all the sons of Fin- gal ; younger, it is plain, than his nephew, Oscar,
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by whose fame and great deeds in war, we may naturally suppose his ambition to have been high- ly stimulated. Withal, as he is younger, he is described as more rash and fiery. His first ap- pearance is soon after Oscar's death, when he was employed to watch the motions of the foe by night. In a conversation with his brother Os- sian, on that occasion, we learn that it was not long since he began to lift the spear. " Few are " the marks of my sword in battle ; but my soul " is fire." He is with some difficulty restrained by Ossian from going to attack the enemy ; and complains to him, that his father had never allow- ed him any opportunity of signalizing his valour, " The king hath not remarked my sword ; I go " forth with the crowd ; I return without my " fame." Soon after, when Fingal, according to custom, was to appoint one of his chiefs to com- mand the army, and each was standing forth, and putting in his claim to this honour, Fillan is pre- sented in the following most picturesque and na- tural attitude : " On his spear stood the son of " Clatho, in the wandering of his locks. Thrice " he raised his eyes to Fingal : his voice thrice " failed him as he spoke. Fillan could not boast
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" of battles ; at once he strode away. Bent over " a distant stream he stood ; the tear hung in his " eye. He struck, at times, the thistle's head, *' with his inverted spear." No less natural and beautiful is the description of Fingal's paternal emotion on this occasion. " Nor is he unseen of " Fingal. Side-long he beheld his son. He be- " held him with bursting joy. He hid the big *' tear with his locks, and turned amidst his crowd- " ed soul." The command for that day being given to Gaul, Fillan rushes amidst the thickest of the foe, saves Gaul's life, who is wounded by a random arrow, and distinguishes himself so in battle, that " the days of old return on Fingal's " mind, as he beholds the renown of his son. As " the sun rejoices from the cloud, over the tree " his beams have raised, whilst it shakes its lone- " ly head on the heath, so joyful is the king over " Fillan." Sedate, however, and wise, he mixes the praise which he bestows on him with some re- prehension of his rashness. " My son, I saw thy " deeds, and my soul was glad. Thou art brave, " son of Clatho, but headlong in the strife. So " did not Fingal advance, though he never feared " a foe. Let thy people be a ridge behind thee :
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*' they are thy strength in the field. Then shalt " thou be long renowned, and behold the tombs *' of thy fathers."
On the next day, the greatest and the last of Fillan's life, the charge is committed to him of leading on the host to battle. Fingal's speech to his troops on this occasion is full of noble senti- ment ; and, where he recommends his son to their care, extremely touching. " A young beam is '• before you ; few are his steps to war. They are " few, but he is valiant ; defend my dark-haired " son. Bring him back with joy ; hereafter he " may stand alone. His form is like his fathers ; " his soul is a flame of their fire." When the battle begins, the poet puts forth his strength to describe the exploits of the young hero ; who, at last encountering and killing with his own hand Foldath the opposite general, attains the pinnacle of glory. In what follows, when the fate of Fil- lan is drawing near, Ossian, if anywhere, excels himself. Foldath being slain, and a general route begun, there was no resource left to the enemy but in the great Cathmor himself, who in this ex- tremity descends from the hill, where, according to the custom of those princes, he surveyed the battle. Observe how this critical event is wrought
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up by the poet. " Wide spreading over echoing *' Lubar, the flight of Bolga is rolled along. Fil- " Ian hung forward on their steps ; and strewed " the heath with dead. Fingal rejoiced over his *' son. Blue-shielded Cathmor rose. Son of Al- " phin, bring the harp ! Give Fillan's praise to the " wind ; raise high his praise in my hall, while yet " he shines in war. Leave, blue-eyed Clatho ! " leave thy hall ; behold that early beam of thine ! " The host is withered in its course. No farther " look — it is dark — light trembling from the harp, *' strike, virgins ! strike the sound." The sudden interruption, and suspense of the narration on Cathmor's rising from his hill, the abrupt bursting into the praise of Fillan, and the passionate apos- trophe to his mother Clatho, are admirable efforts of poetical art, in order to interest us in Fillan's danger ; and the whole is heightened by the im- mediately following simile, one of the most mag- nificent and sublime that is to be met with in any poet, and which, if it had been found in Homer, would have been the frequent subject of admira- tion to critics; " Fillan is like a spirit of heaven, " that descends from the skirt of his blast. The " troubled ocean feels his steps, as he strides " from wave to wave ; his path kindles behind
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" him ; islands shake their heads on the heaving " seas."
But the poet's art is not yet exhausted. The fall of this noble young warrior, or, in Ossian's style, the extinction of this beam of heaven, could not be rendered too interesting and affecting. Our attention is naturally drawn towards Fingal. He beholds from his hill the rising of Cathmor, and the danger of his son. But what shall he do ? " Shall Fingal rise to his aid, and take the *' sword of Luno ? What then should become of " thy fame, son of white-bosomed Clatho ? Turn " not thine eyes from Fingal, daughter of Inis- " tore ! I shall not quench thy early beam. — No " cloud of mine shall rise, my son, upon thy soul " of fire." Struggling between concern for the fame, and fear for the safety of his son, he with- draws from the sight of the engagement ; and dispatches Ossian in haste to the field, with this affectionate and delicate injunction, " Father of *' Oscar !" addressing him by a title which on this occasion has the highest propriety, " Father of " Oscar ! lift the spear ; defend the young in " arms. But conceal thy steps from Fillan's eyes : " He must not know that I doubt his steel." Ossian arrived too late. But unwilling to de-
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scribe Fillan vanquished, the poet suppresses all the circumstances of the combat with Cath- mor ; and only shews us the dying hero. We see him animated to the end with the same martial and ardent spirit ; breathing his last in bitter re- gret for being so early cut off from the field of glory. " Ossian, lay me in that hollow rock. " Raise no stone above me, lest one should ask " about my fame. I am fallen in the first of my " fields ; fallen without renown. Let thy voice " alone, send joy to my flying soul. Why should *' the bard know where dwells the early-fallen " Fillan." He who, after tracing the circumstan- ces of this story, shall deny that our bard is pos- sessed of high sentiment and high art, must be strangely prejudiced indeed. Let him read the story of Pallas in Virgil, which is of a similar kind ; and after all the praise he may justly be- stow on the elegant and finished description of that amiable author, let him say which of the two poets unfold most of the human soul. I wave insisting on any more of the particulars in Temo- ra ; as my aim is rather to lead the reader into the genius and spirit of Ossian's poetry, than to dwell on all his beauties.
The judgment and art discovered in conduct-
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ing works of such length as Fingal and Temora, distinguish them from the other poems in this collection. The smaller pieces, however, contain particular beauties no less eminent. They are historical poems, generally of the elegiac kind ; and plainly discover themselves to be the work of the same author. One consistent face of man- ners is everywhere presented to us ; one spirit of poetry reigns; the masterly hand of Ossian appears throughout ; the same rapid and animated style ; the same strong colouring of imagination, and the same glowing sensibility of heart. Besides the unity which belongs to the compositions of one man, there is moreover a certain unity of subject, which very happily connects all these poems. They form the poetical history of the age of Fin- gal. The same race of heroes whom we had met with in the greater poems, Cuthullin, Oscar, Con- nal, and Gaul, return again upon the stage ; and Fingal himself is always the principal figure, pre- sented on every occasion with equal magnificence, nay rising upon us to the last. The circumstances of Ossian's old age and blindness, his surviving all his friends, and his relating their great exploits to Malvina, the spouse or mistress of his beloved son Oscar, furnish the finest poetical situations
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that fancy could devise for that tender pathetic which reigns in Ossian's poetry.
On each of these poems, there might be room for separate observations, with regard to the con- duct and disposition of the incidents, as well as to the beauty of the descriptions and sentiments, Carthon is a regular and highly finished piece. The main story is very properly introduced by Clessammor's relation of the adventure of his youth ; and this introduction is finely heighten- ed by Fingal's song of mourning over Moina ; in which Ossian, ever fond of doing honour to his father, has contrived to distinguish him, for be- ing an eminent poet, as well as warrior. Fingal's song upon this occasion, when " his thousand " bards leaned forward from their seats, to hear " the voice of the king," is inferior to no pas- sage in the whole book ; and with great judg- ment put in his mouth, as the seriousness, no less than the sublimity of the strain, is pecu- liarly suited to the hero's character. In Dar- thula, are assembled almost all the tender images that can touch the heart of man ; friendship, love, the affections of parents, sons, and brothers, the distress of the aged, and the unavailing bravery of the young. The beautiful address to
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tlie moon, with which the poem opens, and the transition from thence to the subject, most hap- pily prepare the mind for that train of affecting events that is to follov/. The story is regular, dramatic, interesting to the last. He who can read it without emotion may congratulate him- self, if he pleases, upon being completely armed against sympathetic sorrow. As Fingal had no occasion of appearing in the action of this poem, Ossian makes a very artful transition from his narration to what was passing in the halls of Selma. The sound heard there on the strings of his hai'p, the concern which Fingal shews on hearing it, and the invocation of the ghosts of their fathers, to receive the heroes falling in a dis- tant land, are introduced with great beauty of imagination to increase the solemnity, and to di- versify the scenery of the poem.
Carric-thura is full of the most sublime dignir- ty ; and has this advantage of being more cheer- ful in the subject, and more happy in the catas- trophe than most of the other poems : thougli tempered at the same time Avith episodes in that strain of tender melancholy, which seems to have been the great delight of Ossian and the bards of his age. Lathmon is peculiarly distinguished,
VOL. I. >i
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by high generosity of sentiment. This is carried so far, particularly in the refusal of Gaul, on one side, to take the advantage of a sleeping foe ; and of Lathmon, on the other, to overpower by numbers the two young warriors, as to recal into one's mind the manners of chivalry ; some resemblance to which may perhaps be suggested by other incidents in this collection of poems. Chivalry, however, took rise in an age and coun- try too remote from those of Ossian, to admit the suspicion that the one could have borrowed any thing from the other. So far as chivalry had any real existence, the same military enthusiasm, which gave birth to it in the feudal times, might, in the days of Ossian, that is, in the infancy of a rising state, through the operation of the same cause, very naturally produce effects of the same kind on the minds and manners of men. So far as chivalry was an ideal system existing only in romance, it will not be thought surpris- ing, when we reflect on the account before given of the Celtic bards, that this imaginary refine- ment of heroic manners should be found among them, as much, at least, as among the Troba- dores, or strolling Proven9al Bards, in the tenth or eleventh century ; whose songs, it is said, first
8
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♦mve rise to those romantic ideas of heroism, which for so long a time enchanted Europe *. Ossian's heroes have all the gallantry and genero- sity of those fabulous knights, without their ex- travagance ; and his love scenes have native ten^ derness, without any mixture of those forced and unnatural conceits which abound in old romances. The adventures related by our poet which re- semble the most those of romance, concern wo- men who follow their lovers to war disguised in the armour of men ; and these are so managed as to produce, in the discovery, several of the most interesting situations ; one beautiful instance of which may be seen in Carric-thura, and another in Calthon and Colmal.
Oithona presents a situation of a different na- ture. In the absence of her lover, Gaul, she had been carried off and ravished by Dunrommath. Gaul discovers the place where she is kept con- cealed, and comes to revenge her. The meeting of the two lovers, the sentiments and the behavi- our of Oithona on that occasion, are described with such tender and exquisite propriety, as does the greatest honour both to the art and to the de-
* Vid. Huetius de online fabularum Romanensium.
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Jicacy of our author : and would have been admir- ed in any poet of the most refined age. The con- duct of Croma must strike every reader as re- markably judicious and beautiful. We are to be prepared for the death of Malvina, which is related in the succeeding poem. She is there- fore introduced in person ; " She has heard a " voice in a dream ; she feels the fluttering of '' her soul ;" and in a most moving lamentation, addressed to her beloved Oscar, she sings her ovAai death song. Nothing could be calculated with more art to sooth and comfort her, than the story which Ossian relates. In the young and brave Fovargormo, another Oscar is introdu- ced ; his praises are sung ; and the happiness is set before her of those who die in their youth, " when their renown is around them ; before the •' feeble behold them in the hall, and smile at *^' their trembling hands."
But nowhere does Ossian's genius appear to greater advantage, than in Berrathon, which is reckoned the conclusion of his songs, " The last " sound of the voice of Cona."
Qualis olor noto posituriis littore vitam, Ingemit, et ma?stis mulcens concentibus auras Pra^sago qiiffiritur venicntia funera cantu.
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The whole train of ideas is admirably suited to the subject. Every thing is full of that invi- sible world, into which the aged bard believes himself now ready to enter. The airy hall of Fingal presents itself to his view ; " he sees the *' cloud that shall receive his ghost ; he beholds " the mist that shall form his robe when he ap- " pears on his hill;" and all the natural objects around him seem to carry the presages of death. *' The thistle shakes its beard to the wind. The " flower hangs its heavy head ; it seems to say, *' I am covered with the drops of heaven ; the " time of my departure is near, and the blast " that shall scatter my leaves." Malvina's death is hinted to him in the most delicate manner, by the son of Alpin. His lamentation over her, her apotheosis, or ascent to the habitation of heroes, and the introduction to the story which follows from the mention which Ossian supposes the father of Malvina to make of him in the hall of Fingal, are all in the highest spirit of poetry. " And dost thou remember Ossian, O " Toscar son of Comloch ? The battles of our " youth were many ; our swords went together " to the field." Nothing could be more proper than to end his songs with recording an exploit
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of the father of that Malvina, of whom his heart was now so full ; and who, from first to last, had been such a favourite object throughout all his poems.
The scene of most of Ossian's poems is laid in Scotland, or in the coast of Ireland opposite to the territories of Fingal. \Vlien the scene is in Ireland, we perceive no change of manners from those of Ossian's native country. For as Ireland was undoubtedly peopled with Celtic tribes, the language, customs, and religion of both nations were the same. They had been separated from one another by migration, only a few generations, as it should seem, before our poet's age ; and they still maintained a close and frequent inter- course. But when the poet relates the expedi- tions of any of his heroes to the Scandinavian coast, or to the islands of Orkney, which were then part of the Scandinavian territory, as he does in Carric-thura, Sulmalla of Lumon, and Cathloda, the case is quite altered. Those coun- tries were inhabited by nations of the Teutonic descent, who in their manners and religious rites differed widely from the Celta? ; and it is curious and remarkable, to find this difference clearly pointed out in the poems of Ossian. His de-
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scriptions bear the native marks of one who was present in the expeditions which he relates, and who describes what he had seen with his own eyes. No sooner are we carried to Lochlin, or the islands of Inistore, than we perceive that we are in a foreign region. New objects begin to appear. We meet everywhere with the stones and circles of Loda, that is, Odin, the Scandina- vian deity. We meet with the divinations and enchantments for which, it is well known, those northern nations were early famous. " There, *' mixed with the murmur of waters, rose the " voice of aged men, who called the forms of "night to aid them in their war;" whilst the Caledonian chiefs who assisted them, are describ- ed as standing at a distance, heedless of theic rites. That ferocity of manners which distin- guished those nations, also becomes conspicuous. In the combats of their chiefs there is a peculiar savageness ; even their women are bloody and fierce. The spirit, and the very ideas of Regner Lodbrog, that northern Scalder whom I form- erly quoted, occur to us again. " The hawks," Ossian makes one of the Scandinavian chiefs say, " rush from all their winds ; they are wont to " trace my course. We rejoiced three days above
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" the dead, and called the hawks of heaven. " They came from all their winds, to feast on the " foes of Annir."
Dismissing now the separate consideration of any of our author's M'orks, I proceed to make some observations on his manner of writing, un- der the general heads of Description, Imagery, and Sentiment.
A poet of original genius is always distinguish- ed by his talent for description *. A second- rate writer discerns nothing new or peculiar in the object he means to describe. His concep- tions of it are vague and loose ; his expressions feeble ; and of course the object is presented to us indistinctly and as through a cloud. But a true poet makes us imagine that we see it before our eyes : he catches the distinguishing features ; he gives it the colours of life and reality ; he places it in such a light that a painter could copy after him. This happy talent is chiefly owing to a lively imagination, which first receives a strong impression of the object ; and then, by a proper selection of capital picturesque circum-
* See the rules of poetical dcscripliou excellently illus- liated by Lord Kames, in liis Elements of Criticiimi, vol. iii. chap. 21. Of narration and description.
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Stances employed in describing it, transmits that impression in its full force to the imagination of others. That Ossian possesses this descriptive power in a high degree, we have a clear proof from the effect which his descriptions produce upon the imaginations of those who read him with any degree of attention and taste. Few poets are more interesting. We contract an in- timate acquaintance with his principal heroes. The characters, the manners, the face of the country become familiar : we even think we could draw the figure of his ghosts : in a word, whilst reading him we are transported as into a new region, and dwell among his objects as if they were all real.
It were easy to point out several instances of exquisite painting in the works of our author. Such, for instance, as the scenery with which Te- mora opens, and the attitude in which Cairbar is there presented to us ; the description of the young prince Cormac, in the same book ; and the ruins of Balclutha in Carthon. " I have seen " the walls of Balclutha, but they were desolate. " The fire had resounded in the halls ; and the " voice of the people is heard no more. The " stream of Clutha was removed from its place
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" by the fall of the walls. The thistle shook there " its lonely head : The moss whistled to the wind. " The fox looked out from the windows ; the " rank grass of the wall waved round his head. " Desolate is the dwelling of Moina; silence is " in the house of her fathers." Nothing, also, can be more natural and lively, than the manner in which Carthon afterwards describes how the conflagration of his city affected him M'hen a child : " Have I not seen the fallen Balclutha ? " And shall I feast with Comhal's son ? Com- " hal ! who threw his fire in the midst of my fa- " ther's hall ! I was young, and knew not the " cause why the virgins wept. The columns of " smoke pleased mine eye, when they rose above " my walls : I often looked back with gladness, " when my friends fled above the hill. But when " the years of my youth came on, I beheld the " moss of my fallen Malls. My sigh arose with " the morning ; and my tears descended with " night. Shall I not fight, I said to my soul, " against the children of my foes ? And I will " fight, O bard ! I feel the strength of my soul." In the same poem, the assembling of the chiefs round Fingal, who had been warned of some im- pending danger by the appearance of a prodigy,
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is described with so many picturesque circum- stances, that one imagines himself present in the assembly. " The king alone beheld the terrible " sight, and he foresaw the death of his people. " He came in silence to his hall, and took his " father's spear ; the mail rattled on his breast. " The heroes rose around. They looked, in si- " lence, on each other, marking the eyes of Fin- " gal. They saw the battle in his face. A thou- " sand shields are placed at once on their arms ; " and they drew a thousand swords. The hall " of Selma brightened around. The clang of " arms ascends. The grey dogs howl in their " place. No word is among the mighty chiefs. *' Each marked the eyes of the king ; and half " assumed his spear."
It has been objected to Ossian, that his de- scriptions of military actions are imperfect, and much less diversified by circumstances than those of Homer. This is in some measure true. The amazing fertility of Homer's invention is nowhere so much displayed as in the incidents of his bat- tles, and in the little history pieces he gives of the persons slain. Nor, indeed, with regard to the talent of description, can too much be said in praise of Homer. Every thing is alive in his
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writings. The colours with which he paints are those of nature. But Ossian's genius was of a different kind from Homer's. It led him to hur- ry towards grand objects, rather than to amuse himself with particulars of less importance. He could dwell on the death of a favourite hero ; but that of a private man seldom stopped his ra- pid course. Homer's genius was more compre- hensive than Ossian's. It included a wider circle of objects ; and could work up any incident into description. Ossian's was more limited ; but the region within which it chiefly exerted itself was the highest of all, the region of the pathetic and sublime.
We must not imagine, however, that Ossian's battles consist only of general indistinct descrip- tion. Such beautiful incidents are sometimes in- troduced, and the circumstances of the persons slain so much diversified, as shew that he could have embellished his military scenes with an abundant variety of particulars, if his genius had led him to dwell upon them. " One man is *' stretched in the dust of his native land ; he " fell where often he had spread the feast, and " often raised the voice of the harp." The maid of Inistore is introduced, in a moving apostrophe,
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 189
as weeping for another ; and a third, " as rolled " in the dust he lifted his faint eyes to the king," is remembered and mourned by Fingal as tlie friend of Agandecca. The blood pouring from the wound of one who is slain by night, is heard " hissing on the half-extinguished oak," which had been kindled for giving light ; Another, climbing a tree to escape from his foe, is pierced by his spear from behind ; " shrieking, panting, " he fell ; whilst moss and withered branches " pursue his fall, and strew the blue arms of " Gaul." Never was a finer picture drawn of the ardour of two youthful warriors than the fol- lowing : " I saw Gaul in his armour, and my '' soul was mixed with his : for the fire of the " battle was in his eyes: he looked to the foe " with joy. We spoke the words of friendship " in secret ; and the lightning of our swords pour- " ed together. We drew them behind the wood, " and tried the strength of our arms on the emp- " ty air."
Ossian is always concise in his descriptions, which adds greatly to their beauty and force. For it is a great mistake to imagine, that a crowd of particulars, or a very full and extended style, is of advantage to description. On the contrary,
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such a diffuse manner for the most part weakens it. Any one redundant circumstance is a nuis- ance. It encumbers and loads the fancy, and renders the main image indistinct. " Obstat," as Quintilian says with regard to style, " quic- " quid non adjuvat." To be concise in descrip- tion, is one thing ; and to be general, is another. No description that rests in generals can possibly be good ; it can convey no lively idea ; for it is of particulars only that we have a distinct con- ception. But, at the same time, no strong ima- gination dwells long upon one particular ; or heaps together a mass of trivial ones. By the happy choice of some one, or of a few that are the most striking, it presents the image more complete, shows us more at one glance, than a feeble imagination is able to do, by turning its object round and round into a variety of lights. Tacitus is of all prose writers the most concise. He has even a degree of abruptness resembling our author : Yet no writer is more eminent for lively description. When Fingal, after having conquered the haughty Swaran, proposes to dis- miss him with honour : " Raise to-morrow thy " white sails to the wind, thou brother of Agan- "decca!" He conveys, by thus addressing his
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 191
enemy, a stronger impression of the emotions then passing within his mind, than if whole pa- ragraphs had been spent in describing the conflict between resentment against Swaran, and the ten- der remembrance of his ancient love. No am- plification is needed to give us the most full idea of a hardy veteran, after the few following words : " His shield is marked with the strokes of battle ; " his red eyes despise danger." When Oscar, left alone, was surrounded by foes, " he stood," it is said, " growing in his place, like the flood of "the narrow vale;" a happy representation of one, who, by daring intrepidity in the midst of danger, seems to increase in his appearance, and becomes more formidable every moment, like the sudden rising of the torrent hemmed in by the valley. And a whole crowd of ideas, concerning the circumstances of domestic sorrow, occasion- ed by a young warrior's first going forth to battle, is poured upon the mind by these words : " Cal- " mar leaned on his father's spear ; that spear " which he brought from Lara's hall, when the " soul of his mother was sad."
The conciseness of Ossian's descriptions is the more proper on account of his subjects. De- scriptions of gay and smiling scenes may, with-
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out any disadvantage, be amplified and prolong- ed. Force is not the predominant quality expect- ed in these. The description may be weakened by being diffuse, yet, notwithstanding, may be beautiful stilL Wliereas, with respect to grand, solemn, and pathetic subjects, which are Ossian's chief field, the case is very different. In these, energy is above all things required. The imagi- nation must be seized at once, or not at all ; and is far more deeply impressed by one strong and ardent image, than by tlie anxious minuteness of laboured illustration.
But Ossian's genius, though chiefly turned to- wards the sublime and pathetic, was not confined to it : In subjects, also, of grace and delicacy, he discovers the hand of a master. Take, for an example, the following elegant description of Agandecca, wherein the tenderness of Tibullus seems united with the majesty of Virgil. " The " daughter of the snow overheard, and left the " hall of her secret sigh. She came in all her " beauty ; like the moon from the cloud of the " east. Loveliness was around her as light. Her *' steps were like the music of songs. She saw " the youth, and loved him. He was the stolen " sigh of her soul. Her blue eyes rolled on him
THE POEMS OF OSSlAN. 193
*< in secret : And she blest the chief of Morven." Several other instances might be produced of the feelings of love and friendship, painted by our au- thor with a most natural and happy delicacy.
The simplicity of Ossian's manner adds great beauty to his descriptions, and indeed to his whole poetry. We meet with no affected ornaments ; no forced refinement ; no marks, either in style or thought, of a studied endeavour to shine and sparkle. Ossian appears everywhere to be prompt- ed by his feelings ; and to speak from the abun- dance of his heart. I remember no more than one instance of what can be called quaint thought in this whole collection of his works. It is in the first book of Fingal, where, from the tombs of two lovers, two lonely yews are mentioned to have sprung, " whose branches wished to meet *' on high." This sympathy of the trees with the lovers, may be reckoned to border on an Italian conceit ; and it is somewhat curious to find this single instance of that sort of wit in our Celtic poetry.
The "joy of grief," is one of Ossian's remark- able expressions, several times repeated. If any one shall think, that it needs to be justified by a precedent, he may find it twice used by Homer ;
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in the Iliad, when Achilles is visited by the ghost of Patroclus ; and in the Odyssey, when Ulysses meets his mother in the shades. On both these occasions, the heroes, melted with tenderness, la- ment their not having it in their power to throw their arms round the ghost, " that we might," say they, " in a mutual embrace, enjoy the delight " of grief."
• Kf uifolo Tira.fTreoy.iaBa. yooio *.
But, in truth, the expression stands in need of no defence from authority ; for it is a natural and just expression ; and conveys a clear idea of that gratification, which a virtuous heart often feels in the indulgence of a tender melancholy. Ossian makes a very proper distinction between this gratification, and the destructive effect of overpowering grief. " There is a joy in grief, " when peace dwells in the breasts of the sad. " But sorrow wastes the mournful, O daughter " of Toscar, and their days are few." To " give " the joy of grief," generally signifies to raise the strain of soft and grave music ; and finely cha- racterises the taste of Ossian's age and country.
* Odyssey, ix. 211. Iliad, xxiii. 98. 1
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In those days, when the songs of bards were the great delight of heroes, the tragic muse was held in chief honour; gallant actions, and virtuous sufferings, were the chosen theme ; preferably to that light and trifling strain of poetry and music, which promotes light and trifling manners, and serves to emasculate the mind. '' Strike the harp " in my hall," said the great Fingal, in the midst of youth and victory, " Strike the harp in my " hall, and let Fingal hear the song. Pleasant " is the joy of grief! It is like the shower of " spring, when it softens the branch of the oak ; " and the young leaf lifts its green head. Sing " on, O bards ! To-morrow we lift the sail."
Personal epithets have been much used by all the poets of the most ancient ages, and when well chosen, not general and unmeaning, they contri- bute not a httle to render the style descriptive and animated. Besides epithets founded on bodily distinctions, a-kin to many of Homer's, we find in Ossian several which are remarkably beau- tiful and poetical. Such as, Oscar of the future fights, Fingal of the mildest look, Carril of other times, the mildly blushing Evirallin ; Bragela, the lonely sun-beam of Dunscaich ; a Culdee, the son of the secret cell.
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But of all the ornaments employed in descrip- tive poetry, comparisons, or similes, are the most splendid. These chiefly form what is called the imagery of a poem : And as they abound so much in the works of Ossian, and are commonly among the favourite passages of all poets, it may be ex- pected that I should be somewhat particular in my remarks upon them.
A poetical simile always supposes two objects brought together, between which there is some near relation, or connection in the fancy. What that relation ought to be, cannot be precisely de- fined. For various, almost numberless, are the analogies formed among objects, by a sprightly imagination. The relation of actual similitude, or likeness of appearance, is far from being the only foundation of poetical comparison. Some- times a resemblance, in the effect produced by two objects, is made the connecting principle : Sometimes a resemblance in one distinguishing property or circumstance. Very often two ob- jects are brought together in a simile, though they resemble one another, strictly speaking, in nothing, only because they raise in the mind a train of similar, and what may be called, concor- dant ideas ; so that the remembrance of the one,
2
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when recalled, serves to quicken and heighten the impression made by the other. Thus, to give an instance from our poet, the pleasure with which an old man looks back on the exploits of his youth, has certainly no direct resemblance to the beauty of a fine evening ; farther than that both agree in producing a certain calm, placid joy. Yet Ossian has founded upon this one of the most beautiful comparisons that is to be met with in any poet. " Wilt thou not listen, son of " the rock, to the song of Ossian ? My soul is " full of other times ; the joy of my youth re- ^' turns. Thus the sun appears in the west, af- '•' ter the steps of his brightness have moved be- " hind a storm. The green hills lift their dewy " heads. The blue streams rejoice in the vale. " The aged hero comes forth on his staff; and " his grey hair glitters in the beam." Never was there a finer group of objects. It raises a strong conception of the old man's joy and elation of heart, by displaying a scene, which produces, in every spectator, a corresponding train of plea- sing emotions ; the dechning sun looking forth in his brightness after a storm ; the cheerful face of all nature ; and the still life, finely animated by the circumstance of the aged hero, with his
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stafF and his grey locks ; a circumstance both ex- tremely picturesque in itself, and peculiarly suit- ed to the main object of the comparison. Such analogies and associations of ideas as these, are highly pleasing to the fancy. They give oppor- tunity for introducing many a fine poetical pic- ture. They diversify the scene ; they aggrandize the subject ; they keep the imagination awake and sprightly. For as the judgment is principally exercised in distinguishing objects, and remarking the differences among those which seem like ; so the highest amusement of the imagination is to trace likenesses and agreements among those which seem different.
The principal rules which respect poetical com- parisons are, that they be introduced on proper occasions, when the mind is disposed to relish them ; and not in the midst of some severe and agitating passion, which cannot admit this play of fancy ; that they be founded on a resemblance neither too near and obvious, so as to give little amusement to the imagination in tracing it, nor too faint and remote, so as to be apprehended with difficulty ; that they serve either to illustrate the principal object, and to render the conception of it more clear and distinct : or, at least, to heigh-
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ten and embellish it, by a suitable association of images *.
Every country has a scenery peculiar to it- self; and the imagery of a good poet will exhi- bit it. For as he copies after nature, his allusions will of course be taken from those objects which he sees around him, and which have often struck his fancy. For this reason, in order to judge of the propriety of poetical imagery, we ought to be, in some measure, acquainted with the natu- ral history of the country where the scene of the poem is laid. The introduction of foreign images betrays a poet, copying not from nature, but from other writers. Hence so many lions, and tygers, and eagles, and serpents, which we meet with in the similes of modern poets ; as if these animals had acquired some right to a place in poetical comparisons for ever, because employed by ancient authors. They employed them with propriety, as objects generally known in their country ; but they are absurdly used for illustra- tion by us, who know them only at second-hand, or by description. To most readers of modern poetry it were more to the purpose to describe
* See Elements of Criticism, cli. 19. Vol. III.
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lions or tygers, by similes taken from men, than to compare men to lions. Ossian is very correct in this particular. His imagery is, without ex- ception, copied from that face of nature, which he saw before his eyes ; and by consequence may be expected to be lively. We meet with no Gre- cian or Italian scenery ; but with the mists, and clouds, and storms, of a northern mountainous re- gion.
No poet abounds more in similes than Ossian. There are in this collection as many, at least, as in the whole Iliad and Odyssey of Homer. I am indeed inclined to think, that the works of both poets are too much crowded with them. Similes are sparkling ornaments ; and, like all things that sparkle, are apt to dazzle and tire us by their lustre. But if Ossian's similes be too fre- quent, they have this advantage, of being com- monly shorter than Homer's ; they interrupt his narration less ; he just .glances aside to some re- sembling object, and instantly returns to his for- mer track. Homer's similes include a wider range of objects. But in return, Ossian's are, without exception, taken from objects of dignity, which cannot be said for all those which Homer employs. The sun, the moon, and the stars,
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clouds and meteors, lightning and thunder, seas and whales, rivers, torrents, winds, ice, rain, snow, dews, mist, fire and smoke, trees and fo- rests, heath and grass and flowers, rocks and mountains, music and songs, light and darkness, spirits and ghosts ; these form the circle, within which Ossian's comparisons generally run. Some, not many, are taken from birds and beasts; as eagles, sea-fowl, the horse, the deer, and the mountain-bee ; and a very few from such opera- tions of art as were then known. Homer has di- versified his imagery by many more allusions to the animal world ; to lions, bulls, goats, herds of cattle, serpents, insects ; and to the various ocr xjupations of rural and pastoral life. Ossian's de- fect in this article, is plainly owing to the desert, uncultivated state of his country, which suggested to him few miages beyond natural inanimate ob- jects, in their rudest form. The birds and ani- mals of the country were probably not numerous ; and his acquaintance with them was slender, as they were little subjected to the uses of man.
The great objection made to Ossian's imagery, is its uniformity, and the too frequent repetition of the same comparisons. In a work so thick
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sown with similes, one could not but expect to find images of the same kind sometimes suggest- ed to the poet by resembling objects; especially to a poet like Ossian, who wrote from the imme- diate impulse of poetical enthusiasm, and without much preparation of study or labour. Fertile as Homer's imagination is acknowledged to be, who does not know how often his lions and bulls and flocks of sheep, recur with little or no variation : nay, sometimes in the very same words ? The ob- jection made to Ossian is, however, founded, in a great measure, upon a mistake. It has been sup- posed, by inattentive readers, that wherever the moon, the cloud, or the thunder, returns in a si- mile, it is the same simile, and the same moon, or cloud, or thunder, which they had met with a few passages before. Whereas very often the similes are widely different. The object, whence they are taken, is indeed in substance the same ; but the image is new ; for the appearance of the ob- ject is changed ; it is presented to the fancy in another attitude ; and clothed with new circum- stances, to make it suit the different illustrations for which it is employed. In this lies Ossian 's great art ; in so happily varying the form of the
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few natural appearances with which he was ac- quainted, as to make them correspond to a great many different objects.
Let us take for one instance the moon, which is very frequently introduced into his compari- sons ; as in northern climates, where the nights are long, the moon is a greater object of atten- tion, than in the climate of Homer ; and let us view how much our poet has diversified its ap- pearance. The shield of a warrior is like " the " darkened moon when it moves a dun circle " through the heavens." The face of a ghost, wan and pale, is like " the beam of the set- *' ting moon." And a different appearance of a ghost, thin and indistinct, is like " the new moon " seen through the gathered mist, when the sky " pours down its flaky snow, and the world is si- *' lent and dark ;" or in a different form still, is like " the watery beam of the moon, when it rushes " from between two clouds, and the midnight " shower is on the field." A very opposite use is made of the moon in the description of Agandec- ca : " She came in all her beauty, like the moon " from the cloud of the East." Hope, succeeded by disappointment, is "joy rising on her face, and *' sorrow returning again, like a thin cloud on
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" the moon." But when Swaran, after his de- feat, is cheered by Fingal's generosity, "His face " brightened hke the full moon of heaven, when " the clouds vanish away, and leave her calm and " broad in the midst of the sky." Vinvela is " bright as the moon when it trembles o'er the " western wave ;" but the soul of the guilty Uthul is " dark as the troubled face of the moon, when " it foretels the storm." And by a very fanciful and uncommon allusion, it is said of Cormac, who is to die in his early years, " Nor long shalt " thou lift the spear, mildly shining beam of " youth ! Death stands dim behind thee, like the " darkened half of the moon behind its growing " light."
Another instance of the same nature may be taken from mist, which, as being a very familiar ap- pearance in the country of Ossian, he applies to a variety of purposes, and pursues through a great many forms. Sometimes, which one would hard- ly expect, he employs it to heighten the ap- pearance of a beautiful object. The hair of Morna is " like the mist of Cromla, when it " curls on the rock, and shines to the beam of
" the west." " The song comes with its mu-
" sic to melt and please the ear. It is like soft
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" mist, that rising from a lake pours on the si- " lent vale. The green flovvers are filled with *' dew. The sun returns in its strength, and the " mist is gone *." But, for the most part, mist is employed as a similitude of some disagreeable or terrible object. " The soul of Nathos was " sad, like the sun in the day of mist, when his " face is watery and dim." " The darkness of " old age comes like the mist of the desert." The face of a ghost is " pale as the mist of Crom- '' la." " The gloom of battle is rolled along as '' mist that is poured on the valley, when storms " invade the silent sun-shine of heaven." Fame suddenly departing, is likened to " mist that flies
* There is a remarkable propriety in this comparison. It is intended to explain the effect of soft and mournful music. Armin appears disturbed at a performance of this kind. Carmor says to him, " Why bursts the sigh of Ar- " min ? Is there a cause to mourn ? Tlie song comes with ** its music to melt and please the ear. It is like soft mist," &c. that is, such mouraful songs have a happy effect to soften the heart, and to improve it by tender emotions, as the moisture of the mist refreshes and nourishes the flowers : whilst the sadness they occasion is only transient, and soon dispelled by the succeeding occupations and amusements of life : " The sun returns in strenglh, and the •' mist is gone."
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" away before the rustling wind of the vale." A ghost, slowly vanishing, to " mist that melts by " degrees on the sunny hill." Cairbar, after his treacherous assassination of Oscar, is compared to a pestilential fog. " I love a foe like Cath- " mor," says Fingal, " his soul is great ; his arm " is strong ; his battles are full of fame. But " the little soul is like a vapour that hovers *' round the marshy lake. It never rises on the " green hill, lest the winds meet it there. Its " dwelling is in the cave ; and it sends forth the " dart of death." This is a simile highly finish- ed. But there is another which is still more striking, founded also on mist, m the 4th book of Temora. Two factious chiefs are contending ; Cathmor the king interposes, rebukes, and si- lences them. The poet intends to give us the highest idea of Cathmor 's superiority ; and most effectually accomplishes his intention by the fol- lowing happy image. " They sunk from the *' king on either side ; like two columns of morn- *' ing mist, when the sun rises between them, on " his glittering rocks. Dark is their rolling on *' either side ; each towards its reedy pool." These instances may sufficiently shew with what richness of imagination Ossian's comparisons a-
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bound, and at the same time, with what propriety of judgment they are employed. If his field was narrow, it must be admitted to have been as well cultivated as its extent would allow.
As it is usual to judge of poets from a compa- rison of their similes more than of other passages, it will perhaps be agreeable to the reader, to see how Homer and Ossian have conducted some images of the same kind. This might be shewn in many instances. For as the great objects of nature are common to the poets of all nations, and make the common store-house of all imagery, the ground-work of their comparisons must of course be frequently the same. I shall select only a few of the most considerable from both poets. Mr Pope's translation of Homer can be of no use to us here. The parallel is altogether unfair between prose and the imposing harmony of flowing numbers. It is only by viewing Ho- mer in the simplicity of a prose translation, that we can form any comparison between the two bards.
The shock of two encountering armies, the noise and the tumult of battle, afford one of the most grand and awful subjects of description ; on which all epic poets have exerted their
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Strength. Let us first hear Homer. The fol- lowing description is a favourite one, for we find t twice repeated in the same words *. " When
* now the conflicting hosts joined in the field of ' battle, then were mutually opposed shields, ' and swords, and the strength of armed men. ' The bossy bucklers were dashed against each ^ other. The universal tumult rose. There ' were mingled the triumphant shouts and the ' dying groans of the victors and the vanquished. ' The earth streamed with blood. As when
* winter torrents, rushing from the mountains, ' pour into a narrow valley their violent waters. ' They issue from a thousand springs, and mix ' in the hollowed channel. The distant shepherd ' hears on the mountain their roar from afar. ' Such was the terror and the shout of the en- ' gaging armies." In another passage, the poet,
much in the manner of Ossian, heaps simile on simile, to express the vastness of the idea, with which his imagination seems to labour. " With " a mighty shout the hosts engage. Not so " loud roars the wave of ocean, when driven " against the shore by the whole force of the
* Iliad, iv. 446. and Iliad viii. 60.
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" boisterous north ; not so loud in the woods of " the mountain, the noise of the flame, when ri- " sing in its fury to consume the forest ; not so " loud the wind among the lofty oaks, when the *' wrath of the storm rages ; as was the clamour *' of the Greeks and Trojans, when, roaring ter- " rible, they rushed against each other *."'
To these descriptions and similes, we may op- pose the following from Ossian, and leave the reader to judge between them. He will find images of the same kind employed ; commonly less extended ; but thrown forth with a glowing rapidity which characterises our poet. " As " autumn's dark storms pour from two echoing " hills, towards each other, approached the he- " roes. As two dark streams from high rocks " meet and mix, and roar on the plain ; loud, '' rough, and dark in battle, meet Lochlin and " InisfaiU Chief mixed his strokes with chief, " and man with man. Steel clanging, sound- " ed on steel. Helmets are cleft on high ; blood " bursts and smokes around — As the troubled " noise of the ocean, when roll the waves " on high ; as the last peal of the thunder of
* Iliad, xiv. 398. VOL. I. O
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" heaven, such is the noise of battle." — " As roll ** a thousand waves to the rock, so Swaran's host " came on ; as meets a rock a thousand waves, " so Inisfail met Swaran. Death raises all his ** voices around, and mixes with the sound of *' shields. — The field echoes from wing to wing, " as a hundred hammers that rise by turns on the " red son of the furnace." — " As a hundred winds *' on Morven ; as the streams of a hundred hills ; ** as clouds fly successive over heaven ; or as " the dark ocean assaults the shore of the de- ** sert ; so roaring, so vast, so terrible, the armies " mixed on Lena's echoing heath." In several of these images, there is a remarkable similarity to Homer's ; but what follows is superior to any comparison that Homer uses on this subject. " The groan of the people spread over the hills ; " it was like the thunder of night, when the cloud " bursts on Cona ; and a thousand ghosts shriek " at once on the hollow wind." Never was an image of more awful sublimity employed to heigh- ten the terror of battle.
Both poets compare the appearance of an ar- my approaching, to the gathering of dark clouds. *' As when a shepherd," says Homer, " beholds ** from the rock a cloud borne along the sea by
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*' the western wind ; black as pitch it appears " from afar sailing over the ocean, and carrying " the dreadful storm. He shrinks at the sight, " and drives his flock into the cave : Such, under *' the Ajaces, moved on, the dark, the thickened
*' phalanx to the war." " They came," says
Ossian, " over the desert like stormy clouds, " when the winds roll them over the heath ; their " edges are tinged with lightning ; and the echo- '< ing groves foresee the storm." The edges of the cloud tinged with lightning, is a sublime idea; but the shepherd and his flock, render Homer's simile more picturesque. This is fre- quently the difference between the two poets. Ossian gives no more than the main image, strong and full : Homer adds circumstances and appendages, which amuse the fancy by enlivening the scenery.
Homer compares the regular appearance of an army, to " clouds that are settled on the moun- ** tain top, in the day of calmness, when the " strength of the north wind sleeps *." Ossian, with full as much propriety, compares the ap- pearance of a disordered army, to " the moun-
» Iliad, V. 522,
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" tain cloud, when the blast hath entered its " womb ; and scatters the curling gloom on every " side." Ossian's clouds assume a great many forms ; and, as we might expect from his climate, are a fertile source of imagery to him. " The " warriors followed their chiefs, like the gather- " ing of the rainy clouds, behind the red meteors " of heaven." An army retreating without com- ing to action, is likened to " clouds that, hav- '' ing long threatened rain, retire slowly behind " the hills." The picture of Oithona, after she had determined to die, is lively and delicate. " Her soul was resolved, and the tear was dried " from her wildly-looking eye. A troubled joy " rose on her mind, like the red path of the " lightning on a stormy cloud." The image also of the gloomy Cairbar, meditating, in silence, the assassination of Oscar, until the moment came when his designs were ripe for execution, is ex- tremely noble, and complete in all its parts. " Cairbar heavd their words in silence, like the " cloud of a shower ; it stands dark on Cromla, '' till the lightning bursts its side. The valley ** gleams with red light ; the spirits of the storm " rejoice. So stood the silent king of Temora ; *' at length his words are heard."
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Homer's comparison of Achilles to the Dog Star, is very subhme. " Priam beheld him rush- " ing along the plain, shining in his armour, " like the star of autmnn : bright are its beams, " distinguished amidst the multitude of stars in " the dark hour of night. It rises in its splen- " dour ; but its splendour is fatal ; betokening " to miserable men, the destroying heat *." The first appearance of Fingal, is, in like manner, compared by Ossian, to a star or meteor. " Fin- *' gal, tall in his ship, stretched his bright lance. " before him. Terrible was the gleam of his " steel ; it was like the green meteor of death, " setting in the heath of Malmor, when the tra- *' veller is alone, and the broad moon is darken- " ed in heaven." The hero's appearance in Ho- mer, is more magnificent ; in Ossian, more ter- rible.
A tree cut down, or overthrown by a storm, is a similitude frequent among poets for describ- ing the fall of a warrior in battle. Homer em- ploys it often. But the most beautiful, by far, of his comparisons, founded on this object, in- deed one of the most beautiful in the whole Iliad,
* Iliad, xxii. 2G.
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is that on the death of Euphorbus : " As the " young and verdant ohve, which a man hath " reared with care in a lonely field, where the " springs of water bubble around it ; it is fair " and flourishing ; it is fanned by the breath of " all the winds, and loaded with white blossoms ; " when the sudden blast of a whirlwind de- " scending, roots it out from its bed, and stretches " It on the dust *." To this, elegant as it is, we may oppose the following simile of Ossian's, re- lating the death of the three sons of Usnoth. " They fell, like three young oaks which stood " alone on the hill. The traveller saw the love- " ly trees, and wondered how they grew so lone- " ly. The blast of the desert came by night, " and laid their green heads low. Next day he " returned ; but they were withered, and the " heath was bare." Malvina's allusion to the same object, in her lamentation over Oscar, is so exquisitely tender, that I cannot forbear giv- ing it a place also. *' I was a lovely tree in " thy presence, Oscar ! with all my branches " round me. But thy death came, like a blast " from the desert, and laid my green head low.
• Iliad, xvii. 53.
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 215
" The spring returned with its showers ; but no " leaf of mine arose." Several of Ossian's simi- les taken from trees, are remarkably beautiful, and diversified with well chosen circumstances; such as that upon the death of Ryno and Orla : " They have fallen like the oak of the desert ; " when it lies across a stream, and withers in the "wind of the mountains:" Or that which Os- sian applies to himself; " 1, like an ancient oak in " Morven, moulder alone in my place ; the blast " hath lopped my branches away ; and I tremble " at the wings of the north."
As Homer exalts his heroes by comparing them to gods, Ossian makes the same use of compa- risons taken from spirits or ghosts. '' Swaran " roared in battle, like the shrill spirit of a storm *• that sits dim on the clouds of Gormal, and en- *' joys the death of the mariner." " His people " gathered around Erragon, like storms around " the ghost of night, when he calls them from *' the top of Morven, and prepares to pour them " on the land of the stranger." " They fell be- " fore my son, like groves in the desert, when *' an angry ghost rushes through night, and takes " their green heads in his hand," In such ima-
216 A CRITICAL DISSERTATION OK
ges, Ossian appears in his strength ; for very sel- dom have supernatural beings been painted with so much sublimity, and such force of imagina- tion, as by this poet. Even Homer, great as he is, must yield to him in similes formed upon these. Take, for instance, the following, which is the most remarkable of this kind in the Iliad. *' Meriones followed Idomeneus to battle, like " Mars, the destroyer of men, w hen he rushes to " war. Terror, his beloved son, strong and *' fierce, attends him ; who fills with dismay the *' most valiant hero. They come from Thrace, *' armed against the Ephyrians and Phlegyans ; ** nor do they regard the prayers of either ; but " dispose of success at their will *." The idea here, is undoubtedly noble : but observe what a figure Ossian sets before the astonished imagina- tion, and with what sublimely terrible circum- stances he has heightened it. " He rushed in " the sound of his arms, like the dreadful spirit " of Loda, when he comes in the roar of a thou- " sand storms, and scatters battles from his eyes. " He sits on a cloud over Lochlin's seas. His " mighty hand is on his sword. The winds lift
* IliaJ, xiii. 298.
THE POEMS OF OSSIAK. 2l7
*' his flaming locks. So terrible was Cuthullin " in the day of his fame."
Homer's comparisons relate chiefly to martia subjects, to the appearances and motions of ai"- mies, the engagement and death of heroes, and the various incidents of ^^'ar. In Ossian, we find a greater variety of other subjects illustrated by similes ; particularly, the songs of bards, the beau- ty of women, the different circumstances of old age, sorrow, and private distress ; which give oc- casion to much beautiful imagery. What, for in- stance, can be more delicate and moving, than the following simile of Oithona's, in her lamenta- tion over the dishonour she had suffered? " Chief " of Strumon," replied the sighing maid, " why " didst thou come over the dark blue wave to •' Nuath's mournful daughter ? Why did not I " pass away in secret, like the flower of the rock, " that lifts its fair head unseen, and strews its " withered leaves on the blast ?" The music of bards, a favourite object with Ossian, is illustrat- ed by a variety of the most beautiful appearances that are to be found in nature. It is compared to the calm shower in spring ; to the dews of the morning on the hill of roes ; to the face of the blue and still lake. Two similes oh this subject,
218 A CRITICAL DISSERTATION ON
I shall quote, because they would do honour to any of the most celebrated classics. The one is : " Sit thou on the heath, O bard ! and let us hear " thy voice ; it is pleasant as the gale of the spring " that sighs on the hunter's ear, when he wakens " from dreams of joy, and has heard the music of " the spirits of the hill." The other contains a short, but exquisitely tender image, accompanied with the finest poetical painting. " The music of " Carril was like the memory of joys that are past, " pleasant and mournful to the soul. The ghosts " of departed bards heard it from Slimora's side. " Soft sounds spread along the wood ; and the si- " lent valleys of night rejoice." What a figure would such imagery and such scenery have made had they been presented to us, adorned with the sweetness and harmony of the Virgilian num- bers !
I have chosen all along to compare Ossian with Homer, rather than Virgil, for an obvious reason. There is a much nearer correspondence between the times and manners of the two former poets. Both wrote in anearly period of society ; both are originals ; both are distinguished by simplicity, sublimity, and fire. The correct elegance of Vir- gil, his artful imitation of Homer, the Roman state- 1
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 219
liness which he everywhere maintains, admit no parallel with the abrupt boldness and enthusiastic warmth of the Celtic bard. In one article, in- deed, there is a resemblance. Virgil is more ten- der than Homer ; and thereby agrees more with Ossian ; with this difference, that the feelings of the one are more gentle and polished, those of the other more strong ; the tenderness of Virgil sof- tens, that of Ossian dissolves and overcomes the heart.
A resemblance may be sometimes observed be- tween Ossian's comparisons, and those employed by the sacred writers. They abound much in this figure, and they use it with the utmost propriety*. The imagery of Scripture exhibits a soil and cli- mate altogether different from those of Ossian ; a warmer country, a more smiling face of nature, the arts of agriculture and of rural life much far- ther advanced. The wine-press, and the thrash- ing-floor, are often presented to us, the cedar and the palm-tree, the fragrance of perfumes, the voice of the turtle, and the beds of lilies. The similes are, like Ossian's, generally short, touching
* See Dr Lowtb, de Sacra Poesi Hebraeorum.
220 A CRITICAL DISSERTATION ON
on one point of resemblance, rather than spread out into httle episodes. In the following example may be perceived what inexpressible grandeur poetry receives from the intervention of the Deity. " The nations shall rush like the rushings of many " waters ; but God shall rebuke them, and they " shall fly far off, and shall be chased as the chaff " of the mountains before the wind, and like the *' down of the thistle before the whirlwind *."
Besides formal comparisons, the poetry of Os- sian is embellished with many beautiful meta- phors : Such as that remarkably fine one ap- plied to Deugala ; " She was covered with the " light of beauty ; but her heart was the house " of pride." This mode of expression, which suppresses the mark of comparison, and substi- tutes a figured description in room of the object described, is a great enlivener of style. It de- notes that glow and rapidity of fancy, which, without pausing to form a regular simile, paints the object at one stroke. " Thou art to me the " beam of the east, rising in a land unknown." " In peace, thou art the gale of spring ; in war»
* Isaiah, xvii. 13.
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 221
** the mountain storm." " Pleasant be thy rest, " O lovely beam, soon hast thou set on our hills ! *' The steps of thy departure were stately, like " the moon on the blue trembling wave. But " thou hast left us in darkness, first of the maids " of Lutha ! — Soon hast thou set, Malvina ! but *' thou risest, like the beam of the east, among " the spirits of thy friends, where they sit in " their stormy halls, the chambers of the thun- *' der." This is correct, and finely supported ; but, in the following instance, the metaphor, though very beautiful at the beginning, becomes imperfect before it closes, by being improperly mixed with the literal sense : " Trathal went forth " with the stream of his people ; but they met a " rock : Fingal stood unmoved ; broken they rol- " led back from his side. Nor did they roll in " safety ; the spear of the king pursued their " flight."
The hyperbole is a figure which we might ex- pect to find often employed by Ossian ; as the undisciplined imagination of early ages generally prompts exaggeration, and carries its objects to excess ; whereas longer experience, and farther progress in the arts of life, chasten men's ideas and expressions. Yet Ossian's hyperboles ap-
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pear not to me, either so frequent or so harsh as might at first have been looked for ; an ad- vantage owing, no doubt, to the more cuhivated state, in which, as was before shewn, poetry subsisted among the ancient Celtae, than among most other barbarous nations. One of the most exaggerated descriptions in the whole work, is what meets us at the beginning of Fingal, where the scout makes his report to Cuthullin of the landing of the foe. But this is so far from de- serving censure that it merits praise, as being, on that occasion, natural and proper. The scout arrives, trembling and full of fears ; and it is well known, that no passion disposes men to hy- perbolize more than terror. It both annihilates themselves in their own apprehension, and mag- nifies every object which they view through the medium of a troubled imagination. Hence all those indistinct images of formidable greatness, the natural marks of a disturbed and confused mind, which occur in Moran's description of Swaran's appearance, and in his relation of the conference which they held together ; not unlike the report which the affrighted Jewish spies made to their leader of the land of Canaan. " The " land through which we have gone to search
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 223
*^ it, is a land that eateth up the inhabitants there- *' of ; and all the people that we saw in it, are men " of a great stature : and there saw we giants, the *' sons of Anak, which come of the giants ; and " we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and " so were we in their sight *."
With regard to personifications, I formerly ob- served that Ossian was sparing, and I accounted for his being so. Allegorical personages he has none ; and their absence is not to be regretted. For the intermixture of those shadowy beings, which have not the support even of mythological or legendary belief, with human actors, seldom produces a good effect. The fiction becomes too visible and fantastic ; and overthrows that im- pression of reality, which the probable recital of human actions is calculated to make upon the mind. In the serious and pathetic scenes of Os- sian especially, allegorical characters would have been as much out of place, as in tragedy ; serving only unseasonably to amuse the fancy, whilst they stopped the current and weakened the force of passion.
With apostrophes or addresses to persons ab-
* Numbers, xiii, 32, S3»
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sent or dead, which have been, in ail ages, the
language of passion, our poet abounds ; and they
are among his highest beauties. Witness the
apostrophe, in the first book of Fingal, to the
maid of Inistore, whose lover had fallen in battle ;
and that inimitably fine one of Cuthullin to Bra-
gela, at the conclusion of the same book. He
commands the harp to be struck in her praise ;
and the mention of Bragela's name, immediately
suggested to him a crowd of tender ideas ; " Dost
" thou raise thy fair face from the rocks," he
exclaims, " to find the sails of Cuthullin ? The
" sea is rolling far distant, and its white foam
" shall deceive thee for my sails." And now
his imagination being wrought up to conceive
her as, at that moment, really in this situation,
he becomes afraid of the harm she may receive
from the inclemency of the night ;. and, "with an
enthusiasm, happy and affecting, though beyond
the cautious strain of modern poetry, " Retire,"
he proceeds, " retire, for it is night, my love,
" and the dark winds sigh in thy hair. Retire
" to the hall of my feasts, and think of the times
" that are past ; for I will not return till the
" storm of war has ceased. O Connal, speak of
" wars and arms, and send her from my mind ;
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 225
** for lovely with her raven hair is the white-bo- " somed daughter of Sorglan." This breathes all the native spirit of passion and tenderness.
The addresses to the sun, to the moon, and to the evening star, must draw the attention of every reader of taste, as among the most splendid orna- ments of this collection. The beauties of each are too great, and too obvious, to need any par- ticular comment. In one passage only of the address to the moon, there appears some obscu- rity. " Whither dost thou retire from thy course, " when the darkness of thy countenance grows ? " Hast thou thy hall like Ossian ? Dwellest thou " in the shadow of grief ? Have thy sisters fallen *' from Heaven ? Are they who rejoiced with " thee at night, no more ? Yes, they have fallen, " fair light ! and thou dost often retire to mourn." We may be at a loss to comprehend, at first view, the ground of these speculations of Ossian, con- cerning the moon ; but when all the circum- stances are attended to, they will appear to flow naturally from the present situation of his mind. A mind under the dominion of any strong pas- sion, tinctures with its own disposition every ob- ject which it beholds. The old bard, with his heart bleeding for the loss of his friends, is me-
VOL. I. p
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ditating on the different phases of the moon. Her waning and darkness presents to his melan- choly imagination the image of sorrow ; and pre- sently the idea arises, and is indulged, that, like himself, she retires to mourn over the loss of other moons, or of stars, whom he calls her sisters, and fancies to have once rejoiced with her at night, now fallen from heaven. Darkness suggested the idea of mourning, and mourning suggested no- thing so naturally to Ossian as the death of be- loved friends. An instance precisely similar of this influence of passion, may be seen in a passage which has always been admired of Shakspeare's King Lear. The old man on the point of distrac- tion, through the inhumanity of his daughters, sees Edgar appear disguised like a beggar and a madman.
Lear. Didst thou give all to thy daughters ? And art thou come to this? Couldest thou leave notliiug ; Didst thou give them all ? Kent. He hath no daughters, Sir.
Lear. Death, traitor ! nolliing could have subdued na- ture, To such a lowness, but his unkind daughters.
King Lear, Act iii. Scene v.
The apostrophe to the winds, in the opening of Darthula, is in the highest spirit of poetry.
a
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 227
•• But the winds deceive thee, O Darthula : and " deny the woody Etha to thy sails. These are " not thy mountains, Nathos, nor is that the roar " of thy chmbing waves. The halls of Cairbar are " near, and the towers of the foe lift their head. " Where have ye been, ye southern winds, when " the sons of my love were deceived ? But ye " have been sporting on plains, and pursuing the " thistle's beard. O that ye had been rustling in " the sails of Nathos, till the hills of Etha rose ! " till they rose in their clouds, and saw their " coming chief." This passage is remarkable for the resemblance it bears to an expostulation with the wood nymphs, on their absence at a critical time ; which, as a favourite poetical idea, Virgil has copied from Theocritus, and Milton has very happily imitated from both.
Where were ye, nymphs! when the remorseless deep
Clos'd o'er the head of yom* lov'd Lycidas?
For neither were ye playing on the steep
"NVliere your old bards, the famous Druids, lie ;
Nor on the shaggy top of Mona, high.
Nor yet where Deva spreads her wizard stream *.
* Milton's Lycidas. See Theocrit. Idyll. I.
n* Tsit' «f »(r6' OKA Aafits irttKiTO ; :rai TrceicXf Su/xfAi, &c. And Virg. Eclog. 10. Quae nemora, aut qui vos saltus habuere, puella, Ai:c«
228 A CRITICAL DISSERTATION ON
Having now treated fully of Ossian's talents, with respect to description and imagery, it only remains to make some observations on his senti- ments. No sentiments can be beautiful without being proper ; that is, suited to the character and situation of those who utter them. In this re- spect, Ossian is as correct as most writers. His characters, as above observed, are in general well supported; which could not have been the case, had the sentiments been unnatural or out of place. A variety of personages of different ages, sexes, and conditions, are introduced into his poems ; and they speak and act with a pro- priety of sentiment and behaviour, which it is surprising to find in so rude an age. Let the poem of Darthula, throughout, be taken as s^n example.
But it is not enough that sentiments be natu- ral and proper. In order to acquire any high degree of poetical merit, they must also be sublime and pathetic.
The sublime is not confined to sentiment alone. It belongs to description also ; and whether in description or in sentiment, imports such ideas presented to the mind, as raise it to an uncom- mon degree of elevation, and fill it with admira-
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 229
tion and astonishment. This is the highest effect either of eloquence or poetry : and to produce this effect requires a genius glowing with the strongest and warmest conception of some object awful, great, or magnificent. That this charac- ter of genius belongs to Ossian, may, I think, suf- ficiently appear from many of the passages I have already had occasion to quote. To produce more instances, were superfluous. If the engagement of Fingal with the spirit of Loda, in Carric-thura ; if the encounters of the armies, in Fingal ; if the address to the sun, in Carthon ; if the similes founded on the ghosts and spirits of the night, all formerly mentioned, be not admitted as examples, and illustrious ones too, of the true poetical sub- lime, I confess myself entirely ignorant of this quality in writing.
All the circumstances, indeed, of Ossian's com- position, are favourable to the sublime, more per- haps than to any other species of beauty. Ac- curacy and correctness ; artfully connected nar- ration ; exact method and proportion of parts, we may look for in polished times. The gay and the beautiful, will appear to more advantage in the midst of smiling scenery and pleasurable themes. But amidst the rude scenes of nature,
230 A CRITICAL DISSERTATION ON
amidst rocks and torrents, and whirlwinds and battles, dwells the sublime. It is the thunder and the lightning of genius. It is the offspring of nature, not of art. It is negligent of all the lesser graces, and perfectly consistent with a certain noble disorder. It associates naturally with that grave and solemn spirit, which distin- guishes our author. For the sublime is an awful and serious emotion ; and is heightened by all the images of trouble, and terror, and dark- ness.
Ipse pater, media nimborum in iiocte, corusca Fulniina niollitur dextra ; quo maxima motii Terra tremit ; fiigcre feras ; et mortal a corda Per gentes, humilis stravit pavor : ille, flagranti Aut Atho, aut Rliodopen, aut alia (lerannia telo Dejicit. ViRG. Georg. i.
Simplicity and conciseness are never-failing characteristics of the style of a sublime writer. He rests on the majesty of his sentiments, not on the pomp of his expressions. The main secret of being sublime is to say great things in few, and in plain words : for every superfluous deco- ration degrades a sublime idea. The mind rises and swells, when a lofty description or sentiment
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 231
is presented to it, in its native form. But no sooner does the poet attempt to spread out this sentiment or description, and to deck it round and round with ghttering ornaments, than the mind begins to fall from its high elevation ; the transport is over ; the beautiful may remain, but the sublime is gone. Hence the concise and simple style of Ossian, gives great advantage to his su- blime conceptions ; and assists them in seizing the imagination with full power *.
* The noted saying of Julius Caesar to the pilot iu a storm, " Quid times ? Caesarem vehis ;" is magnaniiBon.s and su- blime. Lncan, not satisfied with this simple conciseness, resolved to amplify and improve the tliought. Observe, how every tune he twists it round, it departs farther from the sublime, till, at last, it ends in tumid declamation.
Sperne minas, inquit, pelagi, ventoque furenti
Trade sinum. Italiam, si coelo auctore, recusas,
Me, pete. Sola tibi causa haec est justa timoris
Vectorem non nosse tuum ; quern numina nnnquam
Destituunt ; de quo male tunc fortuna meretnr.
Cum post vota venit ; medias perrumpe procellas
Tutela secure raea. CceU iste fretique,
Non puppis nostras, labor est. Hanc Caesare prcssara
A fluctu defendit onus.
Quid tanta strage paretur,
Ignoras? Quaerit pelagi coelique tumultu
Quid praestet fortuna mihi.
Pharsal, V. 578.
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Sublimity, as belonging to sentiment, coin- cides in a great measure with magnanimity, he- roism, and generosity of sentiment. Whatever discovers human nature in its greatest elevation ; whatever bespeaks a high effort of soul ; or shews a mind superior to pleasures, to dangers, and to death, forms what may be called the moral or sentimental sublime. For this Ossian is eminent- ly distinguished. No poet maintains a higher tone of virtuous and noble sentiment, through- out all his works. Particularly, in all the senti- ments of Fingal, there is a grandeur and loftiness proper to swell the mind with the highest ideas of human perfection. Wherever he appears, we behold the hero. The objects which he pursues, are always truly great ; to bend the proud ; to protect the injured ; to defend his friends ; to overcome his enemies by generosity more than by force. A portion of the same spirit actuates all the other heroes. Valour reigns : but it is a generous valour, void of cruelty, animated by ho- nour, not by hatred. We behold no debasing passions among Fingal's warriors ; no spirit of avarice or of insult ; but a perpetual contention for fame ; a desire of being distinguished and re- membered for gallant actions ; a love of justice ;
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN". 233
and a zealous attachment to their friends and their country. Such is the strain of sentiment in the works of Ossian.
But the subhmity of moral sentiments, if they wanted the softening of the tender, would be in hazard of giving a hard and stiff air to poetry. It is not enough to admire. Admiration is a cold feeling, in comparison of that deep interest which the heart takes in tender and pathetic scenes ; where, by a mysterious attachment to the objects of comparison, we are pleased and de- lighted, even whilst we mourn. With scenes of this kind Ossian abounds ; and his high merit in these, is incontestible. He may be blamed for drawing tears too often from our eyes ; but that he has the power of commanding them, I believe no man, who has the least sensibility, will ques- tion. The general character of his poetry, is the heroic mixed with the elegiac strain ; admira- tion tempered with pity. Ever fond of giving, as he expresses it, " the joy of grief," it is visi- ble that, on all moving subjects, he delights to exert his genius; and accordingly, never were there finer pathetic situations, than what his works present. His great art in managing them lies in giving vent to the simple and natural emo-
234? A CRITICAL DISSERTATION ON
tlons of the heart. We meet with no exaggerat- ed declamation ; no subtle refinements on sor- row ; no substitution of description in place of passion. Ossian felt strongly himself; and the heart when uttering its native language never fails, by powerful sympathy, to affect the heart. A great variety of examples might be produced. We need only open the book to find them every- where. What, for instance, can be more mov- ing, than the lamentations of Oithona, after her misfortune ? Gaul, the son of Morni, her lover, ignorant of what she had suffered, comes to her rescue. Their meeting is tender in the highest degree. He proposes to engage her foe, in single combat, and gives her in charge what she is to do, if he himself should fall. " And shall the " daughter of Nuath live ?" she replied, with a bursting sigh. " Shall I live in Tromathon, and " the son of Morni low ? My heart is not of " that rock ; nor my soul careless as that sea, " which lifts its blue waves to every wind, and " rolls beneath the storm. The blast, which " shall lay thee low, shall spread the branches " of Oithona on earth. We shall wither toge- " ther, son of car-borne Morni ! The narrow " house is pleasant to me ; and the grey stone
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 235
" of the dead ; for never more will I leave thy
'^ rocks, sea-surrounded Tromathon ! Chief of
" Strumon, why comest thou over the waves to " Nuath's mournful daughter ? Why did I not " pass away in secret, like the flower of the rock, " that lifts its fair head unseen, and strews its " withered leaves on the blast ? Why didst thou '• come, O Gaul ! to hear my departing sigh ? — " O had I dwelt at Duvranna, in the bright " beams of my fame ! Then had my years come " on with joy : and the virgins would bless my " steps. But I fall in youth, son of Morni, and " my father shall blush in his hall."
Oithona mourns like a woman ; in Cuthul- lin's expressions of grief after his defeat, we be- hold the sentiments of a hero, generous but de- sponding. The situation is remarkably fine. Cuthullin, roused from his cave, by the noise of battle, sees Fingal victorious in the field. He is described as kindling at the sight. " His hand *' is on the sword of his fathers ; his red-rolling " eyes on the foe. He thrice attempted to rush " to battle ; and thrice did Coniial stop him ;" suggesting, that Fingal was routing the foe ; and that he ought not, by the show of superflu-
236 A CRITICAL DISSERTATION ON
ous aid, to deprive the king of any part of the honour of a victory, which was owing to him alone. CuthulHn yields to this generous senti- ment ; but we see it stinging him to the heart with the sense of his own disgrace. '' Then, " Carril, go," replied the chief, " and greet the " king of Morven. When Lochlin falls away " like a stream after rain, and the noise of the " battle is over, then be thy voice sweet in his " ear, to praise the king of swords. Give him " the sword of Caithbat ; for Cuthullin is wor- " thy no more to lift the arms of his fathers. " But, O ye ghosts of the lonely Cromla ! Ye " souls of chiefs that are no more ! Be ye the " companions of Cuthullin, and talk to him in " the cave of his sorrow. For never more shall " I be renowned among the mighty in the land. " I am like a beam that has shone : Like a mist " that has fled away ; when the blast of the " morning came, and brightened the shaggy side " of the hill. Connal ! talk of arms no more : " departed is my fame. My sighs shall be on " Cromla's wind ; till my footsteps cease to be " seen. And thou, white-bossomed Bragela ! " mourn over the fall of my fame ; for vanquish-
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 237
'• ed, I will never return to thee, thou sun-beam " of Dunscaich !"
./Estuat ins^ens
Uuo in corde pudor, luctusque, et coDscia virtus.
Besides such extended pathetic scenes, Ossian frequently pierces the heart by a single unex- pected stroke. When Oscar fell in battle, " No " father mourned his son slain in youth ; no bro- " ther, his brother of love ; they fell without " tears, for the chief of the people was low." In the admirable interview of Hector with An- dromache, in the sixth Iliad, the circumstance of the child in his nurse's arms, has often been remarked, as adding much to the tenderness of the scene. In the following passage relating to the death of Cuthullin, we find a circumstance that must strike the imagination with still great- er force. " And is the son of Semo fallen ?" said Carril with a sigh. " Mournful are Tura'a *' walls, and sorrow dwells at Dunscaich. Thy " spouse is left alone in her youth ; the son of " thy love is alone. He shall come to Bragela, ** and ask her why she weeps. He shall lift his " eyes to the wall, and see his father's sword. " Whose sword is that ? he will say ; and the
238 A CRITICAL DISSERTATION ON
" soul of his mother is sad." Soon after Fingal had shewn all the grief of a father's heart for Ryno, one of his sons, fallen in battle, he is cal- ling, after his accustomed manner, his sons to the chase. " Call," says he, '' Fillan and Ryno — But "he is not here — My son rests on the bed of " death." — This unexpected start of anguish is worthy of the highest tragic poets ;
If she comes in, she'll sure speak to my wife —
My wife ! — my wife — Wiiat wife ? — I have uo wife —
Oh insupportable ! Oh heavy hour !
Othello, Act v. Scene vii.
The contrivance of the incidents in both poets is similar ; but the circumstances are varied with judgment. Othello dwells upon the name of wife, when it had fallen from him, with the confusion and horror of one tortured with guilt. Fingal, with the dignity of a hero, corrects himself, and sup- presses his rising grief.
The contrast which Ossian frequently makes between his present and his former state, diffuses over his whole poetry a solemn pathetic air, which cannot fail to make impression on every heart. The conclusion of the Songs of Selma, is particularly calculated for this purpose. No-
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 239
thing can be more poetical and tender, or can leave upon the mind a stronger and more affect- ing idea of the venerable and aged bard. " Such " were the words of the bards in the days of the " song ; when the king heard the music of harps, " and the tales of other times. The chiefs ga- " thered from all their hills, and heard their love- " ly sound. They praised the voice of Cona * ; " the first among a thousand bards. But age is " now on my tongue, and my soul has failed. '' I hear, sometimes, the ghosts of bards, and " learn their pleasant song. But memory fails " on my mind ; I hear the call of years. They " say, as they pass along ; WTiy does Ossian " sing ? Soon shall he lie in the narrow house, " and no bard shall raise his fame. Roll on, ye *' dark-brown years ! for ye bring no joy in your " course. Let the tomb open to Ossian, for his '• strength has failed. The sons of the song are " gone to rest. My voice remains, like a blast, " that roars lonely on a sea-surrounded rock, *' after the winds are laid. The dark moss whis- " ties there, and the distant mariner sees the wav- " ing trees."
* Ossian himself is poetically called the voice of Cona.
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Upon the whole ; if to feel strongly, and to describe naturally, be the two chief ingredients in poetical genius, Ossian must, after fair exami- nation, be held to possess that genius in a high degree. The question is not, whether a few im- proprieties may be pointed out in his works ; whether this, or that passage, might not have been worked up with more art and skill, by some writer of happier times ? A thousand such cold and frivolous criticisms, are altogether indeci- sive as to his genuine merit. But, has he the spirit, the fire, the inspiration of a poet ? Does he utter the voice of nature ? Does he elevate by his sentiments ? Does he interest by his descrip- tions ? Does he paint to the heart as well as to the fancy ? Does he make his readers glow, and tremble, and weep ? These are the great characteristics of true poetry. Where these are found, he must be a minute critic indeed, who can dwell upon slight defects. A few beauties of this high kind, transcend whole volumes of faultless mediocrity. Uncouth and abrupt, Os- sian may sometimes appear, by reason of his con- ciseness ; but he is subhme, he is pathetic, in an eminent degree. If he has not the extensive know- ledge, the regular dignity of narration, the ful-
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 241
ness and accuracy of description, which we find in Homer and Virgil, yet in strength of imagina- tion, in grandeur of sentiment, in native majesty of passion, he is fully their equal. If he flows not always like a clear stream, yet he breaks forth often like a torrent of fire. Of art, too, he is far from being destitute ; and his imagination is remarkable for delicacy as well as strength. Seldom or never is he either trifling or tedious ; and if he be thought too melancholy, yet he is always moral. Though his merit were in other respects much less than it is, this alone ought to entitle him to high regard, that his writings are remarkably favourable to virtue. They awake the tenderest sympathies, and inspire the most generous emotions. No reader can rise from him, without being warmed with the sentiments of hu- manity, virtue, and honour.
Though unacquainted w^ith the original lan- guage, there is no one but must judge the trans- lation to deserve the highest praise, on account of its beauty and elegance. Of its faithfulness and accuracy, I have been assured by persons skilled in the Gaelic tongue, who, from their youth, were acquainted with many of these poems of Ossian. To tranfuse such spirited and fer-
VOL. I. Q
242 A CRITICAL DISSERTATION ON
vid ideas from one language into another; to translate literally, and yet with such a glow of poetry ; to keep alive so much passion, and sup- port so much dignity throughout, is one of the most difficult works of genius, and proves the translator to have been animated with no small portion of Ossian's spirit.
The measured prose which he has employed, possesses considerable advantages above any sort of versification he could have chosen. Whilst it pleases and fills the ear with a variety of harmo- nious cadences, being, at the same time, freer from constraint in the choice and arrangement of words, it allows the spirit of the original to be exhibited with more justness, force, and simpli- city. Elegant, however, and masterly as Mr Macpherson's translation is, we must never for- get, whilst we read it, that we are putting the merit of the original to a severe test. For, we are examining a poet stripped of his native dress ; divested of the harmony of his own numbers. We know how much grace and energy the works of the Greek and Latin poets receive from the charm of versification in their original languages. If then, destitute of this advantage, exhibited in a literal version, Ossian still has power to please
THE POEMS OF OSSIAN. 245
as a poet ; and not to please only, but often to command, to transport, to melt the heart ; we may very safely infer, that his productions are the offspring of true and uncommon genius ; and we may boldly assign him a place among those whose works are to last for ages.
END OF VOLUME FIRST.
Printed by George Ramsay, Sc Co. Edinburgh, 1812.