degree, that resemblance to each other which they all have to their object.'

It is true, however, if we were fully able to admit that Macpherson could not have obtained these ideas where he professes to have found them, Mr. Laing has produced many instances of such remarkable coincidence as would make it probable that Macpherson frequently translates, not the Gaelic, but the poetical lore of antiquity. Still this is a battery that can only be brought to play on particular points; and then with great uncertainty. The mode of attack used by Mr. Knight, could it have been carried on to any extent, would have proved much more effectual. We shall give the instance alluded to. In his Analytical Enquiry into the Principles of Taste, 1805,' he makes these remarks:

The untutored, but uncorrupted feelings of all unpolished nations, have regulated their fictions upon the same principles, even when most rudely exhibited. In relating the actions of their gods and deceased heroes, they are licentiously extravagant : for their falsehood could amuse, because it could not be detected; but in describing the common appearances of nature, and all those objects and effects which are exposed to habitual observation, their bards are scrupulously exact; so that an extravagant hyperbole, in a matter of this kind, is sufficient to mark as counterfeit any composition attributed to them. In the early stages of society, men are as acute and accurate in practical ob. servation as they are limited and deficient in speculative science; and in proportion as they are ready to give up their imaginations to delusion, they are jealously tenacious of the evidence of their senses. James Macpherson, in

the person of his blind bard, could say, with applause in the eighteenth century, Thus have I seen in Cona; but Cona I behold no more thus have I seen two dark hills removed from their place by the strength of the mountain stream. They turn from side to side, and their tall oaks meet one another on high. Then they fall together with all their rocks and

trees.'

But had a blind bard, or any other bard, presumed to utter such a rhapsody of bombast in the hall of shells, amid the savage warriors to whom Ossian is supposed to have sung, he would have needed all the influence of royal birth, attributed to that fabulous personage, to restrain the audience from throwing their shells at his head, and hooting him out of their company as an impudent liar. They must have been sufficiently acquainted with the rivulets of Cona or Glen-Coe to know that he had seen nothing of the kind; and have known enough of mountain torrents in general to know that no such effects are ever produced by them, and would, therefore, have indignantly rejected such a barefaced attempt to impose on their credulity.'

The best defence that can be set up in this case will, perhaps, be to repeat, 'It is he himself that now speaks, and not Ossian.'

Mr. Laing had scarcely thrown down the gauntlet, when Mr. Archibald M‘Donald✶ appeared

'Ready, aye, ready,† for the field.

Some of Ossian's lesser Poems, rendered into verse, with a Preliminary Discourse, in answer to Mr. Laing's Critical and Historical Dissertation on the Antiquity of Ossian's Poems, 8vo. p. 284. Liverpool, 1805.'

+ Thirlstane's motto. See Scott's Lay of the Last Minstrel.

The opinion of the colour of his opposition, whether it be that of truth or error, will depend on the eye that contemplates it. Those who delight to feast with Mr. Laing on the limbs of a mangled poet, will think the latter unanswered; while those who continue to indulge the animating thought, that Fingal lived, and that Ossian sung,' will entertain a different sentiment. After successfully combating several old positions,† Mr. M'Donald terminates his discussion of the point at issue with these words:

He (Mr. Laing) declares, if a single poem of Ossian in MS. of an older date than the present century (1700,) be procured and lodg ed in a public Library, I (Laing) shall return among the first to our national creed.'

'This is reducing the point at issue to a narrow compass. Had the proposal been made at the outset, it would have saved both him and me a good deal of trouble: not that in re gard to ancient Gaelic manuscripts I could give any more satisfactory account than has been done in the course of this discourse. There the reader will see, that though some of the poems are confessedly procured from oral tradition, yet several gentlemen of veracity attest to have seen, among Macpherson's papers, several MSS. of a much older date than Mr.

A professor in the University of Edinburgh, the ami able and learned Dr. Gregory, is on the side of the believ ers in Ossian. His judgment is a tower of strength, See the preface, p. vi. to xii. and p. 146, of his Comparative View of the State and Faculties of Man with those of the Animal World.

† Such as the silence of Ossian in respect to religion; his omission of wolves and bears, &c. See also in the Literary Journal, August, 1804, a powerful encounter of many of Mr. Laing's other arguments in his Dissertation against the authenticity of these poems. His ignorance of the Gaelic, and the consequent futility of his etymological remarks, are there ably exposed.

Laing requires to be convinced. Though not more credulous than my neighbours, I cannot resist facts so well attested; there are no stronger for believing the best established human transactions.

I understand the originals are in the press, and expected daily to make their appearance. When they do, the public will not be carried away by conjectures, but be able to judge on solid grounds. Till then, let the discussion be at rest.' P. 193-4.

It is curious to remark, and, in this place, not unworthy of our notice, that whilst the controversy is imminent in the decision, whether these poems are to be ascribed to a Highland bard long since gone to the halls of his fathers,' or to a Lowland muse of the last century, it is in the serious meditation of some controversialist to step in and place the disputed wreath on the brows of Hibernia. There is no doubt that Ireland was, in ancient times, so much connected with the adjacent coast of Scotland, that they might almost be considered as one country, having a community of manners and of language, as well as the closest political connexion. Their poetical language is nearly, or rather altogether the same. These coinciding circumstances, therefore, independent of all other ground, afford to ingenuity, in the present state of the question, a sufficient basis for the erection of an hypothetical superstructure of a very imposing nature.

In a small volume published at Dusseldorf in 1787, by Edmond, Baron de Harold, an Irishman, of endless titles, we are presented

*Colonel-commander of the regiment of Konigsfield, gentleman of the bedchamber of his most serene highness the Elector Palatin, member of the German Society of

with what are called, Poems of Ossian lately discovered.'*

'I am interested,' says the baron in his preface, in no polemical dispute or party, and give these poems such as they are found in the mouths of the people; and do not pretend to ascertain what was the native country of Ossian. I honour and revere equally a bard of his exalted talents, were he born in Ireland or in Scotland. It is certain that the Scotch and Irish were united at some early period. That they proceed from the same origin is indisputable; nay, I believe that it is proved beyond any possibility of negating it, that the Scotch derive their origin from the Irish. This truth has been brought in question but of late days; and all ancient tradition, and the general consent of the Scotch nation, and of their oldest historians, agree to confirm the certitude of this assertion. If any man still doubts of it, he will find, in Macgeogehan's History of Ireland, an entire conviction, established by elaborate discussion, and most incontrovertible proofs:' pp. v. vi.

We shall not stay to quarrel about 'Sir Archy's great grandmother,' or to contend that Fingal, the Irish giant, did not one day go over from

Manheim, of the Royal Antiquarian Society of London, and of the Academy of Dusseldorf.'

new.

* In some lines in these poems we find the lyre of Ossian called the old Hibernian lyre.' The idea is not See Burke's Observation in Hume's first Letter to Dr. Blair. Also, the collections by Miss Brooke and Mr. Kennedy. Compare the story of Conloch with that of Carthon in Macpherson.

See Macklin's Love A-la-mode.

Selma is not at all known in Scotland. When 1 ask ed, and particularly those who were possessed of any poetry, songs, or tales, who Fion was? (for he is not known by the name of Fingal by any ;) I was answered, that he was an Irishman, if a man; for they sometimes thought him a giant, and that he lived in Ireland, and some times came over to hunt in the Highlands.