Blair Collection > Critical dissertations on the origin, antiquities, language, government, manners, and religion, of the antient Caledonians, their posterity the Picts, and the British and Irish Scots

xxli PREFACE.
vages arifes entirely from hunting : it therer-
fore rnay be fuppofed that the Gauls found
fir{\. their y/ay to the Northern extremity of
Britain, in purfuit of their game. In pro-r
portion as the original colony advanced
IVorthward, other emigrants from Gaul trod
on their footfleps. Thus for a courfe of
ages Gaul poured into Britain a fucceilion
pf colonies. The mapners and language of
the Gauls, in the mean time, fuffered ma-
terial changes at home. The arts of civil
life gradually arofe among them, and na-
turally introduced new ideas and new words
into their language. It is to this advancing
civilization pf Gaul that we muft afcribc
the difference between the Northern and
Southern Britons. The latter imported with
them thp changed manners, and adulter-
ated, though improved, language of the
more n;odcrn Gauls : the former tenaciouf-
]y retained the unpolilhed cufloms and
original language of their anccftors.
It would be as prefumptuous, as it
would be idle, to hope for the warm atten-
tion of the public to difquintions of this
kind. There are, hpwever, fome who,
could they be culled out of the mafs of
mankind, have more enlarged ideas ; fome
that are as im.partial with refpeCt to timeSj
as