Ossian Collection > Essay on the authenticity of the poems of Ossian

30 ON THE AUTHENTICITY
The Druids, according to the universal tes-
timony of antiquity, were highly distin-
guished by their attainments in every de-
partment of the most valuable science. They
taught, as we are informed by the unques-
tionable testimony of Julius C8esar,f the
immortality of the soul; — in common with
the Magi of the East, from whom, it is pro-
bable, as Pliny insinuates,:]: that they deri-
ved their philosophy, they held the doctrine
of transmigration ; they taught the science
of the stars, and of their motions ; they in-
structed the youth, that resorted to them,
in physics, or concerning the general nature
of things ; and, ascending to the mysteries
of theology, they taught the doctrine of the
immortal Gods. Strabo (lib. iv.) informs us,
to the same purpose, that the Druids taught
Scotland has been denied by some, I reserve the proofs
of their establishment there for a separate dissertation.
t CfES. Bell. Gall. lib. vi. c. 14.. 15.
t Hist. Nat. lib. XXX. c. 4. and Pomp. Mela, lib. iii.
c. 1.