Ossian Collection > Poems of Ossian > Volume 2

224 A Critical DISSERTATION
of human imagination and paffion. They make
us acquainted with the notions and feelings of
our fellow-creatures in the moft artlefs ages;
difcovering what objects they admired, and what
pleafurcs they purfued, before thofe refinements
of foclety had taken place, whi'ch enlarge in-
deed, and diverfify the tranfadions, but difguife
the manners of mankind.
Besides this merit, which ancient poems
have with philofophical obfervers of human na-
ture, they liave another with perfons of tafte.
They promife feme of the higlieft beauties of
poetical writing. Irregular and unpolilhed we
may exped the produdlions of uncultivated ages
to be ; but abounding, at the fame time, with
that enthufiafm, that vehemence and fire, which
are the foul of poetry. For many circumftances
of thofe tijiies which we call barbarous, are fa-
vourable to the poetical fpirit. That ftate, in
which human nature flioots wild and free,
though unfit for other improvements, certainly
encourages the high exertions of fancy and
paffion.
In the infancy of focieties, men live fcattered
and difperfed, in the inidft of folitary rural
ilcnes, wliere the beauties of nature arc their
chief entertainment. They meet with many
objevT^s, to them new and llrangc; their wonder
'] and