Ossian Collection > Poems of Ossian > Volume 1

THE JERA OF OSSIAN. 15
of Fingal to the third century; and this ac-
count agrees exactly with the Irish histories,
which place the death of Fingal, the son of
Comhal, in the year !283, and that of Oscar
and their own celebrated Cairbre, in the year
296.
Some people may imagine, that the allu-
sions to the Roman history might have been
derived, by tradition, from learned men, more
than from ancient poems. This must then
have happened at least three ages ago, as these
allusions are mentioned often in the composi-
tions of those times.
Every one knows what a cloud of igno-
rance and barbarism overspread the north of
Europe three hundred years ago. The minds
of men, addicted to superstition, contracted a
narrowness that destroyed genius. Accord-
ingly we fmd the compositions of those times
trivial and puerile to the last degree. But let
it be allowed, 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 Avhich could be
entertained by any man who lived in the fif-
teenth century.
The strongest objection to the antiquity of
the poems now given to the public under the