Ossian Collection > Poems of Ossian

14 DISSERTATION ON
to obstruct the incursions of the Caledonians.
Several other passages in traditions allude to the
wars of the Romans; but the two just mentioned
clearly fix the epocha of Fingal to the third cen-
tury; and this account 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 allusions to
the Roman history might have been derived, by
tradition, from learned men, more than from anci-
ent poems. This must then have happened at
lecist three years ago, as these allusions are men-
tioned often in the compositions of those times.
Every one knows what a cloud of ignorance and
barbarism overspread the north of Europe three
hundred years ago. The minds of men, addicted
to superstition, contracted a narrowness that de-
stroyed genius. Accordingly we find the compo-
sitions 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 in-
duce him to allude to the Roman times. We find
no fact to favour any designs which could be en-
tertained by any man who lived in the fifte&nth
century.
The strongest objection to the antiquity of the
Poems now given to the public under the name of
Ossian, is the improbability of their being handed
down by tradition through so many centuries.
Ages of barbarism, some will say, could not pro-
duce poems abounding with the disinterested and
generous sentiments so conspicuous in the com-
positions of Ossian ; and could these ages produce
them, it is impossible but they must be lost, or al-
together corrupted, in a long succession of barba-
rous generations.
Those objections naturally suggest themselves to
men unacquainted with the ancient state of the
northern parts of Britain. The bards, who were
an inferior order of the Druids, did not share
their bad fortune. They were spared by the vie-