Ossian Collection > Fingal

Antiquity, 5ec. of OSSIAN's Foems. xI
When virtue in peace, and bravery in war,
are the chara^leriftics or a nation, their a6tions
become interell:ing, and their fame worthy ci im-
mortahty. A generous fpirit is warmed with no-
ble adions, and becomes ambitious of perpetuating
them. This is the true fource of that divine in-
fpiration to which the poets of all ages pretended.
When they found their themes inadequate to the
warmth of their imaginations, they var-fuOitd
them over with fables, fupplied by their own fancy,
or furniihed by abfurd tiaditicns. Thefe fablts,
however ridiculous, had their abettors; pofitrily
either implicitly believed them, or through a va-
nity natural to mankind, pretended that they did.
They loved to place the founders of their families
in the days of fable, when poetry, without the
fear of contradi£tion, could give what character
fhe pleafed of her heroes. It is to this vanity that
we owe the prefervation of what remained of the
works of OiTian. Kis poetical merit m.ade his he-
roes famous in a country where hercifm v/as much
efteemed and admired. The polierity of thefe
heroes, or thofe who pretended to be defcended
from them, heard with pleafure the eulogiums of
their anceftors ; bards were employed to repeat
the poems, and to record the connection of their
patrons with chiefs fo renowned. Every cliief in
procefs of time had a bard in his family, and the
office became at laft hereditary. By the fuccef-
fion of thefe bards, the poems concerning the an-
ceftors of the family were handed down from gene-
ration to generation; they were repeated to the
whole clan on folemn occafions, and always allu-
ded to in the new compofitions of the bards. This
cultom came down near to our own times ; and after
the bards Vv^re difcontinued, a great number in
a clan retained by memory, or committed to
writing, their compofitions, and founded the an-
b % tiquity