Ossian Collection > Poems of Ossian

A PRELIMINARY DISCOURSE. 9
' I am very glad,' he Avrites on the 6th of October,
1763, • you have undertaken the task which I used the
freedom to recommend to you. Nothing less than what
you propose will serve the purpose. You need expect
no assistance from Macpherson, avIio flew into a pas-
sion when I told him of the letter I had wrote to you.
But you must not mind so strange and heteroclite a
mortal, than whom 1 have scarce ever knov.Ti a man
more perverse and unamiable. He will probably de-
part for Florida with governor Johnstone, and I would
advise him to ti-avel among the Chickisaws or Chero-
kees, in order to tame and ci^^ilize him.
' Since writing the above, I have been in company
with Mrs. Montague, a lady of great distinction in this
place, and a zealous partisan of Ossian. I told her of
your intention, and even used the freedom to read
your letter to her. She was extremely pleased yviih
your project; and the rather, as the Ducde Nivernois,
she said, had talked to her much on that subject last
winter ; and desired, if possible, to get collected some
proofs of the authenticity of these poems, which he
proposed to lay before the Academic de Belles Lettres
at Paris. You see, then, that you are upon a great
stage in this inquiry, and that many people have their
eyes upon you. This is a new motive for rendering
your proofs as complete as possible. I cannot conceive
any objection which a man even of the gravest cha-
racter coiild have to your publication of his letters,
which will only attest a plain fact known to him. Such
scruples, if they occur, you must endeavour to remove,
for on this trial of yours will the judgment of the pub-
lic finally depend.' — — —
Without being acquainted Avith Hume's advice to
Dr. Blair, the Committee, composed of chosen persons,
and assisted by the best Celtic scholars, adopted, as it
will be seen, a very similar manner of acting.
It conceived the purpose of its nomination to be, to
employ the influence of the society, and the extensive
co mm u ni cation which it possesses with every part of