obscure allegories and extravagant fables. They describe a brave people, driven from their native land in search of new settlements, establishing themselves by their valour in a fair and fertile island: the chieftains parcelling out lands to their attendants, and the whole collection of adventurers, from the moment of their peaceable establishment, devising means to give stability to their acquisitions. From one family more distinguished and reverenced than the rest, they choose a monarch, not with that regard to primogeniture suited to times more composed, but the ablest and bravest of the particular race, as the man most likely to protect or to avenge them. To guard against the confusion of sudden accidents in a time of violence, a successor is appointed to this monarch during his life, who on his demise is instantly to take the reins of government. But the power of the monarch is considerably limited. His associates in adventure, conscious of their own merit, claim a share of dignity as well as of emolument. They pay their tributes to that provincial king whom they choose monarch of the island. In the other provinces they exercise all regal authority by virtue of a similar election. They have their rights independent of the monarch, and frequently vindicate them by arms against his invasions. The monarch, sensible of the danger arising from their turbulent spirit of freedom, endeavours to secure his authority, sometimes by dividing their power, sometimes by uniting the vari

Ous

ous independent states into one general interest by national conventions. In this state of things, a robust frame of body, a vehemence of passion, an elevated imagination were the characteristics of the people. Noble instances of valour, generous effusions of benevolence, ardent resentments, desperate and vindictive outrages abound in their annals. To verse and music they are peculiarly addicted. They who are possessed of any superior degree of knowledge, they who operate on their fancies and passions by the liveliest strains of poetry, are held in extraordinary veneration; the ministers of their religion are accounted more than human, To all these they submit their contests; they consult them as oracles of law and policy. But reflection and the gradual progress of refinement convince them of the necessity of settled laws. The principles of equity and independence implanted in the human breast receive them with delight; but the violence of passion still proves superior to their re straint. Private injuries are revenged by force; and insolent and ambitious chieftains still recur to arms.

THEY Who compare this account with the progress of society in other European settlements, may decide on the justness of this colouring. The Irish antiquarian deduces from it an intrinsic proof of the general authenticity of his favourite annals. Even from the idle tales of enchantments and supernatural events, a late advocate labours to prove their

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of Ireland.

high antiquity. "Into this story," saith doctor Warner, speaking of a particular engage-Warner. ment," there is foisted a very wonderous History "tale of the skill and enchantments of the p. 244 “Druids in each army; in order, no doubt, "to possess their countrymen with an high opinion and esteem of the power and importance of their holy leaders, as well as "to enliven the history with wonder and surprise. At the same time therefore "that we acquit the bard who invented it "in that age of darkness and superstition, we must condemn doctor Keating, who "relates it to us in these days for serious

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history. Indeed his relating it to us from "the ancient records has answered one end, "for which we ought to forgive him it has "furnished us with a proof from the history "of Ireland itself, of the antiquity of that

history, and of the existence of letters "before the introduction of Christianity.

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For though in the time of Druidism it was "natural to take every opportunity of dis

playing the power of that order, yet this "was absurd and inconsistent in Christian "annalists, and could not therefore be foisted "in by them; nor the history be the pro"duction of later ages, as our candid critics all seem to contend.".

BUT to the antiquarian I leave it to establish the authenticity of this history. It is only pertinent to my present purpose to observe, that if we suppose that the old poets were merely inventors of this whole series

of

of actions and incidents so circumstantially detailed, still they must have drawn their picture from that government and those manners, which subsisted in their own days, or were remembered by their fathers. So that we may reasonably conclude, that the state of Ireland for several centuries at least before the introduction of the English power, was such as they describe it in these early periods. And this is the only conclusion which I am concerned to establish.

OF

OF THE

ESTABLISHMENT OF CHRISTIANITY,

IN

IRELAND,

T

AND THE

CONSEQUENCES OF THIS EVENT.

HE conversion of the Irish to Christianity is generally considered as a new period, whence we may trace their history with more certainty; though we still find it encumbered with legendary and poetical fictions. The people were prepared for the preaching of Patrick their great apostle, by the gradual progress of the Gospel. by the labours of some former missionaries, and (if we may believe the old annalists) by theliberal and philosophical spirit of Cormac O'Conn, who first taught his subjects to despise the pagan rites. To him they principally attribute it, that the Druidical order so ancient and so powerful, gradually declined in consequence, though not extinct on the arrival of the great missionary; for the most authentic records mention the name of a Druid who violently opposed the introduction of Christianity, and warned the monarch of the heavy and oppressive taxations which VOL. I.

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