more amusing, and there scarcely can be a more useful speculation, than that of tracing the causes which have occasioned in a people originally the same, possessing the same genius, and language, and customs, and superstitions, any difference of moral complexion. Such an investigation has, at least, the tendency of shewing us the vast influence which popular opinions and accidental circumstances exert in the formation of character.

In the first place, I remark, that the endless divisions and feuds, occasioned by the Brehon law of Tanistry;* operated most unfavourably on the Irish character. It is true, there were divisions and animosities among the Highland clans, but they were of a very different description. While they waged war against their enemies, their affection to their chief, who was "the first in their battles and "the wisest in their councils," and to that large family of which he was the head, was by this circumstance increased rather than diminished. There is not perhaps an instance on record in which a clan was divided against itself, and in which the claims of aspiring rivals produced a disunion in the tribe to which they belonged. They loved one another therefore intensely,

* See the chapter on the progress of English law, &c. and also note A.

not merely because their hearts were warm, but because their affections were circumscribed by barriers, stable as the mountains with which they were surrounded.

The reverse of this was the case in Ireland: according to the custom to which I have alluded, a chief was succeeded in his authority and in his estate by the person who was deemed best qualified for discharging his duty, of the sept of which he was head, whether he were a son, or an uncle, or a cousin, or only connected by those ordinary ties of kindred which united all the members of the clan. This practice evidently had its origin in times of great turbulence, when it was of the first importance for the clan to have a leader in whose wisdom and courage they might place the utmost confidence. It was attended, however, with the most unhappy effects; it divided a clan into parties; each division had recourse to arms to support its favourite chief; both contended with the implacable rancour and ferocity which seem inseparable from civil war; and the moral character was finally injured by the circumstances of aggravation which accompanied the combat. The people were thus accustomed not merely to witness scenes of carnage and of blood, but to mingle in such scenes when their brethren and their friends

were the sufferers, and, consequently, to have the finer susceptibilities of their nature perverted or destroyed.

In

Every one knows the deleterious influence which civil war exerts on national character. In some instances, indeed, the atrocities committed in such circumstances are the effect of a previous state of barbarism and gross depravity in the multitude; but in every case, they tend to weaken the moral feelings, and to deaden the virtuous emotions of the heart. Ireland, the clans not only contended with one another and with the English, or as they call them the Gall,* but almost as often as there was a new chief every clan was divided against itself. This was a civil war in its worst form. To expect that in such circumstances the people should retain their original purity and moral loveliness, were to look for an impossibility.

In the second place; there has been a much closer connection, during the last two or three centuries, at least, between the higher and lower orders in the Highlands than in Ireland. In the former country, the hall of the chieftain was ever open to receive his clan; they appeared before their lord, not with the spirit of servility, but with that of unsuspecting confi

That is, strangers.

dence, of mingled attachment and veneration : they heard the same bards recite the praises of departed heroes; the same mournful and inspiring melody; and they were accustomed to think, that their fame also would produce the same glorious emulation in the sons of future times. Their manners were polished, and the tone of their moral feeling elevated and improved, by their frequent and endearing intercourse with the only person in the world whose authority to them was paramount, and whose wealth, and rank, and military prowess were thought to confer distinction on the meanest of the clan. It is impossible that people placed in such circumstances, and feeling the influence of such sentiments, should not have arrived at a superior degree of moral attainment, should not have been impelled by a noble enthusiasm to the exercise of every manly virtue, to heroism, and glory.

Besides, it should be recollected, that this state of things was very general in the Highlands so late as the year 1745: so that the inhabitants have not only had the advantage of their original circumstances till this recent period, but have had also the important privilege of receiving religious instruction in their own language. Thus, when the period.

arrived in which the race of the bards became extinct, in which the chieftains were to relinquish their patriarchal and peculiar character, and to assume that which is common to the possessors of equal rank and fortune throughout the empire ; in which the dark, and melancholy, and sublime superstitions of the mountains, was to be confined within narrower limits, and to have its influence on the imagination and the heart diminished, the mild and purifying religion of the gospel shone with a brighter lustre, and the knowledge of the cross afforded a principle to excite and perpetuate the noble and moral enthusiasm of the Highland mind.

It is almost unnecessary to say how different from all this was the case in Ireland. In that country the number of the native chieftains, in consequence of the endless hostilities in which the English involved them, was, during some centuries, gradually diminishing; various rebellions furnished the occasion of immense forfeitures; and the fatal ambition of Tyrone, and the civil wars of Cromwell, nearly completed their total extirpation. Most of the Irish clans were now as sheep without a shepherd. The halls in which they were accustomed to assemble, in which they had heard the music of the