“ omnibus pagis partibufque, fed pene etiam in ❝ fingulis domibus, factiones funt*." MEN poffeffed of the freedom of action, ever arrayed in the weapons of war, would not readily furrender their natural rights, to be guided by the arbitrary will of any of their fellowmembers of fociety. The perfonal right of avenging wrongs and injuries continued to prevail in fociety, until a right of exclufive property was generally understood and established. It is laid down by an ingenious and learned author, that criminal is in all countries of a much later date than civil jurifdiction. This opinion appears to us to receive no fupport from thofe circumstances in the natural progrefs of fociety which lead towards the establishment of * De Bello Gallico, lib. vi. cap. 7. jurifdi&ion, jurifdiction, and the formation of a system of jurifprudence. THE first establishment of property was marked by the common poffeffion of a certain district, or territory, by the individuals of a family or tribe connected. together by motives of mutual fafety and convenience. A crime committed against any individual of a tribe, operated to roufe the refentment of all its members. Animofities fo deftructive and dangerous were altogether inconsistent with the principles of any fort of regular government. To fubdue the minds of a rude and warlike people, to reduce them under the dominion of regularity and order, to prevail upon them to yield paffive obedience to awards of punishment; was an arduous task, the accomplishment of which required more than the efficacy of human authority. It seems to be a propofition in a great measure admitted, that no tribes or focieties of men men have been found totally deftitute of the * Cæfar informs us, that it was thought the difcipline of the Druids had been first found in Britain, and from thence tranflated into Gaul; and that, for the most part, those who were ambitious of acquiring a perfect knowledge of their myfteries, travelled into Britain to learn them. "Difciplina in Britannia re"perta, atque inde in Galliam tranflata effe exiftimatur: et "nunc, qui diligentius eam rem cognofcere volunt, plerumque "illo difcendi caufa proficifcuntur." No doubt can be entertained, that the arts and learning of that much-famed order were cultivated among the antient Britons of the northern as well as fouthern parts of Albion. From Cæfar's account of the Druids. we learn, that they were not only the priests, but the philofophers, legislators, and judges of the antient Gauls; that they ftudiously taught the doctrine of the immortality and tranfmigration of fouls; held difputations concerning the ftars and their motions, ་་ THE introduction of exclufive property held up to view a tempting object for firring up the motions, the magnitude of the heavens and the earth, the natures of things, and the might and power of the immortal gods. "In primis hoc volunt perfuadere: non interire animas, fed ab "aliis poft mortem tranfire ad alios ;▬▬▬▬Multa præterea de "fideribus atque eorum motu, de mundi ac terrarum magnitu“dine, de rerum natura, de deorum immortalium vi ac potestate "difputant, & juventuti tranfdunt." The celebrated tranflator of the Poems of Offian, accounting for the total filence of the poet with respect to religion, informs us in his Differtation concerning the antiquity of those poems, that the authority of the Druids, however great it might have been prior to the beginning of the fecond century, began at that period to decline among the Caledonians; they having, in the time of Fingal's grandfather, commenced a war against the Druids, which ended in the almoft total extinction of their order. The learned tranflator makes mention of a dispute which Offian, in his old age, had been led into with a Culdee, or one of the first Chriftian miffionaries, who was defirous of making him a profelyte to the Chriftian doctrine. From the terms in which that difpute was couched, the tranflator, with great propriety, remarks Offian's extreme ignorance of the Chriftian tenets. Tradition has handed down, that it was St. Patrick, the tutelar Saint of Ireland, who undertook the pious tafk of converting Offian to the Christian faith. This curious relict of antient compofition, which has preferved an account of the religious converfation of the pious with the heroic and poetic worthy, ferves to fhew, that Offian was not only ignorant of the Chriftian tenets, but totally deftitute of the knowledge of the religious doctrine and philofophy of the Druids; andthat his notions of a divinity and of a future life were those of a primeval the artifices of fubtle fpirits to work upon the minds of a fimple people, in order to obtain primeval fociety, whofe religious conceptions had not been methodized into any fort of regular fyftem. Offian fays to the Culdee, or St. Patrick: Ciod an t ait i, 'n ear na 'n iar In English thus: 1 "What place is it, from the Eaft to the Weft, thou "who art an expert fcholar, that is not equally good with "the Heaven of God, if therein deers and dogs are to be "" found?" It appears from an antient poem, called The Old Bard's Wish, that, at a later period than the days of Offian, the fame notions respecting the joys of a future ftate prevailed. The Bard, after enumerating those paftoral occupations and hunting scenes which had afforded him delight in the vigour of life, expreffes the fituation in which he wished his body to be laid at his death. The words in the original are thefe : O! cairibh mi ri grean tra noin Fo 'n bharach aig fiubhal an loin, 'S air an t fheamraig 's ann fan neoinein, Bioidh cruit a's flige lan ri m' thaobh, 'S an fgia dhion mo fhinfir fa chath, |