The Works of Oliver Goldsmith - Volume 8 Author:Oliver Goldsmith Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: "THE MONTHLY REVIEW." I —MYTHOLOGY AND POETRY OF THE CELTES." [The following paper was sent us by the gentleman who signs " D.," and who, we hope, will ex... more »cuse our striking out a few paragraphs for the sake of brevity.] On " Remains of the Mythology and Poetry of the Celtes, particularly of Scandinavia, designed as a Supplement and Proof of the Introduction to the History of Denmark." By P. H. Mallet.1 Copenhagen, 1766. 4to. If all the brilliancy of sentiment which so dry a subject may require to its support, and all the laborious assiduity which may be necessary in the solution of its intricacies, demand applause, Professor Mallet must deserve it, who has so happily united both. The learned on this side the Alps have long labored at the antiquities of Greece and Rome, but almost totally neglected their own; like conquerors who, while they have made inroads into the territories of their neighbors, have left their own natural dominions to desolation. The cause of this our author ascribes, first, to the disadvantageous idea we have conceived of the Celtes in general, an idea entirely groundless, and which offers no reason for not studying those antiquities to which our manners, our government, our laws, are continually calling us back. Secondly, to the few monuments of Celtic mythology which have reached our times. " To draw this subject from obscurity, we ought in some measure to give new life to those poetical mythologists, our ancestors; we should consult them, and attend, in the frightful gloom of their forests, to those mysterious incantations in which is concealed the whole system of their religion and morality." In France, Spain, and England the ravages of time, or of more destructive zeal, have left few remains of this sacred poesy. The countries of the Nor...« less