The Poems of Ossian: To which are Prefixed a Preliminary Discourse and Dissertation on the Æra and Poems of Ossian

Front Cover
Phillips, Sampson, 1850 - Scottish Gaelic poetry - 492 pages

From inside the book

Other editions - View all

Common terms and phrases

Popular passages

Page 168 - The land through which we have gone to search it, is a land that eateth up the inhabitants thereof; and all the people that we saw in it, are men of a great stature. And there we saw the giants, the sons of Anak, which come of the giants : and we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight.
Page 233 - Whence are thy beams, O sun ! thy everlasting light ! Thou comest forth in thy awful beauty ; tho stars hide themselves in the sky ; the moon, cold and pale, sinks in the western wave ; but thou thyself movest alone. Who can be a companion of thy course...
Page 233 - O thou that rollest above, round as the shield of my fathers! Whence are thy beams, 0 sun! thy everlasting light? Thou comest forth in thy awful beauty; the stars hide themselves in the sky; the moon, cold and pale, sinks in the western wave.
Page 166 - The nations shall rush like the rushing of many waters : but God shall rebuke them, and they shall flee far off, and shall be chased as the chaff of the mountains before the wind, and like a rolling thing before the whirlwind.
Page 287 - Rear the tomb, ye friends of the dead. Close it not till Colma come. My life flies away like a dream. Why should I stay behind? Here shall I rest with my friends, by the stream of the sounding rock. When night comes on the hill — when the loud winds arise, my ghost shall stand in the blast, and mourn the death of my friends. The hunter shall hear from his booth; he shall fear, but love my voice!
Page 234 - ... from the clouds, and laughest at the storm. But to Ossian thou lookest in vain, for he beholds thy beams no more; whether thy yellow hair flows on the eastern clouds, or thou tremblest at the gates of the west. But thou art perhaps like me for a season; thy years will have an end. Thou shalt sleep in thy clouds, careless of the voice of the morning.
Page 142 - The flower hangs its heavy head, waving, at times, to the gale. Why dost thou awake me, O gale, it seems to say, I am covered with the drops of heaven? The time of my fading is near, and the blast that shall scatter my leaves. Tomorrow shall the traveller come, he that saw me in my beauty shall come; his eyes will search the field, but they will not find me?
Page 288 - Many fell by thy arm : they were consumed in the flames of thy wrath. But when thou didst return from war, how peaceful was thy brow. Thy face was like the sun after rain : like the moon in the silence of night : calm as the breast of the lake when the loud wind is laid.
Page 126 - In thoughts from the visions of the night, when deep sleep falleth on men, Fear came upon me, and trembling, which made all my bones to shake. Then a spirit passed before my face ; the hair of my flesh stood up: It stood still, but I could not discern the form thereof: an image was before mine eyes, there was silence, and I heard a voice, saying, Shall mortal man be more just than God?
Page 225 - O bards! over the land of strangers. They have but fallen before us: for, one day, we must fall. Why dost thou build the hall, son of the winged days? Thou lookest from thy towers to-day; yet a few years, and the blast of the desert comes; it howls in thy empty court, and whistles round thy halfworn shield. And let the blast of the desert come! we shall be renowned in our day!

Bibliographic information