"Never discover your uneafinefs to an evil perfon, for he will afford you no comfort. "Know, that if you have a friend, you "ought to vifit him often. The road is grown over with grafs, the bushes "quickly spread over it, if it is not con"ftantly travelled. "Be not the firft to break with your "friend. Sorrow gnaws the heart of him "who hath no one to advife with but himfelf. "Obfequiousness produces friends: but "it is vile indeed to flatter ones own felf. "Have never three words of dispute with the wicked. The good will often yield up a point, when the wicked is enraged and fwollen with pride. Ne"vertheless, it is dangerous to be filent, "when you are reproached with having the heart of a woman; for then you "would be taken for a coward. "I advife you, be circumfpect, but not too much: be fo, however, when you have drunk to excefs; when you are near "the "the wife of another; and when you "find yourself among robbers. "Do not accuftom yourself to mocking; neither laugh at your guest, or a ftranger: they who remain at home, "often know not who the ftranger is that "cometh to their gate. "Where is there to be found a virtuous "man without fome failing? or one fo "wicked as to have no good quality? Laugh not at the gray-headed de«claimer, nor at thy aged grandfire. "There often come forth from the wrin"kles of the fkin, words full of wisdom. "The fire drives away diseases: the oak expels the ftranguary: ftraws diffolve in"chantments*: Runic characters destroy "the effect of imprecations: the earth "fwallows up inundations; and death extinguishes hatred and quarrels.” 66 * Hence probably is derived the cuftom of laying two ftraws croffwife in the path where a witch is expected to come. T HESE Fragments of the Ancient EDDA are followed, in the Edition. of Refenius, by a little Poem called, The RUNIC CHAPTER, or the MAGIC OF ODIN. I have before observed, that the Conqueror, who ufurped this name, attributed to himfelf the invention of Letters; of which, they had not probably any idea in Scandinavia before his time. But although this noble art is fufficiently wonderful in itself, to attract the veneration of an ignorant people towards the teacher of it: yet Odin caufed it to be regarded as the ART of MAGIC by way of excellence, the art of working all forts of miracles: whether it was that this new piece of fallacy was subfervient to his ambition, or whether he himfelf was barbarous enough to think there was fomething fupernatural in writing. He speaks, at leaft in the following Poem, like a man who would make it fo believed. .. ་་ Do you know (fays he) how to engrave Runic characters? how to explain them? how to procure them? "how to prove their virtue?" He then goes on to enumerate the wonders he could per perform, either by means of thefe letters, or by the operations of poetry. « * I am poffeffed of fongs: fuch as nei"ther the spouse of a king, nor any fon "of man can repeat; one of them is called "the HELPER it will HELP thee at thy "need, in fick nefs, grief and all adver"fities. 66 "I know a Song, which the fons of men ought to fing, if they would become "fkilful phyficians. + I know a Song, by which I foften " and inchant the arms of my enemies ; "and render their weapons of none effect. "I know a Song, which I need only to "fing when men have loaded me with "bonds; for the moment I fing it, my ❝chains fall in pieces, and I walk forth at liberty. "I know a Song, useful to all mankind; "for as foon as hatred inflames the fons of "men, the moment I fing it they are ap-"peased. * Barthol. p. 658. + Ibid. p. 347. "I know a Song, of fuch virtue, that "were I caught in a ftorm, I can hush "the winds, and render the air perfectly ❝ calm." One may remark upon this last preroga tive of the verfes known to Odin, that among all the Gothic and' Celtic nations, the Magicians claimed a power over the Winds and Tempefts. Pomponius Mela tells us, that in an island on the coast of Bretagne (he probably means the Isle of SAINTS, oppofite to Breft) there were priefteffes, feparated from the rest of the people, who were regarded as the Goddeffes of Navigation, because they had the winds and tempests at their difpofal. There are penal statutes in the Capitularies of Charlemagne, in the canons of feveral councils, and in the ancient laws of Norway, against fuch as raise storms and tempefts; Tempes tarii is the name there given them. There were formerly of these impoftors on the coafts of Norway, as there are at present on thofe of Lapland, to whom fear and fuperftition were long tributary. Hence filly travellers have, with much gravity, given us ridiculous accounts of witches who fold wind to the failors in those feas. It is no less true, that the very Norwegian fisher men |