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o ver this part of character, inhich it cannot approve, and many, perbrips, prompt solo to imputo her u motis to her si tua raon, mores than to her dispositionaaiad to lamont ibe tin happi Dela of the former, ratam tbaa to accuso the pervers uias of the Ialter. Μaryla
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sotile Dotice fro in their connexion with the decline and nil of the Roman empire. We inali occasionalty mention the Scythian, or Sarmatian tribes, which, withtheir arm s and horias, their flochs and herda, thelewives and families, wandered over the immense plains, whicti spread themiatve Dom the Caspian Sea to the Vistula, froin the confines of Persia to those of Ge
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many. But the warli ho Germans, who si st resistod, thon invadeti, and at length ovetturned, the westem monarchy of Rome, Will occupy a much more imporistant place in this history and posseti a stronger, and ii me may use the eκpression, a more do1nestio claim toour attention, and regat d. ThB most civiliged nationos modern Europo issu ed hom the woods of Germannaud in the rude institutions of tho se barbarians inomay stili distinguisti tho Original principies of our preissent laws and manners. In their primitive state os simplicity and indepelidence, the Germans were suris
.eyed by the discerning eye, and delinea ted by thomasterlv pencit of Tacitus, the sirst of historians, who applied the science of philosopby to the stud y of facta.
The expros sive conciseri eis of his descriptions has deserisved to exercita the diligence of innumerable antiqua. xians, and to excite the genius and penetration of thaphilosophie historians os our ΟWn times. The subjecti however various and important, has atready been lafrequently, in ably, and so successsul ly discussed, thatit is now grown familiar to the reader, and difficuli to e writer. We stiali there fore content our lves Minobservin g, and inde ed With repeating, fome of theniost important circuitistances of climate, of manners. and of institutiori , which rendered the wild barbariansos Germany Iuch formidabie enemies to the Roman
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MI n, and preserved a stri hing resemblance. On the west, ancient Germany was divided hy the Rhinsfro in the Gallie, and on the lauth, by the Danube, Bom the Illyri an provinces of the empiris. A ridge of hills ti sing froni thε Danube, and called the Carpathian
The eastern frontier Was Dintly ma rhed by the
mutuat sests of the Germans and the Sarmatians, and was osten conlaunded by the mixture of warring andeon sedera ting tribes of the two Datiotis. In the remotadarhnessos the north, the ancients imperfectly discri eda Dogos ocean that lay beyond the Ballic sea, and he. yond the Peninsula or istands of Scandi navia. Some ingenious writers have suspected that Europe was much eoider formerly than ii as at present; anatho most ancient descriptiona of the climate ofGermany tetid exceedingly to confirm their theory. The generat complaints of intense Bost, and eteri Bal minter, are perhaps litile to he regarded, since Wohavo no method οξ roducing to the accurate standaraof the thermo meter the seelings, or expressio tis of an orator, borri in the happier regions os Greece or Asia. Boi I mali select two rema rhable circumstances of a les, equivocat nature. 1 The great rivera which coverea the Roman provinces , thct Rhine and the Danube, mere frequens y froZen over, and capable of suppori'ing the most enorm ous Weigbis. The barbariana who . Ofteti chole that severe Dason for their inroada, tra ported, without apprehelision or danger, their num rous armi es , their cavalry avd their heavy waggon over a vast and solid bridge of ice. modern ages hav. not presented an insi ance of a like phaenomenon.
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Mea iso, is os a constitution that supporis, and ev nrequires, the most intense coid. He is found on therock of Spitaberg within ten degrees of the Polo; hoseems to delight in the snows of Lapland and Siberia ;but at present he can not subsist, much leti multi pinis any country, to the lauth of the Ballio. In thalime of Caesar, the rein deer, as ineli as the eth, and the wild bult was a native os ibo Hercynian forest, inhich theti overnadowed a great pari os Germany, and . Polandis. The modern improvemenis sufficiently eraptain the causes of tho diminution of the cold. The immense woods have heen gradu atly cleared, whichintercepted Dom tbe earth the rays of the sun. Thomorasses have been drained, and , in proportion as tholait has been culti valed, the air has hecomet more temperate. Canada, at this day, is an exact pictura olancient Germany. Although silua ted in tho fame pa-xaltet with finest provinces of France aud England, that eountry experienees the most rigorous coid. The rein deer are very numerous, the ground is covered witti deop and lalting sno , and the great river of St. La.. Tence is regularly froZen, in a Dason wheci the watem of the Seine and the Thames aro usualty freo Bom ice. It is difficult to ascertain, and easy to eri aggeratEtho influence of the climate os ancient Germany ovexilio minds and bo dies of the natives. Many writera. have supposed, and most have ullowed, though, as it nould se em. without any adequale pro os, that thorigorous cold of the North Was favourable to a longli , and senerative Vigo ur, that the women .erct more fruitsul, and the human syecies more pro It Rc, than in v rmer or more temperate climates We may assert, Witu greater confidelice, that theheen air of Germany formed the large and masculino limbs of the native , who where, in generat, os a
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them a hind of strength betver adapted to violent emeristioras than to patient labour, and inspired them initheonstitutional bra very, which is the result os nerves and spiriis. The severity of a winter campa ign , that ehitIed the eourage of the Roman troops, was scarcelyfelt by these hardy children of the Forth, who, in theixtum, were unable to resist the summer heaths, and dissolved away in languor and sichneia under the beamsos an Italia n, sua. . There is not anywhere upon the globo, a largo tra et os country, which we have di overed, destitute os inhabitanis, or wliose first population can be fixed with any degree of historical.certainty. And yet, as thomost philosophic mirids ean seldom refra in Dom investigat ing the infancy of great Dations, our curiosity co fume, itiali ira totisome and dilappo inted essoris. Wheu Tacitus considered the purity of the German blood and the forbidding aspect of the country, he was dispoiadis pron Ounce thoia barbarians Indigenae, or 'natives of the lail. We may allow With Iaratri aud perhaps witti truth, that ancient Germany was not originalty peopled by any foret gn colonies, atready formed into a poliatical societ'; but that the Dame and nation received their existence fro in the vadual union os lame wandeis ring lavages of the Hercynian woods. TO asseri tholasa vages to have been the spontaneous production of thoearth which they inhabited, would he a ram inferencs, eondemned by religion, and unwarranted by reason. Sueb rationat doubi is but ill-suited with the genius os popular vanity. Among the nations who havo adopted the Mosaic history of the worid, the arli or Noah has beeti of the fame uiri as Was formerly to the Greehs and Romans the siege of Thoy. On a narroπ
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perstructura ορ Labie has been erectedo; and the wild Irishman, as weli as the wild Tartar could potnt out ibe individual son os Iaphet, froin whose lo ins his anis cestoi s were lineatly descended. The last century a boundis edi ith antiquarians os profound Iearning aud easyla illi. who, by the dim light oi legends and traditions,
of eoisjoctu res and etymologies, conducted the great grandi hild ren of Noah fro in the Tower of Babel to the exiremities of the globe. of these judici ous crities, one of the most entertaining was Olaus Rudbeck, prosellot in ine univeisi ty of Upsal. Whate ver is celebrais ted either in history or suble, ibis aealous patriotia ri. bes to his country. Froni Swedon which sormed socotissiderabis a part of ancient Germany the Gree hsitiem lues derived their alphabetical characters, thei rastronomy, and their religion. of that delight sul reagion, for sucti it appea red tO tbe e yes of a native theitlantis of Plato, the Couut ry of the Huperboriatis, thega, dens of the Hesperides, the Fortunate Isianda audeven ibo Elysian Fieliis. were ali but nitit and imperis soci transcripis. A clime so profusely savoured by nature, could not long rema in deleri aster the flood. The Iearne d Rudbech allows the family of Noab a seis diears, to multiply from eight to abo ut twentv thousandpersons. Ne theti disperses them tuto sinali coloni esto replenisti the evrib, a Dd,to propagate the humata species. The German or Swedilh delachment, hieti marehed, is I am not misi ahen, under the commandos Ashetiag the lon os Gomer, the son os Iaphet distingui med itials by a more than common diligetice iathe prosecution of this great worh. The Dortherra: hive cast iis swarms over the greatest part of Europe, Afri ea, and Asia; and , cto uia the author a metaphor the bl ood circulated Dom the extremities to the Learta
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leave ro om for any reply. The German. in the age of Tacitus, mere uuac qua inted with tbe use of letters; a Dd the use of letters is the principat circumsiance that
incapa hie of knowledge or reflectiora. Without that artificiat help, the human memory soon dissipares oecorrupis the ideas intrusiad to her charge ; and thoen obter saeuities of the mitid, no longer supplied witti modeis or.willi maloiiais, gradu atly sorget their powers; the jud gement becomes se eble, and lethargic, the imagination longuid or irregular. Fullybio apprehendthis impρrtant truth, let us attempt, in an improved Society, to calculate the immense dissance belween thoman of learn in g, and the illiterate pea lant. The foris mer, by re ad ing and reflection, multiplies his om perience, atid lives in distant fges, and remoto colati tries: whil It the lalter, rooted to a single spol, and confined to a few years of erit stence, surpasses, butvery litile, his fellow - labourer the ox in the eκerciseor his mental faculties. The fame, and even.a greater disserenoe will bo ound belween nations than tWeen individuals; and
we may lasely Pronounee, that without solue species of writing, no People has ever preserved the Laith Mannals of their hissory, evex made any considexabis Progress in the abstraci sciencea or ever possessed, in any tolerable degree of Persection, the uia fui and
edly destitute. They passed their livos in a state oe, ignorance and poverty, whieti it has plea sed lame d Haimers to digni with the appellation os viri noua . simplicity. Μodem Germany is laid in contain about
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two thousana three hundred walled towns. In E muchwider extent of country, the geographer Ptolemycould discover no more than ninely faces, wbicb hedecorates with the Dame OF cities : though, accordirigio our id fas, they would but ili deserve that splendidtille. We can only suppose them to have been rude sorti fleations, constructed in the centre of the woods, and designed to secure the women, child ren and catile, whilst the warriors of the tribe marched out to repet a. Iuddeti invasi n. But Tacitus asseris, as a meit Enown laci, that tho Germans. in his timo, had no cities; and that theyassected to despila the worha os Roman industry, aa Places of confinement rather than os security. TLela
gular villas; each balbari an fixed his independent dweI- ling. on the spol to which a plain, a Wo Od, Or a IlI eam os fresh water, had induced him to give the preserente. Neither stone, nou br ch, Dor tiles Here employed ita these night habitations. They were in deed no mor than low huts of a circular sigure, bulli of iough timber, thalched with stia in and pierced at the top to leave a Deo passage for the Mohe. In the most inclement inter, the hardy German was satisfied with a scatitygarmetit made of the shin os lame animal. The naistions who dwelt lowards the Nortli , clothed themial-ves in surs; and the women manufactured for the rown use a coarte hicid os linen. The igaino os variouasoris, with whicli the foresta of Germany were Plenti.