to it the use of speech. He carried it every where about with him, and made it pronounce whatever oracles he wanted. This artifice reminds us of the Pigeon[1] which brought to Mahomet the commands of heaven, and proves pretty plainly, that neither of these impostors had to do with a very subtle and discerning people. We find another feature of great resemblance in their characters, and that is the eloquence, with which both of them are said to have been gifted. The Icelandic chronicles paint out Odin as the most persuasive of men. They tell us, that nothing could resist the force of his words, that he sometimes enlivened his harangues with verses, which he composed extempore, and that he was not only a great poet, but that it was he who first taught the art of poesy to the Scandinavians. He was also the inventor of the Runic characters, which so long prevailed among that people. But what most contributed to make him pass for a God, was his skill in magic. He persuaded his followers, that he could run over the world, in the twinkling of an eye, that he had the direction of the air and tempests, that he could transform himself into all sorts of shapes, could raise the dead, could foretel
- ↑ Yet this is now proved to be a fiction. See Sale’s Preface to the Koran. T.
