94 OF THE GEUMA.XS. 



trees, from his teeth the rocks, and from his brain the clouds. Now, 

 an old Frisian manuscript presents us with a cosmogony in which, with 

 some admixture from tlie account given in the IJible, this order in the 

 process of production is nearly inverted. The passage in this MS., of 

 which I speak, is as follows : "God scop thene eresta meneska, thet was 

 Adam, fon achta wendem ; thet beneta fon tha stene, thet flask fon there 

 erthe, thet blod fon tha wetere, tha herta fon tha winde, thene togta fon 

 tha wolken, thene suet fon tha dawe, tha lokkar fon tha gerse, tha agenc 

 fon there sunna, and tha blerem on thene helga 6m, and tha scope [i. e. 

 scop he, or scop hi] Eva fon sine ribbe, Adames liana." Of this singu- 

 lar account, the following is a literal translation : "God created the first 

 man, tliat was Adam, out of eight things ; the bones of the stones, the 

 flesh of the earth, the blood of the water, the heart of the wind, the 

 thought * of the clouds, the sweat of the dew, the hair of the grass, the 

 eyes of the sun; and then he blew into him the holy .spirit, || and then 

 he created Eve of his rib, Adam's companion." 



Rather amusing is the manner in which the old Frisians here exhibit 

 their knowledge of the human heart, by describing it as formed of wind: 

 varium et mutabile semper. — Here then we have a strange blending of 

 Scripture with heathen cosmogony : many such cosmogonies probably 

 arose when the ancient inhabitants of northern Europe were first made 

 acquainted with Christianity. The correspondence between the extract 

 given above and the Scandinavian mythe, is, with all its divergence, yet 

 so obvious, that we find here, unquestionably, remains of an ancient 

 Frisian cosmogony, clumsily interwoven witli the Scriptural account of 

 man's creation. 



I confess tliat the ancient mythology of the Scandinavians, and of 

 our Teutonic forefatliers, has long interested me rather more deeply than 

 that of the Greeks and Romans. It is not as poetical, as luxuriant, and 

 splendid, nor as effeminate and impure, as the latter; it is more abstract, 

 more stern and manly ; more vast, lofty, and (if I may use the word in 

 this connexion,) more colossal as a complete whole ; more strictly con- 

 nected, more consistent with itself; and yet abounding in endless, mys- 

 teriously interwoven, details, which, though they are so many branches, 

 directly connected with the huge stem, it is exceedingly difiicult to re- 

 tain in the memory : much more so than the details of the Grecian my- 

 thology, which consist of many distinct and disconnected faldes. 



To any one desirous of taxing the powers of the memory to the ut- 

 most, J would recommend tlie aluily of the ScancHnavian Mythology. 



*Brain : Tr. llLiviiie, bruutli : Tr. 



