Johnson made him advert to the consideration, that he who does not
understand a language, cannot know that something which is recited to
him is in that language, he might have believed, and reported to this
hour, that he had 'heard a great part of _Fingal_ repeated in the
original.'

For the satisfaction of those on the north of the Tweed, who may think
Dr. Johnson's account of Caledonian credulity and inaccuracy too
strong,[1061] it is but fair to add, that he admitted the same kind of
ready belief might be found in his own country. 'He would undertake, (he
said) to write an epick poem on the story of _Robin Hood_,[1062] and
half England, to whom the names and places he should mention in it are
familiar, would believe and declare they had heard it from their
earliest years.'

One of his objections to the authenticity of _Fingal_, during the
conversation at Ulinish,[1063] is omitted in my _Journal_, but I
perfectly recollect it. 'Why is not the original deposited in some
publick library, instead of exhibiting attestations of its
existence?[1064] Suppose there were a question in a court of justice,
whether a man be dead or alive: You aver he is alive, and you bring
fifty witnesses to swear it: I answer, "Why do you not produce the
man?"' This is an argument founded upon one of the first principles of
the _law of evidence_, which _Gilbert_[1065] would have held to be
irrefragable.

I do not think it incumbent on me to give any precise decided opinion
upon this question, as to which I believe more than some, and less than
others.[1066]

The subject appears to have now become very uninteresting to the
publick. That _Fingal_ is not from beginning to end a translation from
the Gallick, but that _some_ passages have been supplied by the editor
to connect the whole, I have heard admitted by very warm advocates for
its authenticity. If this be the case, why are not these distinctly
ascertained? Antiquaries, and admirers of the work, may complain, that
they are in a situation similar to that of the unhappy gentleman, whose
wife informed him, on her death-bed, that one of their reputed children
was not his; and, when he eagerly begged her to declare which of them it
was, she answered, '_That_ you shall never know;' and expired, leaving
him in irremediable doubt as to them all.

I beg leave now to say something upon _second sight_, of which I have
related two instances,[1067] as they impressed my mind at the time. I
own, I