the Edda insinuates pretty clearly, when it tells us, that he hath established from the beginning governors to regulate the destinies of mortals. One may conceive what impression this doctrine must have made upon men who were naturally warlike. Recent examples have shewn us, that it never fails among men to add strength to their ruling passion, and to produce particularly in such as love war, a blind temerity which knows neither measure nor danger[1]. But to this unlucky prejudice the ancient inhabitants of the north added another, the effects of which were no less barbarous: which was, that the term of a man’s life might be prolonged, if any one would put himself in his place and die in his stead. This was often practised when a prince or illustrious warrior was ready to perish by some accident; Odin appeased by such a sacrifice, and content to have a victim, revoked, they said, the decree of the destinies and lengthened the thread of his life whom they were so desirous to save.
The other precepts of this religion[2] probably extended no farther than to be brave and intrepid in war, to serve the
