Publisher's Synopsis
This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1908 edition. Excerpt: ... There is little attempt made to discriminate between the penalties accorded to different kinds of guilt. Heaven is described in the same rhapsodical style as in the Fis Adamndin, the Felire Oengusa, etc. Another moral treatise is the Dd Brbn Flatha Nime, 'The Two Sorrows of the Kingdom of Heaven, ' i.e. the two sorrows referred to ch. 33 of the Fis Adamndin. Here, too, Elias is represented as standing in Paradise, the Gospels in his hand, and he preaching to the birds that perch on the Tree of Life, eating its berries.1 5. The Fis Adamnain The general plan of the Fis Adamndin is distinguished from that of the other similar writings that have come down to us by an architectonic character to which they can make no claim. The structure proper to the Imram was, in great measure, that of a framework into which a greater or less number of incidents could be fitted, according to the author's taste, without impairing the general effect; the same, in a somewhat less degree, may be said of the Echtra, which are more nearly akin to the romance of adventure than to the epic. The early Christian writers, again, solely intent upon edification, and being for the most part men of little culture--for this species of composition, after all, was but a by-way of ecclesiastical literature--were usually content to repeat a few topics belonging to the common stock of ideas prevalent in their day, and paid but little heed to literary effect, or even to the clear conception, or orderly presentment, of their subject.1 1 David Fitzgerald, loc. cit., pp. 192-3, where he cites from Kuhn, Die Herabkunft des Feuers, a passage of the Vedas: 'Two birds sit on the top of the imperishable acvattha, one eating its figs, and the other looking on.' He also cites from the..
