“Our second illustration,” says the Dublin Penny Journal, referring to what I have here introduced, “belongs to a later period, and will give a good idea of the usual mode of representing the Saviour, whether on stone crosses, or on bronze, which prevailed from the sixth to the twelfth century. Such remains however, are valuable, not only as memorials of the arts, but as preserving the Celtic costume of a portion of the inhabitants of our island in those remote ages. It will be seen that in this, as in one of the shrine-figures before given, the kilt, or philibeg, is distinctly marked, and controverts the erroneous assertion of Pinkerton, formerly noticed, that “it was always quite unknown amongst the Welsh and Irish.”[339]
How others may receive it I do not know; but for myself, I confess, I find it no easy matter to maintain the composure of my countenance at this affected pomposity of censorial magniloquence. The self-complacency of the censor one could tolerate with ease, if the assumption of the historian had aught to support it. But alas! every position in the extract is the direct opposite of truth, with the exception of that which asserts another person’s error; and even this is beclouded with such egregious observations as to show, that leaving Pinkerton to P——[340] would be consigning the blind to a blinder conductor.
For, in the first place, the philibeg was not a Celtic costume at all, but belonged to the De-danaan, or Iranian colony,[341] who, on their overthrow here, took it with them to what is now called Scotland. The Firbolgs, who were Celts, and occupied this island before the Iranians, wore another style of dress altogether, which, on the reconquest of the country by the Scythian swarms, B.C. 1000, became again the national uniform. For the Firbolgs, having assisted the Scythians in dislodging the Iranians from the throne of the kingdom, and agreeing with them furthermore in point of worship and of garb, they did not only make their own habits, as well of religion as of dress, universal throughout the realm, but obliterated every vestige of the obnoxious costume, and cancelled every symptom of its characteristic ceremonial, except alone those Round Temples of adamantine strength, which defied the assailment of all violence and batteries.
There was no remnant, therefore, of the kilt to be met with in Ireland, either in the sixth century, or in the twelfth, or indeed for many centuries before the Christian era at all. This effigy,[342] therefore, could not have been intended for our Saviour, wanting, besides, the I. N. R. I.,[343] and wearing the Iranian regal crown instead of the Jewish crown of thorns. Therefore are we justified in ascribing it to its owner, Budha, whom again we find imprinted in the same crucified form, but with more irresistibility of identification, over the monuments of his name—over the doors and lintels of the temples of his worship.
Mr. Gough, describing this edifice, tells us that “On the west front of the tower (Brechin) are two arches, one within the other, in relief. On the point of the outermost is a crucifix, and between both, towards the middle, are figures of the Virgin Mary and St. John, the latter holding a cup with a lamb. The outer arch is adorned with knobs, and within both is a slit or loop. At bottom of the outer arch are two beasts couchant. If one of them, by his proboscis, was not evidently an elephant, I should suppose them the supporters of the Scotch arms. Parallel with the crucifix are two plain stones, which do not appear to have had anything upon them.”[344]
Captain Mackenzie, in his Antiquities of the West and South Coast of Ceylon, which still professes adherence to Budhism, tells us that “at each side of the doorway (of the temple at Calane), inclosed in recesses cut in the wall, are two large figures, the janitors of the god (Budh).... A large elephant’s tooth and a small elephant of brass form the ornament of a lampstead.... A female figure of the natural size, decently and not ungracefully arrayed in the same garb, was represented standing in another quarter, holding a lamp in the extended hand. The gallery was entirely covered with paintings, containing an history of the life of Boodhoo—one of these seemed to represent the birth of the divine child. A large white elephant made a conspicuous figure in most of these assemblies.”[345]
Scotch arms, indeed! Why, Sir, those animals were recumbent there, in deified transfiguration, before ever Pict or Scot had planted a profane foot within their neighbourhood. What connection, let me ask, could this elephant and this bull have with Christianity, to entitle them to the honour of being grouped with our Saviour? Or, if any, how happens it that we never see them enter into similar combinations, in churches or chapels, or convents or cathedrals?[345]