10. In the first place they circulated the doctrine that souls do not die, but migrate into other bodies.[391] By this principle they hoped men would be more powerfully actuated to virtue, and delivered from the fear of death. They likewise instructed students in the knowledge of the heavenly bodies, in geography, the nature of things, and the power of the gods.[392]
11. Their admiration of the mistletoe must not be omitted. The druids esteemed nothing more sacred than the mistletoe, and the tree on which it grew, if an oak. They particularly delighted in groves of oaks,[393] and performed no sacred rite without branches of that tree, and hence seems to be derived their name of druids, Δρυιδες. Whatever grew on an oak was considered as sent from heaven, and as a sign that the tree was chosen by God himself. The mistletoe was difficult to be found, and when discovered was gathered with religious ceremonies, particularly at the sixth day of the moon (from which period they dated their months and years, and their cycle of thirty years,) because the moon was supposed to possess extraordinary powers when she had not completed her second quarter. The mistletoe was called in their language all heal.[394] The sacrifice and the feast being duly prepared under the tree, they led thither two white bulls, whose horns were then bound for the first time.[395] The priest, clothed in a white vestment, ascending the tree, cut off the mistletoe with a golden bill, and received it in a white cloth. They then slew the victims, invoking the favour of the Deity on their offering. They conceived that the mistletoe cured sterility in animals; and considered it as a specific against all poisons. So great was the superstition generally prevailing among nations with respect to frivolous objects.
13. At a certain time of the year the druids retired to a consecrated grove in the island of Mona, whither all persons among whom controversies had arisen, repaired for the decision of their disputes.
14. Besides the druids, there were among the Gauls and Britons poets, called bards,[396] who sang in heroic measures the deeds of the gods and heroes, accompanied with the sweet notes of the lyre.
15. Concerning the druids and bards, I shall conclude this chapter in the words of Lucan:—
"You too, ye bards! whom sacred raptures fire.
To chant your heroes to your country's lyre;
Who consecrate, in your immortal strain,
Brave patriot souls, in righteous battle slain,
Securely now the tuneful task renew,
And noblest themes in deathless songs pursue.
The druids now, while arms are heard no more,
Old mysteries and barbarous rites restore,
A tribe who singular religion love,
And haunt the lonely coverts of the grove.
To these, and these of all mankind alone,
The gods are sure revealed or sure unknown.
If dying mortals' doom they sing aright,
No ghosts descend to dwell in dreadful night;
No parting souls to grisly Pluto go,
Nor seek the dreary silent shades below;
But forth they fly immortal in their kind,
And other bodies in new worlds they find;
Thus life for ever runs its endless race,
And like a line death but divides the space,
A stop which can but for a moment last,
A point between the future and the past.
Thrice happy they beneath their northern skies,
Who that worst fear—the fear of death—despise
Hence they no cares for this frail being feel,
But rush undaunted on the pointed steel;
Provoke approaching fate, and bravely scorn
To spare that life which must so soon return."
Rowe's Lucan, book i.
FOOTNOTES:
[386] This passage has puzzled the British antiquaries, because it militates against the grand principle of the druidic theology, and because, as they assert, no traces of the Greek or Roman deities are found among the early Britons. Possibly some of the British tribes might have brought this mode of worship from Gaul; but more probably the assertion was derived from the misconception of the ancient authors themselves, who gave the names of their own deities to the objects of adoration distinguished by similar attributes in other countries. The account is borrowed from Cæsar's description of the Gauls, lib. vi. § 15.