[217b] Supposed to be the Aristobulus of the New Testament.
[217c] See British Archæology, lately published: also Owen’s Cambrian Biography.
[218] Annal. I. 13. C. 22.
[219] Before the introduction of Christianity, the prevailing and established religion of Britain and of Gaul, was Bardism, or Druidism, as it is more commonly called, of which very different accounts have been given by different authors. According to our best informed antiquaries and most competent judges, it was of very remote if not of patriarchal origin, and exhibited for no short period a most strikingly rational and venerable appearance. It taught the existence, unity, spirituality, and benevolence of the Supreme Being; also the doctrine of a future state, of providence, and the immortality of the soul: but it taught withal the transmigration of the soul, and even the final salvation of the whole human race, with other tenets equally grating to an orthodox ear. Its fundamental object and principle were a diligent search after truth, and a rigid adherence to justice and peace. The religious Functionaries never bore arms, nor engaged in any party disputes. They were employed as heralds in war, and so sacred were their persons considered, in the office of mediators, that they passed unmolested through hostile countries, and even appeared in the midst of battle, to arrest the arm of slaughter, while they executed their missions. So far they appear singularly dignified and respectable; but this did not always continue—like the priests of other professions, they, in time, departed from their original principles, and introduced various degrading changes, especially among the Gauls. In Britain the system was preserved in greater purity: hence the first families of Gaul sent their children hither for education, as Cesar testifies.
We have often heard Druidism represented as a monstrous and shocking system: but if it was so, it must have been in its corrupt, and not in its original state. Even christianity itself, in a corrupt state, becomes an object equally monstrous and shocking; but that can furnish no argument against genuine christianity, or the religion of the New Testament. As to the human victims which the Druids are said to have offered, they were, it seems, chiefly malefactors: in that view we may be said to have our human victims too, and that in far greater numbers probably, than those of the Druids. Our executions are very frequent, and the victims we thus offer up are more numerous than in any other country we know of. These victims we offer up to law and justice, but they are very few compared with the myriads upon myriads we have offered on the altar of injustice, persecution, ambition, and folly.
[220] Badeslade, §. 3. page 15.—Colonizing was an essential branch of the Roman policy in conquered countries, and it is likely that such an important undertaking as that of recovering and improving these fertile parts, would be by them committed to colonists, such as they might introduce from Belgium, who must from their habits and employment at home, be peculiarly rated for the task.—Circumstances also lead us to think, that the work was begun here, which being nighest the inhabited parts, seems to have been the right end, where common sense would dictate that it should commence.
[221] Salen. Village au bord d’un Marais. Sal, bord; Len, marais. Mullet, Memoires Sur la langue Celtique. Tom. 1. p. 136.
[222a] Ey, is also said to have been another of its names.
[222b] See Gough’s Edition of Camden’s Britannia.
[225] Henry of Huntingdon, William of Malmsbury, Dugdale, &c.