RITES OF DRUIDICAL WORSHIP.

435

tenacious of the opinions and customs of their ancestors, than the Greeks and Romans, who discovered a great propensity to adopt the gods and religious ceremonies of other nations.

Besides the deities now mentioned, there is sufficient evidence that our unhappy ancestors, in those times of ignorance, had many other imaginary gods, who had been real men, to whom they paid religious homage. They worshipped also several female divinities or goddesses; among which were Andraste, Minerva, Ceres, Proserpine, &c. Indeed, into such an abyss of superstition and idolatry were they sunk, that, according to Gildas, they had a greater number of gods than the Egyptians; and there was scarcely a river, lake, mountain, or wood, which was not supposed to have some divinities or genii residing in them. Such were the unworthy objects to whom the benighted Britons paid religious worship and adoration of various kinds.

III. I shall now proceed to give you some account of the ends which the ancient Britons had in view, in the worship which they rendered to their gods; and these seem to have been the following:-to express their admiration of their perfections and gratitude for their favours-to obtain from them such things as they wanted and desired-to appease their anger and propitiate them-and to discover their designs and councils with regard to future events. To accomplish these ends, their acts of religious worship consisted of songs of praise and thanksgiving— prayers and supplications-offerings and sacrifices-and the various rites of augury and divination.

Hymns of praise and thanksgiving to the object of religious worship are of the highest antiquity, and the most ancient compositions extant are of that kind (See Deut. xxxii. and Judg. v.). Nor was the use of such sacred hymns less universal than it was ancient, for they have always made a part of the religious worship of every nation. There is a passage in the writings of Diodorus Siculus, which is generally considered as pointing to Great Britain, in which he says, "Hecateus and some other ancient writers report, that there is an island about the bigness of Sicily, situated in the ocean, opposite to the northern coast of Gaul (Celtica), inhabited by a people called Hyperboreans, because they are beyond the north wind. The climate is excellent, and the soil fertile, yielding double crops. The inhabitants are

great worshippers of the sun (Apollo), to whom they sing many hymns. To this god they have consecrated a large territory, in the midst of which they have a magnificent round temple, replenished with the richest offerings. Their very city is dedicated to him, and is full of musicians and players on various instruments, who every day celebrate his benefits and perfections."* If this be not our own country, it is difficult to say to what island it refers; and, if it be, it furnishes interesting information concerning the religious rites of our ancestors. But, independently of this, the Britons and other nations had another reason for employing songs and musical instruments in profusion, in their religious worship. This was to drown the cries of those human victims which they offered in sacrifice to their gods; of which I shall say more hereafter.

It seems to have been the practice of all nations, the Jews not excepted, whenever they presented any offerings and sacrifices to their gods, to offer supplications to them, to propitiate their regards, and supplicate such favours as they needed. Pliny acquaints us with the substance of one of the prayers usually offered by a Druid at one of their most solemn sacrifices. His words are:-"Which done, they began to offer their sacrifices, and to pray to God, that he would grant a blessing with his own gift to them that were honoured with it."+

Offerings of various kinds constituted an important part of the religion of the ancient Britons, and of many other nations. These offerings differed both in nature and value, according to the circumstances of those who presented them, and generally consisted of the most precious things that they could procure, and which they were taught to believe would be most acceptable to their gods. This was a mode of worship which the Druids very much encouraged, and their sacred places were crowded with those pious gifts, expressive of the gratitude of the donors for favours received, and the desire of obtaining others, and not a few of these offerings were in performance of vows which had been made in time of trouble. When armies returned from a successful campaign, it was usual to offer the most precious of their spoils to some celestial being, to whom they fancied themselves indebted for their success. These spoils * Diod. Sicul. lib. xi. cap. 29. + Pliny's Nat. Hist. b. xvi. ch. 44.

DRUIDICAL SACRIFICES.

437

were piled up in heaps in their consecrated groves, or by the side of some hallowed lake, and were esteemed so sacred that they were rarely violated.*

In all ages, and in every country, mankind have betrayed a consciousness of guilt, and consequent dread of punishment from superior beings. They have therefore had recourse to various means of expiating the guilt of which they were conscious, and thereby averting the consequences they so justly dreaded. The expedients most commonly resorted to for this end have been the sacrifice of animals, and this constituted a very essential part of the religion of the ancient Britons. The victims destined for this purpose were carefully examined by the Druids, to see that they were the most perfect and beautiful in their several kinds, and, on their being approved, they were slaughtered with various ceremonies, by priests appointed for that purpose. On some occasions they were entirely consumed by fire upon the altar; but they were more commonly divided into three parts, one of which was consumed upon the altar, another fell to the share of the officiating priests, and on the third the person who brought the sacrifice feasted with his friends.†

Happy had it been for our British ancestors, had they confined themselves to the sacrificing of oxen, sheep, goats, and other animals; but we have undoubted evidence that they proceeded to the most horrid lengths of cruelty in their superstition, and offered human victims to their gods. It had become an article in the creed of the Druids, that nothing but the life of man could atone for the life of man; and the result was that their altars streamed with human blood, and great numbers of unhappy mortals fell a sacrifice to this barbarous superstition. On some great occasions they formed a huge colossal figure of a man, composed of osier twigs; and having filled it with human beings, and surrounded it with hay and other combustible materials, they set fire to the pile, and reduced it, with all the miserable creatures included in it, to ashes. For this horrid purpose, indeed, they are said to have preferred convicted criminals; but, when there was a scarcity of such, they made no scruple to sup

Cæsar de Bel. Gal. lib. vi. cap. 16. + Cluver. Ger. Antiq. lib. i. cap. 35.

Cæsar de Bel. Gal. lib. vi. cap. 16; Strabo, lib. iv.

ply their place with innocent persons. These dreadful sacrifices were offered by the Druids for the public good, on the eve of a dangerous war, or in a time of national calamity; and for particular persons of elevated rank, when such persons were afflicted with any dangerous disorder. By such acts of cruelty did the Britons of old endeavour to avert the displeasure of their deities and render them propitious. And in this they were not more stupid and cruel than the most polite and learned nations of the Heathen world; such as the Egyptians, Phoenicians, Carthaginians, Greeks, and Romans, all of whom were guilty of the same superstitious barbarities. How thankful should we be for the light of Revelation, which by conveying to us the knowledge of the true God, and the way of worshipping him acceptably, has delivered us from this horrid darkness and superstition!

We learn from Pliny that the ancient Britons were, also, greatly addicted to divination, and excelled so much in the practice of all its arts, that they might have given a lesson to the Persians themselves. I cannot go into a minute and laborious detail of all those arts of divination. Let it suffice to observe that, besides all those that were practised by them in common with other nations, they had one of a very shocking nature, which is thus described by Diodorus Siculus:-"They have a great veneration for those who discover future events, either from the flight of birds, or the inspection of the entrails of victims; and all the people yield an implicit faith to their oracles. On great occasions they practise a very strange and incredible manner of divination. They take a man who is to be sacrificed, and kill him with one stroke of a sword above the diaphragm; and by observing the posture in which he falls, his different convulsions, and the direction in which the blood flows from the body, they form their predictions according to certain rules which have been left them by their ancestors."* By such acts of religious worship did our forefathers, in those dark and benighted times, express their pious regards, and endeavour to gain the favour and discover the will of their gods. These acts of religion were performed by them at certain stated times, and in certain places which were esteemed sacred, and appropriated to religious purposes.

Diod. Sicul. lib. v. cap. 35.

TIMES AND CUSTOMS OF THE ANCIENT BRITONS. 439

The Britons certainly were not ignorant of the ancient and universal division of time into weeks of seven days each; for several writers, of unquestionable veracity, assure us that this was known, not only to the Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans, but to all the barbarous nations. It is not, however, so well known or so certain that one of these seven days was consecrated to religious purposes. The Britons divided their time by lunar months, reckoning neither from the change nor the full, but from the sixth day of one moon to the sixth day of another; and the first day of every lunar month, according to their way of reckoning, or the sixth according to ours, was a religious festival. Pliny, speaking of one of their most sacred solemnities, says, "it is always done on the sixth day of the moon—a day so esteemed among them, that they made their months, and years, and even ages, which consist but of thirty years, to take their beginning from it. The reason of their choosing that day is, because the moon is by that time grown strong enough, though not come to the half of its fulness." The same writer takes particular notice of an august solemnity which was observed annually among them, of cutting the misletoe from the oak, by the Archdruid, which he thus explains :-"The Druids hold nothing so sacred as the misletoe of the oak. As this is very scarce, and rarely to be found, when any of it is discovered, they go with great pomp and ceremony on a certain day to gather it. When they have got every thing in readiness under the oak, both for the sacrifice and the banquet which they make on this great festival, they begin by tying two white bulls to it by the horns. Then one of the Druids, clothed in white, ascends the tree, and with a knife of gold cuts the misletoe, which is received in a white sagum (sheet or blanket). This done, they proceed to their sacrifices and feastings."* This festival was observed as near as possible to their tenth of March, which was their New Year's day. The 1st of May was a great annual festival in honour of the sun; and on this day prodigious fires were kindled in all their sacred places, and on the tops of all their eminences, and many sacrifices were offered to that luminary, which now began to shine upon them with great lustre. Midsummer day and the first of November were likewise annual fes

*Pliny's Nat. Hist. b. 16, ch. 44.