om the druids who were
its founders and priests. We shall give to the first the name of
the Gaulish polytheism."--(II. 73-74.)

Thierry thinks that this polytheism originally prevailed amongst the
Gauls, but that the Kimry introduced druidism, which soon became the
dominant religion over the whole of Gaul, though the original polytheism
ingrafted upon it more or less, in different places, some of its tenets
and ceremonies. The great seat of the religion of the druids was
Armorika, and, above all, Britain; there existed the most powerful of
their sacerdotal colleges--there were celebrated the most secret of
their mysteries.

It is wondrous thing, that religion of the ancient druids! A solemn
mystery enshrouds it--all the efforts of modern science cannot lift the
veil. When we look on yon circle of stones which, grey with the lapse of
ages, stands in lonely majesty upon the dreary moor, near which no sound
is ever heard, save the distant and sullen roar of the ocean, as it
breaks in sheets of foam on the rock-bound coast--the fitful cry of
curlew, as it wings over them its solitary way--or the occasional low
moaning of the wind, as, stealing through amidst the rocks, it seems to
pour forth a mournful dirge for the shades of departed greatness:--when
we look on a scene like this, we have before our gaze all that is known
of these men of the olden time. Their blood-stained rites, their solemn
mysteries, are forgotten; but their simple temples still stand
imperishable as the God to whom they were erected. From the study of the
ancient authors little or no information can be gleaned; a few
descriptions of their bloody sacrifices, an account of some of their
more public ceremonials, is all that they have handed down to us. But
the real nature of their religion is unknown: more of its spirit is
taught to us by those silent stones than by all other accounts put
together. The choice of the situations for those sacred monuments amidst
the melancholy waste, or buried deep in the recesses of some vast
forest, where the wide-spreading branches of their sacred tree (the oak)
casts its deep shadows over the consecrated spot, with no canopy save
the heavens, shows the dark and gloomy spirit of their faith. They
worshipped the God of the thunder-storm, not the God of peace; and it
was amidst the thunder-storm that their horrid rites appeared most
horrid. When, illuminated by the lurid glare of the lightning, the
gigantic osie