religious
practice in different districts. However, Caesar's statements deserve
the closest consideration. After calling attention to the division of
the Gaulish aristocracy into two main sections, the Druids and the
Knights, he proceeds to speak of the Druids. These were occupied, he
says, with religious matters, they attended to public and private
sacrifices, and interpreted omens. Moreover, they were the teachers of
the country. To them the young men congregated for knowledge, and the
pupils held their teachers in great respect. They, too, were the judges
in public and private disputes: it was they who awarded damages and
penalties. Any contumacy in reference to their judgments was punished by
exclusion from the sacrifices. This sentence of excommunication was the
severest punishment among the Gauls. The men so punished were treated as
outlaws, and cut off from all human society, with its rights and
privileges. Over these Druids there was one head, who wielded the
highest influence among them. On his death the nearest of the others in
dignity succeeded him, or, if several were equal, the election of a
successor was made by the vote of the Druids. Sometimes the primacy was
not decided without the arbitrament of arms. The Druids met at a fixed
time of the year in a consecrated spot in the territory of the Carnutes,
the district which was regarded as being in the centre of the whole of
Gaul. This assembly of Druids formed a court for the decision of cases
brought to them from everywhere around. It was thought, Caesar says,
that the doctrine of the Druids was discovered in Britain and thence
carried over into Gaul. At that time, too, those who wanted to make a
profounder study of it resorted thither for their training. The Druids
had immunity from military service and from the payment of tribute. These
privileges drew many into training for the profession, some of their own
accord, others at the instance of parents and relatives. While in
training they were said to learn by heart a large number of verses, and
some went so far as to spend twenty years in their course of preparation.
The Druids held it wrong to put their religious teaching in writing,
though, in almost everything else, whether public or private affairs,
they made use of Greek letters. Caesar thought that they discouraged
writing on the one hand, lest their teaching should become public
property; on the other, lest reliance upon writing sh