chapter x

).

[372] _Barddas_ (Llandovery, 1862) is 'a collection (by Iolo Morganwg, a Bard) of original documents, illustrative of the theology, wisdom, and usage of the Bardo-Druidic System of the Isle of Britain'. The original manuscripts are said to have been in the possession of Llywelyn Sion, a Bard of Glamorgan, about 1560. _Barddas_ shows considerable Christian influence, yet in its essential teachings is sufficiently distinct. Though of late composition, _Barddas_ seems to represent the traditional bardic doctrines as they had been handed down orally for an unknown period of time, it having been forbidden in earlier times to commit such doctrines to writing. We are well aware also of the adverse criticisms passed upon these documents; but since no one questions their Celtic origin--whether it be ancient or more modern--we are content to use them.

[373] _Barddas_, i, 189-91.

[374] _Barddas_, i, 177.

[375] Preface to _Barddas_, xlii.

[376] One of the greatest errors formerly made by European Sanskrit scholars and published broadcast throughout the West, so that now it is popularly accepted there as true, is that Nirvana, the goal of Indian philosophy and religion, means annihilation. It does mean annihilation (evolutionary transmutation of lower into higher), but only of all those forces or elements which constitute man as an animal. The error arose from interpreting exoterically instead of esoterically, and was a natural result of that system of western scholarship which sees and often cares only to examine external aspects. Native Indian scholars who have advised us in this difficult problem prefer to translate _Nirvana_ as 'Self-realization', i. e. a state of supernormal consciousness (to be acquired through the evolution of the individual), as much superior to the normal human consciousness as the normal human consciousness is superior to the consciousness existing in the brute kingdom.

[377] _De Bel. Gal._, lib. vi. 14. 5; vi. 18. 1.

[378] Book V, 31. 4.

[379] _De Situ Orbis_, iii. c. 2: 'One point alone of the Druids' teaching has become generally known among the common people (in order that they should be braver in war), that souls are eternal and there is a second life among the shades.'

[380] i. 449-62.

[381] Lucan, i. 457-8; i. 458-62.

[382] Cf. _Le Cycle Myth. Irl._, pp. 345, 347 ff.

[383] _Folk-Lore_, xii. 64, &c.; also cf. Eleanor Hull, _The Cuchullin Saga in Irish Literature_ (London, 1898), Intro., p. 23, &c.

[384] What is probably the oldest form of a tale concerning Conchobhar's birth makes Conchobhar 'the son of a god who incarnated himself in the same way as did Lug and Etain' (cf. _Voy. of Bran_, ii. 73).

[385] See _Leabhar na h-Uidhre_, 101{b}; and _Book of Leinster_, 123{b}:--'_Cúchulainn mc dea dechtiri_.'

[386] We have already mentioned the belief that gods having their abode in the sun could leave it to assume bodies here on earth and become culture heroes and great teachers (see p. 309).

[387] From _Wooing of Emer_ in _Leabhar na h-Uidhre_; cf. _Voy. of Bran_, ii. 97.

[388] _L'Épopée celt. en Irl._, p. 11.

[389] Cf. _Voy. of Bran_, ii. p. 74 ff.

[390] In the _Leabhar na h-Uidhre_, 133{a}-134{b}; cf. _Le Cycle Myth. Irl._, pp. 336-43; cf. _Voy. of Bran_, i. 49-52; cf. O'Curry, _Manners and Customs_, iii. 175.

[391] Cf. Stokes's ed. _Annals of Tigernach, Third Frag._ in _Rev. Celt._ xvii. 178. In the piece called _Tucait baile Mongâin_ in the _Leabhar na h-Uidhre_, p. 134, col. 2, 'Mongan is seen living with his wife the year of the death of Ciaran mac int Shair, and of Tuathal Mael-Garb, that is to say in 544,' following the _Chronicum Scotorum_, Hennessy's ed., pp. 48-9. As D'Arbois de Jubainville adds, the Irish chronicles of this epoch are only approximate in their dates. Thus, while the _Four Masters_ (i. 243) makes the death of Mongan A. D. 620, the _Annals of Ulster_ makes it A. D. 625, the _Chronicum Scotorum_ A. D. 625, the _Annals of Clonmacnoise_, A. D. 624, and _Egerton MS._ 1782 A. D. 615 (cf. _Voy. of Bran_, i. 137-9).

[392] J. O'Donovan, _Annals of Ireland by the Four Masters_ (Dublin, 1856), i. 121.

[393] Cf. _Le Cycle Myth. Irl._, pp. 336-43; O'Curry, _Manners and Customs_ iii. 175; _L. U._, 133{a}-134{b}; and _Voy. of Bran_, i. 52.

[394] _Voy. of Bran_, i. 44-5; from _The Conception of Mongan_.

[395] Meyer's version, _Voy. of Bran_, i. 73-4.

[396] Cf. _Voy. of Bran_, i. 137.

[397] _Voy. of Bran_, i. 22-8, quatrains 48-59, &c.

[398] In _L. U._; cf. _Le Cycle Myth. Irl._, pp. 311-22; and _Voy. of Bran_, ii. 47-53.

[399] In the Irish conception of re-birth there is no change of sex: Lug is re-born as a boy, in Cuchulainn; Finn as Mongan; Etain as a girl. But it seems that Etain as a mortal had no consciousness of her previous divine existence, while Cuchulainn and Mongan knew their non-human origin and pre-existence.

[400] Some time after this, according to one part of the tale, Eochaid stormed Midir's fairy palace--for the purpose localized in Ireland--and won Etain back, but the fairies cast a curse on his race for this, and Conaire, his grandson, fell a victim to it. Such a recovering of Etain by Eochaid may vaguely suggest a re-birth of Etain, through the power exerted by Eochaid, who, being a king, is to be regarded in his non-human nature as one of the Tuatha De Danann himself, like Midir his rival.

[401] Cf. _The Gilla decair_, in _Silva Gadelica_, pp. 300-3.

[402] Cf. _Voy. of Bran_, ii. 76 ff. The Christian scribe's version fills up the space between Tuan's death and re-birth by making him pass eighty years as a stag, twenty as a wild boar, one hundred as an eagle, and twenty as a salmon (ib., p. 79). In this particular example, the uninitiated scribe (evidently having failed to grasp an important aspect of the re-birth doctrine as this was esoterically explained in the Mysteries, namely, that between death and re-birth, while the conscious Ego is resident in the Otherworld, the physical atoms of the discarded human body may transmigrate through various plant and animal bodies) appears to set forth as Celtic an erroneous doctrine of the transmigration of the conscious Ego itself (see p. 513 n.). In other texts, for example in the song which Amairgen (considered the Gaelic equivalent or even original of the Brythonic Taliessin) sang as he, with the conquering Sons of Mil, set foot on Ireland, there are similar transformations, attributed to certain heroes like Taliessin (see the _Mabinogion_) and Tuan mac Cairill during their disembodied states after death and until re-birth. But these transformations seem to echo poetically, and often rationally, a very mystical Celtic pantheism, in which Man, regarded as having evolved upwards through all forms and conditions of existence, is at one with all creation:--

I am the wind which blows o'er the sea; I am the wave of the deep; I am the bull of seven battles; I am the eagle on the rock; I am a tear of the sun; I am the fairest of plants; I am a boar for courage; I am a salmon in the water; I am a lake in the plain; I am the world of knowledge; I am the head of the battle-dealing spear; I am the god who fashions fire in the head; Who spreads light in the gathering on the mountain? Who foretells the ages of the moon? Who teaches the spot where the sun rests?

And Amairgen also says:--'I am,' [Taliessin] 'I have been' (_Book of Invasions_; cf. _Voy. of Bran_, ii. 91-2; cf. Rhys, _Hib. Lect._, p. 549; cf. Skene, _Four Ancient Books_, i. 276 ff.).

In later times, especially among non-bardic poets, there has been a similar tendency to misinterpret this primitive mystical Celtic pantheism into the corrupt form of the re-birth doctrine, namely transmigration of the human soul into animal bodies. Dr. Douglas Hyde has sent to me the following evidence:--'I have a poem, consisting of nearly one hundred stanzas, about a pig who ate an Irish manuscript, and who by eating it recovered human speech for twenty-four hours and gave his master an account of his previous embodiments. He had been a right-hand man of Cromwell, a weaver in France, a subject of the Grand Signor, &c. The poem might be about one hundred or one hundred and fifty years old.' It is probable that the poet who composed this poem intended to add a touch of modern Irish humour by making use of the pig. We should, nevertheless, bear in mind that the pig (or, as is more commonly the rule, the wild boar) holds a very curious and prominent position in the ancient mythology of Ireland, and of Wales as well. It was regarded as a magical animal (cf. p. 451 n.); and, apparently, was also a Druid symbol, whose meaning we have lost. Possibly the poet may have been aware of this. If so, he does not necessarily imply transmigration of the human soul into animal bodies; but is merely employing symbolism.

[403] See _Taliessin_ in the _Mabinogion_, and the _Book of Taliessin_ in Skene's _Four Ancient Books_, i. 523 ff.; cf. Nutt, _Voy. of Bran_, ii. 84, and Rhys, _Hib. Lect._, pp. 548, 551.

[404] Cf. Rhys, _Hib. Lect._, pp. 548-50.

[405] Cf. Rhys, _Hib. Lect._, p. 259; and _Arth. Leg._, p. 252.

[406] Loth, _Les Mabinogion, Kulhwch et Olwen_, p. 187 n.

[407] _Le Morte D'Arthur_, Book XXI, c. vii.

[408] See works on Egyptian mythology and religion, by Maspero; also Lenormant, _Chaldean Magic_, p. 84, &c.

[409] F. L. Griffith, _Stories of the High-priests of Memphis_ (Oxford, 1900), c. iii. The text of this story is written on the back of two Greek documents, bearing the date of the seventh year of the Emperor Claudius (A. D. 46-7), not before published.

[410] It is interesting to compare with this episode the episodes of how the magic of St. Patrick prevailed over the magic of the Druids when the old and the new religions met in warfare on the Hill of Tara, in the presence of the high king of Ireland and his court.

[411] E. A. Wallis Budge, _The Gods of the Egyptians_ (London, 1904), p. 3.

[412] Prescott, _Conquest of Mexico and Conquest of Peru_.

[413] W. Crooke, _The Legends of Krishna_, in _Folk-Lore_, xi. 2-3 ff.

[414] _Laws of Manu_, vii. 8, trans, by G. Bühler.

[415] A. B. Cook, _European Sky-God_, in _Folk-Lore_, xv. 301-4.

[416] Cf. Lucian, _Somn._, 17, &c. See Tylor, _Prim. Cult._,{4} ii. 13; also Tertullian, _De Anima_, c. xxviii, where Pythagoras is described as having previously been Aethalides, and Euphorbus, and the fisherman Pyrrhus.

[417] Cf. Huc, _Souvenirs d'un voyage dans la Tartarie et le Thibet_, i. 279 ff.

[418] The doctrine of kingly rule by divine right was substituted after the conversion of the Roman Empire for the very ancient belief that the emperor was a god incarnate (not necessarily reincarnate); and the same christianized aspect of a pre-Christian doctrine stands behind the English kingship at the present day.

[419] A curious parallel to this Irish doctrine that through re-birth one suffers for the sins committed in a previous earth-life is found in the Christian scriptures, where in asking Jesus about a man born blind, 'Rabbi, who did sin, this man, or his parents, that he should be born blind?' the disciple exhibits what must have been a popular Jewish belief in re-birth quite like the Celtic one. See St. John ix. 1-2. Though the Rabbis admitted the possibility of ante-natal sin in thought, this passage seems to point unmistakably to a Jewish re-birth doctrine.

[420] It is interesting to note in connexion with these two complementary ideas what has been written by Mr. Standish O'Grady concerning strange phenomena witnessed at the time of Charles Parnell's funeral:--'While his followers were committing Charles Parnell's remains to the earth, the sky was bright with strange lights and flames. Only a coincidence possibly; and yet persons not superstitious have maintained that there is some mysterious sympathy between the human soul and the elements.... Those strange flames recalled to my memory what is told of similar phenomena said to have been witnessed when tidings of the death of the great Christian Saint, Columba, overran the north-west of Europe, as perhaps truer than I had imagined.'--_Ireland: Her Story_, pp. 211-12.

[421] Cf. M. Lenihan, _Limerick; its History and Antiquities_ (Dublin, 1866), p. 725.

[422] I take this to mean, somewhat as in the similar case of Dechtire, the mother of Cuchulainn (see p. 369, above), that the kind of soul or character which will be reincarnated in the child is determined by the psychic prenatal conditions which a mother consciously or unconsciously may set up. If this interpretation, as it seems to be, is correct, we have in this Welsh belief a surprising comprehension of scientific laws on the part of the ancient Welsh Druids--from whom the doctrine comes--which equals, and surpasses in its subtlety, the latest discoveries of our own psychological embryology, criminology, and so-called laws of heredity.

[423] The reader is referred to the Rev. T. M. Morgan's latest publication, _The History and Antiquities of the Parish of Newchurch, Carmarthenshire_ (Carmarthen, 1910), pp. 155-6.

[424] I found, however, that the original re-birth doctrine has been either misinterpreted or else corrupted--after Dr. Tylor's theory--into transmigration into animal bodies among certain Cornish miners in the St. Just region.

[425] The primitive character of the Incarnation doctrine is clear: Origen, in refuting a Jewish accusation against Christians, apparently the natural outgrowth of deep-seated hatred and religious prejudice on the part of the Jews, that Jesus Christ was born through the adultery of the Virgin with a certain soldier named Panthera, argues 'that every soul, for certain mysterious reasons (I speak now according to the opinions of Pythagoras, and Plato, and Empedocles, whom Celsus frequently names), is introduced into a body, and introduced according to its deserts and former actions'. And, according to Origen's argument, to assign to Jesus Christ a birth more disgraceful than any other is absurd, because 'He who sends souls down into the bodies of men' would not have thus 'degraded Him who was to dare such mighty acts, and to teach so many men, and to reform so many from the mass of wickedness in the world'. And Origen adds:--'It is probable, therefore, that this soul also which conferred more benefit by its residence in the flesh than that of many men (to avoid prejudice, I do not say "all"), stood in need of a body not only superior to others, but invested with all excellence' (_Origen against Celsus_, Book I, c. xxxii).

It is interesting to compare with Origen's theology the following passage from the _Pistis Sophia_, wherein Jesus in the alleged esoteric discourse to his disciples refers to the pre-existence of their souls:--'I took them from the hands of the twelve saviours of the treasure of light, according to the command of the first mystery. These powers, therefore, I cast into the wombs of your mothers, when I came into the world, and they are those which are in your bodies this day' (_Pistis Sophia_, i. II, Mead's translation).

[426] Cf. Nutt, _Voy. of Bran_, ii. 27 ff., 45 ff., 54 ff., 98-102.

[427] Cf. ib., p. 105.

[428] In this chapter, largely the result of my own special research and observations in Celtic archaeology, I wish to acknowledge the very valuable suggestions offered to me by Professor J. Loth, both in his lectures and personally.

[429] See David MacRitchie, _Fians, Fairies, and Picts_; also his _Testimony of Tradition_.

[430] Myers, in the _Survival of the Human Personality_ (ii. 55-6), shows that 'the departed spirit, long after death, seems pre-occupied with the spot where his bones are laid'. Among contemporary uncultured races there exists a theory parallel to this one arrived at through careful scientific research, namely, that ghosts haunt graves and monuments connected with the dead: according to the Australian Arunta the 'double' hovers near its body until the body is reduced to dust, the spirit or soul of the deceased having separated from this 'double' or ghost at the time of death or soon afterwards (Spenser and Gillen, _Nat. Tribes of Cent. Aust._).

[431] See _Les Grottes_, t. i; _Les Menhirs, Les Dolmens, Les Tumulus_, and _Cultes et observances mégalithiques_, t. iv.

[432] On April 17, 1909, at Carnac, in a natural fissure in the body of the finest menhir at the head of the Alignement of Kermario, I found quite by chance, while making a very careful examination of the geological structure of the menhir, a Roman Catholic coin (or medal) of St. Peter. The place in the menhir where this coin was discovered is on the south side about fifteen inches above the surface of the ground. The menhir is very tall and smoothly rounded, and there is no possible way for the coin to have fallen into the fissure by accident. Nor is there any probability that the coin was placed there without a serious purpose; and it is an object such as only an adult would possess. An examination of the link remaining on the coin, which no doubt formerly connected it with a necklace or string of prayer-beads, shows that it has been purposely opened so as to free it at the time it was deposited in the stone. Had the coin been accidentally torn away from a chain or string of prayer-beads the link would have presented a different sort of opening. But it would be altogether unreasonable to suppose that by any sort of chance the coin could have reached the place where I found it. I showed the coin to M. Z. Le Rouzic, of the Carnac Museum, and he considers it, as I do, as evidence or proof of a cult rendered to stones here in Brittany. The coin must have been secretly placed in the menhir by some pious peasant as a direct _ex voto_ for some favour received or demanded. The coin is somewhat discoloured, and has probably been some years in the stone, though it cannot be very old. And the offering of a coin to the spirit residing in a menhir is parallel to throwing coins, pins, or other objects into sacred fountains, which, as we know, is an undisputed practice.

[433] Cf. A. C. Kruijt, _Het Animisme in den Indischen Archipel_; quoted in Crawley's _Idea of the Soul_, p. 133.

[434] Cf. Weidemann, _Ancient Egyptian Doct. Immortality_, p. 21.

[435] Cf. Mahé, _Essai_.

[436] Tylor, _Prim. Cult._,{4} ii. 143 ff., 169, 172.

[437] Marett, _The Threshold of Religion_, c. i.

[438] Mahé, _Essai_, p. 230.

[439] A famous controversy exists as to whether the Coronation Stone now in Westminster Abbey is the _Lia Fáil_, or whether the pillar-stone still at Tara is the _Lia Fáil_. See article by E. S. Hartland in _Folk-Lore_, xiv. 28-60.

[440] These 'idols' probably were not true images, but simply unshaped stone pillars planted on end in the earth; and ought, therefore, more properly to be designated fetishes.

[441] Stokes, in _Rev. Celt._, i. 260; Rhys, _Hib. Lect._, pp. 200-1.

[442] Very much first-class evidence suggests that the menhir was regarded by the primitive Celts both as an abode of a god or as a seat of divine power, and as a phallic symbol (cf. Jubainville, _Le culte des menhirs dans le monde celtique_, in _Rev. Celt._, xxvii. 313). As a phallic symbol, the menhir must have been inseparably related to a Celtic sun-cult; because among all ancient peoples where phallic worship has prevailed, the sun has been venerated as the supreme masculine force in external nature from which all life proceeds, while the phallus has been venerated as the corresponding force in human nature.

[443] _Silva Gadelica_, ii. 137.

[444] Professor J. Loth says:--'_Étymologiquement, le mot est composé de_ CROM, _courbe, arque, formant creux, convexe, et de_ LLECH, _pierre plate_' (_Rev. Celt._, xv. 223, _Dolmen_, _Leach-Derch_, _Peulvan_, _Menhir_, _Cromlech_). In Cornwall, Wales, and Ireland, instead of the peculiarly Breton word _dolmen_ (composed of _dol_ [for _tol == tavl_], meaning _table_, and of _men_ [Middle Breton _maen_], meaning _stone_) the word _cromlech_ is used. _Cromlech_ is the Welsh equivalent for the Breton _dolmen_, but Breton archaeologists use _cromlech_ to describe a circle formed by menhirs.

[445] Rhys, _Hib. Lect._, pp. 193-4.

[446] Ib., p. 192; from Sans-Marte's edition, pp. 108-9, 361.

[447] Ib., p. 193.

[448] Ib., pp. 194-5; cf. _Bibliotheca_ of Diodorus Siculus, ii. c. 47.

[449] Edith F. Carey, _Channel Island Folklore_ (Guernsey, 1909).

[450] Mahé, _Essai_, p. 198.

[451] Mahé, _Essai_, pp. 287-9.

[452] The place for holding a _gorsedd_ for modern Welsh initiations, under the authority of which the Eisteddfod is conducted, must also be within a circle of stones, 'face to face with the sun and the eye of light, as there is no power to hold a _gorsedd_ under cover or at night, but only where and as long as the sun is visible in the heavens' (Rhys, _Hib. Lect._, pp. 208-9; from _Iolo_ MSS., p. 50).

[453] Recently before the Oxford Anthropological Society, Dr. Murray argued that the satyrs of Greek drama may originally have been masked initiators in Greek initiations. (Cf. _The Oxford Magazine_, February 3, 1910, p. 173.)

[454] Edith F. Carey, op. cit.

[455] Mahé, _Essai_, pp. 126-9.

[456] Mahé, _Essai_, pp. 126-9.

[457] Rhys, _Arth. Leg._, p. 339.

[458] Edith F. Carey, op. cit.

[459] Montelius' _Les Temps préhistoriques en Suède_, par S. Reinach, p. 126. (Paris, 1895).

[460] H. Schliemann, _Mycenae_ (London, 1878), p. 213.

[461] Walhouse, in _Journ. Anthrop. Inst._, vii. 21. These Dravidians are slightly taller than the pure Negritos, their probable ancestors; and Indian tradition considers them to be the builders of the Indian dolmens, just as Celtic tradition considers fairies and _corrigans_ (often described as dark or even black-skinned dwarfs) to be the builders of dolmens and megaliths among the Celts. Apparently, in such folk-traditions, which correctly or incorrectly regard fairies, _corrigans_, or Dravidians as the builders of ancient stone monuments, there has been preserved a folk-memory of early races of men who may have been Negritos (pygmy blacks). These races, through a natural anthropomorphic process, came to be identified with the spirits of the dead and with other spiritual beings to whom the monuments were dedicated and at which they were worshipped. Here, again, the Pygmy Theory is seen at its true relative value: it is subordinate to the fundamental animism of the Fairy-Faith.

[462] J. Déchelette, _Manuel d'Archéologie préhistorique_ (Paris, 1908), i. 468, 302, 308, 311, 576, 610, &c.

[463] This famous chambered tumulus 'measures nearly 700 feet in circumference, or about 225 feet in diameter, and between 40 and 50 feet in height' (G. Coffey, in _Rl. Ir. Acad. Trans._ [Dublin, 1892], xxx. 68).

[464] G. Coffey, in _Rl. Ir. Acad. Trans._, xxx. 73-92.

[465] Fol. 190 b; trans. O'Curry, _Lectures_, p. 505.

[466] Mr. Coffey quotes from the _Senchus-na-Relec_, in _L. U._, this significant passage:--'The nobles of the Tuatha De Danann were used to bury at Brugh (i. e. the Dagda with his three sons; also Lugaidh, and Oe, and Ollam, and Ogma, and Etan the Poetess, and Corpre, the son of Etan)' (G. Coffey, op. cit., xxx. 77). The manuscript, however, being late and directly under Christian influence, echoes but imperfectly very ancient Celtic tradition: the immortal god-race are therein rationalized by the transcribers, and made subject to death.

[467] W. C. Borlase, _Dolmens of Ireland_ (London, 1897), ii. 346 n.

[468] As translated in the _Silva Gadelica_, ii. 109-11.

[469] Borlase, op. cit., ii. 346-7 n.

[470] Borlase, op. cit., ii. 346-7 n.

[471] Ib., ii. 347 n.

[472] A good example of a saint's stone bed can be seen now at Glendalough, the stone bed of St. Kevin, high above a rocky shore of the lake.

[473] Coffey, op. cit., xxx. 73-4, from R. I. A. MS., by Michael O'Longan, dated 1810, p. 10, and translated by Douglas Hyde.

[474] Coffey, op. cit., xxv. 73-4, from R. I. A. MS. by Michael O'Longan, dated 1810, p. 10, and trans. by Douglas Hyde.

[475] Borlase, op. cit., ii. 347 n.

[476] O'Donovan, _Four Masters_, i. 22 n.

[477] Rhys, _Hib. Lect._, pp. 148-50.

[478] Cf. O'Curry, _Manners and Customs_, ii. 122; iii. 5, 74, 122; Rhys, _Hib. Lect._, pp. 150, 150 n.; Jubainville, _Essai d'un Catalogue_, p. 244.

[479] Rhys, _Hib. Lect._, p. 194.

[480] Math ab Mathonwy's Irish counterpart is Math mac Umóir, the magician (_Book of Leinster_, f. 9{b}; cf. Rhys, _Trans. Third Inter. Cong. Hist. Religions_, Oxford, 1908, ii. 211).

[481] Rhys, ib., pp. 225-6; cf. R. B. _Mabinogion_, p. 60; _Triads_, i. 32, ii. 20, iii. 90. A fortified hill-top now known as Pen y Gaer, or 'Hill of the Fortress', on the western side of the Conway, on a mountain within sight of the railway station of Tal y Cafn, Carnarvonshire, is regarded by Sir John Rhys as the site of a long-forgotten cult of Math the Ancient. (Rhys, ib., p. 225).

[482] This stone basin, now in the centre of the inner chamber, seems originally to have stood in the east recess, the largest and most richly inscribed. It is 4 feet long, 3 feet 6 inches across, and 1 foot thick. (Coffey, op. cit., xxx. 14, 21).

[483] Cf. W. M. Flinders Petrie, _The Pyramids and Temples of Gizeh_ (London, 1883), p. 201.

[484] All of the chief megaliths of this type, together with the chief alignements, which I have personally inspected--with the aid of a compass--in Ireland, Scotland, Isle of Man, Wales, Cornwall, and Brittany, are definitely aligned east and west. It cannot be said, however, that _all_ megalithic monuments throughout Celtic countries show definite orientation (see Déchelette's _Manuel d'Archéologie_).

[485] L. P. McCarty, _The Great Pyramid Jeezeh_ (San Francisco, 1907), p. 402.

[486] Jubainville, _Le Cycle Myth. Irl._, p. 28.

[487] Maspero, _Les Contes populaires de l'Égypte Ancienne_,{3} p. 74 n.

[488] Tylor, _Prim. Cult._,{4} ii. 426.

[489] W. H. Prescott, _Conquest of Peru_, i, c. 3.

[490] Rochefort, _Iles Antilles_, p. 365; cf. Tylor, _P. C._,{4} ii. 424.

[491] Colebrooke, _Essays_, vols. i, iv, v; cf. Tylor, _P. C._,{4} 425.

[492] _Illus. Hist. and Pract. of Thugs_ (London, 1837), p. 46; cf. Tylor, _P. C._,{4} ii. 425.

[493] Augustin, _de Serm. Dom. in Monte_, ii. 5; cf. Tylor, _P. C._,{4} ii. 427-8.

[494] Ezek. viii. 16. The popular opinion that Christians face the east in prayer, or have altars eastward because Jerusalem is eastward, does not fit in with facts.

[495] Cf. Lenormant, _Chaldean Magic_, p. 88; also Tylor, _Prim. Cult._,{4} ii. 48-9.

[496] Though not a Mason, the writer draws his knowledge from Masons of the highest rank, and from published works by Masons like Mr. Carty's _The Great Pyramid Jeezeh_.

[497] Cf. Borlase, _Dolmens of Ireland_, ii. 347 n.

[498] C. Piazzi Smyth, _Our Inheritance in the Great Pyramid_ (London, 1890).

[499] Flinders Petrie, _The Pyramids and Temples of Gizeh_, pp. 169, 222.

[500] C. Piazzi Smyth, op. cit.

[501] In 1770, when New Grange apparently was not covered with a growth of trees as now, Governor Pownall visited it and described it as like a pyramid in general outline: 'The pyramid in its present state' is 'but a ruin of what it was' (Coffey, op. cit., xxx. 13).

[502] Le Dr. G. de C., _Locmariaquer et Gavr'inis_ (Vannes, 1876), p. 18.

[503] According to Le Dr. G. de C., op. cit., p. 18.

[504] Mr. Coffey says of similar details in Irish tumuli:--'In the construction of such chambers it is usual to find a sort of sill or low stone placed across the entrance into the main chamber, and at the openings into the smaller chambers or recesses; such stones also occur laid at intervals across the bottom of the passages. This forms a marked feature in the construction at Dowth, and in the cairns on the Loughcrew Hills, but is wholly absent at New Grange' (op. cit., xxx. 15). New Grange, however, has suffered more or less from vandalism, and originally may have contained similar stone sills.

[505] Flinders Petrie, _The Pyramids and Temples of Gizeh_, p. 216.

[506] Maspero, op. cit., p. 69 n., &c. The world-wide anthropomorphic tendency to construct tombs for the gods and for the dead after the plan of earthly dwellings is as evident in the excavations at Mycenae as in ancient Egypt and in Celtic lands.

[507] Cf. Bruns, _Canones apostolorum et conciliorum saeculorum_, ii. 133.

[508] Cf. F. Maassen, _Concilia aevi merovingici_, p. 133.

[509] Cf. Boretius, _Capitularia regum Francorum_, i. 59; for each of the above references cf. Jubainville, _Le culte des menhirs dans le monde celtique_, in _Rev. Celt._, xxvii. 317.

[510] Cf. Mahé, _Essai_, p. 427.

[511] See Villemarqué _sur Bretagne_.

[512] Cf. Mahé, _Essai_, p. 326; quoted from _De Glor. Conf._, c. 2.

[513] Cf. Mahé, _Essai_, p. 326; quoted from _De Glor. Conf._, c. 2.

[514] Cf. Mahé, _Essai_, p. 326; quoted from _Goth._, lib. ii.

[515] A. W. Moore, in _Folk-Lore_, v. 212-29.

[516] Cf. Rhys, _Arthurian Legend_, p. 247.

[517] Borlase, _Dolmens of Ireland_, iii. 729.

[518] Stokes, _Tripartite Life of Patrick_, pp. 99-101.

[519] Ib., text, pp. 123, 323, and Intro., p. 159.

[520] Book II, 69-70; see our study, p. 267.

[521] Rennes _Dinnshenchas_, Stokes's trans. in _Rev. Celt._, xv. 457.

[522] Cf. Mahé, _Essai_, p. 323.

[523] The Celts may have viewed the mistletoe on the sacred oak as the seat of the tree's life, because in the winter sleep of the leafless oak the mistletoe still maintains its own foliage and fruit, and like the heart of a sleeper continues pulsing with vitality. The mistletoe thus being regarded as the heart-centre of the divine spirit in the oak-tree was cut with a golden sickle by the arch-druid clad in pure white robes, amid great religious solemnity, and became a vicarious sacrifice or atonement for the worshippers of the tree god. (Cf. Frazer, _G. B._,{2} iii. 447 ff.)

[524] Pliny, _Nat. Hist._, xvi. 95; cf. Rhys, _Hib. Lect._, p. 218.

[525] _Dissert._, viii; cf. Rhys, ib., p. 219.

[526] Meineke's ed., xii. 5, 1; cf. Rhys, ib., p. 219. The oak-tree is pre-eminently the holy tree of Europe. Not only Celts, but Slavs, worshipped amid its groves. To the Germans it was their chief god; the ancient Italians honoured it above all other trees; the original image of Jupiter on the Capitol at Rome seems to have been a natural oak-tree. So at Dodona, Zeus was worshipped as immanent in a sacred oak. Cf. Frazer, _G. B._,{2} iii. 346 ff.

[527] Cf. Mahé, _Essai_, pp. 333-4; quotation from _Hist. du Maine_, i. 17.

[528] Cf. Mahé, _Essai_, p. 334; quoted from _Lib._ VII, _indict._ i, _epist._ 5.

[529] Stokes, _Tripartite Life_, p. 409.

[530] Cf. Wood-Martin, _Traces of the Older Faiths in Ireland_, i. 305.

[531] W. Gregor, _Notes on Beltene Cakes_, in _Folk-Lore_, vi. 5.

[532] Temple, _Legends of the Panjab_, in _Folk-Lore_, x. 406.

[533] Lefèvre, _Le Culte des Morts chez les Latins_, in _Rev. Trad. Pop._, ix. 195-209.

[534] See _Folk-Lore_, vi. 192.

[535] The term 'People of Peace' seems, however, to have originated from confounding _sid_, 'fairy abode,' and _síd_, 'peace.'

[536] Cf. _Le Cycle Myth. Irl._, p. 102.

[537] The crocodile as the mystic symbol of Sîtou provides one key to unlock the mysteries of what eminent Egyptologists have erroneously called animal worship, erroneously because they have interpreted literally what can only be interpreted symbolically. The crocodile is called the 'son of Sîtou' in the _Papyrus magique_, Harris, pl. vi, ll. 8-9 (cf. Maspero, _Les Contes populaires de l'Égypte Ancienne_,[539] Intro., p. 56); and as the waters seem to swallow the sun as it sinks below the horizon, so the crocodile, as Sîtou representing the waters, swallows the Children of Osiris, as the Egyptians called themselves. On the other hand, Osiris is typified by the white bull, in many nations the sun emblem, white being the emblem of purity and light, while the powers of the bull represent the masculinity of the sun, which impregnates all nature, always thought of as feminine, with life germs.

[538] Cf. Maspero, op. cit., Intro., p. 49.

[539] Cf. Borlase, _Dolmens of Ireland_, iii. 854.

[540] Cf. Lefèvre, _Rev. Trad. Pop._, ix. 195-209.

[541] J. G. Campbell collected in Scotland two versions of a parallel episode, but concerning Loch Lurgan. In both versions the flight begins by Fionn's foster-mother carrying Fionn, and in both, when she is tired, Fionn carries her and runs so fast that when the loch is reached only her shanks are left. These he throws out on the loch, and hence its name Loch Lurgan, 'Lake of the Shanks.' (_The Fians_, pp. 18-19).

[542] During the seventeenth century, the English government, acting through its Dublin representatives, ordered this original Cave or Purgatory to be demolished; and with the temporary suppression of the ceremonies which resulted and the consequent abandonment of the island, the Cave, which may have been filled up, has been lost.

[543] Thomas Wright, _St. Patrick's Purgatory_ (London, 1844), pp. 67-8.

[544] Wright, op. cit., p. 69.

[545] In the face of all the legends told of pilgrims who have been in Patrick's Purgatory, it seems that either through religious frenzy like that produced in Protestant revivals, or else through some strange influence due to the cave itself after the preliminary disciplines, some of the pilgrims have had most unusual psychic experiences. Those who have experienced fasting and a rigorous life for a prescribed period affirm that there results a changed condition, physical, mental, and spiritual, so that it is very probable that the Christian pilgrims to the Purgatory, like the pagan pilgrims who 'fasted on' the Tuatha De Danann in New Grange, were in good condition to receive impressions of a psychical nature such as the Society for Psychical Research is beginning to believe are by no means rare to people susceptible to them. Neophytes seeking initiation among the ancients had to undergo even more rigorous preparations than these; for they were expected while entranced to leave their physical bodies and in reality enter the purgatorial state, as we shall presently have occasion to point out.

[546] Wright, _St. Patrick's Purgatory_, pp. 62 ff.

[547] L. R. Farnell, _Cults of the Greek States_ (Oxford, 1907), iii. 126-98, &c.

[548] Cf. Athenaeus, 614 A; Aristoph., _Nubes_, 508; and Harper's _Dict. Class. Lit. and Antiq._, p. 1615.

[549] Cf. O. Seyffert, _Dict. Class. Antiquities_, trans. (London, 1895), _Mithras_.

[550] Brasseur, _Mexique_, iii. 20, &c.; Tylor, _P. C._,{4} ii. 45.

[551] Cf. Hutton Webster, _Primitive Secret Societies_ (New York, 1908), p. 38, and _passim_.

[552] In the ancient Greek world the annual celebration of the Mysteries drew great concourses of people from all regions round the Mediterranean; to the modern Breton world the chief religious Pardons are annual events of such supreme importance that, after preparing plenty of food for the pilgrimage, the whole family of a pious peasant of Lower Brittany will desert farm and work dressed in their beautiful and best costumes for one of these Pardons, the most picturesque, the most inspiring, and the highest folk-festivals still preserved by the Roman Church; while to Roman Catholics in all countries a pilgrimage to Lough Derg is the sacred event of a lifetime.

In the Breton Pardons, as in the purgatorial rites, we seem to see the survivals of very ancient Celtic Mysteries strikingly like the Mysteries of Eleusis. The greatest of the Pardons, the Pardon of St. Anne d'Auray, will serve as a basis for comparison; and while in some respects it has had a recent and definitely historical origin (or revival), this origin seems on the evidence of archaeology to have been a restoration, an expansion, and chiefly a Christianization of prehistoric rites then already partly fallen into decay. Such rites remained latent in the folk-memory, and were originally celebrated in honour of the sacred fountain, and probably also of Isis and the child, whose terra-cotta image was ploughed up in a neighbouring field by the famous peasant Nicolas, and naturally regarded by him and all who saw it as of St. Anne and the Holy Child. Thus, in the Pardon of St. Anne d'Auray, which extends over three days, there is a torch-light procession at night under ecclesiastical sanction; as in the Ceres Mysteries, wherein the neophytes with torches kindled sought all night long for Proserpine. There are purification rites, not especially under ecclesiastical sanction, at the holy fountain now dedicated to St. Anne, like the purification rites of the Eleusinian worshippers at the sea-shore and their visit to a holy well. There are mystery plays, recently instituted, as in Greek initiation ceremonies; sacred processions, led by priests, bearing the image of St. Anne and other images, comparable to Greek sacred processions in which the god Iacchos was borne on the way to Eleusis. The all-night services in the dimly-lighted church of St. Anne, with the special masses in honour of the Christian saints and for the dead, are parallel to the midnight ceremonies of the Greeks in their caves of initiation and to the libations to the gods and to the spirits of the departed at Greek initiations. Finally, in the Greek mysteries there seems to have been some sort of expository sermon or exhortation to the assembled neophytes quite comparable to the special appeal made to the faithful Catholics assembled in the magnificent church of St. Anne d'Auray by the bishops and high ecclesiastics of Brittany. (For these Classical parallels compare Farnell, _Cults of the Greek States_, iii, _passim_.)

[553] Cf. Rhys, _Hib. Lect._, p. 411, &c.

[554] O'Curry, _Lectures_, pp. 586-7.

[555] There is this very significant legend on record about the Cave of Cruachan:--'Magh Mucrime, now, pigs of magic came out of the cave of Cruachain, and that is Ireland's gate of Hell.' And 'Out of it, also, came the Red Birds that withered up everything in Erin that their breath would touch, till the Ulstermen slew them with their slings.' (_B. of Leinster_, p. 288a; Stokes's trans., in _Rev. Celt._, xiii. 449; cf. _Silva Gadelica_, ii. 353.)

[556] Forbes, _Lives of S. Ninian and S. Kentigern_ (Edinburgh, 1874), pp. 285, 345.

[557] Cf. Wright, _St. Patrick's Purgatory_, pp. 81-2.

[558] Cf. Godescard, _Vies des Saints_, xi. 24; also Bergier, _Dict. de Théol._, v. 405.

[559] Cf. Godescard, _Vies des Saints_, xi. 32. But there is some disagreement in this matter of dates: Petrus Damianus, _Vita S. Odilonis_, in the Bollandist _Acta Sanctorum_, January 1, records a legend of how the Abbot Odilon decreed that November 2, the day after All Saints' Day, should be set apart for services for the departed (cf. Tylor, _Prim. Cult._,{4} ii. 37 n.).

[560] Cf. Godescard, _Vies des Saints_, xi. 1 n.

[561] Part II, sec. 4; c. 4, par. 8; cf. Bergier, _Dict. de Théol._, iv. 322.

[562] P. 11{a}, l. 19; in Stokes's _Tripartite Life_, Intro., p. 194.

[563] _Enchiridion_, chap. cx; _Testament of St. Ephrem_ (ed. Vatican), ii. 230, 236; Euseb., _de Vita Constant._, liv. iv, c. lx. 556, c. lxx. 562; cf. Godescard, _Vies des Saints_, xi. 30-1.

[564] St. Ambroise, _de Obitu Theodosii_, ii. 1197; cf. Godescard, _Vies des Saints_, xi. 31 n.

[565] Cf. Godescard, _Vies des Saints_, xi. 31-2.

[566] I am indebted to Mr. William McDougall, M.A., Wilde Reader in Mental Philosophy in the University of Oxford, for having read through and criticized the first draft of this section; and while he is in no way responsible for the views set forth herein, nevertheless his suggestions for the improvement of their scientific framework have been of very great value. I must also express my obligation to him for having suggested through his Oxford lectures a good share of the important material interwoven into