128 Vestiges of the Earliest Inhabitants of Wiltshire. 



these opinions originally had their source in one fountain, and that 

 from their common ancestor Noah, these streams of religious 

 knowledge flowed, though through distinct and separate channels. 

 Then again the Druids,^ (though they never committed their 

 doctrines to writing, and communicated some of their tenets only 

 to the initiated,'^ so that we have no means of ascertaining their 

 entire creed) undoubtedly taught the immortality of the soul,^ and 

 another life after the present. They also advocated mutual kind- 

 ness, justice and equity ; bravery in battle, and reverence towards 

 the Deity they worshipped. But together with a little truth, they 

 unhappily combined a great deal that was false and polluted. 

 Thus, out of the original true belief, they came to adore a plurality 

 of gods : conspicuous among which was the Sun, that most ancient 

 and most universal object of idolatrous worship.* To it were 

 dedicated the famous circles of enormous stones, of which we have 

 in this county the finest examples, in Stonehenge and Avebury. 

 There they kept the sacred fire, the symbol of this Divinity : and 



' The word £)rKt£? was derived from "deru," whicli in the Celtic language 

 signified "an oak," as does "drus" in Greek. Father Pezron in his book on the 

 origin of the Celtic language supposes that the Latin and Greek tongues were 

 derived from the Celtic, [llapin's History of England, vol. i., 5.] 



2 Humes' History of England, chap. i. 

 Sharon Turner's History of England, vol. i., 73. 

 Lingard's History of England, vol. i., 18. 



" The language of flowers was employed by the ancient Druids to conceal 

 their meaning from the uninitiated : thus these leaves and flowers and plants 

 represented to the eye and ear things totally different. In the floral alphabet 

 of the Irish Druids a sprig of yew stood for the letter T, a branch of furze for 

 0, a sprig of heath for U, &c., &c. A similar alphabet, which had its origin 

 in the poetical east, may still be foimd amongst the Chinese and Mexicans 

 [Monthly Packet, vol. xviii., p. 628.] 



^ " The Druids taught the immortality of the soul which distinguished them 

 above all nations, as the fundamental principle of religion ; but they grafted on 

 it the wretched doctrine of metempsychosis, or the transmigration of souls,',' 

 [Carte's History of England, p. 38. Prichard's Physical History of Mankind, 

 vol. ii., p. 172]. 



*Jobxxxi., 26, 27. 

 2 Kings xxiii., 11. 

 Herodotus, lib. i., c. 212, 131. 

 Rollins' Ancient History, vol. ii., p. 136. 

 Henry's History of Great Britain, vol. i., 2. 



