Ossian Collection > Druidism

AFFINITY OF DRUIDISM WITH OTHER RELIGIONS 179
of animals slain. If the entrails were whole and sound, had their natural
place, colour, and proportion, then all was well ; but if any part was
decayed, or wanting, if anything was out of order or not according to
Nature, evil was portended. The palpitation of the entrails was a very
unfortunate omen. P)thagoras, the soothsayer, is said to have foretold
the death of Alexander because his victim's liver had no lobes. Among
the Greeks the oak of Dodona was the seat of the oldest Hellenic oracle,
whose priests sent forth their declarations on its leaves.
Carte, in his History of England, says that the Druids agreed so much
with the Curetes of Greece in the rites and ceremonies of their religion,
in the methods they used to raise the wonder and veneration of the
people ; in the nature of their studies ; as well as in their manner of
life, customs, and institutions, that Pezron makes no difficulty in pro-
nouncing the Druids to be the immediate descendants of those Curetes,
or, at least, their successors ; being admitted into their society, initiated
into their mysteries, and charged with the care of rehgion in the Gomarian
colonies settled in the western parts of Europe.
The Egyptians worshipped the sun and the serpent was sacred among
them as representing the eternal existence of the Deity. At the temple
of Isis at Dendera there is a representation of a procession of men and
women bringing to Isis and Osiris, who stands behind her, globes sur-
rounded with bulls, horns, and mitred snakes. The Egyptians had a
Tauric festival and even went so far as to embalm cattle. They were
firm believers in the doctrine of metempsychosis. They also offered up
both human and animal sacrifices.
If not Druidism, it was a rehgion of a very similar character which
was followed by the inhabitants of a considerable part of Italy. The
Sabin country Ues about twenty miles to the north of Rome, on the
west side of the Tiber. On the top of the mountain Soracte, in that
country, were the grove temples and cam of Apollo. Hirpins was the
name given to the race of people inhabitating that district, and they
held annually a sacrifice similar in every respect to that of the Druids.
It is thus referred to in Dryden's version of Virgil's Aeneid :
" O Patron of Soracte's high abodes,
Phoebus, the ruling pow'r among the gods
Whom first we serve, whole woods of unctuous pine
Burnt on thy heap, and to thy glory shine ;
By thee protected, with our naked soles
Thro' flames unsinged we pass, and tread the kindi'd coals.
Give me, propitious pow'r, to wash away
The stain of this dishonourable day.
The priests of Moloch also walked through the fires they lighted in
honour of their god.