The History of Initiation - The Masonic Trowel

DOCTRINES OF THE DRUIDS. 151
was celebrated by the bards in all the language of grave
and lofty panegyric;, and even the possession of an
orchard containing one hundred and forty-seven apple
trees of equal size, age, and beauty, with wide spreading
branches, and pure white blossoms, succeeded by
delicious fruit, was a prize more splendid and desirable
than any temporal dignity or spiritual rank. 4
It is to be remarked that one hundred and forty-seven
was a magical number, produced by multiplying the
square of seven by the sacred number three; for, like the
rest of the world, the Druids paid the most sacred regard
to odd numbers. In them, some unusual charm was supposed
to exist which would propitiate the favour of the
deity, and secure to the pious worshipper the blessing
of divine protection. The number three was held in
and hence the
peculiar veneration by this order of men ;
arrangement of classes both in civil and religious polity
partook of a ternary form.5 Nothing could be transacted
without a reference to this number. On solemn occasions,
the processions were formed three times round the
sacred inclosure of Caer Sidi; 6 their invocations were
thrice repeated, and even their poetry was composed in
triads. 7 The ternary deiseal, 8 or procession from east to
4
Myrddin's Avallenau. in Dav. Druid., p. 465.
5 Thus Gaul was divided into three provinces, the Belgae, the
Acquitani, and the Celtae ; the inhabitants were of three classes, the
Druids, the Equites, and the Plebs ; and the hierarchy consisted of
three gradations, the Druids, the Bards, and the Eubates. Wales,
England, and Scotland, were denominated Cymru, Lloeger and Alban ;
and Robert of Gloucester gives these names to the three sons of his
fabulous king Brutus.
But this noble prince sones had thre,
By hys wyf Innogen, noble men and fre,
Locryn and Kamber and Albanak al so, &c.
c Pennant's Tour in Scotl., P. ii., p. 15.
7 The triads of the bards, like the proverbs of every country in the
world, were a series of truisms wrapt up in pithy sentences adapted
to oral transmission; and it appears highly probable that many of
the abstruse secrets of religion ; the sacred lore of Druidism ; the
institutional maxims of the bards, were communicated in this form, as
well calculated for being treasured up in the memory; for we have it
on record that these secrets were contained in 2(XOOO verses, which
required twenty years' study to understand perfectly. (P. Mela,
1. 3,
c. 2. Ces., 1. 6. c. 2.) The public triads, however, which were scat-
tered amongst the people, did not exceed three hundred, according to
tradition (W. Arch., vol. 2, p. 75), of which little more than a third
part have descended to our times (Dav. Dm., p. 30).
s Toland. Druids, p. 108.