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A new edition of Toland's History of the druids: - Free History Ebooks

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158 THE HISTORYgreen sod on <strong>the</strong> outside, is in Borera, an ile adjacentto St. Kilda; and was tlie liabitation <strong>of</strong> aDruid, who 'tiswith his nei2:hborin2: Druidess.probable, was not unacquaintedShetland aboundswith ano<strong>the</strong>r kind <strong>of</strong> stone houses, not unfrequentin Orkney, which <strong>the</strong>y ascribe to <strong>the</strong> Picts; as<strong>the</strong>y are apt all over Scotland to make every thingPictish, whose origin <strong>the</strong>y do not know. TheBelgae or Firbolgs share this honour with <strong>the</strong>Picts in Ireland, and King Artiiur is reputed <strong>the</strong>author <strong>of</strong> all such fabrics in Wales, except thatthose <strong>of</strong> Anglesey fa<strong>the</strong>r 'em on <strong>the</strong> Irish,Theseinstances I have given your lordship, to convinceyou, how imperfect all treatises about <strong>the</strong> Druids(hi<strong>the</strong>rto publish'd) must needs be; since <strong>the</strong>y containnothing <strong>of</strong> this kind, tho' ever so essential to<strong>the</strong> subject: and that none <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong>se monuments,very frequent in France, are <strong>the</strong>re ascrib'd to <strong>the</strong>Druids, <strong>the</strong>ir records about such things being alllost;while ^ery many <strong>of</strong> ours happily remain toclear <strong>the</strong>m, since <strong>the</strong> usages were <strong>the</strong> same in bothcountries.Nor are those treatises less defectivein <strong>the</strong> more instructive part, concerning <strong>the</strong> Druidicallphilosophy and politics, where<strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> modernFrench and Brittish writers, have in realityinown nothing fur<strong>the</strong>r, than <strong>the</strong> classic authorsfaruish'd 'em; or if tliey add any thing, 'tisabsolutelyfabulous, ill-invented, and unauthoriz'd.These subjects I reserve intire for my greaterwork.John Aubrey, lisq, a member <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> royal

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