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OF THE DRUIDS. 57merely as being the best expression for the designedabuse, and reverse of religion, (for superstitionis only religion misunderstood) but also becausethe coining of tlie very word was occasionedby the Druids: since the Anglo-Saxons havinglearntforthe word dry * from the Irish and Britonsa magician, did very appositely call magic orinchantment dri/cr{Eft'\ ;as being nothing else buttrick and illusion, the fourbery of priests and theirconfederates.III. Now, this institution of the Druids, I thinkmyself, without any consciousness of vanity, muchabler to retrieve (as having infinitely better helpsin many respects, of which, before I have done)thanDr. H>de was to restore the knowledge ofthe-ancient Persian literature and religion; whichyet he left imperfect for want ofdue encouragement,as I have shown in the first chapter of Nazarenus,From undoubted Celtic monuments, join'd to theGreec and Roman remains, I can display the orderof their hierarchy, from the Arch-Druid down tothe meanest of the four orders of priests. Of thesedegrees, the Arch-Druid excepted, there's littleto be found in the classic authors, that treat of theDruids: but very much and very particularly, iuthe Celtic writings and monuments. For manyreasons their history is most interesting and entertainins::I mean, as on the one hand we consider* ProHounced as Dree in English.t Dnj magus, Drycrceft incantatio, Mlfrk, in Glossar.G