Irish Druids and Old Irish Religions

Irish Gods.
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In comparing Irish gods with others, Ncit has been
identified with the Naat of India and NcitJi of i:-ypt
Creeshua, the sun, with the Indian Christua : /^^v/Z/^lcrd
of the air, with Pritha, a title of Vishnu ; Xcr, latinized to
Nereits, with the Naros of India ; Can, with Caudra ; Omti
with the Buddhist Om ; Esar with Esi.'ara, &c. Comlidhia
—the middle and end—reminds one of the Orphic hymn—
" Zeus is the first, Zeus is the last : Zeus
is
the middle."
is the head, Zeus
" The god of the Gael," writes Donald Ross, " was outside
of him, and draped awfully by his imagination." The
Deity everywhere has been regarded with awe, and even
terror, in all religious systems. Pantheism, however, in
some mystical form, entered the mind of the Gael, as well
as that of the Greek and Hindoo. While Orpheus sang,
''All has come from the bosom of Zeus," Finlandcrs held
that their god Kawe was in the bosom of K-unattaris
(Nature).
Some fancy the butterfly—Dealbhaude—was in Ireland
a symbol of God, from its changes of being. Bt-'a/ was the
source of all being, as the Scandinavian Tiiisco, after whom
our Tuesday is named, was the Father of all beings.
Dr. Todd affirmed— " The Irish had no knowledge of
the Dei Gentknn, Saturn, Apollo, ]\Iars, &c., or of the
feminine deities Juno, Venus, Minerva, &c., under an\'
Celtic name or designation."
Crowe answered, " Now, this
is not true. The Dei Gentiinn, under the ancient Gauh"sh
or Iberno-Celtic names, are often met with in Irish stor\-."
But Crowe held with Caesar and Tacitus, that the
Gaul and our Isles had similar gods to
Celts of
those of Rome and
Greece.
Though the transcribers of the Book of Lciiistcr, thn-ing
the fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth centuries, corrupted
the ^IS., from icrnorance more than dcsitj^n, \'ct not a few
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