Irish Druids and Old Irish Religions

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Old Irish
Religions,
figures with kilts, and others with crowns. Some slabs,
as at Lough Crew, are seen covered with various inscriptions.
New Grange has a number of them ;
like as in
Scotland, France, India, the north of England, &c.
What meaning has been given to these monuments 1
In this scientific
age, circles, &c., are simply called " the
external adjuncts of Bronze-age burials." In the East
they have been treated as Bactyles, or Bethels, to be duly
anointed with oil or milk, and adored ;
they are sometimes
smeared over with the blood of sacrifices.
The Cabir doctrine came conveniently for others in
explanation. The Cabirs were assuredly worshipped in
caves. Some Welsh writers early claimed this theory to
account for their Druids. These latter were said to be of
Cabiric association. As Samothrace was the head-quarters
of the Cabiri, which may have been of Phoenician origin,
and as the Phoenicians visited the British Isles, it was concluded
that Druidism was the same religion, especially as
associated with fire and stones.
Anyhow, the stones were a puzzle. John Aubrey, just two
centuries ago, introduced the Druidical theory, which was
at
once seized upon by Welsh, Scotch, English, and Irish
scholars, as an easy solution. Still, as Professor P. Smith
reminds us well, they were about as mysterious to the
Greeks and Romans as to ourselves. And De Courson
asked — "But were these grand sanctuaries of stone
specially affected to the Druidic worship.? Temples,
altars, perfectly similar, exist, in fact, in all parts of the
earth."
''
If they are Druidical," says Picard, " the Romans
would not have omitted to explain to us
the nature of the
place appointed for worship, for the Druids were their contemporaries."
On the other hand, Morien, the modern
Druid, declares these "temples were their Holy of Holies."