2. hut if tote Celts were oistinguished from the Goths by their ext( rnal appearance, they were distinguished from them, in a stilt greater degree, by their r•tigious belief and their sacred observances. Among the Celts the re existed a hierarchy, regularly constituted and esta blisu•d : a class of men exercising the functions of the priesthood, and e:st•ntling their authority over every de partment of civil Itf ; c featly marked out, and separated front the reL,t of the community, and enjoying many and exclusive pri‘ileges. Our readers wilt perceive, that we allude to the Druids. It is universally acknowledged, that Druidism was peculiar to the Celts, and that nothing resembling that eNtraordinary system was to be found among the Gothic or Teutonic tribes. This difference is stiiking and fundamental : And the fact, that tne Ger mans had no Druids, is mentioned by Cxsar as a cit cum stance completely discriminative of the Celtic and Go thic nations. It has been affirmed, that the Druids were not unacquainted with the great and primary truth of the or tile die inc nature. But if this was the case, and if the notion alluded to formed a part of their secret creed, or w hat the Greeks would have called their isot( ric doctrine, we have sufficient authority for main taining, that they countenanced, at the same time, the belief and the worship of many gods, as Jupiter, Mars, Apollo, 1\lercury, and Minerva, or beings of heavenly origin and power, whose attributes and office corres ponded with those of the principal divinities or Rome. They held likewise t,,e doctrine of Metempsychosis, or the transmigration of souls. Of a general receptacle of spirits, enjoying various degrees of happiness, or doomed to various measures of suffering, they appear to have had no idea. Their notion seems to have been, that the soul of man is destined to occupy various bodies in succession ; and that the alternate transference and residence of the thinking part were to be continued for an indefinite length of time, beyond which the enquiry was not pushed. In addition to all this, it must be stated, that the Druids were philosophers. They had raised their understandings above the first wants and enjoy ments of our species. They had attempted to pierce iteo the recesses of nature. Their toy !elated to the constitution of the physic al %%odd, the of the hett‘enly bodies, the size and li 'up of the and the power and purposes of tte Minton. I ',wk. Schools of phihnophy were est: 'dished an (mg them. What they knew, they taught the youth ommitted to tin it care. These were generally the sot s of nobles, and pet SOUS of distinction. Some of the nt no fewer than twenty years node,. the tuition of the Druidi cal college. It was a principal part of their education, to treasure up in the memory a very great number of verses, in whb h the mysteries of science and of re1iAin.1 were unfolded ; for these ancient masters of Celtic w is dom, though acquainted with alphabetical characters, made no use of them in the schools over which they pre sided. Into the schools alluded to, the vulgar were not permitted to enter. It seems to be au acknowledged principle of the Druidical system, to keep the people in perpetual ignoionce ; and we shall immediately see, th, it %vas a part likewise of their system, to keep them in a debasing and pitiable state of political subjection. See In almost every particular mentioned above, the Ger man nations appear to have differed from the Celtic. They had no separate class of men exercising the func tions of the priesthood, and enjoying the privileges of exemption from taxes and from military service. Their ecclesiastical officers (for they deserve no better Lame) were nearly as ignorant a, themselves. The notion of a direct immortality, in contradistinction to that of a Me tempsychosis, was prevalent among them. And the chief pleasure of the Gothic paradise,—a pleasure in which none but the brave and victorious soldier was al lowed to participate,—consisted in drinking ale out of the sculls of his enemies whom he had slain in battle. They had no institutions corresponding to the Druidical schools; no philosophy; no doctrine, either secret or divulged ; nothing kept hid from the people, because there was nothing to be concealed.
3. In their political iostitutiuns likewise, a considera ble difference appears to have existed bet%%•the Go thic and Celtic tribes. Among these tribes, the state of
the people, regarded as distinct from that of the leged orders, seems to have varied in a most •xtraor•i nary degree. In the one great class of human the people were free, and valued themselves upon their liberty ; in the other, they were doomed to obey, and satisfied with subjection. Among the Gou,s and Gel mans, every man was a soldier, consulted on orcasi( rs of the highest political importance, and to N% that attention to which a free man is entitled. tit; the Celts, every man who could not establish his cl. inn to be ranked with the Druids or the knights, s a slave : his comfort or misery, his life or his de. th, dep. adeti almost exclusively upon the will of his maser. It r I"( " to spew that the difference now alluded to leally ( !, we shall just set down, in opposition to one n Aner, short sentences extracted from Cxsar's Cunt Wen err , the one referring to the state of the people amo. g t Celts, and the other re fdrring to the state of the pc( pie among the Scythians, Germans. er Goths. T1 pass.n,e relating to I.,e Celts is the Wowing: servorum habetur lace. sue fur se ni1:71 cz.th.t. et ;:u1.7 adhibetur concalto." (De Bello Gallico, Ii . ri. c. Toey were, in point of fact, only one instrument, of their superiors. The passage which relates to t.:.e Germat.s or Goths, is in these remarkable words: .Ityat 46; n U.1 ex principibus, in concilio se dixit duccm fore, ut poi sequi velint profiteantur, consurgunt ii qui causam et honzinem probant, suunzque auxilium pollicentur, atque a multitu dine collaudantur." (De Bello Gal. lib. yi. c. 22.) When any one of the chiefs, (so the words may be rendered,) proposes himself as a leader in any expedition, they (not the chiefs, but the people,) who approve of the under taking, and of him who engages to execute it, signify their approbation, and promise their support, amidst the applauses of the whole assembly. That this is the true meaning of the passage last quoted, we learn, beyond the possibility of doubt or difficulty, from the declaration of Tacitus with regard to the same people : "De Mill Ori bus rebus, principcs consultant, de majoribus, omnes." De Mor. Germ.
Among the Gothic nations, the commencement of what has been called the feudal system, may easily be traced. The chief men were possessed of authority and influ ence ; but their authority was exercised within consider able limits, and their influence subjected to considerable restraint. In matters of inferior concern, the decision of the chief was final, but all affairs of high interest were discussed and determined by the people at large. It is to the power of the chiefs thus restrained, and to the mode of civil government connected with it, that Mr Pinkerton has given the name of the feudal system in its purity. And according to the opinion of that learned gentleman, this feudal system in its purity is carefully to be distinguished from the latter feudal system, or that system in its corrupted state. Among the Celts, on the other hand, while the chiefs commanded the armies, and were in other respects not destitute of power, the su preme judicial and even legislative authority appears to have been engrossed, almost entirely, by the other privi leged order, that of the Druids. The Druids judged in all controversies, whether public or private, whether of a civil or of a religious nature. They ordained and inflict ed punishments. If any one refused to abide by their decision, he was instantly excluded from the sacred ob servances ; he became the subject of a most severe ex communication ; he was held as accursed ; he was avoid ed as a person on whom the mark of the divine displea sure had been set ; he lost all claim to justice, and all title to protection. In one respect, however, the two cases, that of the Goths and the Celts, considered in a political point of view, may justly be said to agree. In both, the power of the chief was limited ; but among the Gothic tribes, the check proceeded from the people, the voice of freemen was raised aloud against oppression ; while among the Celts the power of the chiefs seems to have been nearly absorbed in that of the Druids, and the voice of the people, if heard at all, was noticed, only as a symptom of rebellious insolence, and marked only to be punished.