called druids,^8 dwelt in huts or caverns, amid the silence and gloom of the forest, were in possession
of all education and spiritual power, professed to know the secrets of nature, medicine and astrology,
and practised the arts of divination. They taught, as the three principles of wisdom: "obedience to
the laws of God, concern for the good of man, and fortitude under the accidents of life." They also
taught the immortality of the soul and the fiction of metempsychosis. One class of the druids, who
delivered their instructions in verse, were distinguished by the title of bards, who as poets and
musicians accompanied the chieftain to the battle-field, and enlivened the feasts of peace by the
sound of the harp. There are still remains of druidical temples—the most remarkable at Stonehenge
on Salisbury Plain, and at Stennis in the Orkney Islands—that is, circles of huge stones standing
in some cases twenty feet above the earth, and near them large mounds supposed to be ancient
burial-places; for men desire to be buried near a place of worship.
The first introduction of Christianity into Britain is involved in obscurity. The legendary
history ascribes it at least to ten different agencies, namely, 1) Bran, a British prince, and his son
Caradog, who is said to have become acquainted with St. Paul in Rome, a.d. 51 to 58, and to have
introduced the gospel into his native country on his return. 2) St. Paul. 3) St. Peter. 4) St. Simon
Zelotes. 5) St. Philip. 6) St. James the Great. 7) St. John. 8) Aristobulus (Rom. xvi. 10). 9) Joseph
of Arimathaea, who figures largely in the post-Norman legends of Glastonbury Abbey, and is said
to have brought the holy Graal—the vessel or platter of the Lord’s Supper—containing the blood
of Christ, to England. 10) Missionaries of Pope Eleutherus from Rome to King Lucius of Britain.^9
But these legends cannot be traced beyond the sixth century, and are therefore destitute of
all historic value. A visit of St. Paul to Britain between a.d. 63 and 67 is indeed in itself not
impossible (on the assumption of a second Roman captivity), and has been advocated even by such
scholars as Ussher and Stillingfleet, but is intrinsically improbable, and destitute of all evidence.^10
The conversion of King Lucius in the second century through correspondence with the
Roman bishop Eleutherus (176 to 190), is related by Bede, in connection with several errors, and
is a legend rather than an established fact.^11 Irenaeus of Lyons, who enumerates all the churches
(^8) The word Druid or Druidh is not from the Greekδρυ̑ς, oak (as the elder Pliny thought), but a Keltic term draiod,
meaning sage, priest, and is equivalent to the magi in the ancient East. In the Irish Scriptures draiod is used for magi, Matt.
2:1.
(^9) See Haddan & Stubbs, Counc. and Eccles. Doc. I. 22-26, and Pryce, 31 sqq. Haddan says, that "statements respecting
(a) British Christians at Rome, (b) British Christians in Britain, (c) Apostles or apostolic men preaching in Britain, in the first
century—rest upon either guess, mistake or fable;" and that "evidence alleged for the existence of a Christian church in Britain
during the second century is simply unhistorical." Pryce calls these early agencies "gratuitons assumptions, plausible guesses,
or legendary fables." Eusebius, Dem. Ev. III. 5, speaks as if some of the Twelve or of the Seventy had "crossed the ocean to the
isles called British;" but the passage is rhetorical and indefinite. In his Church History he omits Britain from the apostolic
mission-field.
(^10) It is merely an inference from the well-known passage of Clement of Rome, Ep. ad Corinth. c. 5, that Paul carried
the gospel "to the end of the West" (ἐπὶτὸτέρματη̑ςδύσεως). But this is far more naturally understood of a visit to Spain which
Paul intended (Rom. xv. 28), and which seems confirmed by a passage in the Muratorian Fragment about 170 ("Profectionem
Pauli ab urbe ad Spaniam proficiscentis "); while there is no trace whatever of an intended or actual visit to Britain. Canon
Bright calls this merely a "pious fancy" (p. 1), and Bishop Lightfoot remarks: "For the patriotic belief of some English writers,
who have included Britain in the Apostle’s travels, there is neither evidence nor probability" (St. Clement of Rome p. 50). It is
barely possible however, that some Galatian converts of Paul, visiting the far West to barter the hair-cloths of their native land
for the useful metal of Britain, may have first made known the gospel to the Britons in their kindred Keltic tongue. See Lightfoot,
Com. on Gal., p. 246.
(^11) Book I., ch. 4: "Lucius, king of the Britons, sent a letter to Eleutherus, entreating that by his command he might be
made a Christian. He soon obtained his pious request, and the Britons preserved the faith, which they had received, uncorrupted