record, and was the venerable parent of all the Royal and British universities, colleges, or societies of Prydain and the world at large. No university, however egotistic its views may now be, need be ashamed of, or deny, the primeval teaching of its unknown and venerable parent. The institute had its penderwydd or pontifex maximus, elected out of the body corporate, or college of cardinals so to speak, and held in reverential esteem throughout the length and breadth of druidism, for his pre-eminent worthiness-excellit dignitate-and his presidential dignity, as admitted even by Cæsar in the following passage: 66 "Autem omnibus his druidibus unus præest, qui habet summam auctoritatem inter eos." But over all these druids one presides, who holds the chief authority over them." It had also its vice-presidents and other officers, en rôle, of distinguished merit, elected by suffrage, adleguntur suffragio druidum.' In those days they gave merit its due. No forced, or squeezing patronage to clan, or kin, or creed was there. No favour under the sun was there, as in the Ecole Politechnique of modern France, and in our own Eisteddfodau !! Questions of deep import were discussed and adjudicated in these prehistoric literary reunions. Treasure them in your memories. Amongst them would be found, according to Diodorus Siculus and Cæsar: "Professors of different sciences, as that of astronomy, augury or astrology, geography, moral philosophy, ethics and divine disquisitions, lyric poetry, and musical compositions." What more do modern professorial curricula insist upon? Of this learned assembly Pomponius Mela thus writes: "They profess to know the magnitude and figure of the earth and of the universe; the motion of the firmament and fixed stars; also that they have their own school of eloquence and professors of philosophy." Think of Cambridge, Greenwich, and their troiau! The same author also appears to be acquainted with the contents of some of the triads, for, in reference to the institute, he confirms the doctrine of the pre-existence and immortality of the soul inculcated by them in their schools to the vast numbers' of Cimbric or European youths who used to resort to them for doctrine and discipline, "ut forent ad bella meliores, æternas esse animas vitamque alteram ad manes." Contrast the tenets of Greece and Rome. Taliesin, a most illustrious 'fellow' or ovate of this order, corroborates the external testimony of the outer world with regard to the doctrine of the metempsychosis, in the following allegorical, or symbolical, yet mysterious, passage: "Bum yn lliaws rhith In this religious and astronomical formula, reference is distinctly made to the rhith or roth, form, or sign, i. e., the mutable guise, or external instability of the enaid, or anima, as having been a domiciled or zodiacal guest in various bodies, whether theogonic or heroogonic, whether celestial or terrestial, whether human or or animal in its symbolism. The lux alma vite-the genial spark of life, had represented, during this oft-recurring state of transmigration, varied signs, or forms of intelligencies or of brute force. At one time that of a legislator, as dysgryfrith; at another that of a warrior or hunter with a sword in his hand, as cleddyf culfrith, as a measure of deified recompense for the display of certain patriotic achievements or warlike virtues. Sometimes even that of an ‘aerial, tearful emotion,' as deigr yn awyr; at others that of an astronomer, as serwau syr. This floating essence of humanity would float along the Rhodle Huan poeth,' or 'Huan's scorching path,' (Huan being the bardic symbol of the haul, (from hau, to strew, and wl, what is fine and subtle,) the root of nλ-os, sol, or Phaeton (the latter possibly borrowed from Huan s epithet of poeth, or phoeth), on either side of Caer Guiddon ffaeth y nef,' or heaven's luxuriant milky way.' Here the 'via lactea' is represented as a formation of guiddon, or rotted and mited particles' among the Serwau Syr, the 'stellas ardentes,' or 'brilliant stars' in the atmospheric ethers, beyond 'y gyfan-drefn heulog,' or solar system, whether of an Orion or Oroian in aerial space above, or of a Dolffwn in the depths of oceanic life below. "There is none like unto Al, O Jesherun ! "And for His own triumph the atmospheric æthers." The expression 'bum deigr yn awyr,' fui lacryma in aura, seems also to indicate another doctrine which the world would scarcely expect to discover in druidical or paganistic tenets, and which subsequently constituted a part of the Pelasgic creed, namely, the doctrine of contrition and its consequent reward among the starry signs of heaven, as a 'being living in heaven in human form, a theogonic being.' According to the opinion of a Greek historian, "tears shed in secret were deemed solemn acts of religion, as sincere evidences of contrition to appease the anger of heaven." In connection with this idea let us compare the Hebrew lament, "O that mine 66 66 eyes were a fountain of tears," with the Cimmerian ' deigr yn awyr,' and the Sophoclesian nyn darpvwv, the fons lacrymarum, or fountain of tears. This view is also contained in the evangelist, who, when in reference to "afflictions falling on man," states that they were not necessarily regarded as evils, for by suffering the soul was considered as purified, chastened, and endowed with wisdom." Sweet are the uses of adversity' akin to this is the Greek proverb of παθημα τα μαθηματα. Hence the Cimmerian philosophical expression, Poenau deigronol disgleirdeb y naf,' or pænæ lachrymose splendoris in cœlis, in other words, human toils, watered with tears, must be gone through below, prior to a transmigratory development of a brilliant career in the ether above. These ideas require further elucidation by way of comment. Muller, while discussing the question of astronomical mythi, says "that the most ancient poet extant mentions merely the following constellations (which term, however, must not be understood to denote actual figures with definite outlines), viz:-the Pleiades, the Hyades, the Mighty Orion, the Bear of Wain, together with Bootes, and, lastly, the Dog of Orion. He does not appear to have known any others; and Hesiod, also, who had so frequent opportunities of naming stars, never alludes to any but these." Let us not forget in this astronomical calculation the following chronological data, for the question involved is of the utmost importance. Be it, then, understood that Job," the most ancient poet extant," who mentions these constellations as being, even in his day, a very old astronomical nomenclature, flourished about one thousand five hundred and twenty years before Christ, i. e., say, according to Tytler's chronological table, nine hundred and fifty-eight years before the alleged introduction of letters into Greece by Cadmus; or about five hundred years before the birth of Hesiod, or of Homer; or nine hundred and eighty-two years before their first astronomer, Thales; and, consequently, prior to the formation of any literature which could as such have naturally and logically embodied any Achean, Doric, or Ionic scientific knowledge of the heavens. Muller then goes on to insinuate, on the conjectural authority of posterior ages, that the Pleiades were doubtless resolvable into the ship stars (simply, I presume, from the correct or incorrect root of λew, to swim, or sail, which he assigns them), and that “in ancient (how ancient?) Greece the season of navigation commenced with their rising and closed with their setting." [Did not the Pleiades receive their name centuries prior to the season of this quasi posthumous λe, or Greek navigations?] He afterwards describes the Peloponnesian legends ascribed to cach of the Pleiades, as "virgins who had lived on earth and were afterwards placed in the stars." And again he adds, on the authority of Ovid's Fasti, that "the Hyades were the rain-stars." 'The most ancient poet extant' will, I doubt not, be our best guide and interpreter. What does Job, the sacred penman, dictate to our judgment? Let him state his own version, either in his own Hebrew, in that of the Septuagint, the vulgate, or in our authorised version, according to the curiosity of mankind. "Canst thou bind the sweet influences of Pleiades, or loose the bonds of Orion? Canst thou bring forth Mazzaroth in his season? or canst thou guide Arcturus with his sons? Knowest thou the ordinances of heaven? canst thou set the dominion thereof in the earth?" as some astronomers, probably of preceding eras, had boasted of having done, without divine light. "The Pleiades, or seven stars, were, according to the mythi of Greece, as deduced by Volcker, the seven historic daughters of Atlas, the never-resting adventurous mariner, and served him as a guide in the ocean.' Though conscious of navigating through a mass of contradictory evidence, I still persist in hoisting my sail with a view of being wafted into some secure haven or other wherein I might glean some information that can and will withstand the tidal shocks of ages, and expose to mid-day view the everlasting wear and tear of my Cimmerian bark. My port is the Hebrew text. Accordingly, П, or Cimah, is the term translated λecades by the Septuagint, and when cognately resolved into its own primary elements as astronomically propounded by druidical nomenclature, resolves itself into cenau, a cub of a bear, having its root in ci, a dog or cun, and mah, or ma, a place, location. Hence, possibly, arose the expression κυών of Orion Cimmericè, Oraian, ‘jubilation, joy:' as the joyful day on which the early inhabitants, either of Ur in Chaldea, or of Hyria, or Uria in Boeotia, periodically began the dogchase, and jubilantly "worshipped the gigantic Orion with his brazen or bronzed club, as their ancient hero, or rather god of war and of the chase.' In the Phoenician and la Bearla feni of Ireland the term 'cam ceacta' corresponds with the Arctos, or seven stars which roll about the pole, and is derived, according to Schindler, from ', cimalı, and 2512, cochaf (stella Mercurius. plur, cocauth), also that the Hebrew on, chamah, heat, or sol, has its root therein. Let us compare dates and notes of antiquity. Let Muller decide, though unconsciously, respecting the adaptation of Cimmerian discoveries to the usages of Greece-how long after Cadmus I care not. The Kvwv of Orion is a lucky combination of ante-Homeric times, by which a dog already stationed in the sky was brought into connection with Orion, the god of hunting; so 66 that, when the bear was viewed as the hunting animal, a mighty chase, which was afterwards developed still more, swept over the entire heavens. The bright star which the Greeks called кvwv, and the Romans canicula, is, with the exception of the sun and moon, the only one, so far as I can discover, that occupied an important rank in the worship of the Greeks. It makes its appearance, according to Homer, in the owoa. the season which ripens the fruit of trees, (on the 27th day of the καρκινος or cogwrn, according to Euctemon and Eudoxus), and emerging from the bath of the ocean, it beams with piercing brilliancy and sends parching heat to afflicted man." Moreover, the term Orion is represented in Hebrew by bo, cesil, or cesail, hope, arm-pit, foundation. Here, then, the constellation denotes a part of an actual figure, with definite outlines, that would, perhaps, I trow, have satisfied the un-Celtic researches of a Muller and his school. Again, the fable of Ews, or Eos, daylight,' loving and carrying Orion, has lost, in the acoustic confusion of plagiarised terms, its own Cimmerian and traditional interpretation, as incorporated in the prehistoric bardic, or prosaic hanesion of antiquity. What? I ask every poet, philosopher, and admirer of nature, what can be more beautiful to the lover of the sublime than the bardic version of the fragmental and traditional mabinogion of antiquity, when the eos, or nightingale, is silently encouraged by 'caifan y ser' the star-like congress grouped, (the Kiun, or Kaivan of Persia, answering to the Cimmerian Sateyrn, or Oroian), to warble forth its inimitable notes of praise and Oraian, i. e., jubilation, to the long-expectant, yet forthcoming, gwawr-ddydd, or brilliant dawn of a day, which is, en passant, the natural source and interpretation of the aurora? How so? This Umbric, or Cimmerian, term is derived from aura, brilliancy, having its root in air, a gleam of light, hence the Hebrew 18, or air a luminous substance,' and 8, to shine, glow, &c., and awr, a portion of time, an hour. Those who go on an etymological expedition to aura, or avpa, a Latin or a Grecian breeze, will find themselves nocturnized, dazzled, and confounded by an aurea Phoebe in all her brightness, by an aurea Venus, in all her smiles, and particularly by the aureus olor, a swan of a brilliant white colour, who will, on nature's laws of right and privilege, spurn his imputed golden tints, as an insult to his own immaculate colour that was his northern birthright, as well as to the misunderstood clements of the two aurs,' the one from aur, gold, the other from air, brightness, as in Virgil's verse below :"Discolor unde aur-i per ramos aur-a refulsit.” But to return to our constellations. Cimmerically known as Arth and Gwain. : The Bear, or Wain, is The Hebrews, as well |