it was only within woods and consecrated forests, that they could serve him properly. There, he seemed to reign in silence, and to make himself felt by the respect which he inspired. It was an injurious extravagance to attribute to this deity a human figure, to erect statues to him, to suppose him of any sex, or to represent him by images. From this supreme God were sprung (as it were emanations of his divinity) an infinite number of subaltern deities and genii, of which every part of the visible world was the seat and temple. These intelligences did not barely reside in each part of nature; they directed its operations, it was the organ or instrument of their love or liberality to mankind. Each element was under the guidance of some Being peculiar to it. The earth, the water, the
appellant secretum illud quod solâ reverentia vident. Tacit. Germ. c. ix. One might here bring together a great multitude of authorities to prove that so long as these‡ nations had no communication with strangers, their religion severely prohibited the use of temples, idols, images, &c. But it is sufficient to refer those, who would see this subject treated more at large, to M. Pelloutier’s Histoire des Celtes, tom. ii.
‡. ‘The Celtic nations.’ Orig.
